Interviewing Cultural Fantasies: The Tooth Fairy

Tooth Fairy

The following interview, with the “Tooth Fairy,” demonstrates what can be done with a secular, trivial, and silly cultural myth, in order to further exemplify how life doesn’t care what value you or I put on any experience; it will use whatever is at hand in order to say whatever it wants to say. It also illustrates “crazy wisdom,” or the idea that things that sound irrational may be found, on closer evaluation, to contain, or lead to, awakening and enlightenment. In Integral Deep Listening, this is called “cosmic humor,” and it is characterized by the cultivation of an objectivity that allows you to smile and even laugh at the sad, confused, and sometimes embarrassing dramas of your life predicament, even though they are, at the same time, deadly serious.

I decided to channel the Tooth Fairy as a “psychic reading” for a good friend. For the poor, unfortunate souls who have never been visited by the Tooth Fairy, she leaves money if you will put the tooth that fell out or was extracted under your pillow when you go to sleep. The Tooth Fairy is a standing joke between my friend and I about imploring the help of any and all mythological or metaphysical constructs – gods, demons, life energies, yogis, etc. that might provide some leverage on this or that life issue – career, money, health, relationships, whatever.  When we want something, there is no limit to the superstitious behaviors that we are willing to indulge in in order to get it. Making fun of that human tendency is one way of not taking our concerns so seriously. Interviewing the Tooth Fairy takes that strategy to the other side of the Twilight Zone.

Here is what the Tooth Fairy had to say: “I am an imaginary figment of your imagination, probably even more imaginary than the characters in your dreams.  That’s because during dreams your think your self-created images and dream characters are real when they are usually and mostly self-created delusions.  But even in waking life you know I am a convenient cultural delusion, part of a common dream that generations inherit – a comfortable harmless lie some parents tell their children.”

“I have no credibility, therefore I have very little in the way of a reputation to uphold.  I am imaginary; therefore I can be as foolish and as playful as I like! People can think whatever they want about me and it doesn’t affect me at all! How could I have weakness if I’m imaginary?  What’s there to dislike about myself? I am content at being unreal; I don’t have to stress myself out by needing to be different, like say, Pinocchio.”

“I personify receptivity to anything and everything, even the ridiculous and foolish, but in a way that is still discriminatory. It is not that everything is absurd or meaningless or of equal value, only that there are absurd and meaningless aspects in everyone and every situation, and experience is enhanced when they are recognized.”

“If I could change, because I was summoned to make a comment about Joseph’s friend and his green energy interests, maybe I’d turn into a catastrophe large enough to wake the government up so it would embrace his technologies to reduce global warming.  Something that would quadruple the price of oil, maybe…”

“So now I’m a Catastrophe Causing Tooth Fairy, maybe something like the Stay Puffed marshmallow man in Ghostbusters. As such, of course I’m confident! I’m a ‘ten’ in confidence; I kick ass! From the point of view of a lot of humans, I’m a disaster and totally hurtful and hateful. From the perspective of just about everything else, I am a force for purification.  So how do I score myself in compassion? I don’t know; I don’t think in those terms, so I guess zero. I would score myself an eight in intelligence. I think I’m pretty damn smart. I don’t know about wisdom. However, it’s true that if I could bring about reduction of global warming without destroying everything, I’d be wiser. I am a ‘two’ in acceptance, because I don’t accept what humans are doing to the planet.I am a ‘seven’ in inner peace because I have a lot of it about being a catastrophe.  I’m an ‘eight’ in witnessing.”

“If I scored tens in all six of these qualities I wouldn’t be a catastrophe any more.  I would probably be a creative, productive human that can work the system to make things happen.  In fact, I would be thousands of people like your friend, and together we would leverage the global economic system…”

So Tooth Fairy/Stay-Puffed Marshmallow Demon, you’ve basically turned into my friend that is cloned countless times?

“Yup. If you were like me you wouldn’t waste any time being angry at the flat-earth global warming deniers and the greedy assholes in the energy business that fund them. You need to keep doing what you’re doing, what you’re working on.  You have a message that needs to get out there to more people. Help your friend help the world with his heroic efforts in launching his Green business:  What greater assistance could you possibly be than doing Tooth Fairy interviews for him??? I would recommend you focus on staying focused. Become me only when you want to feel connected on a global level to the solution of global problems.  Besides that, I’m useless.  However, it’s true I don’t do drama. I leave that to the Tea Partiers and the people who worry about them and terrorists. I have showed up to provide both Joseph and his friend more confidence.”

When I thought about what was said I concluded, “My Tooth Fairy turned into a catastrophe and then into a multiple clone of my friend, creating a collective consciousness that makes catastrophes unnecessary.  I heard myself say I don’t need to put energy into fear or worry.  Also, that I’m connected to global solutions. I am to stop listening to the bad news and focus on amplifying emerging potentials that have solutions and connect with others who have solutions too.

I failed miserably, or the Tooth Fairy did, or both, in the attempt to channel Universal Truth for my friend. Perhaps if I had chosen to interview God I might have gotten something profound to share, but neither I nor the Tooth Fairy was in a profound mood that day. Nevertheless, the Tooth Fairy transmogrified into some helpful perspectives, and these can be used to throw light on cultural myths and the part they play in our lives.

How so? Notice that no matter what you start with, when you use an Integral Deep Listening interviewing protocol, an accessed emerging potential will use dream characters, cultural mythic figures like heroes and Santa Claus, as well as the personifications of your own most important life issues, to tell you what it thinks you need to know to wake up a bit more in your life.

Why don’t you pick a favorite cultural myth and interview it? Find out what, if anything, it has to say to you about the life issues that mean the most to you. You will probably be surprised at what you learn.

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