But WHY, Daddy? But WHY, Daddy? But WHY, Daddy?

I think, at a child’s birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity. 

– Eleanor Roosevelt

Why Daddy? We were at a lovely outdoor party yesterday, enjoying good food and good company, when I instinctively turned around to make sure the girls were still within sight. Sure enough, there they were, just a few feet away and ankle-deep in a yucky puddle, fishing out rocks and who knows what else. My first thought was, “Ugh. We’re definitely not skipping bath tonight.” But then, another thought followed that one: “I wish I had that kind of unbridled, care-free curiosity about everything.”

Anyone who has been around little ones is familiar with this kind of curiosity. At times annoying (“but WHY, daddy? But WHY, daddy? But WHY, daddy?”) or frightening (“Julia, you can’t just open the back gate and walk down the street. You’re 3, for goodness’ sake!”), this curiosity is what drives children to learn and understand the world and their place in it. They are basically tiny little scientists – something I find absolutely exhilarating.

As a parent, one of my greatest joys is to see my daughters use their imagination. Julia, who’s 3 1/2, spends a lot of time looking for pretend things with pretend flashlights in pretend places – and Mommy and Daddy had better not pretend to be playing along, “this is for realsies!” Clara, two years younger, has already picked up on it and has gotten really good at pretending, too. Of course, as they grow older, I want them to go to school for real and not for pretend, and I certainly don’t want them to pretend to do their chores, either. But what I do want is for them to always have an imagination as vast as the cosmos.

It seems to me most of us want our children to be somewhat like us, to have the same values and same principles we hold dear. My partner and I used to joke that the girls don’t have to love everything we love, as long as they hate everything we hate. But in all seriousness, one of my greatest worries is that these beautiful minds might lose their sense of wonder as they grow older. If I could give them anything in the world, it would be a never-ending sense of curiosity. If we can raise them to be the kind of people who find the questions much more interesting than the answers, I will feel greatly accomplished.

sergioSo, it should be clear by now that I want my daughters to always be curious – but this is much easier said than done. Even if I do my best to stay out of the way of their curiosity, the truth is that our culture and society don’t make things easy. We live in a time of immediate gratification, of easy fixes, of intellectual stagnancy. Today, our great nation is losing its competitive edge in math and science while the rest of the world soars ahead (read all about it here). This is directly linked to our lack of curiosity. But you don’t have to take my word for it; here’s how Neil deGrasse Tyson put it in his keynote address at SXSW,

Science literacy is how much do you still wonder about the world around you.

What is your state of curiosity?

While I’m certainly quite curious, I’m not about to jump into a yucky puddle to fish out slimy rocks. These days, I satisfy my curiosity with books, Wikipedia, and Google searches from my clean and comfy couch; but when Julia and Clara come in from the backyard with an inchworm or any other kind of creepy-crawly, I remember that they are tiny scientists, not little rascals (okay, they’re that, too). And when they’ve asked me the same question for the thirty-seventh time in the row, I try my best to remember that it’s not a silly question if you can’t answer it.

Albert Einstein was, without a doubt, one of the greatest minds of our time. He made some of the greatest contributions to science, such as the general theory of relativity and his mass-energy equivalence formula (“the world’s most famous equation”). He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, and his name is pretty much synonymous with “genius.” And yet, when it came right down to it, he proclaimed, “I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious.” My daughters, your children, they can all be the Einsteins of their generation – but it’s entirely up to us. What can we do to foster their sense of wonder, to enable them to always be passionately curious? Just asking …

Note: This is the third post in our series entitled “On Being a Dad.” For more posts from this series, click here.

SergioMorenoSergio Moreno is the father of two curly girls, ages 3.5 and 1.5. He is not a scientist, he just wishes he were (he’s actually a Creative Strategist at Hallmark). He loves asking questions, and for the next six months he will be asking people to share their stories of faith with him for a project about narratives of faith across a pluralistic landscape. You can follow his journey, and perhaps even share your own story at http://storiesofdevotion.wordpress.com.

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8 COMMENTS

  1. Their curiosity is so much fun for me when I’m around them. I think curiosity is so easy to stifle as in “don’t ask me again” or “don’t do that, you’ll get all dirty”. Glad that you two foster it instead of stifle it.

  2. Lovely post, thanks for sharing! I don’t even know your daughters personally, but they are a delight!

  3. Great post! Sometimes the hardest thing is allowing for unscheduled time to give our kids the chance to just explore. No rushing off to school – no rushing off to eat – no rushing off to bed. I love the weekends where we have enough “free” time (which is really quite expensive!) to allow for pure-d playing. I think that’s good for them and for us. And good for curiosity.

  4. Great post Sergio! My husband is SO good at letting our daughter figure things out for herself… he is so much more patient than I am! I usually want to jump in and do things for her/fix it/figure it out for her when she’s having trouble. Recently, she has been trying to climb up on our couches and chairs, which (I thought) were still too tall for her. When she asks for help, my husband helps her “problem solve” vs lifting her up: “See this crack (pointing between the cushions and the base of the couch)? What if you put your foot in there instead of here (pointing at the top of the cushion)?” He does the same things with building blocks, climbing stairs, trying new foods, playing with new toys, at the playground, etc. I think these “little” opportunities teach not only our kids, but US to be more curious and to be better problem solvers.

  5. I know Julia and Clara quite well, being their grandmother. I love seeing the perfect balance you have achieved between taking care of them (to avert physical harm) and giving them free rein to explore life. Keep up the good work.

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