Why We Need Our Teddies and Winnie-the-Pooh, Too (2024)

Earlier this year the world was charmed by the nightly rituals that developed in response to pandemic lockdowns and the frightening uncertainties of a deadly new virus. Italian citizens threw open their windows at the same time each evening and joined together in song. In New York City, people gathered on rooftops to applaud healthcare workers laboring to care for those stricken by COVID-19.

Before spreading worldwide, the “teddy challenge” (nallejahti) started in Finland in March 2020 as a way for citizens to cheer up people passing their homes by displaying teddy bears in their windows. The challenge was for people to compete to see how many teddy bears or other stuffed animals they could spot, keep count, and take pictures of their favorites and the most unusual examples they saw.

This “pandemic toy play” was implicitly understood—if not labeled as such—to be a strategy for survival and coping with a difficult situation. Katriina Heljakka, a toy researcher at Finland’s University of Turku, noted in an article that soft or plush toys are recognized in many parts of the world as being designed to comfort and invite imaginative play. Character toys, such as anthropomorphic plush toys—including teddy bears—invite caring and nurturing. The world’s first mass-marketed toy, the teddy bear remains one of the most universally popular.

“The public act of displaying toys in the window screens is not a cry for help but an invitation to participate in playing for the common good,” said Heljakka. It’s more about goodwill than competition. As for the teddies themselves, she says, “From being intimately trusted confidants and guardians, they participate in fighting apathy and passivity by taking the role of our representatives as active agents. They become our avatars and spokespersons, fighting isolation because this is the capacity of character toys—toys with faces that, amplified with the power of social media, provide a look out from the window toward a world that is a very different playground compared to previous times.”

Earlier this year, pre-pandemic, a 9-year-old boy named Ayden in Grand Rapids, Mich. talked about how he had relied on his teddy bear, Billy, to help get him through a two-year ordeal with a rare form of leukemia. “He was extremely resilient through all of it,” said Ayden’s mom, Samantha Jones, in an article about the experience. “Ayden kept a smile on his face, just kept chugging along, like nothing was wrong.”

Ayden doesn’t focus on how he looked when he was undergoing treatment, when he lost his hair and a lot of weight. “Yeah, I don’t remember it like that,” said Ayden. “I remember my eyes were always wide open and I was always holding a full thumbs up. It makes me feel like, sometimes, we look different on the outside (than how we feel).”

Asked about Billy, his teddy given to him by the Billy Bear Hugs Foundation, Ayden says simply, “(He) means pretty much everything, like this is my best friend in the world.”

Teddies like Ayden’s best friend Billy are used in a brilliant Australian curriculum aimed at building resilience in children. Bounce-back Bear helps kids develop skills for things like positive thinking, making friends, managing feelings, and thinking for themselves—ingredients in the recipe for resilience.

The world’s most famous teddy bear, Winnie-the-Pooh, offers a lot of what resilience education expert Darri Stephens and the ResilientEducator.com call “Pooh-isms: Subtle Lessons About Resilience from a Famous Bear.”

Consider this to start: Pooh, "a Bear of Very Little Brain," personified attributes that showcased his sense of resilience by floating through life tied to a balloon.

How about a lesson on mindfulness and being present in the moment?: “‘What day is it?’ asked Pooh. ‘It’s today,’ squeaked Piglet. ‘My favorite day,’ said Pooh.”

Or a lesson on self-care?: Piglet: “The things that make me different are the things that make me, me.”

Or this lesson on self-awareness and knowing you’re not alone: “Promise me you’ll always remember: You’re braver than you believe and stronger and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is: Even if we’re apart, I will always be with you in the heart.”

My own teddy—a black-and-white furry faux panda holding a furry red heart, and with a noticeable indentation in the center of his forehead—was a gift 40 years ago from a friend who, when I look back over my life, had a huge influence in shaping it. After all this time, my teddy still sits on or near my bed. He reminds me of my friend, who died in 1987, and he reminds me that I am, and have been, loved. I need reminders like that more often than I care to admit.

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