Forgive for greater things ahead

Kids are just the best, aren’t they? They are the best at doing perfectly ridiculous things and the best at working up your very last nerve but at the end of the day, whatever they did, you still cannot resist the urge to hug them and smother them with kisses and love. In any case, they are children and they give us more than enough reasons to love them.

My niece was given a prescription of antibiotics recently for a persistent cough. Written on the label were the dosage and the method of preservation which strictly stated that it was to be refrigerated. After she took it in the morning, for some reason best known to her, she put in on the shelf.

After supper, she was asked by her mum to get her medicine. She sauntered off to the kitchen and opened to fridge and at that exact moment her jaw dropped. Her medicine was not there. So she went to take others first, and for sure, there it was sitting on the shelf.

At that very moment, on realising that she would be scolded for forgetting, she threw her hands in the air, wore a quizzical look then let out a big, ‘Oh My God, it ecescaped (sic) from the fridge!’ as she looked at the bottle intently. She was so shocked that she either used a very big word to seem convincing or she just forgot how to pronounce 'escaped' properly.

Unable to control myself, I burst out in laughter and honestly whenever I look at her I still do. She was obviously upset and she went to bed angry at me for laughing so hard. What was I supposed to do, bottle it up? Let's be real, it would not have been as funny so I finished it there and then.

The good thing with kids though, is that they do not hold anything against you. The next day she gave me one of the biggest hugs when I got back home from work, she had put our little situation behind her.

This is something we should take from children. How can they waste so much space thinking about who laughed at them or humiliated them when they have spaceships and palaces to worry about?

Tell me how can they stay mad at you when all they can wait to do is share with anyone in sight their biggest dreams, even if it is building a spaceship from sufurias and carrying a month’s supply of Krackles and Pringles for their sustenance when they make it to the moon?

As we grow, forgiveness seems to wean off us and we start taking to heart every bad thing anyone does to us. Little by little, it takes up so much space in our mind and heart and before we know it, we stop dreaming and settle for mediocre because as far as our hearts and minds are concerned, that is the amount of space we have left for our dreams... mediocre.

Our dreams and thoughts are only as big and promising as the amount of space we have for them in our hearts. If we fill that space with unnecessary thoughts, we give ourselves a raw deal. We should bring back the child in us and start thinking higher thoughts and even deeper feelings.

Free up space in your heart, forgiveness in the end benefits you solely; ever heard the quote ‘hate is like taking poison and hoping the other person dies? Our lives are better lived when we dream big and have even bigger hopes and greater convictions of achieving those dreams. We can’t have all that unless we create space for them.