Days of You and Me: Day 16, Into the Fire

Dinosaurs, fire trucks, boom booms (fireworks and other loud noises), spiders, and bugs . . . these are Annabelle’s fears.  In the past, when a dinosaur or some other phantom has paid Annabelle a nighttime visit and she wakes up from her sleep afraid, I’ve comforted her by telling her to shout, “Go away dinosaur!  Go away!”  She’ll shake her arm and point her finger at her fears as she shouts and then inevitably burst into laughter.   Much of the time, naming her fears helps her to overcome them.

When I read Amanda Soule’s Creative Family and came across the idea of lighting a fire to symbolically help children (and ourselves no doubt) release fear, I thought it was a wonderful rite  that could be helpful to our entire family.

So on Friday evening, my husband, Annabelle and I sat down before our hearth and lit a fire.  With pencil and paper, we began the act of expelling our fears.

Annabelle drew many a dinosaur and many a fire truck.

I showed her how to fold up her fears (if she wanted them kept private).

And my husband and I wrote down our fears too.  We shared some with each other and others we too folded up.  Some of our fears are a bit funny though quite serious concerns too; one of my husband’s big fears is that in the coming weeks, after our baby arrives, he will not sleep.  Similarly, one of my fears about the coming change of going from 1 babe to 2 is that I will be overwhelmed by mothering 2 . . . and it is even more complicated than that (fears of less time for myself and for my husband, loss of self, and overall uncertainty . . . these are pressing on me).  Sometimes (and I do not mean to minimize my daughter’s fears) I wish I could simply be afraid of the concrete, like a big old noise making fire truck.

Once we wrote down our fears and stacked them up, it was time to put each fear, one at a time, into the fire.

Annabelle was mesmerized by the site of our papers, our fears, catching fire.  One by one, a flame swept over the fear and ate it up.  I told Annabelle to say, “Bye bye fears.  Bye bye dinosaur.  Bye bye firetruck.”

Of course, watching fire consume our papers thrilled Annabelle; she wanted to draw more spiders, more bugs, more firetrucks.  Watching fire dance is exciting, mysterious.  So we let her draw more firetrucks and dinosaurs and spiders.  And we even managed to jot down a few more of our fears, which seemed to rise up as we listened to our 2 year old daughter name hers.

By the time we’d extinguished the last of our fears and the flames of the fire grew dim, Annabelle began to jump with excitement.  She shouted and danced and was full of what I guess you might call, fire, :-)

The next day, she wanted to light another fire and let a few more fears go.  I wonder, I do, how much she understands the rite and how much she simply is excited by watching the fire, but I say, whatever her reasons, the act of facing our fears is a worthy one.

And, out of curiosity, if you don’t mind sharing, how do you (or your little ones) let go of shadows and fears?