342. seasons ending
intro
Life is an endless series of transition. To go from one thing to another, seasons must change. There’s never any complaint about the flowers that bloom in the spring after we make it through the winter. However, that awareness is often lost on ourselves. We, for whatever reason, avoid the challenge associated with change, and stay the same. Finding comfort in our discomfort, simply because it is familiar. Not until we realize it is us who control the transitional change within ourselves, can we see the bloom of the next season of our lives.
please read the following…
tl;dr
Swamp Thing is slowly dying from the bitter cold while trying to protect a young boy from the encroachment of an endless winter storm. The child persistently urges that Swamp Thing to keep pressing forward to avoid the Snow Monster. But in the end, Swamp Thing realizes the young boy is the real monster that keeps the winter from coming to an end. Upon this realization, he takes control, corrects his errors, and changes the ending of the story.
interpretation
Growth only happens at the rate of acceptance, which brings me to my interpretation of Swamp Thing: Winter Special.
We are the Swamp Thing — outwardly seen as the monster by the world. Created from our environment, gilded by our experience, and tied to the direction of the young child we carry with us. A winter storm exists within all of us — some more severe than others — but its duration is always within our control. The endlessness of the winter storm Swamp Thing faces, is matched with the persistence of the young child he carries with him. We all carry that young child with us in the form of childhood trauma.
For most of us, we clutch so tightly onto it that it becomes Us. So, we defend it at every turn, believing it needs to be protected more than it needs to be healed. It has the power to shape our identity and alter the course of our lives. It is a monster that resides in all of us. Keeping us in an endless storm of depression, sadness, or anxiety, while continuously encouraging us that holding on is better than letting go. It’s not.
The real monster — the wicked, destructive force — is the thing we cannot let go of, the thing that keeps us stagnant, the thing that keeps who we are, the thing that resists the natural transition of the seasons of life. It’s the young child from the story that Swamp Thing protects so faithfully. It’s the childhood trauma we all endure. Only when Swamp Thing came to the realization that the real monster was the child, was he able to break free from the winter storm.
Likewise, our childhood trauma has to be realized, accepted, and eventually dealt with for us to transition into the next version of ourselves. And for most of us, that will be one of the hardest things we’ll have to do. But for the endless winter to break, and the season to change, it’s really the only path towards a life we are so badly withstanding the storm for.