Not the best way to start ANY adventure, but not the worst! Welcome to the inaugural Blog post from The Goblins Chest. I hope all future posts are amusing at least, but I will try and make sure that no one reading these ever feel confused or alone.
My goal in starting The Goblins Chest was to allow young people and children an opportunity to communicate and engage in a way that perhaps they had not yet been exposed too. For six years I have worked with numerous young people who, above all else, just wanted to be heard, understood, and accepted.
With the increased stresses of growing up in todays society, pressures on our children sometimes have unfortunate effects on their metal well being, and expression often finds dangerous outlets.
With this in mind, I began working with some complex children in a way that allowed them to be themselves by not being themselves, to express complex ideas and feelings in a way that they felt did not betray themselves to the eyes and ears of grownups, that they did not feel could ever understand them or their feelings.
The first few sessions would start slowly, a new thing introduced to a scared creature, but when the fear of the new is eclipsed by the shine of adventure, personalities blossom and interesting things start to happen. Quite kids get loud, Boisterous kids become thoughtful, ideas are shared and unlikely alliances are formed, relationships are built and life skills learnt, all without leaving the safety of the table.
This is not a cure all, not some panacea for the ails of childhood, what it is however is an incredible tool to help exercise a skill we are all born with, and one we as adults are duty bound to help children explore, that incredible uniquely human gift of imagination.
So, what am I going to do? I'm going to take people on adventures, show them sights and places undreamed of until that very moment, challenge them with cryptic clues and terrible danger, show them a way to tap that wellspring of imagination, and drain the swamp of hidden feelings and fears.
So I suppose the real question is, what would you like to do?
