All Quotes By Tag: Children

“She says you should never wake dreaming people suddenly,’ Rahel said. ‘She says they could easily have a Heart Attack.’Between them they decided it would be best to disturb her discreetly rather than wake her suddenly. So they opened drawers, they cleared their throats, they whispered loudly, they hummed a little tune. They moved shoes. And found a cupboard door that creaked.Ammu, resting under the skin of her dream, observed them and ached with her love for them…….’If you’re happy in a dream, Ammu, does that count’ Estha asked, ‘Does what count?”The happiness–does it count?’She knew exactly what he meant……Because the truth is, that only what counts counts. The simple, unswerving wisdom of children.”

“Approaching new people, never being afraid to ask questions, clearly expressing emotions, moving, playing and laughing. There is a lot we can learn from our children.”

“You don’t learn confidence, you remember it.”

“Before a child learns the limits of our narratives, they have more potential than we could ever imagine.”

“Her dads warned her that some people won’t understand their family and might say ignorant (their word) and hurtful things to her and it might not be their fault because of what they’ve been taught by other ignorant people with too much hate in their hearts, and, yes, it was very sad. Wen assumed they were talking about the same bad or stranger-danger people that hide in the city and want to take her away, but the more they talked to her about what Scott had said and why others might say things like that, too, the more it seemed like they were talking about everyday kind of people. Weren’t the three of them everyday kind of people? She pretended to understand for her dads’ sake, but she didn’t and still doesn’t. Why do she and her family need to be understood or explained to anyone else?”

“Loving my son, building my son, touching my son, playing with my son, being with my son… these aren’t tasks that only super dads can perform. These are tasks that every dad should perform. Always. Without fail.”

“Only to the degree that people have what they need, that they are healthy and unafraid, that their lives are varied, interesting, meaningful, productive, joyous, can we begin to judge, or even guess, their nature. Few people, adults or children, now live such lives.”

“Children are the closest we have to wisdom, and they become adults the moment that final drop of everything mysterious is strained from them.”

“Dads. Do your faces light up when you first see your child in the morning or when you come home from work? Do you not understand that a child’s entire sense of value can revolve around what they see in your face when you first see them?”

“Do you not realize that your kids are going to make mistakes, and a lot of them? Do you not realize the damage you do when you push your son’s nose into his mishaps or make your daughter feel worthless because she bumped or spilled something? Do you have any idea how easy it is to make your child feel abject? It’s as simple as letting out the words, “why would you do that!?” or “how many times have I told you…”

“I wrote “David” because it seemed to me that children, who can love a book more passionately than any grown person, got such a lot of harmless entertainment and not enough real, valuable literature.”

“Dads. It’s time to tell our kids that we love them. Constantly. It’s time to show our kids that we love them. Constantly. It’s time to take joy in their twenty-thousand daily questions and their inability to do things as quickly as we’d like. It’s time to take joy in their quirks and their ticks. It’s time to take joy in their facial expressions and their mispronounced words. It’s time to take joy in everything that our kids are.”

“Dads. Do you not realize that a child is what you tell them they are? That people almost always become what they are labeled? Was whatever your child just did really the “dumbest thing you’ve ever seen somebody do”? Was it really the “most ridiculous thing they ever could have done”? Do you really believe that your child is an idiot? Because she now does. Think about that. Because you said it, she now believes it. Bravo.”

“Have faith that your child’s brain is an evolving planet that rotates at its own speed. It will naturally be attracted to or repel certain subjects.”

“Children must early learn the the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving.”