Have you ever read a book you wished could be real? Have you ever heard a tale, and wishedyou could be a part of it? Everyone has a story other than their own that they carry with them. A story that tugs at their heart and mind, a constant reminder of a dream that will never be true. A story where danger waits around every corner. A story where good always wins. A story where ‘happily ever after’ isn’t just a line to send children to sleep without the shadow of nightmares dancing through their dreams.

But what if you could really have that life? What if, when you turned your attentions to that other world where you wished you could belong, you really became a part of it?

Would it be a miracle? A dream come true?

Or would it be a nightmare? A prison sentence to a place where you could never belong?

After all, despite our desperate wish for escape from work, from sorrow, from the doldrums of our cyclic lives, we never consider the reality of what we wish for. How could we? To consider the reality of a place that is not real? Where is the sense in such a venture?

Yet if we threw sense aside and really thought about what we were asking for, we would see that what we always thought was a dream was just another nightmare in disguise.

Because the stories we love so much, the ones that are so much more exciting and magnificent than our plain lives, are built upon pain and suffering. What need is there for heroes if there is not great turmoil? Where is the danger that draws us in if there is not the threat of death? Where is the substance that makes us so attached if the characters we so admire do not feel the burden of adversity nearly defeating them?

When we read a story, we hope for adventure. We never stop to consider that if it were real, if it were happening to us, we would be feeling the pain, the fear, the loss…all of the bad, and not just the good.

The hurdles of fiction are much more obvious; the hero embarks upon a dangerous journey, the villain kidnaps the girl, the king abuses his power. Maybe that is why storybooks are so appealing. In the real world, trials creep unseen until they are upon us, and are often still encrypted when we finally do realize their presence. In fantasy, the burdens carried are spelled out clear as day. But just because they are transparent does not mean they are easier to defeat.

Ask yourself, if the story were real, and you were a part of it…could you really survive it all? Could you brave the monsters, the massacres, the malefactors? Could you withstand the second-guessing and the paralyzing fears? Could you bear the intense mental and physical pain and the staggering guilt of failure? Could you live with the knowledge that, at any moment, your life could end? Could you carry on knowing if you failed, an entire world would suffer? Could you withstand such a burden?

And, if you somehow possess the strength for such feats of bravery and endurance, could you do it all alone? For no one in your story would believe where you came from. Could you accept that you would forever be a stranger? Not born among your fellows in the world you have ventured into, nor able to return to the world you came from? Could you live with the emptiness of losing an entire life? Of leaving behind your home, your past, your future, your family, your friends?

How much could you survive?