Lost Innocence

(Photo compliments of Esteban Rivera)

Innocence… the absence of guilt, the harmless intentions, the freedom from sin or evil. The purity deep within our childlike hearts that becomes exceedingly obscured through our own maturity into adulthood. Innocence is an emotion, a deed, an altruistic behavior that produces rapture within an individual and can overwhelm an entire world if allowed to be communicable.

To act out of sincere innocence is completely tranquil to the body, mind, and spirit. It’s a natural endeavor accomplished by ones soul that is gratifying to the core of humanity. To feel pure innocence is invigorating to the body. The tickle in your bones, the slow pump of blood through your heart as your chest decompresses, the tingle from your stomach as it surfaces to the edge of your skin and your hair lifts gradually from your cooling self. The smile that eases across your face as your eyes intimately close and your mind is calmed and you feel weightless and safe. And just then, out of pure innocence, life around you is still happening, yet now, it’s tolerable, it’s reasonable, it’s acceptable.

Being you, truly you, and not perturbing the natural flow of righteousness that is within you, that you know will bring out the preeminent you, will allow you to taste that childlike innocence you were so instinctively born with. Take a minute, and don’t think twice, ultimately when it comes down to it, what is right? What is selfless? What won’t just benefit you, but will benefit the world as we don’t know it? What will allow you to make another smile without defiantly knowing that you didn’t do it for yourself, but you genuinely did it for them?

The next time a child has the power to alleviate the tension from within the foundation of your heart and suppress the pressures of your life for a slight moment with just a simple contagious giggle or sweet innocent smile, remember, you too, still have that same influence within yourself. Although it may not be as easy and comfortable as that of a child as they are still sheltered from the insubordination the human race is devastated with. I know that with a trivial amount of effort, your innocence within you can flow like a river and quench the thirst of those that are hopelessly seeking the smallest drop of water.