Espen just watched his first Disney movie at the beach this weekend. We were there celebrating my parent’s 40th wedding anniversary with all the immediate relatives under one roof. As we are the only ones who do not typically let Espen consume media, I decided that we could relax the line for an evening and watch The Lion King.
Before launching into the exegetical take-aways that Espen
expounded on at bath-time, I will simply say this. I last watched The Lion King
approximately 20+ years ago and I can basically sing every song, word perfect,
on command when it plays. To this day.
Neuroplasticity be real, people, and you’re particularly
primed when your younger. But enough said on that little glimpse into my
personal parenting beliefs-I let down the spill-ways and the drama of Scar and
Mufasa began.
Espen, as you might imagine, was riveted, as only a kid who
never gets to watch media can be. He was blithely humming Hakuna Matata the
rest of the weekend, as if it had been magically overlaid from the screen onto
his brain. Part of me was delighted to be able to clown around with that song
and refer to common characters that I loved in my youth. The other part of my brain
was rapidly deconstructing the subtle messages being poured into the
unsuspecting minds of today’s youth through the vehicle of innocuous seeming
talking animals.
But I digress.
Tonite in the bathtub, Espen had some questions about Scar.
Scar, if you will recall, is the nefarious uncle of young
Simba, who through cunning, greed, and homicidal inclinations, seizes the
throne and gives his nephew a hefty dose of PTSD.
“Scar is bad and Simba is good, right?”
“Yep.”
“Why?”
That question has opened soo many doors, some exciting, some
a bit disconcerting…and now, it’s back in the form of my 5 year old.
“Wellll….because Scar made certain choices and Simba made others.”
“What kind of choices?”
Parenting on the fly. Seize the lesson. Choices. Ok. Make
good choices.
“Scar felt angry and jealous of Mufasa being king.”
“Why?”
“I’m not sure, maybe he thought he should have been king.
Maybe he thought he would be a better king. There are always reasons, but we
don’t always know them, ok?”
“Ok. I guess.”
“Stay with me. So because Scar felt those emotions, he chose
to do some really mean and hurtful things.”
“Like killing Mufasa?”
“You got it. Now Simba, he felt hurt and sad and scared when
his dad died and he chose to run far away because he didn’t want to make things
worse. He could have chosen to get angry and yell at his mom or his friends,
but he chose to go away. It’s all about what we choose to do about our feelings
that makes us the bad guys or the good guys.”
His eyes are squinting, he’s considering this.
“Well, I feel angry sometimes.”
“Sure, we all do. We all have the same feelings at one time
or another. Everyone feels angry sometimes. Or sad. Or confused. Or happy. Or
jealous. Or brave. It’s how we choose to act that makes us get into more
trouble or less trouble.”
“Ohhhhh. Ok. Look, I can fly Pip all around the bathtub!”
Having a deep conversation about making mindful choices and
dualism with a 5 year old is like trying to sew with spaghetti. It goes great
until you try to apply the noodle to make a cape instead of eating it. Still, I’m
hoping that he’ll remember the “Everyone has feelings, make good choices on how
you act on yours.”
We’ll see. Thanks, Lion King, for a provocative and utterly
ridiculous bathtime object lesson. Hakuna Matata.
