Ogres are like onions.
Donkey: They stink?
Shrek: Yes. No.
Donkey: Oh, they make you cry.
Shrek: No.
Donkey: Oh, you leave em out in the sun, they get all brown, start sproutin’ little white hairs.
Shrek: No. Layers. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. Onions have layers. You get it? We both have layers.
Donkey: Oh, you both have layers. Oh. You know, not everybody like onions.
People are like Ogres. By that, I don’t mean you’re a large green stinky swamp creature, unless.. that’s your thing. No, I just mean people also have layers. We develop these layers as we grow older, kind of like the rings on a tree. At the very center of it all is you. The real you. The wizard of oz behind the curtains. And these layers are built around you, defined by you for whichever purpose. For Shrek, he adopted the persona of a swamp monster. The townspeople hated him so he layered himself behind what they wanted him to be.
That defense mechanism isn’t exclusive to ogres, however; we do the same multiple times throughout our lives. Each time we bury ourselves deeper and deeper behind those walls. After a bad breakup, you become less willing to give someone else a chance. If your best friend betrays you, you become untrusting of everyone. These layers protect us from getting hurt again, which is exactly why we build them. But today I wanna talk about stepping outside that curtain. Sure, there will be the risk that you’ll get hurt again and chances are you most likely will, but that’s life. I believe life is about learning to live with mistakes instead of trying not to make them.
These walls and inhibitions keep you from living your life, from taking control of your own destiny. Sure they prevent you from making terrible mistakes, but they also keep you from taking advantage of everything life gives you. By closing yourself out from everyone, you miss out on some of the best parts of life without even realizing it. I wish we all had someone like donkey to come along and tell us that they think we’re perfect just the way we are and that princess you think so highly of has her own faults and fears and insecurities that you could never even imagine. We all do. But if we never bother to learn about others, we’ll miss out on the amazing person that they are. But opening up someone’s layers is a two way street. You can’t find out who they are without letting them through your own layers. So sure, you may find they’re a terrible person that takes advantage of you and tries to hurt you, but that’s when you drop them from your life. You lock them out and stop them before they can. And at the same time you embrace the people that bring love into your life. Your Donkey and Fiona. You go from being alone in your own swamp to having dozens of people that care about you and love you to death. And then who knows, maybe one of those friends, a dragon perhaps, will eat the Fuckwads.. I mean Farqaads in your life.
The most important thing in life isn’t money. It’s family. And not just your parents or your siblings. I’m talking about the friends that know you probably more than you know yourself. They are your happiness. And to find that happiness, you have to go get it. You might have to cross over a rickety old rope bridge dangling over a lake of fire, but you don’t have to do it alone. You can always fall back on your friends, because they’ll be with you every step of the way. So drop your inhibitions and walls. You don’t have to do it all at once and that may not even be possible, but you have to at least stop running. Stop building more walls and retreating further. Because I’ve seen what happens when someone keeps doing that. They lose who they are behind all the walls and they eventually start to push away even the friends that love them the most. It’s not a pretty sight, and it’s a very difficult thing to truly come back from. So give the world another chance, and give yourself another chance. You will eventually find the love of your life and they will make you the happiest person alive. You just have to get ogre your layers 😉
And that’s what’s in my head, thanks for reading! 😀