Childlike is not childish

On the corniche in Muscat, a man in his fifties is flying a kite with his grandson. The boy has lost interest. The man has not. He is watching it climb with the face of someone noticing the wind for the first time.

That face is one of the most valuable things a grown-up can bring to work.

Being childlike means looking at the ordinary thing as if it were new. Why does the receipt look like this? Why do we greet people at the door in that tone? What would this shop feel like to someone walking in for the first time ever? Fresh eyes are where most good ideas come from, and they get rarer with every year of experience.

Being childish is something else. It is acting as if nothing you do will come back to you. The sale that announces its final day every day for a month. The advert that promises what the product cannot do. The joke at a customer's expense because it will get noticed this week.

The odd part is that we have never been better at seeing consequences. Reviews arrive within hours. Returns are counted. Anyone can screenshot anything. We know roughly what a fake countdown costs in trust. And it gets done anyway, because the cost arrives later and the attention arrives now.

The two get mixed up because both look playful from a distance. But one plays with the world, and the other plays with other people.

It is entirely possible to keep the grandfather's face at the kite and still remember that the string is in your hand.