What to do when a lion starts singing

I’ve been reading The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis to my son. It’s the only Narnia book I never read as a kid. So, I’m reading it with totally fresh eyes.

As you can expect from Lewis it’s full of allegory. One scene jumped out at me. The characters find themselves in a dark work. Aslan sing and the first dawn begins. Plants and animals spring from the ground. Aslan gives some of the animals the ability to speak.

The characters from our world all find this wonderful but Uncle Andrew (the magician) is terrified.

As “smart”, “intelligent” adults we often do exactly what Uncle Andrew does here. The song attacks his sense of reality in two ways.

First, the song made him think and feel things he did not want.

We can fall under the delusion that we are the masters of our universe. We think we get to choose positive emotions —- to avoid suffering. A painful memory, a political opinion we disagree with, conviction, guilt and shame. All these are difficult things to wrestle with. If we don’t want to hear something we may just plug our ears and carry on.

Reality is that we don’t get to choose how we feel, in every moment. We need to be open to thinking and feeling things we do not want to think and feel. Often the feelings we don’t want to have are most appropriate for that moment. If a feeling or a thought makes us feel uncomfortable, it may be that we are the ones that need to change. Don’t make that discomfort disappear, explore it.

Second, the song came from a source he did not expect.

As a mature grown up Uncle Andrew knows that lions never sing. Despite the fact that he just traveled between worlds through magic rings, he is trying to make sure this world fits his old paradigms for how the world auht to work.

When we hear something we don’t want we tend to discredit it on the source. It might come from a child, a political opponent (our “enemy” in this society), someone with a different religion, race, sex, anyone we may prejudge as irrelevant. The truth is that beauty and wisdom can come from all kinds of sources.

These two come together when our children tell us something we don’t want to hear. It might be that we have hurt them emotionally and they are confronting us about it. Maybe we’ve missed the mark in some way. We didn’t keep our word. It’s easy to be dismissive to children. After all, they don’t have the life experience we have. What do they know?

Our children’s internal worlds are being shaped and formed. Just like Narnia, they have a whole landscape springing up inside. If we want to plug our ears and not listen to the song being sung, we forfeit our ability to help shape and enjoy their internal world. It’s important that we take what our kids say seriously. Don’t dismiss what is hard to hear.

Remember, “the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you often succeed.”

Listen up: Don’t shut your ears off from, beauty, wisdom and guidance from unexpected sources. This will include correction from your children if you’re ears are open to it.

Listen actively:

• Be curious, not reactive.

• Ask questions, before sharing perspective.

• Be willing to change