"You don't understand; I can NEVER go to school again! This is the WORST day of my ENTIRE life!" The five year old girl throws herself onto her Hello Kitty bedspread and cries what seems like endless amounts of tears as the parent tries to keep a straight face while saying, "honey, this isn't the end of the world; things like this happened to me and then years go by and they don't even matter anymore."

And welcome to the first time a child will have their feelings invalidated.

That five-year-old knows her world. She knows that she goes to school every day and sees the same kids, most of which are rather mean. She knows her family, her house, her street. She knows what it feels like to laugh and cry. She knows how she feels in her world.

Just the same way a thirty-year-old does. And a forty-year-old. And a fifty-year-old. We are all just living in our world, at this moment in our lives.

When I missed my train yesterday and broke down crying, it seemed like the end of the world in that moment. When I was a sophomore in high school and got a C on a paper, it seemed like the end of the world. When I was 10 and some girl told the guy I liked that I liked him, that definitely felt like the end of the world.

Was it? No, it wasn't. And in five years, if something horrible happens, will it be the end of the world? No, it won't.

But perhaps if we took the time to listen and empathize, instead of just shooing away the feelings of children (and anyone who is younger than us) as if they don't matter, kids would grow up with more compassion and more validation. They wouldn't feel like they were being "over dramatic" if they got upset. They would trust their emotions, good and bad- and they would grow up to be better people for it.