Cinderella - Modern Mythology and its' Lessons

Children's stories that have been told for over a 100 years take on the quality of mythology.  Like all myths they communicate information that is significant to the culture and underlies paradigms in the society.  So yes I am actually going to talk about Cinderella.   This ancient myth (the oldest variant apparently from 6 BC Greece and popular in Europe in the 1600s and incorporated into Grimm's fairy tales in 1812.   I believe this tale was popular for centuries because for centuries of class based society and female economic subordination - Cinderella represents the possibility of women being rescued from poverty by marriage to a "prince".   For the most part this is all we think of it - as a sort of sappy love story where true love overcomes evil step mothers.

However, I would like to bring out two aspects of this myth that I think are worth noting.   One is an important anti-dote to female co-dependence.   Cinderella takes matters into her own hands.   She does not settle for her step-mother's dictate that she cannot go to the ball.  She, granted with the help of magic, goes anyway.  As a psychotherapist for almost 25 years I have often had clients tell me while dealing with oppressive treatment that they are afraid of "hurting" the person oppressing them if they say no or refuse to do what they are told.   While finding a husband is not exactly a feminist mission, I would still say Cinderella, for her era, was way ahead of her time.  She was not co-dependently care taking her step mother or step sisters.   She was looking our for her own interests.

The other symbol I think noteworthy in this tale is the step sisters efforts to "stuff" their feet into a shoe to small for them.  (In fact in the Grimm's version they actually cut off their toes and stuff their bleeding feet in, so desperate are they to try to win over the prince if even fraudulently so.)  How often have we each done this?   Been so anxious to make something work, to see a certain outcome that we try to stuff ourselves into a situation or a time frame in which we really don't fit.  We try to force things to work.   And of course to no good outcome.  As the tale tells us, when it's right - the fit is effortless.  Many spiritual teaching are about the "way", the dao, the effortless path.

It is also worth noting the Prince's mission.  He sees what he wants and then with the only clue he has, a shoe, he goes about finding it.  What if we all held a clear picture of what we wanted and did not compromise for anything less than that?