Are you sure about this?, replied the god Dionysus.
– Yes, yes, let everything he touches turn to gold, insisted Mides.
-Okay, if you’re stubborn about it, that’s how it will be, the god said resignedly as he made a half turn.
Mides, king of Phrygia (a region of the Anatolian peninsula, today’s Turkey) had collected Silenus, one of the satyrs, nice and wise, but like all satyrs, a drunkard, who in one of his drunken bouts had lost Zeus had at one time entrusted this satyr with the education of his son Dionysus, after the god of gods himself gave birth to him in his hired thigh (he had carried him for two months in his thigh, in died the mother of Dionysus, lover of Zeus). Mides welcomed him and returned him after a while with the god of wine, of whose retinue this good but incorrigible satyr was part.
Dionysus, as a sign of gratitude, granted Mides the fulfillment of one of his dreams. This one, although his wealth was proverbial, asked that everything he touched turn to gold. The god tried to dissuade him, but the insatiable Mides insisted. In the end, his dream came true.
“May your dreams come true”. This is one of the phrases we say most these days in Christmas greetings and pious wishes to start the year. And one of the ones we find most in the cheap self-help courses and books that invade us (every time I hear the word coaching I run away). For example: “go ahead and make your dreams come true” or “hold on to your dreams, because if they die, life is a bird with broken wings that can’t fly” and such catchphrases , which produce stomach and soul burning.
Mides could neither eat nor drink, because when he went to ingest food or liquid it turned into gold. He had to beg the god to restore him to his former condition. “Fulfill your dreams” is a very dangerous song. The myth of Mides teaches us this (classical myths are also moral lessons). Oscar Wilde already wrote: “When the gods want to punish us, they listen to our prayers”.