Off to seek my fortune–it’s a fairy tale phrase. One of my all-time favorite movies “The Princess Bride” begins with the romantic hero Wesley goes to do that exact thing.

It still happens, I think. One way or they other, we are seeking our fortune.

I’m not sure when this quest-phrase was overtaken by “find myself.”

I know it was popular in the 1960s. Flower children ran away to San Francisco to have be-ins.

We are all looking for ourselves, it seems.

I know I lose myself often and quickly. As I immerse myself in some new environment or project I lose my borders and take on what I see the group needs as my own need.

Immerse is the right word for it. I don’t realize for quite some time how I have merged with something that is not me so completely.

I recall this experience vividly when I read Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. It was a book. It was the story of someone else. And I found myself feeling depressed and hopeless as I read her story.

Where did my borders go?

This definitely happens with friends, family, work and other social group.

Heck, it can happen with the news.

I have found myself wrestling with a mood or a state of mind for ridiculous lengths of time before shaking myself to the realization:

It wasn’t even me.

It’s not always easy to rediscover the difference between myself and my circumstance.

It makes sense that people might need to leave their circumstances completely to “find themselves.”

One of the things I love best about fairy tales is their uncomplicated lack of psychology. Fairy tale heroes do not have inner voices. They take external action. They seek their fortune, an external pursuit.

Our new quest to find ourselves has appeared only in the last hundred or so years. It seems our fortune–meaning our wealth and our fate–is what we find inside our hearts and souls. To seek our fortune, if we are so blessed, is to find ourselves.