What happens if . . .?

So Sonwun wanders into the kitchen the other day. His eyes are full of tears. He's sobbing and he's carrying his Wii wheel.

Yeah, it's been raining a lot the past week or so here in Thompson, so he's been polishing his Mario Kart skills a little more than I'd like to see. But, to be honest, the video games have given me a peek inside his little mind. And I'm fascinated.

He's sobbing because he erased his driver's licence and lost all of his medals. This is a big problem because I have no idea how he did it, or if it's fixable. So I ask him what he did. And, without missing a beat, he takes me through a series of menus in Mario Kart that ends with a button that says "Erase Licence."

I had no idea it was there and if you asked me today, I'm not sure I could find it again. But he could. Even though he can't read yet, he recognizes the shapes and colours of the different buttons and retains the patterns in his head. It is actually kind of amazing.

Anyhoo, turns out this is not fixable so he must start again. Lesson learned, I hope.

Now this got me to thinking. As a parent, I often ask this 4-year-old the typical, probably stupid, question that all parents seem to ask of their children at some point . . . "What were you thinking??"

I mean, when you hear laughter from the dining room table and enter the room to find the dog and walls covered in yogurt, what else can you say? "What were you thinking??!!"

When he winds up with his plastic baseball bat and takes careful aim at his younger brother's head, you gotta ask. When you see him walking toward the electrical outlet with a fork, you gotta ask. And when you see him hauling his tricycle to the top of the slide, and then standing on the seat at the top, you gotta ask.

But Mario has given me the answer. Sonwun is thinking the same thing he is always thinking: "What happens if . . .?"

It is his mantra, his philosophy, his raison d'être. It is the way he learns.

And you can see it in Mario Kart. While I'm content to race around the track, Sonwun is always bumping into walls, driving off the course, painting outside the lines, if you will. Why? Because he wants to know what happens if . . .

And I'll tell you what happens. He finds shortcuts, secret places and boosts that give him an edge over me. He learns, he gets better and he teaches me things.

Sonwun is teaching me, for example, that his philosophy is a good one. It makes life interesting. Honestly, how boring is your life if you stop asking the question? Is that when you stop living and start the slow march to the big dirt nap?

The world, to Sonwun, is new and fascinating. I am watching him and I can see that every day he craves new experiences, new answers to the same question. What happens if . . .?

In the adult world, in business, in the board room, in the lab, we call this Thinking Outside the Box and we revere those who are good at it. They are the business leaders, the great artists, the ones finding cures for disease. But they're only doing what my 4-year-old son is doing. What happens if . . .?

So yeah, it begins with Mario Kart. Sometimes you erase your driver's licence, sometimes you find a shortcut. But you keep trying, you keep driving where you "shouldn't," and you keep asking yourself, What happens if . . .?

It's a great philosophy.