“Forgive me my nonsense, as I also forgive the nonsense of those that think they talk sense.”

Robert Frost

Responsibility. Goals. Progress. Knowledge. As we age we get entrenched in a sea of boringness and reason, constantly pursuing success and accumulating stuff we don’t need. At some point we glance back at the person we once were and we barely recognize them. Where did that naive young adult go? What happened to that child living so free?

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry writes in The LIttle Prince, “I have lived a great deal among grown-ups. I have seen them intimately, close at hand. And that hasn’t much improved my opinion of them.” All children desperately want to grow up. In their minds grown-ups are free to do whatever they want, but children are restricted. What a mix-up. 

Children aren’t burdened with the same useless thinking that adults are. They are the ones that have freedom in abundance. They embrace silliness and adore nonsense, because those things are fun. They’re not overthinking the issue. If something is fun, they try to do it more. 

We adults lose sight of this and actually see silliness and nonsense as unproductive acts. When our stressful lives are running full steam ahead, we have no time for silliness and nonsense. Especially nonsense. It’s as irritating as having a piece of sawdust in your eye. 

But we would benefit from a little nonsense here and there, wouldn’t we? There’s a part of us that wants nothing more than our inner child to come back for an occasional visit, no? If this is true, how do we make it happen? How can we get our fill of nonsense every once in a while?

Let’s take some cues from children. Children don’t think much beyond the moment at hand. That’s beautiful and we adults looking to introduce some nonsense into our lives should start there. 

Kids also pay close attention to their surroundings. They see everything. Let’s use a couch for an example. If a kid and an adult walk into a room with a plush couch, the adult will see the couch and automatically classify it as a piece of furniture for sitting. The adult might also take note of its placement, design, color, material, condition, etc., ultimately deciding whether or not to sit on it. A child, on the other hand, might simply judge whether or not the couch looks like something fun to play with. In most cases a couch looks like something fun to climb or bounce on. Remember, a couch is big compared to a child so it isn’t just about a lack of conditioning. The child then runs up to the couch and jumps on it, causing the adult to panic and educate the child that a couch isn’t the same as a jungle gym. Or is it?

I think we adults can find truth in Robert Frost’s words if we take the time to think about them. What makes sense? Even the sense we think we have doesn’t really make sense. A couch is whatever you choose to make it. Sure, it might be a bad idea to just jump on a couch that’s in a public space or in someone else’s house. But I bet it would be fun, and completely against what we consider sensible. 

Embracing nonsense is an exercise in thinking outside the box. Take a cup and see how many different sounds you can make with it. Dance without music. Go for a long walk back and forth in a single room. Go outside and yell at the top of your lungs. Make up a poem of complete gibberish. Make a helmet out of the next Amazon box you get in the mail, and then wear it for an hour. Take an old pair of shoes, paint them, and then nail them to a piece of wood. Why? For no good reason at all. That’s the point. Nonsense. Practice it more and I bet you’ll start to recognize that young, naive person trapped deep within you.