No One Can Break the Curses You Have Placed on Yourself-- But You!

In the 2007 film “Penelope,” Christina Ricci plays Penelope Wilhern. Penelope is born into a wealthy family that unfortunately has a curse on it. Seems great-grandpa Wilhern had a tryst with a servant girl and impregnated her. He wanted to marry the girl but his blue-blooded parents quashed the notion that a Wilhern should marry someone so unworthy.  As a result, the servant girl jumped off a cliff and killed herself. Her mother, the town witch, then placed a curse on the Wilhern family: Henceforth, every female born unto the Wilherns will have the features of a pig.

Luckily for the Wilherns, a long period of time passed with only male births. But in the early 1960s, the first female Wilhern was born. The baby was perfectly normal and so most of the Wilhern family believed the curse was broken. Mom, on the other hand, new differently. The baby wasn’t Mr. Wilhern’s child—It was the chauffeur’s. 

Twenty years later, a second Wilhern female is born—with the features of a pig—and her name is Penelope. Penelope’s mom does her best to keep Penelope under wraps. She’s never allowed to leave the house and is essentially a prisoner in her own mansion. She has no friends or contact with the outside world until she gets old enough to marry. You see, the witch stipulated that the curse could be broken if Penelope married a blue-blood. 

Penelope’s mom, Jessica, does her best to line-up all of the eligible blue-blooded young men she can find, but as soon as they see Penelope, they run for their lives. While all of this is happening, a reporter named Lemon has an inkling about what’s going on in the Wilhern family. When his suspicions are proven by a crazed young blue-blood her can’t hide his horror of having met Penelope, Lemon decides to look for a down and out blue blood named Max to court Penelope.

Unfortunately for Lemon, he mistakes commoner Johnny (James McAvoy) for Max and sends Johnny off to meet Penelope. Johnny’s initially grossed-out by Penelope’s pig features, but he sticks around and as he gets to know Penelope, he begins to like the person inside her. Johnny eventually comes to love Penelope, but he knows he’s not a blue-blood and that he can’t marry her and break the curse.

Jessica finally ropes a blue-blood into marrying Penelope, but at the altar Penelope says “No!” She runs back to her room with her mother on her heels. Mom is insistent that this wedding is the only way Penelope can ever be happy. But Penelope insists that she’s happy now, saying “I like myself just as I am.” As soon as these words flow off Penelope’s tongue, she is transformed into a beautiful, normal girl.

The curse is broken. And, as it turned out, nobody could break the curse but Penelope herself. There was no blue-blooded male, no prince charming who could magically break her curse for her. She had to break the curse by accepting and loving herself as she was.

How often have we placed curses on ourselves, or allowed others to place curses on us? No one can break these curses but us. If you’ve been looking for a Mr. or Miss Right to rescue you and break your curse, you have been living a fairy tale—a “grim” fairy tale. Rescue yourself. Break your own curses by accepting and loving yourself just as you are, and allow your soul to shine!