“What if our house was like a giant swimming pool and we could swim all day, even when we were eating?  And we had a pet dolphin instead of a dog?”

“Hmmm.  That would be cool.”

“Mom, what if our car could fly and we could fly right over all the other cars so we would never be stuck in traffic and we could get to Grandma’s really fast?”

“That would be awesome.”

“Mom. Mom. Mom. What if no one ever died and everyone could live forever and you could always be my Mom and I could stay a kid for infinity?”

“Uh, um, um…”

“What if the whole world was made of candy even the trees and grass and our house and if you wanted some you could just stick out your tongue and lick something?”

Ah, yes.

The old “what if…” followed by something completely preposterous. This is how the majority of our conversations start around here lately.

Hopefully these preposterous questions are just baby steps to bigger and better things.

For example, if you Google “what if” you get a list of companies on the fore of technological innovation or humanitarian groups who dare to see the world differently. You will find that “what if” is the basis for creative writing and scientific exploration.

What if people could fly? What if we could fly to the moon? What if we could talk to people who were far away? What if we could stop diseases like polio?

Right.  What if we could? It would be amazing. It IS amazing!

These “what if’s” have brought humans a very long way from eating raw meat in caves.  Thank God for them.

But they have so much farther to take us.

What does the next 50 years hold? The next 100? 1,000?

The answer is in all the “what ifs” in all the kids around the world. The kids and their questions are what will make the world whatever it is going to be.

And our job at CLiF and as parents is to make sure kids have what they need to keep asking questions, and maybe, someday to come up with some good answers.

What if all the kids in all the world meet the potential with which they were born?

That would be awesome!