godatus buddies.

Games usually always have some sort of a follower and then a leader-well at least with games in our early childhood this is true. Children learn first by imitation...

Question: Who is the leader?
If you are in a group, sitting in a circle, and one person begins to make a rhythm with their body and the rest follow in suite...then, someone were to walk in-would they be able to tell who the leader was, and who the followers were? If the leader changed the pattern, would the guest then be able to tell who the leader was, and who the followers were? I played a game today where this exact situation happened. The object of the game was to not allow the person, 'detective', discover who the leader was. With many shady faces and thrown glances to swerve the 'detective' to someone who was not the leader-it was very difficult for the 'detectives' to figure out exactly who the leader was. Actually, it was a really fun game. Really fun. As fun as it was, it was so extremely difficult for me to follow the exact pattern if I was not looking at the leader. My patterns would always be a little off and not exactly as the leaders if I were to look at someone else and copy what they were doing. The copy will never be as the same as the original. Never.

I thought 'How silly-It would be so much simpler if I could just look at the leader the whole time and do what he was doing, following his lead'...then I thought..."How silly-It would be so much simpler if I would just look at the leader the whole time and follow His lead...' Games free people to become more open and even sometimes, free themselves to act as their true self. It's a state of comfort. Barriers are down, walls are lowered, and minds are fully focused on the task at hand.

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One of my students this summer was raised with Baltic as his native language and very little English-he also had a severe case of a.d.d. Each day we would go to the park, and each day he would be the last of forty in the back of the line. For about a week, I thought: 'ahhh, seriously-hurry up, lets go, you're taking forever, it's so hot. Stop becoming sidetracked with the things on the sidewalk, you can play later, you can look later, you can talk later, you can do everything later...'

Then I decided, 'dude, he's six-chill'.
Obviously.
So, I decided to play a game with him. I finally decided that him, taking his time was fun. So I would walk with him so he would not stray from the rest of the group and would not cross the street without a buddy so he would not become a victim to an accident. 'Godatus'.
Godatus is the baltic word for 'quickly'. A simple game, but it was something that he could understand. I would run a little bit ahead of him, and he would stare at me in amazement as if 'what are you doing...please don't leave me...' I would smile and say 'godatus, godatus, godatus!' Beaming like a ray of sunshine, this wonderful six year old would dash up to me with arms outstretched ready to embrace me in full force. This would repeat until we reached our destination.



God knows our deepest desires, and He knows how we tick.
Though, for all of us, He is a leader, a Father, a friend, a 'buddy' if you will; a crosswalk buddy of sorts...playing that 'come on, you can do it, come embrace me and I'll take you a little further' game. It might not even be 'quickly' either, and at times it might be a struggle; a language barrier at times. At other times, it might be 'too hot in the summer sun' and for you, it might take every ounce of strength to want to follow, but possibly stray a bit...but I guarantee, He is there with outstretched arms every minute of everyday.
...I post this, in hopes that as a community we can help assemble that steady beat; without wandering eyes, without thrown glances, but with a strong a firm fervor of movement. In a way, to free barriers, to lower walls and all with the simple objective that we learned as lessons through games as children...would, quite simply be...to follow.

baltic: godatus
.god.at.us.