Coldplay: Paradise Meaning
Song Released: 2011
Paradise Lyrics
Oo-oo-oo, oo-oo-oo, oo-oo-oo.
When she was just a girl,
She expected the world,
But it flew away from her reach,
So she ran away in her sleep.
And dreamed of...
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1TOP RATED
#1 top rated interpretation:My interpretation is more straightforward than the other ones but here goes. In the first verse, 'when she was just a girl, she expected the world' shows that when the little girl was young, she saw life as being perfect. This could have been from her parents being kind and loving to her. She expected the world to be a fairytale where she would live in a grand castle and marry her Prince Charming. 'But it flew away from her reach' meaning that as she got older, her parents expected her to be mature and start working for herself, and she starts to struggle, with all her dreams falling apart. 'So she ran away in her sleep, and dreamed of para- para- paradise, every time she closed her eyes.' The little girl now despises her life, and so takes limbo in her dreams and thinks about her perfect life when she was younger. And now in the second verse, 'and the bullets catch in her teeth' might show that in her perfect world, she was invincible and that nothing could stop her. 'Life goes on, it gets so heavy.' The now teenage girl lives by herself and with her parents possibly deceased, has a lot of mortgage to pay off and gives her depression. 'The wheel breaks the butterfly,' might reference the Wheel of Forture where in Medieval times, and wheel was said to have been placed and goes through a cycle of happiness and sorrow. The wheel might have taken a full cycle back to sadness and depression and 'breaks the butterfly' with the butterfly being symbolic to the girl. She might have be gentle and shy, just like a butterfly. 'Every tear, a waterfall,' shows the girl crying every single day and feels hopeless. 'In the night, the stormy night, she closed her eyes, in the night, the stormy night, away she'd fly, and dreamed of para- para- paradise' Depicts that in the darkest part of her life, she takes refuge in her dreams once again and dreams about her castle, dreams of her Prince Charming and her fairytale life. And in the bridge, 'So lying underneath those stormy skies, she said oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh, I know the sun must set to rise.' Shows a change of heart and even though she is still lying in the middle of her problems, she realizes that for her dreams to rise, she has to first experience hardship. But in the final chrous, 'This could be para- para- paradise' it shows hesitation with the word 'could'. But I believe that she has decided to try her best and push through her problems and to see what is on the other side. She knows that for things to improve, she has to first do something. The song ends with, 'Oo-oo-oo, oo-oo-oo, oo-oo-oo' which might be her thinking of her next move in making her life into a real fairytale.
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2TOP RATED
#2 top rated interpretation:I think the beauty of the song is that it is interpreted relative to the feelings of every individual listener and what they're going through in their life. We all had dreams of our lives when we were young and innocent, we all grew up and saw how the world really is, and we all face struggles every day that we wish we could just run away from- and we can, when we close our eyes and envision our own ideas of paradise.
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3TOP RATED
#3 top rated interpretation:This girl was just like any other little girl. She had big dreams, and she knew she was special. So she knew that one day, her dreams would come true. She expected the world to come to her. When she grows up, reality strikes her down...it's not as simple as she once dreamed. Every time she closes her eyes, she imagines the "paradise" she had dreamed of since she was only a girl.
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I agree that this song is about a girl who grew up and realized that life isn't as fun as an adult compared to when she was a kid. But another way I interpret it as is that the girl committed suicide after life got too hard for her to handle. A lot of people refer to Heaven as Paradise.
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I relate to this song because I feel like it's a young girl that had all the normal hops and dreams until she realized that life was not what she thought and so many things pulled her from growing and having all she needed as a child to grow into an adult without wounds and scars and no idea..having to face life beating you down into a point where you dream of what you think you could have been or fight to survive and learn to love and trust. I feel like the song is a big representation of what I went through and what life really is for a lot of girls who grow up without learning self love and self respect.
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I think its about the pain we suffer when we are not with our family, and there is no hope to find them.but we can't loss hope because our family our home is our paradise. No matter how much time we suffered, when we reach our home we forget everything. Family is the paradise on Earth. Its true for all living things. Human is cruel,we capture animals for our entertainment we never think about their families and their pain. They want to go home too. They also miss their paradise. Unfortunately they don't have any way to meet their families again.
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This is a different take on the song than what I have seen, but I think this song is about a very young girl who expected to live a full normal life (When she was just a girl/She expected the world.), but was tragically hospitalized in a car crash one rainy night (in the night, the stormy night, away she flies; The wheel breaks the butterfly). So now she has to imagine what life would have been like without the crash. Just an idea.
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Lovely touching song and I weep every time I listen this song. It seems she is the same girl with big dreams in her closed eyes. Fact is that she is unable to fullfil the dreams. Her infatuation and loneliness is fading her dreams , which she shared with me and i told her I will be with you as your mentor.
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I think it's about a girl who in her early years believed the world would do her bidding, lead her through her life and make it beautiful, but as she grows, she realizes that the world is not always on her side, and she will have hard times in her life.
Still chasing her innocence, she tries her hardest to make things right, but the "bullets catch in her teeth," she comes close to death or just realizes that the world is dangerous, and she is on her own now.
Just realizing how hard the world is, she becomes depressed, "each tear is a waterfall," or the world is crashing down on her.
So, she visions herself in a perfect world, the one she imagined as a child, where she can take on the world and it won't hurt her. "In the night, the stormy night, she closed her eyes," or everytime life got tough, she'd envision it the way she wanted.
Eventually, as she becomes an adult, she realizes that life has its ups and downs but it will always be better in the end, hence, "So lying underneath those stormy skies, She said oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh,
I know the sun must set to rise." -
I think its about how you can never give up! GOD'S Love will gt u there!
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i believe this song is about a girl who's her head was always full of dreams, and she always expected that life is sweet and does whatever u expect and she always lived in a fancy while her whole life was a total life and when she finally wake up from her dream, she realize that life didn't went as she expected it, and it left her so disappointed while everything she actually needs is under her nose, and she was so blinded by her dreams and fancies to see what she really needed. and then even though reality hit her hard,and brought disappointment, it also brought more better things, so she figures out that even if life didn't goes on with what she always wanted, and took a whole new unexpected different way, but this unexpected surprise wasn't a total hell, it was actually a paradise. not the kind of paradise she wanted or imagined, but it was still a paradise.
this song is about that life can goes in a total different direction and can might surprise us in good or bad ways all the time, and we can't control with what future hides.our destiny, but we still can control with how we accept it, and let it flow without fighting it and wishing something that can't happen.
i love this song it is so meaningful and i can totally relate. -
This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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i beleive that this song is about a little girl who was abused so much she passed out and dreamed about getting away with an amazing family which was her paradise.
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I think its about people and they all expected to be in a great, equal, fair, world. but they soon end up knowing the true meaning of the world. it isn't as easy as it was imagined and its not fair or equal and its all just plain "evil"
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The first time I heard this song was about 3 weeks after my beautiful daughter died of a drug overdose. Coldplay was on the "Today Show", and I was just going back to work that week, and had the T.V. on in the background. Still overcome with shock and grief, for some reason, when I heard this song, I thought "Oh my God... this is about her..". I started crying uncontrollably, because the words sounded so much as if it was written for my girl. I could not listen to music for the past year and a half because something always reminds me of her. But it's so weird that wherever I go, some store, restaurant, whatever... this song comes on almost ALWAYS. I think it's my daughter's way of telling me "Yes, Mommy, I am in PARADISE". At least that is how I interpret this. God Bless you, Chris Martin, for writing this song for my baby..
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This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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I think the song Paradise,is about someone who is not happy with their reality. And the wheel is a metaphor for life it keeps going round. And the butterfly is the girl. Life is hard it breaks the butterfly,she fragile (Butterfly).. Paradise when you sleep check out of reality (Dream)....Thinks about what could be.... I love this song !!
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