Once upon a time, there was you….
And then what happened?
When we are young we pattern our life dreams and expectations after the stories we hear and the movies we watch. Often, in American culture, Disney plays a major role in that. While the Disney rendition of fairytales is a butcher job of the originals, children only know what they are shown and taught and so we head off into our lives picturing a prince or princess and a happily ever-after.
We all want love, magic, and riches. That sounds good – I’ll take that.
I learned this week when I asked people how their life was like a fairytale, that the go-to mindset was to think about how it was a happily ever after. Fairytale seems to equate with perfection or the ideal. Stay tuned to hear my man-on-the-street quicky interviews where people got to share how their lives were like fairytales.
When I first started getting the responses and everyone was going straight to the happily-ever-after, I had to ask – haven’t you ever read an entire fairytale? What about the challenges along the way? What about the problem the main character faced? Repunzel was a prisoner who wanted freedom, Cinderella was enslaved and wanted a little recreation, the Shoemaker and his wife were on the verge of financial ruin and desperately wanted money to buy food, the princess in the Princess and the Frog had lost something important to her. She desperately wanted her golden ball. Goldilocks was tired and hungry and wanted a place to crash.
The main character wants something in these stories and they are faced with major obstacles. Fairytales aren’t just about happily ever afters, they are about a hero or heroine facing heartbreak/challenge/disappointment, often the death of a parent. We love the stories with happy endings, but the stories are only interesting and beloved because the main character found their way through the struggle.
This is the part of the stories that smack a bit more of real life. We will always have challenges because those are the steps to growth and understanding. Challenges –check!
Let’s talk about more ways our lives are like fairytales:
One of the things I love about fairytales is the way magic shows up to help. Whether it is a fairy godmother, or an elf, or a frog, or simply the thing they wanted, there is a pattern that aligns closely with the universal laws of creation. As we desire, believe we will receive, envision and focus, then magic shows up to help us take something from an idea into literal creation. I love the fairy godmothers– the serendipity, the “coincidence” the unplanned for things that show up just when I need them. I love these because it makes life seem so unpredictable and wonderful and supported by goodness. How wonderful to be able to believe that magic will show up. We all have those people we turn to in tough times – the people who show up in a pinch. Sometimes it is the small and simple things – the books, the advice, the workshop, the tip, the connection, the idea that glitters with magic and takes us where we need to go. Pay attention to the magic in your life and celebrate how much it really is like a fairytale. (Listen to the episode on serendipity – episode 10)
It’s also like a fairytale because we have wonderful pets and while they might not sing and talk to us in our native tongue they love us unconditionally and whenever life gets rough they are there.
Have you ever noticed that in fairytales there is almost always an enchanted forest? We also have nature – botanical gardens, backyards, wilderness, hiking trails, fresh air – head into nature and feel the magic.
One of the lessons of fairytales is that beauty is often buried. Things are not as they appear. A beautiful face doesn’t equate with a beautiful personality. The lesson here is the...
