The Princess, the Prince & the Dragon.

We all love a good story - or even a bad one.  We love them so much we illustrate cave walls with them, gather round the campfire to hear them, sit in theatres to see them acted out, flock to the cinema to be entertained by them and slump in front of the telly to be transported by them.

Why?

Because we are story telling creatures.  It helps us find our place in the world, to make sense of our experiences, to heighten our awareness and to  ease our suffering.

In Ancient Greece dream hospitals were sanctuaries where patients' symptoms - be they physical, emotional or spiritual - were treated using a variety of methods including story telling.  As night descended stories of love, war and great dering-do were told using the Earth's original outdoor movie screen: the night sky.  The characters created from the constellations were the first movie stars, their bold and dramatic adventures helped patients identify their inner turmoil by activating their imagination and triggering their emotions.


Every myth, every fairy tale, every fable is also an exploration of the human psyche. They are stories created by humans for humans about the human experience and reveal the deep patterns of the unconscious mind. They are painted with bold brush-strokes on the canvass of our imagination.

Learning to see how those bold brush strokes have been drawn in fine pen onto the fabric of your daily life can give powerful insights about the patterns - both helpful and destructive - in your life and relationships.


I often see couples weave their relationship fairy tale into a nightmare.  When the woman unconsciously sees herself as the Princess and her man as the Prince, a knight in shining armour, she has an expectation that he will rescue her, all her dreams will come true and they'll live happily ever after.

When the man loves the idea of being the hero, and battles the evil foe to rescue his Beloved, he sets himself a high standard of behaviour to maintain. In the early Romance phase of a relationship this is a large part of the attraction.  Alongside falling in love, a couple can fall in love with Love.  Both parties are equally deluded, determined to remain oblivious to their psychology and to the fact that a fairy tale is a fragile fantasy and true relationship is woven from a much stronger thread.

After a while the Princess gets bored of waiting around, complaining he doesn't pay her any attention as he's so busy fighting dragons!  The Prince, realising his Beloved has disappeared, begins to feel his heroic efforts are unappreciated, he suspects the Princess may have turned into the very dragon he's fighting!  Having lost his motivation, he goes off in search of another Princess to impress.

How do you know you are living out a 'story'?  Where do you feel disappointed about your life?  Disappointment is always a sign that there was an expectation - a hidden demand about how you thought things should be. Whenever you experience disappointment its a sign you're running a story.

How do you know what story it is?  Start with asking yourself what your favourite story was as a child?  Who was your favourite character?  Can you see the pattern of that story in any way in your life now?  Who plays all the different characters?  Remember, in some stories there are characters who don't get to experience a 'happy ever after'!

If you're ready to rewrite your story contact Kim on kim@relationshiptraining.co.uk or 07789 408378