The Credo

Robert Fulghum, author of The Credo wrote this poem about life lessons and how they are picked up very early during childhood. He wrote this poem I believe to help readers understand that the littlest lessons are not that complicated and the bases of them are picked up and passed off as basic instinct when you're very young. After the first few phrases of this poem I was intrigued and very impressed at Robert's ability to compare and demonstrate examples of how we use in our lives today things we've learned back in Kindergarten and grade Primary for some of us. I enjoyed reading and the author's thoughts and relating his points of views to that of my own.

Reading The Credo I believe of course this author is qualified to write this poem. He uses his own prior childhood experiences and his knowledge to help us understand and make our own lives a little less confusing by reading about his lessons he's learned growing up. Learning is a life long process but by reading this poem we can understand more easily that most of what we learn, we figured out young and it's kept with us all these years.

I think that one of the most important phrases the author wrote in this poem was, "It is best to hold hands and stick together." I find this phrase to be important, because in life no matter what occurs it will always be in your best interest to put the past behind you and continue on in the right direction, along the side of the people who are most important to you.

The author also stresses the word LOOK in capital letters at the same time tells his readers it's "the biggest word of all", also mentioning the fact that he learned this word back in his Kindergarten years. I believe the word "look" was symbolically written into his poem for readers to realize that even now many years later since kindergarten, it still can be a very effective term. We should take time out more often to look around us and appreciate the beauty in our lives that have occurred naturally such as our family, friends and the other things we take for granted each day we live.

Reviewing the poetry over I remembered some my own experiences being a young child, and also thought of more little lessons in life. However they were more along the line of advice and if I was to change any part of Robert Fulghum's poem I would most likely alter or just add more material to help improve his one-line statements rather than actually remove any of his words or thoughts in whole. I will dispense my points of views from what Robert wrote throughout the next few paragraphs.

In his poem he wrote "Take a nap every afternoon". That is something I'm sure not everyone does, but reading this gave me thoughts such as we should all take care of our bodies. If I were to add anything to this statement it would be that people should not be afraid of their bodies or what other people may say. You should use your body every way you can, because as I've heard many times before, it is the most important instrument you'll ever own.

Robert