Coldplay: Paradise Meaning

Song Released: 2011

Paradise Lyrics

Oo-oo-oo, oo-oo-oo, oo-oo-oo.
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...

1. anonymous

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   Dec 17th 2011 !⃝

   I think it's about a girl who grew up "expecting the world" but realized that life does not always come easily. For me, I relate it to Glee's Rachel Berry, because she's dreamed of escaping the small town she grew up in and living in New York. When she was younger she got everything she wanted, but she got tormented in high school, so she escapes in her dreams to New York.
2. anonymous

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   Dec 13th 2011 !⃝

   at first i thought this song had something to do with elephants in zoos and how they are trapped and just wish to be re-united with there home and families... 8|
3. anonymous

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   Dec 12th 2011 !⃝

   Many people have said similar and overlapping things, And really all interpretations are correct its personal.
   
   Mine is that she is a girl, who dreams big and grows up in a world of anarchy and chaos, slowly and gradually realising to this. She experiences many problems along the way, an in an attempt flees all these problems (plane flight). They've use the elephant costume as a motif/symbol as it is large and stands out, but also because it needs care and love - its delicate (hence why they've chosen a girl to represent this).
   
   When she reaches a foreign place she still faces the problem and attempts to flee again, this time finding her paradise -- death (via drugs etc. - link to Amy winehouse) or real paradise on earth -- when she meets the group.
4. anonymous

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   Dec 11th 2011 !⃝

   This is one of the interpretations that I got out of this song...
   
   This to me could be about the Adam and eve story in the bible. Eve was so innocent like a little girl. It flew away from her reach when she disobeyed God and ate the forbidden fruit. Now she deeply regrets it and when she closes her eyes she is haunted with the images of the paradise that she once had in the form of eternal life with God.
   
   Just a thought.
5. anonymous

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   Dec 11th 2011 !⃝

   This song is about a girl who, as a child, saw through innocent eyes at the world around her. But as time went on, she found that reality was not quite what she expected, and experienced a deep sadness - or in the words, the dissapointment that life was not as she had dreamed of.
   
   So she went to sleep to find forgetfulness of her reality. This song relates to anyone who has gone to sleep to find solace and peacefulness; the girl took shelter within her dreams where her childhood "Paradise" was still present. The line which states "so lying underneath the stormy skies" evokes a sense of how, although the world around her is crashing down, she has her own little world to take refuge in; her dreams. The vulnerability of her in sleep also suggests that in weakness she finds strength in her private fantasy. A universe - a Wonderland - where she can live when she "closes her eyes" and falls away from the bleak realities she did not expect to originally see.
6. anonymous

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   Nov 27th 2011 !⃝

   To me, this song represents renewed hope. I was very shy as a kid, and I spent half my days dreaming about how life would be, how I would be when I got older. But now that I am older, it's still difficult to open up to the world. I still spend a lot of time dreaming about how the future will be. This song somehow gives me the feeling that 'the future' is now. "This could be paradise" makes me feel like what I've been dreaming of could be where I am, for me it's all about daring to open oneself up. And first and foremost to dare to be the person one dreamed one could be as a child, not holding oneself back with fears and regrets of how things turned out and how they might be.
7. anonymous

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   Nov 26th 2011 !⃝

   I don't think that its about technology or any of that other crap about old and new technology. I think that this song is simply about growing up. Like as a child you imagine to grow up and have everything handed to you on a silver platter. But as the girl grows up she finds out that the world isnt as friendly as she thought it would be.but as she goes through tough times she can close her eyes every once in a while or when she sleeps she can remember the paradise she imagined and that gives her the hope to keep going.
8. anonymous

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   Nov 22nd 2011 !⃝

   I think this song is about a girl who is looking forward to "Paradise" and her dream involves a man she has loved for years. It is singing that sex is extremely important to her with this man. Something about this man has always made her want to have sex with him. It might be his brain. This song is singing about how she wants to be with him and live like the ancient egyptians for the remainder of their days on this planet and after that as well. Have copious amounts of wild, spontaneous, frightening sex for each and all of her days with this one man yes of course. If he gets bored of her, or she of him, that is okay, but they never part for the rest of their lives as it is now her earthly duty to punish and torture him every day for an extended period of time until he dies. When they tire of having sex with each other they will spice things up by smearing food products on each other, such as but not limited to, fine maple syrup, filet mignon, beets, horseradish and corndogs. They will also have fun with leather and sequins, bandanas, animals, scottish negligees, cars, sidewalks, third and fourth parties, the militant elderly and foreign rugby teams when necessary.
   
   Yes that is the meaning of Paradise the song by Coldplay.
9. anonymous

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   Nov 21st 2011 !⃝

   It talks about innocence and being naive everybody use to be before maturity, like we can reach for the stars if we wanted to.
   Then we faced challenges and problems, or dreams that were unattainable.
   so we ran away not knowing how to face them.
   
   After that we faced the biggest challenge that could made anybody gave up or break anybody down.
   But we just became numb and shut ourselves out, moving on with life with these problems/challenges we have no idea how to face.
   It gets so hard that we even lose faith, shed tears.
   
   And when after a great struggle we saw the light at the end of the tunnel, and started thinking positively because worrying can only pull us down.
   
   Knowing that this could be paradise, that we chose to be happy.
10. anonymous

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    Nov 21st 2011 !⃝

    Coldplay's "Paradise" is specifically about one girl (when she was just a girl) Who believed that she can obtain anything, do anything, and that she deserved all that the world has to offer (she expected the world) But some thing caused her to lose all -probably due to poor parents- and have nothing (but it flew away from her reach)Due to this, whenever she went to sleep each night, she'd dream of running away somewhere else (so she ran away in her sleep)
    This place apparently is the verdant eutopia she had hoped for in the past.(Dreamed of para-para-paradise...everytime she closed her eyes)
    Apparently this girl lived in a time of poverty, suspectingly during the war (and the bullets catch in her teeth)
    But she learns that live is turbulent and changes as she herself does, but it takes a turn for the worst(life goes on it gets so heavy) She even watches the world of yesterday turns into an industrial world of tomorrow. (the wheel breaks the butterfly)And as all of her dreams are crushed before her very eyes, turning her sorrow into depression, (every tear a waterfall)One night, during a stormy night, she goes to sleep and dreams...(in the night the stormy night she closed her eyes, in the night the stormy night away she flies) dreams specifically of that one eutopia she's always strived to reach.(dream of para-para-paradise)Then, due to the storms clatter, she is woken up from her pleasent dreams, and realizes that all may just get better soon (She said...I know the sun's set to rise.
11. anonymous

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    Nov 19th 2011 !⃝

    I think it's about a girl who comitted suicide after reality hit her bad
    ''When she was just a girl, she expected the world, but it flew away from reach, so she ran away in her sleep.'' Ran away in her sleep = Suicide. And dreamt of paradise = heaven
12. anonymous

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    Nov 14th 2011 !⃝

    Elephant in the room, hence the elephant costumes in the video.....
13. anonymous

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    Nov 13th 2011 !⃝

    This song's meaning can be related to the biblical paradise cycle.
    In the beginning when Eve and Adam were still innocent, they lived in Eden, or the perfect place. Then they ate the forbidden fruit and were banished from eden and put in reality where they had to work for a living and where death existed. Eve dreams of being back in Eden at first, but later realizes that because she was put in reality and had knowledge of evil that she could produce children and that is what her new paradise became. In the end of the song, there is a twist: "THIS could be paradise" meaning the reality may be tough, but good things come as well.
14. anonymous

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    Nov 11th 2011 !⃝

    The elephant is the video is symbolic of one's "True Self". Its about finding your self in this chaotic and twisted world, like many of the other comments said,But is Really about finding your place in this world.
    "when she was just a girl she expected the world" Most of us has this impression when we are young that the world is there for our taking, then when "reality" sets in and your have all this responsibility and you cant cope you dream of paradise. A better place for you where you can relax and just be you.Or better yet how you had envision life..Paradise could mean heaven,As you could hear the choir singing angelically in the chorus.Making a slight reference to heaven
15. anonymous

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    Nov 9th 2011 !⃝

    Its about a girl who has been sheltered her whole childhood probably cause she is different than everyone else. This makes her lost and lonely for most of her life until she realized that we are actually the same.

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