Actor Jack Black’s most recent movie is a modern version of the classic Gulliver’s Travel. Besides being good, interesting entertainment, it contains some good life lessons.
Self Esteem
Inside the movie Jack Black plays a mailroom guy who has been stuck in the position for years and is not progressing in his job. He has a low self esteem of himself and has a crush with a female colleague of another department, but he deems that he is not good and worthy enough and thus dare not ask her out.
Lesson – Our self esteem and beliefs limit our achievement in life. What we think and believe about ourselves will set the limit to what we think we can do and achieve in life. If we have a low self esteem and always think that we are not good and worthy enough, it is unlikely that we will be able to achieve much in life. If we do not believe in ourselves and our own capabilities it is unlikely that others would. With a low self esteem and limiting belief in our own abilities, come fear. It is then highly unlikely that we will venture to take risks or try anything that is outside our comfort zone or are unfamiliar with, and that will keep us small and encaged in the status quo, with little room for improvements and breakthroughs in our lives.
Be Yourself
When Jack Black ended up in Lilliput and saved the king, he suddenly became somebody, which has never happened in his life before. Overnight he became a hero, a saviour, all important and respected. As a result he started to lie and make up tales, living in a fantasy world to keep up his image in the eyes of the people in Lilliput that he is an important person – The President of US, where he came from, so that he would be respected. But of course the day came when his vulnerability and incompetence is exposed and he loses all the respect.
Lesson – Be yourself, do not try to be someone you are not. In life, we need first acknowledge and accept who we are and be comfortable with ourselves. We can lie to others, be inauthentic to try to be someone else we are not, but we will never be able to lie to ourselves and God, and it is a matter of time our disguises and lies will be exposed. More important of all, if we always try to be like some others, worse still put up a false front, identity, or image, we will never be truly happy, as we will then always lead a life of pretense which will be very tiring, unnatural and artificial.