Impressions?

“Mom, where are we going to?”
“Wherever we set our minds to.”

Wise people say that in order to have a true confirmation that you lived a fulfilled and successful life you need to impress only two people: your eight-year-old self and eighty-year-old self.

My personal top priority regarding impressioning anyone is my almost-6-year-old daughter. More than anything, I live for the idea of being a role model to her, to motivate her to open up to the world and explore it herself, by the rules she will create herself.

I want her to always have clearly on her mind that she should:

• enjoy the life itself and explore its possibilities, in order to find her authentic self in this everchanging environment
• enjoy the outdoors in every way possible, as certain joys of life with enormous impact on us go far beyond wealth, power, social influence and status symbols
• develop and nurture interests and hobbies, because they define us and our core values way better than our income sources, and provide balance in our lives after we leave our workplaces
• be aware that she has the luxury of living in a society in which she is treated as equal to boys around her in every possible way, and that no one would find it “weird” if she would, one day, decided to cross the Greenland ice cap on skis while dragging pulka behind her (she can also be sure as hell that her mother would scream her lungs out in cheering and supporting her while doing so)

The possibility of uniting my biggest loves, my family and being outdoors, opened up the door to the most beautiful experiences I have ever had in my entire life.

Exposing children to nature by simply walking through the nearby forest, picking wild blueberries, earthworms and pine cones, running through muddy puddles, eating sandwiches while siting on stones or tree trunks and fighting the ants over fruit yogurt inadvertently left on the ground are guaranteed fun which in the long term create the feeling of comfortability while being outside. Preferred habits are built systematically; never underestimate tiny everyday steps.