Are you ready to meditate with Kari?
Lay down and get warm and comfortable in your bed.
Make sure that the light is just right in your room so you can relax your body and let go of your busy day.
It was production day at the cookie factory.
The machines were clanking and banging and making lots of different noises.
The cookie batter had all been stirred and mixed and made and the cookie batter was ready to be poured onto the first machine on the assembly line of all the different machines that it took to make a gingerbread man.
Something wacky was going on at the cookie factory on this particular day.
Whether there was too much electricity in the air,
Whether it was a full moon,
Whether it was retrograde,
Whatever the reason,
Something was not quite right there.
All the machines were acting up.
They were doing very strange things.
One of the gingerbread men had only got one and a half legs.
By the time he got to the end of the factory line and he was all set and dusted and ready to be packed in a packet,
He looked around at the other gingerbread men and noticed that he didn't look quite right.
And he gasped in horror.
Where's the bottom part of my leg?
He shouted out loud.
One of the other gingerbread men had a bulging,
Big,
Enormous eye.
The machine that drops the tiny little cute eyes on the gingerbread men had gone wrong right at the moment where this particular gingerbread man was laid underneath the eye part.
It double-double-dropped an eyeball on one eye and then a normal,
Regular eye on the other.
So he had one big,
Bulging eye and one regular eye.
When he got to the end of the line,
He heard snickering and laughing.
He reached up and felt his big,
Ginormous eyeball.
Oh,
Oh wow!
He said,
Hiding it with his arm.
This is very big!
The next gingerbread man in line ready to be made got messed up because the part of the machine that dropped out the body paused and just kept pouring.
The poor cookie was really,
Really long.
Extra extra tall.
When he got dried and cooked and dusted and developed,
By the time he got to the end of the line,
He was like,
Wait a minute,
Something's not right here.
Why is my body so long?
One poor cookie ended up with a really big,
Fat,
Round body.
It just kept blobbing and blobbing and blobbing and it got stuck.
It barely filled his legs,
So he had tiny little legs and a big fat body.
He was absolutely horrified.
And then the last gingerbread man that got messed up that day was one with big,
Big ears.
They were enormous.
Like an elephant!
All the slightly messed up,
Different,
Unusual,
Abnormal gingerbread men were gathered in the bin at the end of the row.
Next to a bunch of regular,
Very perfect,
Very normal,
Very ordinary looking gingerbread men.
The one with the big ears said,
I can hear everything that they're saying.
The regular gingerbread men had all grouped together and they were laughing and snickering and saying mean things about the ones that looked different.
I can't believe the size of that one's belly.
It's so fat!
The one with the big,
Fat belly blushed and felt very uncomfortable.
The extra long,
Skinny,
Tall one said to the one with the big ears,
What are they saying?
I'm two way up here.
I'm so tall,
I can't hear anything.
The one with the big ears said,
They're laughing at that one's belly.
They said it's really big and fat.
Oh,
Said the tall one,
Getting really upset and quite frustrated and angry.
That's not very nice.
The tall one shouted down,
Oy,
You lot,
Stop being so mean.
All the regular gingerbread men thought that was even funnier.
They just laughed.
They were laughing at how tall he was and how ridiculously long he looked.
The one with the ears,
The big ears,
Heard all of it.
He's so tall.
I bet he can't even,
I bet he can't even get through a door.
Then they all cracked out laughing.
The tall gingerbread man said,
What are they saying?
The big ears gingerbread man said,
They're saying you're so tall you can't even fit through a door.
The tall gingerbread man bent down and said,
Well,
They're probably right,
But at least I can pick the apples off the tallest trees.
They can't do that,
Can they?
The gingerbread man with the big bulgy eye said,
Well,
I'll help you through the door because I can see really well.
And then all the strange,
Different,
Unusual,
Slightly messed up gingerbread men started laughing.
They decided to bunch together and think about all of the good things that would come from the fact that they were different.
That they were unusual,
That they didn't look like everyone else.
The one with the one and half legs said,
I can take my time.
I have to take my time walking because,
I mean,
Look at me,
I'm a bit hobbly.
So,
Because I take my time,
I get to see more things.
I walk slower so I can think and pause and decide before I speak or say something silly and ridiculous like those guys.
Having one and half legs makes me be able to be smarter.
The one with the big eye said,
Well,
I can see that.
And then they all started laughing again.
No,
Seriously,
I can see really good.
This bigger eye of mine,
I can see in the dark.
I bet they can't do that.
The one that was long and skinny said,
Well,
You know,
I'm going to be the bestest fruit picker in the world.
The one with the big round belly said,
I give really good hugs.
The gingerbread man with the big ears said,
Obviously,
I can hear really well.
But also,
I actually really like big ears.
I think they're pretty cool,
Which makes me feel really good about myself.
Regular ears are great and all,
But I think I'd prefer mine.
I really like them.
The unusual cookies,
The ones that weren't typically looking like every other cookie,
Were making the most of the fact that they had different things about themselves.
What was really important to the unusual cookies was that it didn't make them want to be like the regular cookies.
Not that all the regular cookies were mean and rude and couldn't accept the fact that some of the cookies were different.
Some of the regular cookies were very nice gingerbread men.
They just stayed out of it.
They just sat there,
Quietly waiting in the packet until they got moved into the factory where they would be sorted out and sent out into the world to be eaten by anybody that wants to eat a gingerbread man.
The gingerbread man with the one and a half legs said he was smart because he took his time with things and he realised because he was smart that maybe the world wasn't ready for a group of gingerbread men like they were.
Maybe they weren't ready for a cookie with one and a half legs.
They would think it was broken,
A defect,
And they might even send it back to the store.
They wouldn't be ready for a cookie that had one big googly eye and one normal regular eye.
They'd think that maybe it was ugly and it wasn't right.
Something didn't look right and therefore they'd reject it and send it back to the store.
A gingerbread man that was way too tall because his body was misshaped and too long would probably not be accepted either because he didn't look like a regular,
In proportion,
Gingerbread man.
And the one with big round belly that looked like he had a chubby chubby belly,
He would probably get rejected.
Unless someone put a Santa Claus outfit on him because then it's okay to have a big chubby belly if you're Santa Claus.
But if you're a regular gingerbread man,
Then no,
Only certain cookies can look like that.
He would probably get rejected as well.
And finally the cookie,
The gingerbread man with the big elephant ears.
Well,
I think most children or people that was buying him would probably just laugh.
They might be okay with it because they think it's supposed to be funny,
But he's not supposed to be funny.
It's not funny that his ears are big and he's different.
Ideally,
In a perfect world,
All the regular gingerbread man cookies would be kind and open and flexible and be okay with the fact that some gingerbread men are different.
That would be a wonderful world at the cookie factory,
If that could happen.
But in the meantime,
The cookies that were different did the best thing that they could do.
They actually liked the differences.
They saw the positive in the differences and they weren't going to let the closed minded cookies make them feel bad about themselves.
Because then they wouldn't be able to shine in the world.
They'd just hide and feel sorry for themselves.
And that was not going to happen.
Not with this group.
So maybe their life was going to be quite short.
Maybe they were going to get put into the rejection bin.
And that was okay because they would make the most of every other cookie that was in the rejection bin.
They'd make friends,
They'd have a good time and they'd make the most of it.
Maybe kind of like what we should do.
Embrace all of our differences.
Be flexible and open and loving and kind to all different types of people.
What a wonderful world that would be.
The End.
