Things My Children Are Teaching Me: Listening Skills

"I want to be a good listener!"

Bottom planted on the last step, she stomps her feet. Thuds reverberate across our old wooden floor.

When that doesn't get my attention she flops over like a rag doll beating her fists, shouting it again.

It has become her go-to phrase. Code for "I don't want to be in time-out." But there we are again, sitting on the stairs.

"Why didn't you listen to me?"

She glares at me. I glare back.

"I forgot," she says, innocence washing over her face.

"You forgot."

"I want to be a good listener now."

"If I had a nickel..." I contemplate whether to keep arguing or walk away so she can stew for a minute.

I want to scream. At her, at the wall, I just want to scream.

"Why can't you just obey?" I wonder, forcing my lips shut. "Why can't you just follow the simplest instructions?"

Behind eyes that plead for mercy, and despair in her tiny voice, I see anger and contempt. Her words feign compliance, but we've been through this dog and pony show before. She wants to do her thing.

Right there, in the middle of our showdown, it happens again.

It always happens right in the middle of things.

I'm not sure what to call it yet... an awareness... a lightbulb moment... though it's far more than a strange feeling or a new thought.

It's a flash of conversation, between God and I. He, showing me, what a fool I am. The error of my ways.

"You do the same thing," he points out.

"No I don't." I list off a good many ways I've been obedient, even faithful.

"Only when you want to be," he says.

I pause.

"You obey me in the big things, but you're slacking off in the small things. Things you decide are not such a big deal. Things that don't appeal to you. You busy yourself. You're not listening."

Ughhh.

I finish up with my child, who has a face so much like mine, and send her on her way.

I sit there for a minute. My turn on the stairs.

"Will you show me what I need to be working on? I think I forgot."

"Sure," he says.

"Will you help me see when I have my blinders on?"

"Of course," he says.

"Stay with me?" I ask.

"Yep," he says.