unico_love | Fairy Tale Influences (Reply)

I love fairy tales, obviously. Their concreteness and predictable patterns add order to my life, eliminate the excess chaos without eliminating the magic or emotion. And though there are clear patterns, these stereotypical patterns are often exchanged for other patterns (for instance, not all lead females in fairy tales are powerless, sometimes what gets you rewarded in one story gets you punished the next, etc.) I have always felt my mind worked a bit more straightforward than most people's. I can sound really complicated at times, or think in complex patterns, but to me it still seems straightforward and if I'm given time I can often sum up how I'm feeling or what my overall impression is. Perhaps it sounds metaphoric at times (especially delving into sensory perceptions), but there's still the familiarity with my core experience.

I have led an unusual lifestyle that I think is more reminiscent of fairy tale situations than is typical for a person (though I do believe the archetypes of fairy tales can be extended to almost anything and anyone). I feel like I was locked away in a tower, cursed, living my own introverted innocent life with all kinds of strange creatures around me (including certainly my family, filled with a peculiar magic). Then the spell broke and I went out into this new other world. I have the unfortunate tendency to seek out a rescuer, due to my chronic feelings of helplessness. This rescuer can come in many forms, sometimes it's someone I admire and obsess over even from a distance. People's subjective worlds are just so beautiful in some, so transcendent and gorgeous and enchanting, I just feel enveloped and bask. Though usually the people I hook onto most for rescuing are people close to me, or whom I want to be close to and it's a realistic possibility. It's a characteristic I hate about myself, because it makes me feel out of control in my life.

Love in fairy tales is simultaneously straightforward and unmuddled, but also often romanticized (you wouldn't usually want to apply love in fairy tales to real life relationships too much or bad situations/disappointing situations could occur). My emotions, including love, are very strong. I dislike change, my feelings rarely change, and I identify all too much with the idea that you love someone, and that's it. Not that you can't feel compassion and love towards others, but whom you most love are irreplaceable beings. So if you lose them, it's a huge deal, and I'm very inflexible by nature. I can't bear losing anyone, let alone those I most adore.

In The Princess Bride, after Westley is gone, Buttercup says "I will never love again." She says it with such convincing melancholy, and I relate to it too much. It's beautiful, but sets one up for so much suffering. As it is I already lean towards too much asceticism. It's not that it's hard for me to imagine only being in love with one person my entire life, it's that when that love fails or the person dies or leaves or something, how do you cope with it, knowing that was the one person you could ever truly be in love with? Even if you were adaptable in every other dimension of your life, just that lingering knowledge would slowly drive many people insane, I think. So maybe given my natural tendencies I'm not so insane -- merely incredibly impractical and inflexible?

I'm also a perfectionist and look up to the heroes, heroines, and innocent maidens of fairy tales and folklores for their saintly personalities. Not all such archetypal characters are so perfect and good, but many are. And I just mess up a lot, and I'm aware of it. Maybe that's normal, but it makes me feel so guilty and ashamed, I just end up doing even worse! That you should just bear undeserved punishment with a smile. I can't do that. I relate more to the character Jane Eyre in this case (but even Jane Eyre was more of a martyr than many characters...). And I'm not suggesting anyone try to stay quiet when bad things happen, but for myself I have such a warped sense of expectations.

I love animals and don't relate so much to humans, so the fairies and shape shifters and animal helpers in fairy/folk tales always drew my attention, as well. Be a good person and somehow things will turn out alright. I wish life were so clear-cut...