Everything My Daughter Needs To Know She Can Learn From A Disney Princess - Mulan

Mulan is the "warrior princess." She is the one typically seen as strong and willing to fight for what she believes in and not "waiting to be rescued." When I read Peggy Ornstein's book she even talked about how miserable Mulan was in the matchmaker dress and how upsetting it is that the only place you can meet her (Epcot in China) she is wearing that, since that isn't who she wants to be at all. The funny thing about all of that is as far as I can tell people don't understand Mulan at all. Mulan doesn't fit in. She doesn't seem to be excelling at the life she has. She is smart and yet in her world she has no real outlet for that. She is expected to be quiet (in public - her parents don't seem to treat her that way), refined and to make a good match to bring honor to her family. When she is getting dressed and ready to meet the matchmaker I did not see her as unhappy that she was doing this but nervous that she would be unsuccessful. She seems to feel that she is not good at anything. When her father is called to war, more than anything she seems to feel that just in being a girl she has failed her father again - why can't she at least be a boy who could keep him from dying?

So, what can my daughter learn from Mulan? Well, first and foremost my daughter can learn that fitting in is not always the most important thing. In the end Mulan saves all of China because she finds something that she is good at and she excels at it. She is good at being a warrior. She is smart and she uses her brain to outthink the opponents. She sees the opportunity in the mountain to cause the avalanche that takes out almost all of the Huns. She fools them by getting the other soldiers to be concubines and then she takes out Shan Yu by using some physics to calculate where that firework will take him out. The emperor says it best: "The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all."

My daughter can learn that no matter what problem is presented to her there is always a solution that can be worked out if she thinks about it long enough. When the soldiers are faced with retrieving the arrow none of them can do it. Including Mulan. When Mulan is faced with being sent home because she is not strong enough to be in the army she spends the entire night trying to figure out how to climb that pole. In the end she does. Not because she is strong but because she is smart. She finally figures out how to hold those weights so that they help her, not hinder her, as she climbs the pole. My daughter can learn to keep trying to puzzle out the answer to any problem - no matter how big it seems. 

My daughter can also that she has worth just by being herself. When Mulan comes home she hands her father the emperor's crest telling him it is to "bring honor to the family." He tells her that "the greatest privilege and honor is having you for a daughter." As a parent I want my daughter to know that I am always proud of her. She does not have to fit into some random mold that someone else has decided would make her the "perfect daughter." She just has to be herself and try her best. I will always be proud of who she is. 

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