We went to see the Buzz Lightyear movie yesterday and I actually liked it quite a bit. I thought the story was developing in a non-predictable manner and the problems and challenges being faced by the protagonists were quite interesting and unexpected. For me the theme that stood out was the theme of ‘Failure’ and ‘shame within making mistakes’.
These are topics that are close to my heart because I have walked such points in my life many times and I know how tough it can be to stand up from making mistakes, sometimes even with really detrimental outcomes, and to then stand up from that and continue finding a reason and purpose to live. I mean that is what some people are actually facing in reality – not only ‘challenges’ as it is being called, but mistakes and outcomes that make you question your very existence.
I found that when I had arrived in such a
point in my life, the only way to move foward was to drop all expectations
about myself and my life and to communicate with the people in my life. Start
including everyone in my life and reality and see where I can be of support,
and most importantly: where it is that I need assistance and support. That is
how you create yourself anew.
It is as though Buzz Lightyear cannot forgive
himself. He has to be ‘the one’ that is going to ‘save everyone’ to fix the
situation. Except that the more he tries to ‘save everyone’ the more it leads to
more consequences. What comes through is that his unwillingmess to forgive himself
and his stubbornness to be a saviour actually reveals a superiority belief –
where ‘only he’ is able to succeed alone by himself. Except that ‘alone’ he
appears to be going nowhere…
In an interesting scene where he and his
companions are stuck together in a time-sensitive trap, he still approaches the
situation from the vantage point of having to save everyone. At this point someone
in his team actually says that they don’t need him to save them, they need him to
work together with them. And indeed, by being humble to the reality of the
situation and realising that he needs to give up his specialness and simply
work together, he and his companions form a team that is one unit of combined
strengths which succeeds to break out of the trap.
I thought that was really interesting: because
I have often also found that when working in a team, I have to stop myself from
making assumptions and actually need to slow down and communicate with everyone
before I can act – and when I do eventually act my actions actually represent the
team-effort and not simply my individual will.
This is the lesson of Buzz Lightyear: a
process from superiority to humility and actual real care for his fellow
companions as equals. Perhaps that is also the way forward for humanity and all
of us who feel we have ‘failed’ and made ‘unrepairable mistakes’: don’t take yourself
so seriously and include others into your life.
