I grew up with these stories – or fairy tales as they have been known. Walt Disney took some of them and turned the story into something a little more pleasant than the original stories – or at least that is my understanding.
The next few blogs on my website are going to be around the ‘fairy tales’ that I grew up with. I will look at how they shaped my childhood and young adult life, and this journey I am on regarding finding – redefining beauty.
So, the quote above of course is from the story of Snow White. The story starts out quite sad. A woman longs to have a child, but not any woman, she is a queen. She would have had the duty to her husband and the kingdom to provide an heir. Sadly, after giving birth, she dies and her husband the king gets remarried. Spoiler alert: if you have never read the story, you quickly find out that his second wife has the desire to be the most beautiful in all the land.
Without telling the entire story, what I see now as an adult is that throughout the story this woman has a few issues with who she is. Remember that she is the queen, so that should mean she has the things that I use to think would be nice to have – money, maids, hosting events, a big house (castle).
It is surprising to learn though that she is lacking in self confidence. One learning point might be that you can have all the money and the good things of life and still not have a good self image? How I know this is part of her problem is that she must go to a magic mirror every day to make sure she is still “the fairest in the land”. I mean I get it – affirmations from someone are certainly helpful.
But the problem arises when suddenly the answer is, “I’m sorry, but there is someone else that is now in top place. I want to stop here and talk about comparison. Because this aligns with my entire mission when it comes to redefining beauty.
Comparison…
Who decides who is the best? Do we take a random poll on Instagram and hope for the best?
How is it decided who is the most popular? And even further, does that make it the ‘top’ just because of someone’s polling system?
Obviously, I don’t have a magic mirror like the queen in the story. However, there were times I may have been taught growing up that looking like one person was ‘better’ than looking like this other person. The result has been that as an adult I seem to still be influenced by this concept of comparison.
Think of how fashion dictates what we wear and how we wear our hair. A few weeks ago, I did a “Throw back Thursday” picture of some famous people and how the way they did their hair became the way everyone did their hair.
And don’t get me started to talk about ‘weight’. I don’t know what size is the ‘best’ size, but I do know that I am in the ‘average’ for my age and city. Not by any scale, but by the fact that they never have my size on any clearance rack or in any of the second hand stores I frequently go to.
I did not grow up wanting to be Snow White, or her queen for that matter. However, I did and still do have issue with looking in the mirror, except to make sure my face is clean, nothing is in my teeth, and that my hair is not sticking up.
I do find something even more interesting in this story though that I want to leave you to ponder. I wonder if the ‘fairest in all the land” was actually a different kind of ‘beauty’ because Snow White was caring and loving and kind (or so the story goes). And the reason the queen lost her position was because she became jealous and vain and bitter.
So, until next time – as you are considering sparking your beauty – recognize that it is in the loving and caring of ourselves and showing the same kindness and love to others that true beauty shines.
At least that is the way I see it in my magic mirror!
Until next time, this is me…helping you…Spark Yr Beauty!