Isolation

Here’s something I’ve discovered since coming home: for missionaries, regular time stops the day they go into the MTC. I still expect girls that were pregnant when I left to be pregnant. “New movies” are any movie that came out after I left. Everyone is the age and stage they were when I left. So then I see them and I’m shocked.

Along the vein of movies, “Frozen” is still a new movie in my mind. It was the first movie I saw after being released, and I was asking people if they’d seen it for like two weeks after that. Their responses were usually something like “Uhhh yes….” with inexplicable perplexity in their faces. #RMProbs

Anyway, that was a pre-set for a Frozen post, because I fully recognize that the internet is over Frozen and everyone has already said everything there is to say about it. But I haven’t! It’s still a new movie for me! So here are some of my thoughts, and you can yawn and pass on if you’re sick of Frozen blogs.

I have to admit that the first time I watched it, the homosexuality political commentary was screaming at me the whole time. No one had told me about it, but I’d just spent a year and a half in LA, home of the Rainbow Crosswalk on Santa Monica Boulevard, so it was kind of fresh on my mind.

I was quick to come up with other readings for the film, because I would prefer to not love a movie that promotes disobedience. My current reading of choice centers around the concept of isolation. Individuals who struggle with same-gender attraction absolutely experience isolation, and I cannot begin to comprehend how difficult that trial would be, but I think that all challenges, trials, and weaknesses have the potential for placing us in isolation. Any challenge. Any trial. Any weakness. If we “conceal, don’t feel, don’t let it show”, we continue in isolation. Therefore, “letting it go” shouldn’t mean breaking serious commandments. “Letting it go” should mean being open with our struggles and seeking support. We are not intended to do anything in this life by ourselves. That’s why we have families, that’s why we have wards and home- and visiting-teaching, and that’s why we have the Atonement. Because of the Atonement, we never need to be isolated. He has literally experienced every trail and challenge and weakness we will ever have, and He knows exactly how to help us. (See Alma 7:11-13.)

In conclusion, I think Disney’s “Frozen” is a commentary on the necessity of relying on the Atonement and living the Gospel of Jesus Christ. People do in fact “make bad choices if they’re mad or scared or stressed”, and it is our responsibility to “throw a little love their way”! The Act of true love that was performed by the Lord Jesus Christ is the only way frozen hearts can be thawed, and the only way any trial or challenge or weakness can be overcome. We “let it go” by relying on Him.

Those are my thoughts on Frozen. I loved it. I cried the first time I heard “Let it Go”.