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There used to be a TV show called Fractured Fairy Tales. It was part of the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, which aired between 1959 and 1964. Fractured Fairy Tales featured “re-tellings” of classic fairy tales that confronted some of the questionable assertions contained in those timeless narratives. We are only now beginning to fully realize the impact of those classic tales which condemned generations of men to combat in the forest outside the castle, while shackling women to the drudgery within. But the task is not yet complete. Consider this possible ending to a seemingly sanitized tale:
“So, the self-identified prince and the princess drew their nano-quantum powered light sabers and removed all the dead wood from the environmentally managed forest, and used it to build a wind and solar powered castle in which they lived happily ever after.”
Better, but still needs our attention. You see, the last phrase will never come to be because living happily ever after is an emotional impossibility. Wait, wait, least you think I am a misanthropic frog with no hope of a kiss from well-meaning princess, I am open to this slight editing of the sentence:
Princess, prince, light sabers, forest, wind power, yadda, yadda, OK here we go, here is the edit: “in which they lived contentedly ever after.” Contentedly ever after, there is a concept we can work with.
The problem with “happily ever after” is at least two-fold. First, in “happily ever after world” or HEAW, how would you even know you were happy? Happy is a comparative emotional state that we can only recognize when we compare it to “unhappy” or, heaven forbid, “sad.” Second, once we realize that there are other emotional categories, HEAW, requires that one lives constantly at the top end of the scale. Whoa, that seems exhausting, like living life in some sort of perpetual “river dance” frantically beating our feet across the floor to traditional Irish music with a huge Gaelic grin on our faces. Furthermore, HEAW seems existentially questionable, like the assertion from Lake Woebegone, that “all the children are above average.” Is it really possible, without brain surgery or powerful drugs, to be continually, unceasingly happy? Somehow I don’t think so.
Now, living contentedly ever after is a horse of a different color. Maybe even a Pinto, yeah, I like Pintos. Gorgeous creatures. OK, living contentedly ever after is a Pinto. First of all, and most importantly, contentment isn’t really an emotion, it is a state of mind, an attitude that we control. A wise friend once pointed out to me that we really have little control over the slings and arrows that life tosses our way, but we do control our reaction to those insults. Combine that notion with Niebuhr’s serenity prayer: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference,” and we are well on the way to contentment.
As we live any kind of normal life, we are going to encounter events and individuals who make us sad, even angry. If we eschew mandated happiness and instead take Niebuhr’s advice we can walk away from those inevitable encounters, perhaps not happy, but serene - and I am content with that. You should be too, especially during those moments when you realize , “Hey, This isn’t really ‘Happily Ever After.’"
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bravo
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