Stop and Smell the Flowers by Amanda Quesnell

Children have an impressive capability to take things slowly and live in the moment.  This can be frustrating sometimes for adults, because we all have numerous plans throughout our day.  But children only have one plan, and it’s to have fun.  One of the biggest things I have learned from working at LifeWays is to always take things slowly and make sure to give the children plenty of time.

            I remember one day when I took some children on a long nature hike through the woods. At the time I thought I had given us plenty of time to get back and ready for lunch, but I was definitely wrong.  On our way back from the hike the children wanted to stop and throw rocks in the river, dig up some worms, and pick some flowers.  But the entire time I just kept thinking, “We have to go, we’re going to be late for lunch!”  After a while of nagging the children to hurry up I thought, “I guess it’s not a big deal if we’re a few minutes late.”  I let us slowly work our way back to LifeWays, letting the children do their exploring.  Now I know to give us a lot of time to transition from one thing to the next so the children can live in the moment and explore.
            As adults there are never enough hours in a day.  Our schedule for the day is planned out for us hour by hour and it is easy to forget to live in the moment, and not worry about what’s going on next.  I know I personally get really anxious when I have more than one thing to do in a day, or I am constantly worried about being late.  The children at LifeWays have taught me to live in the moment, because if I always rush there are probably a lot of good memories I am going to miss out on.