The concept of Destiny is so cool to me. The idea of divine powers coming together to make sure that you reach your destination, no matter where you start from, no matter the obstacles, against all odds. It’s poetic, it’s beautiful, it’s awe inspiring. It’s like the magic you feel on a clear night when you look up and have an unobstructed view of the moon. It’s the stuff that you see in movies, but somehow even better because it’s real life. Destiny to me is like walking down a long dark hallway, to a door with a bright light shining behind it. When you get to the door and open it, you see a radiant, golden room, with like, I don’t know, a choir inside singing “Hallelujah” or something. That’s what destiny is to me, grand and dramatic. Usually I think of Destiny within the context of romance. A true love, two people coming together regardless of the physical distance, regardless of their backgrounds. I don’t typically associate Destiny with pandas who can do Kung Fu, but here we are. Somehow a movie as silly as Kung Fu Panda provides us with shining examples of Destiny.
Po is the unlikely hero of the story. He’s an out of shape panda, who sells noodles for a living with his dad. Po knows he’s meant to do something in his life other than making noodles, he dreams of being a Kung Fu master and joining the “Furious Five,” which is basically a Kung Fu crime fighting group that maintains peace in the valley. On the surface this seems ridiculous, there aren’t really a lot of transferable skills between making noodles and being a Kung Fu warrior. But still, there’s something within Po that makes him yearn to be a part of Kung Fu in any capacity, so he makes it a priority to go with the rest of the valley to see who will be crowned as the Dragon Warrior. The Dragon Warrior of course being a Kung Fu master the likes of which the world has never seen, the heir to an incredible amount of power.
Po gets to the coliseum, and is met by a few seemingly insurmountable obstacles. He has to climb up the side of a mountain to get to the entrance, but the doors are slammed in his face. He tries a variety of different methods to see what’s going on inside the coliseum. Now for the normal person, the story would end here, there’s no conceivable way for Po to get into the coliseum, and even if he does, it’s not really going to bring him any closer to his ultimate goal. But it’s different for Po, because he has Destiny on his side. It’s Po’s Destiny to be crowned the Dragon Warrior, and when Destiny’s on your side, it’s not a matter of “if” it’s a matter of “when.” So despite his clear limitations, and the obstacles in his way, he ends up being dropped from the sky, in a blaze of fire, landing right in the middle of the festivities just in time to be named the Dragon Warrior.
Tai Lung’s character was deemed so dangerous that he was thrown into a prison where he was the only prisoner. When Grand Master Oogway tells Master Shifu that he foresees Tai Lung escaping prison, Shifu’s first instinct is to tell the prison to double security measures. The prison Tai Lung was being kept in was basically inescapable. He was completely immobilized, there were dozens of weapons aimed at him at all times, the prison was underground with only one way in or out, and there were hundreds of guards. Still, all of that was no match for Destiny. Ironically the messenger bird, Zeng, that Shifu sent indirectly helped Tai Lung escape. It was Tai Lung’s Destiny to escape, challenge Po and serve as the catalyst to help Po realize his full potential as the Dragon Warrior no matter the odds against him.
It’s the Dragon Warrior’s Destiny to fight Tai Lung. That’s why we see Tai Lung make it to the valley to fight Po against all odds. He escaped the inescapable prison, he defeated the “Furious Five,” he even defeated Shifu. They weren’t just fighting Tai Lung, they were fighting Destiny. It’s also the Dragon Warrior’s Destiny to defeat Tai Lung. For a large portion of the movie, Po seemed like a lost cause. He was too unskilled, and untrainable to defeat Tai Lung, especially within the limited time they had to accomplish that feat, but they still found a way. Shifu was able to train Po, and Po was able to defeat Tai Lung, because it was his Destiny, and Destiny is undefeatable.
As someone in their early-mid 20’s I feel like there’s a lot of changes and moving pieces in my life. I’m still trying to find my way in the world, still trying to find stability in my career and my relationships. It’s easy to spiral and wonder if you’re making the right choices to end up where you want to end up. It’s a comforting thought, for me at least, to know that no matter what, literally even if you actively fight against it happening, your Destiny will find a way to come to fruition. Ultimately you will end up where you’re supposed to be, and your path to get there will prepare you for the end destination. You can’t fight it, no matter how strong you are. You can’t run from it, no matter how fast you are. Destiny is truly a beautiful, unstoppable force of nature.
Just some guy on the internet 