Two mice story - analysis (part 2)

The last time I covered this article I talked about how I loved it specifically due to its characteristics and the open minded thinking it provokes. When I covered it, I talked about many different analogies and processes of thinking that we can approach it. The quote allows us to infer many different important lessons all from the convenience of a single sentence, such as the strength of resilience/perseverance in the face of danger, and optimistic, open minded thinking. All this inferring requires us to be very analytical of this quote; looking at different perspectives, hindsight bias, and information bias. Given these elements that may fray our thinking and understanding it's important to be very critical in our understanding of these concepts.You can read my first article here if you haven't already.

To understand the quote is to be one with the mice. Looking further, we can devolve that there are three different literal elements of the story; the first mouse, the second mouse, and the bucket of cream. These literal elements, upon further analysis, provide us with an insightful glance into symbolism within the story.

As critical thinking is so important with inferring, I want to mention that that's how I got to this wishful thinking - had the mice been representing two different people with two different mindsets, we would be getting nowhere as we do nothing besides replace one subject with another - by replacing the mice with people in an attempt to portray the symbolism towards reality, we get nowhere. It's still a metaphor in which two characters have contrasting mindsets.

That's why for the first mouse, I did something more creative with the symbolism; I made it so that the mice represent the different mindsets we have - the devil over our left shoulder and the angel over our right shoulder. In our case, that malicious devil over our left shoulder would be that first mouse. The two different "angels" in our head are our mindsets; pessimistic and optimistic, and it's the fact that we have this choice that complicates things. This is why symbolism is so important; it helps us distinguish this reality and the quote, and how every character can play an important role in our real life thinking skills.

The second mouse represents the righteous angel over our right shoulder. It's that part of our mind that tells us to think rationally and to remain calm under the suffocation and pressure of any situation, not just falling into a bucket of cream. Our angel and our devout way of thinking can push us to success. Every. Single. Time.

Then, what about the bucket of cream? Personally, I like this symbol the most because it's "organic" - you can take apart its elements and explain those elements in detail simply by using text from the story, which means that readers are already familiarized with our analysis. Please allow me to demonstrate this:

The bucket of cream as a symbol can be taken apart into two elements; the bucket, and the cream. Notice how none of them are negotiable. They need to work together to make this symbolism work.

-Without the cream, the mice would have time to breathe and formulate a strategy, such as tipping the bucket over, as without the cream, this was now a more than realistic outcome.

-Without the bucket, the cream would just spill everywhere, presenting no danger at all to the mice.

These two elements must work together to present the danger to the mice, which is the key to decoding the symbolism here. The bucket of cream represents our duties and debts in life. Just like our universes of obligation, only we know ourselves best, so we must take a moment to reflect and make it clear: What are they?

I'll give myself as an example: I'm currently a Canadian grade 10 student. I have many differing responsibilities and debts which vary from familial obligations to different studies that I have, which may be an array of data similar for another grade 10 student, but might be completely different from a 35 year old, who has to take care of taxes and her two children.

The point I'm trying to make is that all of us need to consult with ourself and ourself only to understand what this symbolism means to us. Ultimately? It can mean what we want it to. Utilizing the comparison of the angels with our struggles help us shape our identity as well. It's counterintuitive from what I said about symbolism, that the mice aren't people, but let's acknowledge the mice for a second. Here, we shape our identity by a choice: Are we going with the angel or the devil?

Your choice.