This One Movie Taught Me HOW TO LIVE & LOVE; I Am Not Same Anymore
There are so many guidelines, hacks, and techniques on how to live the life that sometimes, I think I am not living but implementing pre-determined ideas.
And honestly speaking, after coming across all this great advice on life, I feel that my life is not mine anymore. My desire to live a life in a certain way is just a reflection of what I have learned from the outside world.
But since I started my self-reflection journey (about 3 months ago), I don’t consume any sort of information subconsciously. I try to observe if this movie, this book, this article, and this video meet my principles or not. I also try to consume content that I believe matches my values, something that I stand for, something that I dream of so that through this virtual content, I am living that life that I want.
One such movie that touched my soul and helped me rekindle my dream was A Castle for Christmas
The movie is about an author Sophie Brown who takes an escape in the arms of the castle of Edinburgh. Let’s explore what I learned from Sophie and her trip to Edinburgh:
1. Be a Warm Hug to People; Not Cold and Cool:
No matter how hard you try, you can never lie to yourself. No matter who you want to be like, you can never be happy if you lose your real essence.
All these American teen dramas and movies glorify just one thing — HOW BEING COLD & COOL IS THE WAY OF ENJOYING LIFE. Pick any movie or series and you will notice one simple pattern — teenagers are partying, clubbing, indulging in mindless sex, and making fun of others while being extremely rude to their own parents. Do you really think that’s the only way to have fun?
I believe the true way to live life is not to be cold and cool but to be like a warm hug to anyone you meet. To be like a ray of sunshine on a rainy day for people. To smile like you bring happiness just with your presence.
When I watched A Castle for Christmas, this is exactly what I learned from Sophie’s character. She is an insanely rich author yet when she met village people in Edinburgh, she opened her heart for them to create a place for themselves. After seeing Sophie, I instantly knew that this is what I am.
I don’t want to be remembered as the coolest kid. I want people to shed happy tears when they remember the time they spent with me. I want to be the reason for someone’s smile. I want to be the reason people still believe in kindness, love, and joy. I want to have that aura around me that makes people safe and be themselves.
Maybe I have been keeping my heart closed so that no one really takes advantage of my niceness but at the end of the day, I have to learn how to love people yet not let them use you.
Sophie’s character made me realize that you can make friends, have fun, and enjoy life without being cool. All you need to be is true to your own behavior. Deep down, I think each one of us wants to love others. I trust you and I want to be kind and warm to others but we are either afraid or manipulated to be cool.
So, take this blog as a reminder to be loving to people. To share your smile with the world. And don’t forget to ask yourself every now and then, are you being true to your nature?
2. Love Irrespective of Your Age:
Although, I am in my early 20s and I am expected to love until I found the love of my life. But I have seen as people age, they resist themselves to love as if there is a particular age till your heart can feel love.
Love is beyond age and it can happen to anyone at any point in life. Instead of restricting yourself to love again, you should be grateful that your heart could find love again.
In the movie, Sophie is around 50 (guessing) yet she didn’t accuse herself of falling in love. She allows the love to grow and create a fairytale for herself. So, whether you are15 or 50, LOVE without any guilt or judgment.
3. Spending time with different age groups:
My grandfather died almost 3 years ago and if there is one thing that I crave to date is to have some time with him. I regret not laughing, sharing, and playing with him enough. I know, I cannot have any of that anymore now.
But what I have realized is that we are running so fast in this race of becoming rich, famous, and our best selves that anyone who makes us pause, we leave them behind.
In A Castle for Christmas, Sophie joins a group where people of all ages sit together, talk about each other’s lives, and simply knit. Just watching them knit made me question when was the last time I did something without any sense of getting results out of it.
To be completely honest with you, I love elderly people because they are peaceful and warm and they don’t rush as if life is about to end (ironic, right?)
After watching Sophie, I knew that this is a reminder from Universe for me to expand my friendship circle. It was my call to spend time with different age groups without thinking about what I can get from this conversation.
And I would highly suggest you do the same as well. Spend time with a 10-year-old because he knows how to be in the moment and play like your life depends on it. Spend time with 70-year-olds because they know how to be still and loving to everyone. I bet your life wouldn’t be the same after that.
After growing up, everything in this world is about networking so that you can get something from everyone and every conversation. Since everyone is connecting with each other for a hidden purpose, the real connection is lost. Perhaps, that is the reason even after having friends, people feel lonely. And in such an era, it is life’s savior to be friends with people who cannot give you anything materialistic but pure love and affection — a sense of belonging.
4. Work on your passion:
No matter how many videos you watch on self-love, you will never be able to completely love yourself when you know something is dying inside you. Yes, that something is your higher potential.
Deep down, we all know what we are capable of and if we don’t live up to that potential, we feel guilty and create a negative self-image.
I learned from Sophie to write without waiting for perfect words to enter in my mind. Seeing Sophie rekindle my dream of writing a novel one day. I wish to become a published author someday but this stupid laziness, procrastination, and excuses come in my way to start writing a novel.
After seeing her, I started working on my book and if everything goes well, it will be out in 2023. I am writing non-fiction as of now but will also be starting a fiction soon.
The catch here is that your motivation can come from any place. You just have to make sure that you don’t waste your life wishing for something to happen. If you have an unfulfilled dream, come on, this is the right time to start working on it without giving any excuses. Today is the day when you should start working on your dreams and live a passionate life.
Conclusion:
I love Edinburgh, I love writing and I think my heartbeat is lost somewhere in the castles. Hence, A Castle for Christmas movie was like a sweet dream to me. However, after watching this movie, I realized that you can learn life-changing lessons even from Netflix movies. The bottom line is to consume the kind of content that makes your soul younger rather than manipulating your mind. I hope this blog helps you in living and loving life just as the movie helped me.
