CALLICOON, NY — I have always felt this sense of heart-filled joy around children.  

Children seem to find joy in the most mundane of tasks.  The simplest things bring them a sense of wonder for which I find myself searching far and wide.  

This might explain why I choose to hang out with my nephews and niece rather than my brother and sister.  Or why I opted to hang out at my friend’s forest school over attending a retreat for a course I was taking.  

Is it too late for us adults to also discover this sense of bliss in our everyday lives?  Have the dos and don’ts that come with adulting reached a point of no return?  

I went on a mission to discover just how I can bring this sense of awe and wonder into my life.

I recently spent a morning with children of all ages at a local forest school. I arrived at the Wizard School, with one job—to have extraordinary fun!  

And that I sure did.  From grabbing a mint chocolate ice cream cone made of leaves and twigs; to hiking up a vertical dirt hill barefoot, with nothing to grab onto but some scattered tree stumps and rocks,  I had fun like never before.

All my cares and worries of the day had melted away.  I found myself amused, discovering joy in the simplest things. My inner child was out and ready to play.

What was it that brought me this wholehearted fun?  Was it being surrounded by kids and their joyful energy?  Was it playing in the dirt, surrounded by trees and the creatures that inhabited them?  Was it allowing myself to use my imagination while being silly and free?

At the school, which is inspired by Walford education (see walfordeducation.org), the children learn how to understand their power, and how to use it to create more joy, love, harmony and creativity in the world.  They know that they have a connection to all things in the natural world, and are taught how they can use this connection to influence the things around them in magnificent ways.

That day, I noticed a three-year-old girl was with Mackenzie Kell (a Waldorf-certified teacher), crying and standing apart from the other kids.  I later learned that she was processing her emotions.  

After she had rejoined the group, she was the happiest little girl—smiling, laughing, sticking her tongue out while making funny sounds, and giving a tickling attack.  

I wondered if the processing of her emotions was connected to the pure bliss I saw in her later.

Caitlyn Pezza, owner and founder of the Wizard School, explained to me how they help the children with this important work.

The teachers first help the child identify the emotion. Then they express to them that it is OK to feel, and how to do so without intruding on others.  They then bring them into a safe space, separated from the group. Sometimes the children just need to be held, or to do something physical with their bodies.  And then when they’re ready to talk, the teachers give them the space to do so.

Then, just as I witnessed, they go back to the group, seemingly happier than before.

Huh. These same emotions, that I was taught to shove down as a child, lead to more joy.  Interesting, I thought.

Another thing I was fascinated by were the children’s imaginations.  Fallen-down trees became forts where they resided, or could be anything they wanted to be.  The children built an ice cream station behind a fallen-down tree.  They painted on pumpkins, and referred to the paint as the pumpkin’s “skin.”

One five-year-old boy was sitting on a blanket with only one leaf, flinging it up and allowing it to fall.  He had a smile on his face like he was playing with thousands of leaves.

Could imagination be another ingredient in joy?  This same imagination that some might say was shut down in so many of us, as we were told to “get our heads out of the clouds.”

To quote Einstein, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.  For knowledge is limited to all we know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.”

Pezza said that imagination is an important factor in joy.  When it is used with “self-mastery and safe containers for them to express and process things, their imagination becomes this tool that allows them to create more joy in their lives because it’s coming from a place of empowerment, versus a place of anxiety or fear.”

Another thing I noticed was that the kids weren’t afraid to get their hands dirty.  They used this, along with their imagination skills, to scoop up dirt with shovels, using it to make mud, pie, cake or even potions.  They seemed free to create whatever they wanted.

“We have a flow and structure, but within that, they’re free,” Pezza told me. “And within the flow and structure, it’s always flexible, depending on what energy is coming up that day.”

Some might agree that this freedom is also an integral ingredient of joy.

Imagination, play, being in nature, magic, freedom, emotional processing—all are important parts of bringing out our inner-child-like joy.

How can you bring out more imagination, joy and play into your life?  How can you become freer and allow your inner child-like self to run the show?

Let us all embrace our inner child more.  The child that knows how to have fun and not take life too seriously.  Let us bring this pure heart-filled joy out to our friends and loved ones this holiday season.