Letting go of the Fairytale

Cinderella
Beauty and the Beast
Snow White
Sleeping Beauty
The little Mermaid
Aladdin
Shrek
Frozen

The story of finding true love against all odds, getting married and living happily ever after is embedded into our culture. As children, teens and adults, we have all hoped for the man and woman to find each other and experience true love.

As a girl, I loved these stories and I believed I would have my own version. I would meet my "prince charming" in college, marry by the age of 24 and start having kids by age 27. 

Then I turned 24, then 25, 26 and so on... and there was no prince charming. He didn't come. My fairytale dreams crumbled under the weight of reality, so I tried altering my timeline. Surely I would be married by thirty, right?

But as the imminence of the big 3-0 drew closer, I came face to face with the fact that I had it all wrong. All this time, I wanted a life that I was told I deserved by culture, family, friends, church and my overly romantic self. I waited and waited for this life to begin, hoping for something that wasn't within God's timeline for me.  I set myself up for disappointment and blamed God for it.

And then one day my eyes were opened. I looked at my life and realized it is good. I have a great job, a supportive community of friends, a good relationship with my parents, and have traveled around the world.

My life is amazing and I almost missed it because I was waiting.

So I'm letting go of the fairytale. I still want to get married and have a family, but I am not waiting anymore. I am stepping into the unknown, where the only certainty is that God has a good plan for my life, better than any fairytale ever written.