Once upon a time...

Life isn't an easy thing to get through. Every day it's filled with problems, issues, and challenges that make us fume, rant, despair, or cry. To deal with these, we often turn to therapists, substances, or religion. But getting answers to life's questions and conundrums doesn't need to come attached to professional services fees, symptom-quashing drugs (legal or otherwise), or tithes and prayers. Our forbears already wrestled with many of our problems (at least in principle) and left us their answers in the form of folk and fairy tales -- the same folk and fairy tales that we tell today and our children will tell tomorrow! Yes, life's answers come with a dose of hocus pocus and "happily ever after." For example:

We often never know how much influence we have on the lives of others. Sometimes we try to provide helpful advice and lecture others into proper behavior, but the greatest influence has always been, and will always be, our own lives. When my father passed away in March 2011, I told this story from Turkey at his funeral. A father bunny once called his three children to him and told them it was time for them to move out and live on their own. He cautioned them though to build a burrow as he had done and to live close. The first bunny, deciding he had enough of a burrow life, decided to build himself a house of twigs and grass. So this he did, and then went to the meadow to eat. A fox came and saw him, chased him home, tore down his house, and ate him. The second bunny decided that he wanted to live in a comfortable nest. So he gathered a great pile of soft grass and built himself a nest at the foot of a large tree among its roots, then he went to the meadow to eat. The fox came again, saw him, and followed him to his nest. After laughing, the fox pounced on the bunny and ate him up. But the third bunny decided that what had worked for his parents would certainly work for him too. But he decided to build a larger, deeper burrow. When he was finished, he too went to the meadow to eat. The fox saw him and gave chase, but the bunny dashed into his burrow which was too small for the fox. And it was so long and deep that the fox had no hope of ever digging him out. In frustration, the fox left and never returned. That bunny, his family, and his parents all lived happily ever after.

What example are you leaving for others to follow? Will they build thatched houses, nests, or safe burrows based on your example?

For more folktale insight, check out my ebook The Wisdom of Folktales Lessons on How to Live Happily Ever After available here, at BarnesandNoble.com, at Amazon.com, and at Smashwords.com!