When Your Fairy Godmother Doesn't Show
Day 1:
An Introspective View Into An Unrealistic Standard
I'd like to make this post just as a millennial who hasn't seems to measure up to the expectations that I set for myself at such a young age. I also set extremely high expectations for the people who surrounded my life.
I was raised on Disney movies before I could walk or talk. My parents were careful to keep me from the Disney movies with too much magic in them. My parents are non-denominational christians, they didn't want me to think magic was a positive thing. Even though my parents tried to safe guard me from certain aspects of the world and raise me, teaching me their standards of what a good persons belief system should look like, I was curious to explore other beliefs and find out for myself what I believed.
I was raised in public school, which I am thankful for. In the public school I was socialized and learned how to effectively, to some degree, communicate. Our teachers drilled into us how we could be anything that we aspired to be as long as we worked hard. Disney taught me that anything was possible. You never watch a Disney movie and think that your the supporting role or at least I didn't. I always pictured myself as the princess who just hadn't had her break yet. I imagined that some day my Prince Charming would save me from the world of mediocre living that I was trapped in. I mean after all, I was extraordinary and someone would see that eventually, right? I never imagined that my fairytale journey would be such a compilation of unnoticed successes and personal failures.
My standards and hopes for my life were higher than humanly possible. I came to the realization that my narcissistic mindset didn't resemble the Disney princess that I build my identity on. I truly believed that happily ever after was an event and not a mindset. I believed that someday some glorious event would happen and my life would be "happy" from that point forward. I also had a delusion that the woman in the world around me were achieving or being granted their happily ever afters. I observed my classmates, co-workers and family on Facebook. Everyone was either on their way to amazing or already had the deepest desires of my heart. Some got married young and already had a handful of beautiful children lighting up their lives. In my mind, my faith just supported my grandiose dream of "having arrived" someday. In fact I never doubted it once. Well, now in my thirties I'm just now starting to come to the realization that happily ever after doesn't exist as an event. And that achieving it as a mindset comes with an extreme amount of discipline and the ability to either instantly get over disappointment or to never set a standard in the first place.
So what happens after we realize that we have a stack of misfortunes and personal failures? What happens when we realize that it's 10 minutes till midnight and our Fairy Godmother isn't coming and we won't be ready in time for the ball? And where does our faith come in to play?
I found myself incredibly disappointed when I had solid hope and God didn't deliver my every desire to me in a beautifully wrapped package with a bow and a card taped to it saying, you delighted yourself in me so, I gave you every desire that you have ever had. I wonder how many others have taken this scripture out of context just like I did. I even had this scripture tattooed on my skin.
So what happens if I never get the things out of life that I wanted so badly? The problems with my misconception of this scripture are: what if I never have a happy perfect marriage, what if I am not able to have children, what if I never get noticed in my career, or arrive to the point of financial security? If those things never happen does that mean I did not delight myself in the Lord? Or could it possibly mean that my desperate wants were not true desires of my heart?
When I look to the Bible to explore and dissect this mindset what do I find?
If you have struggled with this same mindset and disappointment, please allow yourself to come with me into a journey to find out Gods true promises, and if happily ever after is possible for a princess that is yet to be discovered among the cinders of a servants life.
1.) Write down your previous expectations of what you thought your life would look like.
2.) Write down the disappointments that you have faced and the things that have not gone according to your plan.
This particular blog is just a personal outlet for my views and my journey through adulthood and does not necessarily reflect the views of Petra de Salon & Spa.
Sincerely,
Annidia Lamporous
