The Survival Instinct

As I stood in my balcony, I saw three kids (of laborers) in the next building under construction playing with different rather innovative toys.

The toy was a brick tied to a string and the game that these kids were playing was to drag the bricks through the string. The joy on their face was that of any kid playing with any expensive or inexpensive toy.

Among the three kids, two were boys who would collide each others brick carts from the opposite sides. Every time they succeeded in colliding the bricks they felt extremely happy and satisfied. Guess that was the motive of the game. The girl kid had two sponge squares attached to the string and was pulling them just like the boys. She was younger to the boys and tried imitating them. At times she would try to collide into the bricks of the boys and would laugh out aloud. The boys let her collide with their bricks because they felt she’s their responsibility and allowed her to be a part of the game in whatever way possible.

Sometimes the brick would be so close to one of the kid’s feet that I would get scared it might hit the kid’s feet, but something didn’t let that happen. The kids were not very careful while playing yet nobody hurt anybody. I felt that was very strange as to how come these kids without being monitored or taught to play carefully are able to play so well without hurting each other. I guess that’s what is called instinct. The kids by instinct knew how to play without getting hurt or hurting anyone. They intuitively knew how to play carefully and guess that’s what is called The Survival Instinct.