10. The Fairie's Secret

Learning to trust yourself, to connect with your interior and to be persistent.

Little Celestial Fairy wakes up before the sun rises. She knows she has to get up to continue looking for her wand, but she is very tired and her wings hurt from flying so much. When she sees that it's still dark, she closes her eyes and covers herself with the leaf again to continue sleeping, but she can't. She can't stop thinking about the dream she had last night: she was at home, in her bed, and she woke up very happy because she had finally found her wand and could go to the Fairies’ School. She has been travelling for so many months looking for it... She no longer knows where to go or who to ask. Suddenly she becomes sad and feels very lonely.

“Maybe I will never find it,” she thinks. “Maybe I don't have to be a fairy. Maybe instead of helping people I should do something else, like make jam, paint pictures or learn to play an instrument... What if I was wrong? What if I just wanted to be a fairy because I wanted to be like my friends?”

And without realising it, she starts making a list of all the things that surely prevent her from being a fairy: “To begin with, I don't have a wand, and all fairies need one to be able to do magic. I don't know any magic words either, and without magic words I can't do anything. On top of that, I'm always hearing a strange voice that speaks to me and I don't know where it's coming from... What if I'm going crazy? I can't be a fairy if I'm crazy! And these coloured stockings I'm wearing... I really like them, but fairies don't dress like that...”–And as more and more things come to her, she becomes convinced that she was not born to be a fairy. “Now that I think about it, it's not so bad not to be a fairy either. Not everyone is. Maybe I can do a lot of other things and be very happy without doing magic.” 

Little by little she begins to imagine her new life and becomes happy thinking about all the things she can do without being a fairy. And meanwhile the sky is changing colour and the first rays of the sun begin to make their way through the leaves of the trees.

“Get up and go home,” Sparkly whispers, moving Celestial’s hair away from her ear. But she is so busy thinking that she doesn't hear it. “Get up and go home,” it says again, raising its voice. But nothing happens. Celestial's head is so full of thoughts that she doesn't have room for her friend's words to reach her... Then Sparkly, who can't scream anymore, picks up a feather from the ground and starts tickling her in the ear.

Celestial jumps in surprise and gets to her feet. And since there is nothing like a fright to leave the mind blank, Sparkly, who cannot hold back its laughter, takes the opportunity to say again: “Go home, Celestial. It's time to go back.”akfast, she flaps her wings, shakes them to check that she can fly even if they ache and she hops to take off. For the first time in many months, today she doesn't go looking for the wand. Today Celestial is going home.

There is not a cloud in the sky and there is no wind. Celestial flies slowly so as not to tire. She has a long way to go and although she really wants to get there, she knows she can't push her little wings too much. But all of a sudden she hears a very loud noise and, before she has time to look where it's coming from, a strong air current catches her and spins her at high speed, causing her to lose her balance and she ends up upside down. After circling in all directions she finally manages to recover, but before she can understand what has happened she hears the same noise again, and another whirlwind takes her away a second time and spins her round and round without her being able to do anything about it.

When it seems that everything is over, Little Celestial Fairy pushes her hair away from her face and gasps trying to catch her breath.

“But what was that? What happened? I almost fell to the ground! What a fright!

And then she sees it. A small yellow plane is making twirls, going up and down in the sky as if it were drawing in the air.

“Hey, you!” she shouts. “Watch where you're going! You almost knocked me over!”

The little plane makes a turn and goes back, towards Celestial.

“Noooooo! Don't come back!” she says scared. But this time the plane approaches her very carefully and flies right below the little fairy.

“Wow, I'm so sorry, I didn’t see you!” says the pilot. “Are you OK?”

“Yes, but my wings were already hurting and now that's all I needed. I won't be able to fly for much longer and I won't be able to get home,” she replies.

“Don't worry, I'll take you there. It's the least I can do to make it up to you. Come down slowly and sit on my lap,” he tells her.

Celestial, very carefully, goes down to the pilot's lap and sits on it.

“Wow, I have never met a fairy before!” says the pilot.

“No, I'm not a fairy,” says Celestial. “That's why I'm going home, because I thought I would find my wand but I think I was wrong and I don't need to find it anymore. I've been looking for it everywhere for months, but I probably haven't found it because I'm not a fairy.”

“You know?” he says. “Sometimes we go really far looking for the things we want to find and in the end it turns out that we had them close by and we hadn't noticed. And we often find them when we stop looking for them.”

“Well, I looked for it all around the house before I left and I can assure you that it wasn't there,” says Celestial totally convinced.

“You can say whatever you want, but for me you are a fairy,” says the pilot with a smile.

Celestial looks at him, thinking that this man has no idea about fairies and decides to change the subject. “And what were you doing before, flying in that strange way? Isn't it dangerous?”

“This is called doing stunts. You have to practice a lot and you always have to be very alert, but once you've learned it's a lot of fun. You are very lucky because you have wings and can fly, but I can only do it in my plane. When I was little I dreamed of being able to fly planes, so when I could I learned and now I'm having a blast.”

“Yes, that was obvious,” Celestial says,“ but maybe you should be a little more careful.”

After a long time Celestial looks down and sees that she is already beginning to recognise the landscape. They fly over vast green fields and forests, and here and there a small village of slate-roofed houses. From time to time they see the ruins of a castle or a herd of deer that run scared by the noise of the plane.

“Look! There! It's not long now!” shouts Celestial pointing down.

In the middle of a large plain there is a circle of immense stones stuck in the ground. There are some that are laid flat on top of the others, as if forming a table.

“This is very beautiful. Do you live here?” asks the pilot.
“No, there's still a bit to go, but from time to time I really like to come and spend the day there, because it's a very magical place.”

After flying over an area of mountains and green valleys Celestial exclaims:

“We're here! That down there is the school!” And without the pilot having time to notice, she jumps out of the plane doing a somersault.

"Thank you very much for taking me," she says to her new friend. Before I go home, I will go down to the school to say hello to my friends.”

But before leaving, she approaches the pilot and gives him a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

“I really enjoyed flying with you. I hope that one day we will meet again and repeat it,” he tells her. He smiles, waves goodbye and turns to leave.

Little Celestial Fairy goes down to the forest where the school is, but before arriving she decides to sit on the branch of a tree and watch her friends, who are outside practicing with their wands.

“What a good time they are having,” she thinks.

And without being able to help it, she gets a little sad and thinks:

“I would really like to be a fairy like them, but if it can't be, it can't be. I will probably also do fun things and be very happy.”

Meanwhile, Sparkly has left for school and entered the teacher's office through a window.

“Hello Sparkly! What a surprise!” she tells it when she sees it. “How did Celestial do? Has she discovered the fairies’ secret yet?”Sparkly tells the teacher all the things that happened to them during the trip and tells her that Celestial has decided that she doesn't want to be a fairy anymore because she didn't find the wand.

“She has discovered the secret, but she doesn't know it,” the teacher tells Sparkly. “It's a shame that she doesn't want to be a fairy anymore, but it's normal that when things get tough we sometimes doubt whether it's worth going on. Why don't you go find her and tell her to come see me?”

Sparkly goes out the way it came in and flies towards the tree where Celestial is.

“I don't feel like talking to anyone. I am very tired from the trip. I'm going home. I'll be back another day,” she thinks.

But then Sparkly tells her: “At least go and say hello to the teacher and tell her you're back.”

And at the last moment, Celestial, who has heard the little voice, decides to heed it and flies towards the school.

“Hello!” she greets the teacher entering through the window.

“Hello Celestial! What a joy to see you! How did it go? Have you found your wand yet?” asks the teacher.

Celestial shakes her head, but since she doesn't want the teacher to see that she's sad, she smiles and says:
“Do you know teacher? I've decided that being a fairy isn't for me. I think I'd rather do more normal things... Maybe I'll learn to play an instrument or paint pictures!”

“Oh, really?” says the teacher. “It's a shame, now that you've discovered the fairies’ secret. Your classmates haven't done it yet, and we're almost at the end of the course.”

Celestial looks at her looking surprised.

“The secret? What secret? I haven't discovered any secret.”

“You certainly have. You have discovered the fairies’ secret, the secret of our magic.”

”Look, I introduce you to Sparkly,” she says while the firefly approaches her and lands on her hand. It has been with you all this time and whenever you needed help it talked to you and told you what to do.

”Wow! Now I understand! I heard a little voice but I didn't know where it was coming from, and the truth is that it always got it right!” Celestial exclaims with wide-open eyes. And the teacher continues:

“Fairies, and indeed everyone, can hear it, but sometimes people are so busy thinking about their problems and their heads are so full of thoughts that can’t hear it.

“I told Sparkly to go with you because you were so sad about losing your wand that you couldn't hear your own inner voice, and it acted like a speaker so you could hear it better. And I can see it worked!”

“Yes, but,” asks Celestial “what does this have to do with the fairies’ secret?”

“Because if you know how to listen to this inner voice and heed it, you will always find solutions to your problems and you will also be able to help those who need it. Isn't that what fairies do, help? Throughout your journey you have made many friends and helped them when they were in trouble. And while you were doing it, you even forgot to look for your wand,” the teacher explains.

But Celestial looks like she doesn't quite understand.

“Celestial,” says the teacher approaching her and stroking her hair, “you don't need a wand to do magic. The magic of the fairies is inside! We only carry the wand because many people don't think magic can be done without it, but in reality it is us that do the magic, not the wand. You are already a fairy, even if you haven't found yours.”

“If you learn to silence your thoughts, you will be able to hear your own inner voice whenever you need it and you will be able to help whoever asks you, because you will always find the answer you are looking for. Everyone can do it, but sometimes we all need a little help, and that's why we fairies exist, to help when someone can't do it alone.”

While listening to the teacher, Little Celestial fairy starts feeling so happy that she wants to start dancing. She is so overjoyed that she wishes she could tell all the friends she had made during her trip. She realises that all the effort, all the fatigue and all the time spent away from home had been worth it.

“Now, however, you have to be careful,” says the teacher. “Even if you are a fairy and you really want to help others, you can only do it if they ask you to. You can't do magic to change someone's life and you can't force them to do anything they don't want to do. This is the most important part of your task: you have to help them learn to listen to their own inner voice.”

“So now I don't have to come to school anymore,” Celestial says.

“You don't have to come, but you can do it whenever you want. We will all be very happy if you visit us from time to time.”

Celestial throws herself around the teacher’s neck and gives her a big hug. Then she picks up Sparkly very carefully and kisses it. “Many thanks Sparkly. I wouldn't have made it without you,” she tells it, and puts it back in the golden box. And doing a twirl of joy, she flies out of the window to finally go home.

When she walks through the door she realises how tired she is, and without even taking off her clothes she lies down on the bed and falls asleep in no time.

When she wakes up the next morning she decides to tidy up the house, because she left so quickly that she didn't even make her bed. She spreads out the sheets and fluffs up the pillow to get it right. Then she sees it.
“Oh my! My wand!” she exclaims in surprise.

The night before school started she had put it under her pillow, because she wanted it close by and not forget it the next day, but she woke up so excited that it slipped her mind completely.

“Wow, the pilot was right. I looked for it everywhere and it couldn't have been any closer. And just when I stopped looking for it, I found it.”

And with the wand in her hand, she starts twirling around the room, laughing so hard.

“In the end what I dreamed has come true. I'm home and I've found the wand... And I'm a fairy, a real fairy!”

And yes, her dream has come true and her long journey is over, but what Celestial doesn't know is that now that she's a fairy, she'll never stop travelling either.

Sometimes, when we try really hard to do something and after a lot of trying we don't succeed, we get fed up because it seems like we will never get there. Then we hesitate; we think it's not worth it and decide to forget it. Maybe it wasn't time yet, we needed to grow a little or to learn something and we can try again later. We all have special abilities, things we do better than other people. When we can use them in what we want to do, sooner or later we will achieve it.

Celestial is so tired of searching for the wand that she doubts her greatest wish, to be a fairy. But in the end, without knowing it, she has already become one. She has many gifts that a fairy needs already, and that's why all her efforts have helped her achieve it.

When we see that someone needs help, especially when it's someone we love, we often try to fix their problems because we don't like to see them suffer. We must not forget that problems are always opportunities to learn something, and that is why everyone must be able to find their own solutions. If we do their job, we are taking away an opportunity for them to grow and learn something they need. On the other hand, if the person asks us to help them, we can do it, especially by trying to get them to learn to listen to their own inner voice and find the best solution to what is happening to them.

This, however, does not count if someone has been hurt or is in danger! Then we have to help them as soon as we see it.

The teacher tells Celestial to be careful and only help those who ask her. The most important thing in her fairy work is to help others learn to listen to their own inner voice.

Sometimes, when we sleep, we have dreams that help us understand things that have happened to us or give us answers to questions we ask ourselves. When we cannot hear our inner voice, it often speaks to us through dreams, because when we are asleep we are not thinking and it’s easier for it to get to us.

Celestial dreams that she is at home and that she has found the wand. At first, she gets sad and decides to go back because she is tired of looking for it and thinks she shouldn't be a fairy, but in the end it turns out that her dream comes true. The dream helps her decide to go home and also shows her what will happen next, although Celestial doesn't realise it until she finds the wand.