Montessori referred to the first phase of development (ages 0-6) as the Period of Creation. She didn’t name this period after the child’s style of play, but because through play, the child creates their brain. Montessori called this the Absorbent Mind inferring that as a child in this phase plays and explores the world, they are unconsciously absorbing everything they touch, see, and hear. This absorbing physically forms their brain. She says ever so poetically, “The impressions not only penetrate the mind of the child but form it. They become incarnate. The child makes it’s own ‘mental flesh’ by using the things that are in his environment.” 

We watch with smiles as our children race each other to find the most Easter eggs or scream with joy as they tear into one gift after another on Christmas day. I have stood anxiously amongst the crowd of parents standing on the sideline of Easter egg hunts, hoping my son was fast enough to gather enough eggs to be satisfied, worried that another kid would knock him over to get to an egg before him. Then in later years, I was anxious that my son would be the one to push over another kid. I facilitated the pinata at his birthday and watched as kids scrambled and pushed to get the candy that had fallen. Memories of my own childhood surfaced, memories of sliding into a mess of children beneath a swinging pinata; other kids sliding into me or grabbing candy that I was grabbing at. Then the euphoria afterward to “see what I got.”   

While I fully trust that there is a God and universe bigger than me and more sovereign, I trust myself now too. In fact, it has made all the difference in love, life, and my relationship with God.

For one week, one moment, one short season, through play and silliness, lords and peasants found a form of equality amongst themselves. Peasants dressed like kings. Lords laughed and allowed what would not generally be prohibited.