I’ve been through a similar thing. My upbringing left me with the “happily-ever-after” story as my guide, and the belief that everything would just work out for me.

Then when things didn’t just “work out”, I abandoned that story where someone else was in control, to one of being a passenger in a story I had no control over, and have been pretty much verging on fatalism for at least the past year.

Now I’m inspired by the idea of a story that I get to write (and it being part of a larger narrative). However, I’m also feeling a responsibility for those that are part of my story, to be intentional about it, and create memories for them that are better than what I have.

Which is not saying that you or this way of looking at things are at all wrong – just that I was seeing my life as a story in a rather damaging way… or maybe I was just focusing on the fairytale rather than the real story.

My life changed for the better when I decided that my life wasn’t a story. I gave up on the happily ever after with mr perfect; the everything working-out-okay-in-the-end: I embraced the messiness and contradiction and uncomfortable imbalance of life.

And interestingly, I think that’s just coming to the same place as you: just from the opposite direction.