May I never lose my desire to dream

“What will you be, when you grow up?”

These days, my preschooler can be anyone, or anything, she fancies herself to be.

Today, she is Dora, tomorrow, a princess. She wants to be a cook, and demos her culinary skills in her own little kitchen, serving me great tasting meals that I can not taste or eat. She likes to be Supergirl, and asks her dad to fly around with her. Sometimes, she goes to “Italin” (Italy) and comes back a minute later to tell me who she met in her travels.

To a child, these imaginations are real, and vital to a developing brain. To a child, the possibilities of a bright future are endless. “Someday, I will be… ” is full of promise and hope. To an adult, these are just childish fantasies of becoming someone other than themselves. Somehow we know a lot of a child’s dreams and aspirations will never come true.

But then again, a recent study out of Harvard shows that the adult brain will deteriorate without this desire and ability to imagine and dream of “becoming”.

Many older adults find it difficult to recollect past events, let alone generate new ones. A new Harvard University study reveals that the ability of older adults to form imaginary scenarios is linked to their ability to recall detailed memories.

In order to create imagined future events, the individual must be able to remember the details of previously experienced ones extract various details and put them together to create an imaginary event.

As we grow older, our ability to recall memories fail, and with it our ability to dream and imagine a future for ourselves. How sad, but true.

Oh, to be a child, and young again.

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