Madeleine and I were discussing Halloween lawn decorations, from the mundane to the scary, on our way to swim practice tonight. I expected that she might be a fan of the scary sightings, so I asked her about the sensation of getting spooked.
ME: Do you like the feeling of being a little bit scared, or do you not like anything to be scary at all?
MADELEINE: Well, I like being SURPRISED, but I don't like scary things. I always feel DISAPPOINTED when there's scary things, like I'm DISAPPOINTED that I fell for it.
ME: Oh, I see.
MADELEINE: And Mommy? I don't think that I have ANXIETY, it's just that I have a REALLY ACTIVE imagination, so sometimes I start IMAGINING things that make me feel scared.
ME: Yeah, I agree. You do have a big imagination and I can see how it can get carried away.
MADELEINE: Yeah, like, when I couldn't see the other side of my American Girl balance beam, I thought it looked like it was a SNAKE.
Or like when she saw her Halloween costume in the dark and she was convinced it was Earl.
Not only is Madeleine confident about her really active imagination, she was brimming with self-affirmation after swim practice today.
MADELEINE: Mommy, it was SO AWESOME. It was the MOST AWESOME swim practice EVER! I did SUCH an amazing job. None of the coaches even COMPLIMENTED me, but I just KNEW I was doing an amazing job swimming my fastest EVER.
If only we could all live life with the degree of aplomb that Madeleine possesses.
I know! Keep that self confidence!
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