3 Tips From CS Lewis’s Narnia To Help You Appreciate Where You Are Today
What will happen is another matter entirely.
“All the same… best to keep your eyes open.” — Professor Kirke, The Chronicles of Narnia.
Of all the books and movies I watched so far, Narnia is by far my favorite franchise. It has a very unique way of telling that our world has something else and it has many morals that are applicable to our own life that I realized in mine.
Narnia itself has life lessons that I never knew I needed in my adulthood. Many would say that this is a Christian-based story, but it has lessons that most self-help would put in their books too. So in a way, you are learning from stories.
Some of the lessons I learned from the series had a lot to do with appreciating who you are now. It’s something often not being practiced today since everyone is so caught up with what should their future be and the results they must have. Not many preach the theme of focusing on your present, it’s always about the future.
Thinking about the future creates anxieties. And when these anxieties are not contained, it can create an unnecessary ‘vision’ we have of ourselves in the future. It’s not worthed or healthy to do this.
CS Lewis seemed to know that this is what we’ll be facing, and he imparted a few lessons for us to keep in mind whenever we felt in doubt of our future or feeling insecure.
1) Forgive Yourself
“What’s done is done. There is no need to speak with Edmund about his past.”
There was a scene in The Chronicles of Narnia where Aslan spoke with Edmund after he was rescued from the White Witch. What did Aslan tell Edmund remained a mystery, even CS Lewis didn’t know himself. Edmund betrayed his family to the Witch and got them all in danger, anyone would be angry if this were to happen to their families.
However, after the Lion spoke with him, they went to the siblings and told them not to speak about what had Edmund done in the past. The siblings did what Aslan told and, ultimately, forgave him. No one was mad nor upset with their brother after that.
In the end, the boy changed very much and learned to live to what is right. We’ve seen this much in the next books/movies where he was able to lead the army and be an honorably King and Warrior of Narnia.
Forgiving yourself is a way to make peace internally. There is this constant battle we have with ourselves because we regret the mistake we did and we’d punish ourselves for it by feeling miserable.
Let go of your anger, shame, and guilt. It’ll only way you down the more you think about the errors of your way. The good news is that you have acknowledged it and that you want to fix your errors, it’s a better healing process.
No matter how grave the mistake is, one must learn to forgive themselves. Sure, the past hurts and it could haunt us to the future. But that’s not a reason for us to beat ourselves because of it and not move forward.
The best way is to forgive yourself, and accept who you are today. You have already learned your mistakes, so forget about it, but
2) Respect Yourself
“You wished yourself away, and with it much more. You doubt your value. Don’t run from who you are.”
In the Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Lucy envied her big sister’s beauty and wished to be like her. However, she was given a vision where she did not exist and her family had never seen Narnia at all. A horrible turn of events.
Aslan then came to her in a dream, asking her what had she done that made her see that vision. Lucy told him how she wanted to be beautiful like Susan, disregarding her own self. After that confession, Aslan reminded her that if it weren’t for her, the rest of her siblings would never know of Narnia since she discovered the world first.
In the belief of Christianity, our Maker wants us to love our self, to appreciate who we truly are. This can be said the same for other beliefs, even in self-help. Everyone has their own strength and weaknesses, and we all wish for what we don’t have.
However, that doesn’t mean that we should disregard who we truly are to be someone else who isn’t us. There’s a phrase that said “Be careful what you wish for,” because sometimes it came with a price.
The best thing to do is to appreciate who you are and grow from your own strengths. It’s not worthed to compare ourselves with others because we are not them, the only person we should be comparing to is our older self.
3) Forget “If Only” Situations
“To know what would have happened, child? No. Nobody is ever told that.” — Aslan, Prince Caspian.
Sometimes we dwell in moments of “if only” where we wish that we can get another result than the ones we are stuck at. It made us think of the past and the future.
This is a feeling of regret, something that we can’t do. But we get so caught up in what we could’ve done instead of what we should do, making us regret it even more.
“What will happen is another matter entirely.” — Aslan.
Sure, wrong turns happen. We are human for making mistakes, and we learn from them. So the best way instead of sulking about a past that has happened, we can change what will happen, and that action starts at the present.
Final Thoughts
I felt like CS Lewis predicted the problem we’d face internally in the future, that’s why he had these lessons in his books for us to take note of. I admit, I sometimes get lost in this anxiety about my future, and that wasn’t helpful at all.
Then I recently re-read Narnia since I realized that I didn’t fully understand it when I was reading it as a kid. As I was reading it, I began to realize these life lessons that the author imparted to us in his books and those words moved me.
Perhaps people may take it a different way, but I find that the series is telling us how important the present is instead of wondering what kind of future will come, there is no use getting worried about a negative future that we build in our heads.
To wrap it up, these were what he imparted in the books to help us appreciate our present even more:
- Forget the past
- Self-respect
- Forget “If only” situations.
In the world where we are exposed to everyone’s lives through social media, and we began comparing our lives with one another, we can easily lose ourselves in jealousy, insecurities, and anxiety. It’s not worthed to feel that.
What we can do is focus on our present. To live every single moment to our fullest.
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