Discovering Inner Strength: Life Lessons from 'The Wizard of Oz' and Cherished Holiday Traditions

Ever find yourself searching for something out there, only to realize the solution was within you all along? Join us as we wander down the nostalgic yellow brick road, drawing life lessons from "The Wizard of Oz." We revisit childhood memories of watching Dorothy and her companions—the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion—as they embark on a journey of self-discovery, reminding us of the inner strength we each possess. This episode is a heartfelt exploration of how our mindset and language can empower us, much like Dorothy, to find our way home without needing a wizard's help.

Reflecting on early Christmas mornings and the cherished traditions of our Spanish and English heritage, we share stories of joy and the occasional disappointment. Through our experiences, we reveal the sacrifices our immigrant mother made to ensure the holidays were magical, even with limited resources. From the surprise of wooden prams, built by our dad because our parents couldn't afford to buy us the dolls prams in the shops to the true origins of our gifts, we uncover how cultural traditions and family dynamics shaped our understanding of love and resilience. As we journey through life's ups and downs, we invite you to share your own stories of family, tradition, and the road that leads you home.

Hypnotherapy coaching sessions can help if you are struggling with anxiety.  Please email us at englishsisters@gmail.com if you would like help with an issue, mentioning this episode of our podcast for a special discounted rate. We work with clients worldwide over Zoom. Buy our Book Stress Free in Three Minutes available on Amazon and Kindle, to help support our work. Thank you!

Love and smiles from The English Sisters.

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Power Within
• 11:10 Childhood Christmas Memories and Epiphany
• 18:30 The Journey of Life

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Chasing, chasing, chasing when you're always chasing things in life. What's it like? Yeah, it's a bit like Dorothy, isn't it? What was she chasing down that yellow brick road? Yes, the magical Wizard of Oz. We used to watch that when we were little, didn't we? Yes, we did. We watched it every year. It was pretty boring. Sometimes it was boring, but it was a done thing. It was nice to watch it with the family. It was, yeah. So listen to this week's episode of get real with the English sisters. So we'd quite like to know today, even though it's, yes, quite deep in the end, it is actually, yeah, obviously, when you watch that film when you're a child, what do you see? You see the witches, the monkeys, the scarecrow, the tin man.

Speaker 1: 0:49

I didn't really understand any of it, really, except for the fact that Dorothy was always trying to get back home. I used to like the red shoes because they were shiny. The red shoes were pretty, yeah, and they were apparently magical, weren't they? Well, they were supposed to be to tap them three times and you'd go back to kansas, you'd go back home. But really, the meaning of this, the whole, the whole story, is that dorothy, after all the journey, she went on with the tin man and the scarecrow. Yeah, that she. She had the power just to get back home on her own, just by saying the words. Somebody gave her those shoes, didn't they? No, I think she had them as well, or did the? Wasn't that good witch who gave her these red shoes? Oh my gosh, we wouldn't need google now I've forgotten it.

Speaker 1: 1:35

Yeah, okay, right, I can't remember about the red shoes, but I mean, I I do remember the lion being very frightened, yes, which was a bit of a paradox, isn't it? Because he's a lion, yeah, come on, even though he had a man's face, which I always thought was a bit weird. In the original film, you can see it's just a costume. The tin man is made a bit better, isn't he? He's sort of like more like a real tin, and the scarecrow was scared. And the lion, oh, the lion lacked bravery. Yeah, that was it. Yeah, and the scarecrow, obviously, yes, he was scared. Yeah, and I think it's a bit like it would.

Speaker 1: 2:18

I mean, it reflects our everyday lives, how we might have low self-esteem or we might absolutely bravery when we suffer from anxiety and sometimes when other people perceive you as being really brave and you're not, it makes you feel worse, doesn't it? Yeah, because if you, if you think, if you think that you're really brave, why are you acting so weird looking around? If you're watching this on video, who's gonna be here? It's just us in the studio. Come on, who are you looking at? You're looking to see if the phone's gonna ring.

Speaker 1: 2:54

Oh no, the landline where sometimes we forget to unhook the landline, and because I never answer that landline anymore never because it's normally just promoters and that stuff so I ignore it. Anyway, yeah, it's just creaks. So you've just heard a little creak. It's this old house. It's this old house. Yeah, it's the old house, it creaks.

Speaker 1: 3:13

No, but I mean, sometimes when you're in a, you have responsibility, I know what you mean and then you might not feel as if you're as brave as what everyone else thinks you are, or you might need help and you might think but yeah, but no one thinks I need help. They all think I'm amazing and I can do everything. I'm a lion, I'm strong, I'm brave, but I don't feel like that inside. So that does, in a way, reflect the film. Yes, I think he was missing a heart. I think you know we should have researched this film before. I mean, you did a little tiny bit in the kitchen, it wasn't anyway. Who cares? Yes, the whole thing is that we didn't understand that film, but the end part is actually quite significant, isn't it?

Speaker 1: 4:01

Because dorothy, all she has to do, she's always thinking she has to have the wizard, the magical wizard, who just ends up to be a little old man. Yeah, shouting with a microphone. Yeah, because she needs a wizard to get back home. But really, all she has the power within herself. All she has to do is tap her little red slippers three times and she'll, she's back home like that. Well, she has to do is tap her little red uh slippers three times and she'll, she's back home like that.

Speaker 1: 4:28

Well, she has to say the words. So it really it's the language that we have, it's what gives us power. Yeah, what words does she say? I want to go home? Yeah, I want to go back to kansas. Is that all she says? Yeah, that's like uh, this you're probably gonna think why didn't they read? No, I think that's what she says. Yeah, I want going to think. Why didn't they read? No, I think that's what she says. Yeah, I want to go home, I want to go home, something like that and, if you think about it, sometimes we're looking desperately for a feeling of like our hearts aren't quite calm, are they?

Speaker 1: 5:13

They're not quite satisfied in life. We're struggling when hardly ever I mean people that are really satisfied with their everyday lives are really fortunate. Yes, most of us have lived some form of discontent. We're always either searching for something or we feel as if we have a lack of something. Yes, yes, yes, we're always in lack. We're not in that state of full abundance and appreciation and really enjoying the moment, whatever it may bring. So, no matter what this enormous long journey down this yellow brick road was, in the end, ultimately she had the power within herself, dorothy, to bring herself back home because really she was always home. Yes, she had home, was with inside her already. Yeah, they were just like. I suppose they represented all her anxieties and things. She was just always. She was always home. It was really.

Speaker 1: 6:08

It was just a dream in the film. Yeah, in the film that we watched, it was just a dream. Yeah, she just wakes up with a little dog again and that's it. And you think, gosh, all of that was just one big. I remember being a bit frustrated when I found that out when I was a kid, you know, I thought, gosh, it was all just a dream, because you wanted some real magic as a child, yes, yeah, as a child I wanted it to be more like the cartoons, I guess, and it wasn't.

Speaker 1: 6:35

But the part that I do remember the most about that film is sitting in our little living room with mum and dad and we all watched it and it was like, oh, the Wizard of Oz is coming on again. And then dad would say, I've seen that. But then we would still put it on because that's what was on on Christmas day. There wasn't much choice, it was like three or four channels and we would all sit there together and that's what I remember. That's why I remember it being nice. I remember mum putting a little blanket on. Oh, I'm getting emotional. She used to put this little like checked blanket over her and if I would sit next to her, she would put the little blanket over me too. Oh, gosh, yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:17

And I remember that about watching the wizard of oz, and it was like calm and they would just watch it. Mum and dad would watch it, even though, you know, sometimes I would think, oh, they're watching, it's like a children's film, but they would watch it as well. It wasn't just like us when we were watching our little kiddie stuff, because it was considered a family film. It was considered a family Christmas. It wasn't just for kids. Yeah, do you remember it the way I do? Do you remember what I'm talking about? I remember, right. Yeah, well, you mean sitting down and, yeah, on that sofa, with the pattern, the flower, the flowery, the green sofa, with those, the sofa and the green sofa and everything.

Speaker 1: 7:54

But I don't remember all the details that you know, because I, because I probably I didn't like the film much, but I remember that focused on the family being together than I was, I don't know, I was more interested in the film. Well, I remember that because a lot of times when the films would start, mum would be in the kitchen watch, washing up, and I would find that I didn't like that. No, but she would always come, though sometimes she would come, but sometimes she would be like late or she wouldn't. You know, you can't, you couldn't just stop and start the movie. So I would feel like a bit anxious. I would say, mom, come, you know it's starting, but for that particular film, I don't know, we would watch all of it right from the beginning and the music three hours, oh, the music at the beginning, and then, yeah, I, she would stop and go off for a cup of tea and things and then come back.

Speaker 1: 8:43

Would there be adverts? I don't know, I can't remember there were adverts in those days. Who would last Were there adverts? Yeah, really long ones, oh, so you could get up and go off somewhere, anyway.

Speaker 1: 9:04

But yeah, I'm wondering, you know, the whole film, film is that where we, you know, in the end, the meaning of it is quite significant, isn't it? The meaning is is that we're always home, but we always think we have to have more, more, more. We're already complete, aren't we? We don't need anything extra. We don't need a, like, a new haircut or a new to be to be home. We don't need a new dress or a new to be home. We don't need a new dress or a new. Yes, they're nice things, but you don't need them, so they're not necessities. You just, you know you need the basic. Of course, we all need our basic needs. But then all the rest of it, all this chasing, chasing for, I mean for the bigger, like, even the you know the stress of the christmas shopping and the christmas presents. I mean, what some of our happiest memories are when now you're gonna start tearing dad would make us a little pram exactly wooden pram.

Speaker 1: 9:52

Yes, couldn't, they couldn't, they couldn't afford, they couldn't afford us to make us a little pram for our dolls yeah, the little to buy them. And the the little girl up the road, had a new one and then we said, oh no, she's got a new pram. We want a pram for christmas. Father, christmas will bring us a pram. That probably put mom and dad into massive crisis. No way, two prams, I mean, you know, yeah, so he made, you know, dad made us that tiny little wooden pram with it. And then mom made little wooden wheels, wooden wheels. It was just a basic. It was a little square box but then he had a little like a little cover on. It had a hood. Yeah, he made a hood, a little wooden hood. So the little doll put the hood down? Obviously no, it was a hood, it made a hood, it made a little wooden hood. So, the little doll, you couldn't put the hood down. Obviously no, it was made of wood. But it was so cute and it had little wooden wheels and the little sticks to push it along, and we would push it along up the street, just like the other little girl that was considered to be the rich one, because she was. Obviously they were more well-off than we were at the time, probably, yeah, and you know we were so happy, yeah, and she loved them as well. So we still liked hers more, you preferred hers more.

Speaker 1: 11:10

You wanted the shop one, didn't you? I did, yeah, and then I think, but I still liked the baby one a lot. Did Mum buy you a real baby pram and you were really upset about it? Oh God, I think no. Then, like Mummy and me. And three years later we were a lot older. You were like eight or something. Yeah, we were a lot older.

Speaker 1: 11:28

Then I asked for a pram again because I fixated with prams. Oh God, I thought we wanted. Obviously it's what they used to advertise kids in those days. I don't know, yeah, and I don't know yeah and uh and yeah, and I got a real pram. Yeah, that was a bit disappointing, so it wasn't a dolly's like, it was a real posture for real children. It was because my mum probably thought, look, she thought it was cheaper than the other one and she probably thought this will do. She can put, because my doll was quite big, so she thought the doll fits in it and then I can use it as well. Yeah, I'll use it for because she was a child minder. That was the biggest disappointment. That was yeah, that's what I'm thinking about.

Speaker 1: 12:07

As far as you know, christmas present goes and father christmas. I think when you actually saw that pram, you did not. That wasn't even really because we used to get up some of our presents we would get at christmas because they did respect the Christmas tradition, but since mum was Spanish, we would get the pram came at Reyes Magos. Reyes Magos for the Spanish community, you'll know. Yeah, that's the epiphany is when the three kings actually bring, you know, the children gifts. And then that's when I knew that, like it wasn't, that mum had done it, I knew it wasn't real. Oh yeah, that Christmas of the Three Kings, yeah, because I saw it.

Speaker 1: 12:49

It had mother care. Mother care is a shop in the UK. It used to be. I mean, it's still there. It's still there. I think it's still there and it sells all kids stuff, you know, for children, for babies, and obviously that brand name Mothercare that gave it up, didn't it?

Speaker 1: 13:07

It gave it, totally gave it away. It's written right across the foot bit yeah, that was a bit. That was disappointing. And then I said to mum, that's not from the Reyes Magos, you must have bought that. No, no, I didn't buy it, the Reyes Magos bought it and then that's what happened.

Speaker 1: 13:23

I never really did believe much in those Reyes Magos palaver. I didn't. I didn't, you know, being brought up in England. Definitely, father Christmas was there, but the Reyes Magos was like this I mean, I didn't, I didn't really get that.

Speaker 1: 13:36

Our cousins in Spain would say, no, they're really important, they really do bring you gifts. And I would think, but that's Father Christmas that brings you gifts. And then they would always arrive via you know the post, the post they arrived like in packets. Who From Spain? These gifts? Was it just mum buying them? No, mum would just buy them. No, spanish aunties would give them. Oh my God, I've just discovered this at 57. I thought our Spanish aunties would send them. No, didn't they send us this doll once, this special Spanish doll? Did they send that? Or did we go and get it when we went there once? Because once we went there for Christmas and we got, I think maybe one time after that they did send one, they sent the other dog, I think, once we got one there, and then, once they sent one, one arrived like at the post office or something like in a packet.

Speaker 1: 14:27

Anyway, yeah, these are the things that you kind of remember about the Christmas time, don't you? You do, you do, you don't forget them. No, funny, really, is it funny? Well, yeah, it stays with you all these years. Well, yeah, that disappointment stayed with you, didn't it?

Speaker 1: 14:48

I mean, I'm not bothered about it, obviously, even as a child was very mature, yes, I realized, I reasoned, I realized why mom had done it and that she needed the prime, and I kind of felt sorry for her. Yeah, yeah, you thought, okay, yeah, she, you can use it, borrow it. She would, yes, yeah, she would borrow it definitely. And then, I think, when we were older, she told us it's because the little ones were so expensive compared to the bigger one, so she She'd also did it and this one looks sturdier and stronger. She also did it for that reason. Yeah, but I think really, it was her practicality kicking in there. Practicality can kick in when you're you know, you've got responsibilities.

Speaker 1: 15:30

It was unusual for her because she always used to go to such a big effort to make Christmas really special for us, so it wasn't really like something that she would generally do. No, it was unusual. Yeah, so I don't know, maybe they were going through a harder time that we didn't know as kids. No, yeah, you don't know half of it, do you when you're growing up? Because all the rest of the time she would always take us to the shop and ask choose our Christmas present. And then say, oh, she would be really sneaky about it. Come and have a look and then see what you like, and then I like this and I like this, and then afterwards she would buy it and then it would appear on Christmas Day. Yeah, then later on she would tell us that gifts and you know, the things that we would choose in those days, were really expensive for her being an immigrant, a Spanish immigrant, and so she would have to like literally put save pennies in this little wooden box for to be able to afford it. And then, once she actually told the shop can, can you keep them for me and I'll bring you every week, I'll bring you like one pound. And then she said there was a lovely shop and a toy shop, and they said, yes, of course we'll do that for you. And they kept them Like she would go like in June or something and we would have absolutely no idea about Christmas.

Speaker 1: 16:49

No, I remember going a with later than that. Well, yeah, but come on, it was a lot in advance. It didn't feel like anywhere near the winter or something. She would be very just. Let's just browse around the kids shop. And obviously that's what we did with our children as well. We would take them to the toy shop and say, oh yay, we would have a night here in italy, we would have a couple chino, let let you go and have a look at the toys, isn't it lovely? Then we say, oh, father, christmas is coming soon, and then, of course, we would find out which ones they wanted exactly.

Speaker 1: 17:22

I mean, you've got to find your little ways, don't you? You do, you do. But yes, I do wonder if we're not all like dorothy, that we really do possess our own inner wisdom and our own inner power and we already have the resources we need. However, we still need to go on that journey and go through those difficulties and the struggles in order to come back. Yeah, but I think we can help ourselves by making that journey a little easier and realizing that we don't always need to be chasing, and you know, you'd be grateful for all the, all the resources and everything we have already within us, and that maybe the wizard of oz is, is, is is just like in the film. You know, this person that we're searching for to emulate or to be like a lot of the times, like you know, maybe we are more than they are. We are more than they are because we are what we need, we are what we need, what they need, and but we still have to go through that journey of discovery because it's like as if it's someone else.

Speaker 1: 18:30

That's life, isn't it? That's life. That's life. That's the joy of living really as well, the game we live. It's that yellow brick road that we've all got to go down, and with all the magic and the stress that goes along with it, I guess. Well, let us know what you think. We hope you enjoy the festive season and we'll see you next week. Lots of love and smiles from the English Sisters. Bye.