What Disney’s Soul Taught Me About Satisfaction

Planning to finally sit down with your family and watch Disney’s Soul over Spring Break? It’s an intriguing new movie from Pixar Studios where end-of-life and after-life themes get wrapped up in a psychedelic-techno dream-like animated package suitable for a child. At least it’s supposed to be since it’s animated and it comes from Disney. But it doesn’t take long to realize there’s going to be some heavy stuff in this movie, interplaying with (as Disney so genius-ly does) a silly mix of antics from our main character, Joe Gardner, whose psyche and circumstance are so relatable to just about any adult-trying-to-adult and any child who loves talking cats. Yes…umm, you’ll just have to watch.

But even though there are forthright references to end-of-life scenarios that some kids might not be ready for and spiritual undertones from an amalgamation of world religions and belief systems, I still found a way to see the truth of my Christian faith alive and well in the heart of the message that Joe’s life and journey convey. And as usual, it came up in conversation with my kiddos. (Psst! I want to help you and your kids find the truth of the Gospel everywhere too, no matter how camouflaged it is.) As they dream of one day becoming YouTube sensations or successful to a prodigy-like level in whatever is their favorite interest, it is evident we all want our life to mean something.

We all want our life to mean something.

This inner character conflict of Soul’s protagonist is set up as Joe concedes, “I would die a happy man if I could play with Dorothea Williams.” He’s speaking, of course, of the highly talented and well-known saxophone player who tours the jazz club scene of New York City. It is a dream come true, a pinch-me kind of reality when, through a connection to a former band student, he is invited to play (piano) with her in the quartet that holds her namesake.

But when an accident on the streets of NYC sends him to “The Great Beyond,” rather than seeing his dream play out in real-time, Joe is forced to see his life through an unwanted, yet enlightening new lens.

He learns that “sparks” are things that can add value to your life but are not what ultimately make your life valuable. You see, Joe had been putting a whole lot of stock in his “spark.” He was a pianist. He was destined for great things. He would one day see his name in lights. He would be running in all the famous musician crowds. He would be “one of them.” He would have “made it.”

Joe wanted this reality so badly for himself that in trying to escape his fate of mortality, he cries, “I’m not dying today, not when my life just started!”

He is desperate to see his life mean something, and he believes that playing with Dorothea Williams will satisfy in that deep, lasting kind of way. It will fulfill him. It will plug the hole in his heart.

But *SPOILER ALERT* through a series of alternate world adventures, Joe IS able to get back to this reality, just in the nick of time. “I’ve been waiting for this moment my whole life,” Joe admits to Dorothea herself. “I thought I’d feel different.” And Dorothea responds with this metaphor about a fish looking for the ocean because he’s just in “water” and is astounded to learn that he’s been in the ocean the entire time.

In other words, real living doesn’t start the day you’ve arrived, it happens on the way. It starts the day you are born, in the margins, in the everyday, ordinary moments.

Aside from Dorothea, Joe has plenty of other “ah-ha” moments from other “mentors” along the way.

Through Joe’s wanna-be veterinarian barber (because life had a different plan for him), Joe is queued in on an alternate reality to what he had believed his whole life: you can make meaning out of whatever life throws at you. Likewise, through witnessing the freshness of 22 experiencing Earth for the very first time and her subsequent delight in all its sensations, Joe also realized that you can find meaning and value in the simplest of pleasures— not just in the mountaintop experiences.

In other words, real living doesn’t start the day you’ve arrived, it happens on the way. It starts the day you are born, in the margins, in the everyday, ordinary moments.

You don’t have a choice of when you go, but you have a choice of how you live every day. There is potential in every day, in every moment—an opportunity to find meaning, joy, and purpose, even if you don’t think you’ve “arrived” yet.

Recently, on our way home from school, I told the kids about my day. I told them about the writing I was doing and the excitement of following my passion. They wanted to know things like how many followers I had and how many likes I was getting. I used the story of Joe from Soul  to share with them what was on my heart. Likes and follows are nice, and they are things we all desire, but they aren’t what ultimately satisfy.

As Joe found out, “arriving” isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, if you aren’t taking in all the other moments God has to offer you. It can’t be the sole thing that drives you.

Our Almighty Heavenly Father who intelligently and personally created and breathed life into every living thing, did  inform who we would become and what would make us “spark” here on earth—not random chance assigned by illusive, alter-reality slithering neon silhouettes named Jeri. But as Jeri so wisely points out, “a spark isn’t your soul’s purpose.” We all have a hole in our hearts that only God can fill. We are eternal souls living in a broken world. We experience a sense of incompleteness this side of heaven, and our hearts and souls yearn for that “something more.” Trying to fill it with any number of things, our search can be relentless, never giving up. We try romantic relationships, family, pursuing a successful career, pleasing others, food, drugs, experiences. But nothing measures up.

In the “Great Before” depicted in the movie, the unborn souls all try to find their spark in a single thing: soccer or jazz or really great food. But none of those things, we learn, can provide our worth and significance, our reason for living. They are temporary. God is eternal.

Joe gets an opportunity to look back on the events of his life, and the successes and failures. He says out loud what’s on all our hearts, our greatest human fear that one day we’ll look back on our lives and realize: “My life was meaningless.” But the only reason that was true was that, up until that point, Joe made the mistake of thinking it was all about finding personal satisfaction and success, and through that, to obtain a certain feeling for himself.

But true satisfaction will never be found in those outward markers. In a tender moment with a woman at the well who had tried to find her worth in all the wrong places, Jesus calls himself “living water.” She perks up in curiosity, as she begins to bask in something she’d never felt before—a love without conditions— and asks, “Where can you get this living water?” Jesus answers her, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.” The physical satisfactions we run after. “But whoever drinks the water I give him,” Jesus continues, “will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:10-14) And in Isaiah 55, God invites us, “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters…Come to me” (vv. 1, 3 emphasis added).

In what ways do you need to be reminded that the everyday moments matter? That there is meaning in the ordinary? Leave a comment.

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More Disney Gospels posts: Elsa, Nemo, and more.

POSTED BY

Jenna

Jenna Kruse is a teacher but not in a classroom. She loves to think outside the box and inside the Word and is daily in need of an attitude adjustment. She is a wife to Justin, a mother to three school-aged children, and a mentor to teenagers and young adults. You can learn more about the heart behind her blog HERE.

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