Merida: It’s not all about you
It’s important to embrace the things that make us different from each other—our special abilities, our unique traits, even our shortcomings. But in our uber-individual age, it’s important to remember that sometimes we gotta listen to other folks, too.
Merida, the Scottish princess in Disney/Pixar’s Brave, loves to run around the woods with her bow and arrow. Her mother, Queen Elinor, thinks it’s high time the little lady started accepting some of her future responsibilities. She’s going to be queen someday, after all, and Merida needs to start acting like one.
Mom and Merida both bear (heh-heh) some guilt for what’s to come. Elinor pushes Merida to accept an unwanted betrothal and, in a stormy argument, throws her beloved bow into the fire. Headstrong Merida turns Elinor into a bear—a move Merida quickly regrets. But as they embark on a quest to return Elinor to her proper form, Merida realizes that, hey, maybe her mom had a point. Maybe all of Elinor’s tiresome lessons and corrections were pretty valid after all.
Merida comes to a truth we all reach eventually—even if we reach it kicking and screaming. We all have to accept certain responsibilities. We have jobs to do. Families to raise and care for. Friends to support. We might not always want to deal with our daily duties, but we have to—or risk turning our mothers into bears (or something equally as heinous). The Bible is full of verses about the importance of accepting our responsibilities. And I think it’s telling that Jesus so often talked about shepherds—folks who performed a job defined by duty.
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