I watched a very sweet and quirky movie last night entitled Lars and the Real Girl. On the surface, the movie seemed like it might just be strange, but the characters and writing and message quickly drew me in. How they told the story and the underlying compassion beneath it is what has really stayed with me through today.

The story is about Lars, a painfully shy, yet very good-hearted man who has been seemingly damaged to the point of no repair by his family history. He lives in the garage apartment of his childhood home with his older brother and pregnant sister-in-law, both of whom care very deeply for him and try to help him overcome his less than fully fuctional state. He has a job, but he is very inept at socialization, and compulsively keeps to himself.

Lars decides to purchase Bianca, a life-sized girl doll, as a companion. To Lars, Bianca is alive and very real. Unlike the more typical uses for an anatomically correct doll, Lars treats Bianca with love, respect, and dignity. He compliments her, tells her jokes, opens the door for her, and they sleep in separate rooms because, being that their relationship is so new, to do otherwise would be a violation of trust. Any woman would yearn to be treated with so much care.

Of course his brother, who carries guilt with him for their childhood years through hard times, goes bonkers with worry about Lars seemingly going off the deep end. The sister-in-law hatches a plan to get Lars to accompany his new latex girlfriend to see the local doctor (who also happens to be a psychologist) to make sure Biana stayed healthy during her travel. The doctor uses the time during Bianca’s “treatments” to help Lars untangle his psyche. The doctor further suggests that Lars is not mentally ill, but rather having a delusion designed to help him work through his childhood trauma. She encourages them all to go with it, to treat Bianca as a person until Lars is able to move on without her.

What ensues is a deeply humorous and insightful journey about attachment (or lack of it), the very human need for companionship, and how each of us uses symbols of some sort to not only cope with our traumas, but also to define who we are in this world. We all have our delusions and we all have a need for acceptance.

Here is a scene where the brother and his wife are telling their church family about Bianca and Lars’ need for understanding:

By the end of the movie, the entire town has befriended Bianca with an unconditional love and patience unlike any movie I’ve ever seen. There are no “kill the bully to get the girl” undercurrents here. No one particularly makes fun of Lars. They seem to buy into the idea that he is working through a healing process. Even if he never “gets better”, he is happier than they’ve ever seen him and is interacting with them more than he ever has before.

I don’t want to spoil the story but suffice it to say, Lars works through his issue and returns to humanity able to love and interact with real people like other better adjusted adults. What seemed like a crazy little movie turned out to be a shining example of a new way of treating each other, a new formula of communicating and sharing.

Your first response to this story might be to reject it as unrealistic. Bullies are a given in this dog-eat-dog world and everyone makes fun of those who are different, right? It’s just human nature to be competitive….right? I don’t happen to believe that, but maybe so.

So, how do we create change? I think our world changes, in part, by movies like this. To see such a well done representation of love in action moved and inspired me. It touched my heart because I long for this type of world. And, when people are moved and inspired, they act differently. They change.

So, finally, we arrive at our business. How can we effectively change our world in a way that moves us from war and hate to love and peace? How do we do that through our business? What is our current metaphor, the symbolic story we tell, that defines us and how we conduct our business? What is our coping delusion and how can we heal and move past it?

What is your business Biana, your delusion for coping? What do you choose as your companion in business? Is it stress or worry? Is it food or tobacco? Is it procrastination? Or something positive, yet still a delusion? Would you be able to serve another by understanding their need and allowing for their differences without ridicule? Would you have voted Bianca onto the school board (yes, the story humorously goes that far…)?

Every day, as business people, we are given the opportunity to reach others and serve them. yet often we are focused only on our own viewpoints and needs. When we look beyond the “norm” and truly see another for what they need and how we can help, lives can be transformed. It’s the stories we hold sacred and the metaphors we live that guide us.

What is your business metaphor? How can you soften your grip on your own delusion to move forward in a better and faster way? I challenge you to find out and to do it. Not only is it good business but you will impact others in a way you can barely imagine yet. Go rent the movie and see if inspires you too. Then, go do your thing. Even if this world isn’t idealic yet, do your thing. It makes a beautiful (even if quirky) difference. :-)

Together, we are stronger.
Vicki Flaugher, the original SmartWoman

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