Do You Believe in Fairy Tales?

In the world of dating and marriage, young and dumb girls believe in fairy tales. And when you live your life based on fairy tales, you lose.

I can’t say this for other cultures, but in the United States, women are fed a continuous diet of romance novels, soap operas, magazines, television programs, movies, etc. right along with the fairy tales. As someone deserving to be romanced and loved by a modern day Prince Charming, you have to step into the part. And, you are a loser for buying into this crap.

“Someday, my Prince will come.”

You, the young and dumb girl, have agreed to step into the shoes of Cinderella and all the patterns of weak and passive women generated by fairy tales. Not only will you do everything to attract Prince Charming and think you are so special that he chose to save you, guess again. You have embarked on a shaky journey where in the end; you will pay for it dearly. Based on fairy tale lies, you will do anything to keep him.

In your starry eyes, you have blinders on when it comes to your prince. No matter how he behaves or what he does, he has become what you want him to be and is the “love of your life” and your “soul mate.” And because you believe he will stay with you as long as you keep him interested, it means you will spend the rest of your life doing anything he asks of you and much more. You have deemed him a “prize” and a “catch”. You are showing him off to your friends and family like a cat who has that mouse proudly in her mouth. You’ve chased the guy, caught him and now he seems to be yours forever and ever—amen.

He will never come your way again, so you have to catch him and keep him. You want him because he is the answer to you ending up with someone like your last unsuitable suitor. After all, you are getting old and are racing that biological clock. In fact, you already know where your dream house is, how many babies you’ll have and what you’ll name them.

You may leave him, but you will always return to him again and again because it is understood that you were meant to be. In the world of make believe, young and dumb girls never practice “catch and release.” For whatever reason, they stick their claws into a man and dig into his flesh. The fairy tales are for keeps, and they follow the concept of Prince Charming to the end.

“We’re worth it,” says aging actress Diane Keaton in the L’Oreal commercial. “We’re still worth it.”

No, Diane. You haven’t worked in years because Hollywood only loves the younger actresses. Women are always worth it. Even if we don’t dye our hair or hide our wrinkles using L’Oreal.

All you need to do is flip through any women’s magazine, and you know what it is targeting as its readership. As a young woman, you are given beauty and fashion tips. As you search for your man. As an older woman, you are also given beauty and fashion tips. The difference here? When you are older, the magazines throw in recipes, housekeeping tips, tips on how to raise your children, how cope with family members, the newest treatment for wrinkles, and articles on osteoporosis. As you grow old, you are not really worth it, are you? Is it because other than being the evil stepmother or the wicked witch in fairy tales, there are no roles for you? Or in real life?

The underlying message is the same for all women: Do everything these articles tell you in order to keep your man happy. Whether you are dating or married to the guy, you will be known as the thing on his arm that looks good all the time. You also take on a collection of roles like mother, child care worker, cook, dishwasher, etc. Will you be paid for your services? No. You have agreed to work for a man’s attention and love. It doesn’t mean you’ll get it, even if you’ve given up everything to make it work.

This is how it goes. You already have a day job and bring income to your household. When you come home, you put on that apron for that second shift. You have taught your man that you will do everything as he sits back and watches anything on TV. He does his 8 and gets to come home and relax. You have to gather up enough energy to make it through your second shift.

Overtime? Yes. Most likely, you’ve been doing it for years, and you won’t speak up to ask your boyfriend or your husband for help. Of course, not. The great girlfriend or the good wife does everything for her man.

After all, as the love songs tell us, we are never complete until we are part of a couple. Besides believing in “happy ever after,” the very thought of the line, “You complete me” is the ultimate slap in the face to anyone who has brains. Relationships are not the cure-all for a good, meaningful life. You don’t work at being an individual and lose yourself once you are dating or marry.

Whenever you start off any relationship with a plan to marry the guy (pick a guy, any guy), you are merely playing with a loaded gun. Young and dumb girls who latch onto a man with the thought of not letting him go because they will live “happily ever after” will usually find that this match was not “a match made in Heaven.” In fact, if the girl is really honest with herself, she knows she made a mistake and married the biggest toad to hop this Earth.

Yet, she will stay with him and believe, with her love, the relationship will become the fairy tale union. And she will work, even if it takes the rest of her life, to prove it.

“Relationships, dating or marriage is hard work,” say the media experts who have anywhere from a half hour to an hour of television to solve viewer problems from bratty kids to incest.

Who wants to “work hard” on anything? Going to work on a daily basis is hard enough, but insecure people buy a lot of self-help books and watch a lot television programs. They worship people who tell them how to live. Gutless people can be told anything and easily part with their bucks in hopes for a quick cure.

Young and dumb girls believe in working hard for their relationships. It is understood that they must do their job and do everything so that their mate can do the fun stuff. They live for a man and are thrilled if he pays any attention. And they will settle for any kind of attention.

“I’ll bake him cupcakes when he requests them,” she says.

“I’ll do anything to appease him,” says another.

“We don’t bother him with our problems,” says the young and dumb mom of her and her children when it comes to their basic needs.

Do you see the young and dumb pattern here? When young and dumb girls use words like “request” and “appease”? And when young and dumb girls do all the work as not to “bother him with our problems,” is that any way to have a relationship? If you believe that a man works and comes to a clean, spotless home with dinner on the table and a wife at his disposal to do household duties and take care of the kids, there is no teamwork, here.

“When you have a husband,” said one young and dumb girl who was pushing 60, “you have a friend and a lover all in one.” This is coming from a woman who had been married since the age of 23.

Actually, she was still the 23-year-old girl who married this man. Only now, she had been following the fairy tale so long that she cannot even think of cutting loose from this dead relationship and living her life independently. No, that would be too hard because she is used to being a couple. She also fears loneliness. And, for the rest of her life, she is committed to telling everyone that she is special enough to live this fairy tale. To the point where she has lied to herself and continues to keep house and be available for a man who spends very little time with her. He has no respect for his wife and has shown through his actions that he hasn’t been interested in her for years. People who know the couple know the man is merely going through the motions.

Young and dumb girls won’t grow up because it is the fairy tale they have chosen to live.

So if you are a young and dumb girl, you can stay that way as long as you go by living your life as a fairy tale. You will find that no one cares that you think have a Prince Charming, but they will also know you have married a toad. Although they wonder why you stay with such a jerk and put up with his behavior, they will say nothing. After all, you chose to be with him, and he is your problem. You live with him. So you’re telling yourself and the world that you will stay with him until “death do you part.”

Look around and learn from what you see. People who are truly happy in relationships value their partners for the individuals that they are. In a successful relationship, people are allowed to be individuals, first. The teamwork comes next. They work together and hold each other up when things go wrong. They are each others' cheerleaders in life and share their good fortune.

If you are a young and dumb girl, you will never know what a true relationship or a marriage is all about. Since you are sticking to a fairy tale, you are willing to give yourself to a concept which wasn’t real in the first place. You have only become a full-time maid and doormat to a man who gets the full benefit of being taken care of. And because of this arrangement, he doesn’t appreciate you.

Over the years of following a fairy tale, there is no growth for young and dumb girls. They simply stay where they are because it is much easier to stay stuck than to try and learn how to be on their own. Although children grow up and know a fairy tale is a fairy tale, the ones who live one become bitter. They end up hating their lives and regretting their poor choices. Yet, they find excuses to stay.

So the next time a young and dumb girl looks in the mirror, she should not be asking herself, “Who’s the fairest of them all?”

Instead, she should put that mirror aside, drop the fairy tale and expectations for Prince Charming, “the love of my life” and the “soul mate” and concentrate on herself as an individual.

Step out of that fairy tale world, young and dumb girl, and get on with your real life.