History Main / SelfFulfillingProphecy

* [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Greek Mythology]] frequently displays this trope:

* This is the cause of Baldur's death in Myth/NorseMythology. Baldur has visions of his death approaching, so he turns to his mother Frigg for help. Frigg makes all things in the world swear not to harm Baldur, making him invulnerable to any form of attack, so the other gods start a game out of throwing things at Baldur. Loki gets frustrated by this and discovers that Baldur is not invulnerable to mistletoe (Frigg having forgotten to ask the mistletoe or discounting it as harmless depending on the version), makes an arrow made of mistletoe and tricks Baldur's blind brother Höðr into using it to kill him.

* ''Literature/TheBible'':
** The Tower of Babel was built because its builders feared being scattered across the Earth. As part of His punishment, God did just that.
** Joseph has prophetic dreams saying he will one day rule his older brothers - so they fake his death and sell him into slavery. But this then starts a chain of events which lead to him becoming [[TheGoodChancellor grand vizier of Egypt]] and controlling the only source of stored food when a famine hits, leading to his brothers having to beg him for help.
** King Ahab was warned by Micaiah the prophet that he would die in the battle of Ramoth Gilead. Ahab tries to avert the disaster by dressing up in different clothes before going into battle while King Jehoshaphat wore his royal clothes, hoping that the Syrian army would go after Jehoshaphat instead of him. However, an arrow shot at random pierces King Ahab, and he ends up fulfilling the very prophecy that was spoken about him.
** In Eastern Orthodox Christianity, it is generally accepted that the incarnation, death and resurrection of Christ was bound to happen from the beginning of creation, even if humanity did not fall to sin (this is something known as Recapitulation Theory). Thus, the entire Bible can be seen as a back-and-forth tug-of-war between Satan trying to delay the inevitable and God outsmarting him at every move.

* The origin story of UsefulNotes/{{Buddhism}} involves founder Siddhartha Gautama, a Hindu aristocrat, being prophesied as a child to become either a great religious leader, or a great ruler. Hoping for the latter, his parents spoiled him rotten and made sure he wanted for nothing. However, on his first trip out of the palace he saw suffering for the first time, and began studying with ascetics to come to terms with the shocking-for-him reality of life outside the aristocracy, ultimately becoming the religious leader his parents tried to keep him from being.

* In the song Project "Ma", Queen Maria Moonlit prophetized the end of Levianta (her country) and the whole world by <The Dark Legacy, "Sin">. Levianta's answer was to create Project [Ma] to purify the sins. The first project's failure caused Eve Moonlit's mental instability and the second project created Hänsel and Gretel, the twins she would later kill for, unleashing the "Sin" onto the world.

* ''Literature/InheritanceCycle'': In ''Eragon'' the title character is asked by a mother to bless her child. He scrapes together some magic words and does. Then his dragon kisses the child, leaving a mark on their forehead. When Eragon protests that he didn't really do anything, someone points out that the kid has both the blessing of a dragon rider and the mark of a kiss from a dragon. They're probably not going to be satisfied as, say, a grocer or blacksmith. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, Eragon screwed up the wording, and accidentally cursed [[http://inheritance.wikia.com/wiki/Elva Elva]].]]

* In ''[[Literature/ZeusIsDead Zeus Is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure]]'', Zeus's original order that the gods withdraw from the mortal world was Zeus's attempt to outwit a prophecy of his murder, which, eventually, wound up making it come true.
* ''Literature/TheLicaniusTrilogy'': Given that this story has both prophecy and time-travel as major components of the plot, this trope comes up a lot.
** In the first book, the Augur Kol has a vision that he will be killed by Scyner. Upon meeting Scyner, he promptly attacks and Scyner kills him in self-defense.
** When he was still a youth, Gassandrid's home city was destroyed by an unknown catastrophe. Millennia later, he attempted to travel back in time and prevent this, only for the backlash from his malfunctioning time travel attempt to cause that very catastrophe.

* In ''Sleeping Dragon'' by Johnny Nexus, five people in a DungeonPunk world are teleported to the same place and given a mission. They eventually learn that five hundred years earlier, the wizard who invented the meta-spells that make modern industrial magic possible prophecised that the world was doomed, and so created a spell that would summon the five greatest heroes of the age to stop it. (They also learn that "heroes" are in short supply, so the spell summoned the five people who came closest to fitting the criteria and then had a breakdown, but that's by-the-by.) Much later, they discover that the threat is a product of industrial magic, and then realise that the wizard ''only researched meta-spells in the first place'' for the specific purpose of creating the summoning spell. Their own wizard says that prophecies always work like this, which is why nobody attempts them any more.

* In the short story "The Man Outside" by Evelyn E. Smith, someone called Martin is destined to have a son who develops the interstellar drive, resulting in the exploitation of other planets and their native populations -- so one of his descendants (Conrad) plots to travel back through time to kill him, preventing the birth of his son. Martin's other descendants get wind of this, and themselves travel back to protect Martin from Conrad, including anyone from Martin's time who might be an agent of Conrad. When Martin is old and on his deathbed, Conrad finally turns up -- and confirms what Martin had worked out years earlier, that his plan all along was to deliberately allow his "death threat" to leak, panicking his brothers and sisters into acting as they did, and thereby achieving the same result without the assassination actually needing to be carried out.

** Voldemort hears half of a prophecy about a boy about to be born who will be his nemesis. With two possible choices, Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom, he chooses Harry, but in the process of trying to kill him, gives him both the power to defy him and a reason to. What's the best way to turn an otherwise unimportant young wizard into your mortal enemy who's well-equipped to defeat you? Well, murdering his parents and spending the better part of a decade sticking him in convoluted death traps is not a bad start. What's more, Dumbledore hints that not all prophecies have to be fulfilled. The only reason Harry is going to fulfill the prophecy is that [[TheUnchosenOne he would never rest until Voldemort was dead]], and the same goes for Voldemort. The only way to avoid it coming true is if they both stop, which certainly won't happen. Worth noting, the prophecy only actually says that one of the two (Voldemort, Harry) will kill the other. Since Harry was a baby at the time Voldemort heard it, striking immediately seemed to make sense. Voldy really should have put more thought into it, though. [[WordOfGod JK Rowling]] has said that had the roles been reversed, Neville would have been just as capable of walking the same path Harry did. There ''was'' a [[TakeAThirdOption third option]] available to Voldemort, but it was one that his ego and paranoia would've never allowed him to take even had he been aware of it: do nothing. That would've resulted in neither Harry nor Neville being "marked as the Dark Lord's equal" and gaining the power to defeat him.

* Played with in the Tim Pratt short story "Another End of the Empire": an EvilOverlord receives a prophecy that a child from a certain village will grow up to bring an end to his empire. Rather than wipe them out (he knows how these things work; there will be survivors), he instead uses the village as a test bed for social and political reform, improving education and the general quality of life, hoping to eliminate any possible motive anyone would have for trying to overthrow him. He even adopts the three most likely candidates as his sons and allows them to pursue their own agendas to keep them happy. The twist is that [[spoiler: in making all these changes, he has made his empire peaceful and prosperous, his subjects actually like him now rather than simply fear him, and he can even retire happily and pass on rule to one of his more progressive-minded sons]]. So his empire does come to end, just not the way he expected. Amusingly, both the overlord and his Sybil is aware of this trope and discusses it -- it is the reason he is certain there would be survivors, when he complains that his probability witches have been unable to narrow it down beyond the three most likely candidates the Sybil suggests it is a dynamic prophecy and any one of them ''could'' be the overthrower if the other two are killed or removed, and towards the end the plan is to continue the course so as to avoid triggering the prophecy before he can die from something less destiny-entangled. It is only at the end he realizes he'd managed to arrange things so [[ProphecyTwist the prophecy could be fulfilled in a less personally unpleasant way]].

:: The wording of the prophecy was "If allowed to grow to manhood, he will take over your empire, overthrow your ways and means, and send you from the halls of your palace forever", which ''almost'' (one can quibble about one part of it) happened, just not in the way the evil overlord thought: the Empire is taken over by one of the children... because he adopted the child (all of them, but only one wanted to rule) and later abdicated and gave the throne to that child, his ways and means were overthrown... because, in the process of allowing them to indulge in their agendas, that child had introduced extensive but effective reforms far beyond anything the overlord had considered, and while the one that took over the Empire didn't exactly ''send'' the overlord from the halls of the palace forever, he did see the overlord do so - because the overlord felt useless and didn't ''want'' to stay around after having abdicated.

** The wording of the prophecy was "If allowed to grow to manhood, he will take over your empire, overthrow your ways and means, and send you from the halls of your palace forever", which ''almost'' (one can quibble about one part of it) happened, just not in the way the evil overlord thought: the Empire is taken over by one of the children... because he adopted the child (all of them, but only one wanted to rule) and later abdicated and gave the throne to that child, his ways and means were overthrown... because, in the process of allowing them to indulge in their agendas, that child had introduced extensive but effective reforms far beyond anything the overlord had considered, and while the one that took over the Empire didn't exactly ''send'' the overlord from the halls of the palace forever, he did see the overlord do so - because the overlord felt useless and didn't ''want'' to stay around after having abdicated.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Encanto}}'': Bruno's talent is the ability to predict the future. However, many of his prophecies work this way. For instance, when he said "it looks like rain" during Pepa’s wedding, she freaked out and her weather powers go haywire (it doesn’t help she's very emotionally unstable), or when he said a woman's fish will die (since it was living in a bowl and [[CaptainObvious was mortal]]), or a man would get fatter (well, this is what happens when someone overeats or has a slow metabolism), or the priest will lose his hair (it’s called "genetics"). Because people tend to do exactly what the prophecies say, they immediately label Bruno as a jinx.

* ''{{WesternAnimation/{{Amphibia}}'': Leif, one of Andrias' former friends [[spoiler:who was also the Plantar's ancestor]], stole the Music Box that Andrias and his father were going to use to conquer Earth because it gave her a vision of Amphibia being destroyed by [[ColonyDrop its own moon]], and hid it on Earth where it would be used by Anne, Sasha, and Marcy about a thousand years later. However, other parts of the vision are things that we already saw happen, and it's later revealed that the moon falling is caused by [[spoiler:the Core deciding to destroy Amphibia out of anger after Earth is saved from being invaded]], meaning that it could have been prevented if Leif hadn't taken the Music Box to Earth and allowed the girls to come to Amphibia in the first place.

* One of Russia's many excuses for invading Ukraine in 2022 was because of the number of former Warsaw Pact nations that had joined NATO, and to prevent Ukraine from doing the same. The result? Traditionally-neutral Sweden and Finland--the latter of which was the trope namer of the concept of "Finlandization", where a nation was forced to be neutral--both are now seeking to join NATO. In addition, western European countries, which had long been skeptical of the continued utility of NATO, have increased military spending and reactivated what had become a dormant alliance.[[note]]In 2014, right before Russia's annexation of Crimea, support for NATO had reached an all-time low with only 3 of the at-the-time 26 member states meeting the budgetary requirements of 2% GDP being directed towards military spending.[[/note]]

* One of Russia's many excuses for invading Ukraine in 2022 was because of the number of former Warsaw Pact nations that had joined NATO, and to prevent Ukraine from doing the same. The result? Traditionally-neutral Sweden and Finland--the latter of which was the trope namer of the concept of "Finlandization", where a nation was forced to be neutral--both are now seeking to join NATO.

* ''VideoGame/LobotomyCorporation'': This is the backstory of the three birds. [[spoiler:Small Bird, Long Bird and Big Bird used to live together in the peaceful Black Forest. However, one day the forest got word of a prophecy fortelling of a terrible monster who would bring the forest to ruin. The three birds decided to fight against this prophecy by trying to become the forest's self-appointed protectors, but as a result it transformed them into monsters, both figuratively and [[AnimalisticAbomination literally]]. Small Bird became Punishing Bird, an executioner who would punish anyone it found guilty. Long Bird became Judgement Bird, a HangingJudge who would decide to send people to death for the smallest crime. Big Bird became the vigilant guard of the forest who would MercyKill anyone who trespassed so the "monster" wouldn't be able to get to them. Eventually, the three decided that the three of them would be insufficient to protect the forest alone, so they decided to [[FusionDance fuse into one gigantic bird]] so they could see for miles across the earth, judge any sin without fail, and devour any evildoers in one gulp. Once they did this, the forest's inhabitants left the forest in fear because the birds had become the very monster destined to bring ruin to the Black Forest.]]

** Frieza kills all of the Saiyans he can find and even destroys their home planet in order to prevent a Super Saiyan from rising up and defeating him. What happens later? Frieza's efforts actually anger Goku to the point that he becomes a Super Saiyan and completely beats the shit out of Frieza, even to the point of killing him. [[NotQuiteDead It doesn't stick]] but even at that point, it was pretty clear that Frieza was killed ''because'' of his efforts to prevent himself from being killed. In addition, Frieza's ''actual'' death is by the son of one of the three Saiyans he allowed to live in one timeline, and by Goku in the other.

* Gendo Ikari from ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' [[DisappearedDad abandons his son]], Shinji, because he believes that he will be a bad parent and only end up hurting Shinji. The irony of course, is that with his abandonment, he ends up giving Shinji one of his deepest emotional scars. Funnily enough, [[LikeFatherLikeSon Shinji does something similar]]; he desperately [[IJustWantToBeLoved wants human affection]], but alienates all the people who try to help him because he refuses to believe they care about him.

* ''LightNovel/RosePrincessHellrage'' starts with the execution of the title character because her father was deposed and murdered by his evil younger brother who wanted the crown. The usurper played on a dubious prophecy that children born with silver hair and eyes are "cursed" and destined to doom the country. Since he used this premise to take the throne, he couldn't deny his fanatical KnightTemplar followers who wanted to hunt the child down and preemptively end the menace. When these knights find the child and her mother, they put the pair of women through hell for at least a month before dragging her to the guillotine and then throwing a party over the defiled corpses. They also pointedly ignore the executioner, who is accustomed to seeing undead rise at execution sites if proper measures, like a pre-execution sanctification and a memorial service aren't held, saying "a memorial service for that 'evil' child is a sacrilege." To the surprise of everyone (including the executioner, but only because of her power level), Rene rises up as a powerful undead and immediately starts carrying out her vengeance, only momentarily stopped by an army of the king's strongest elites, and even then only because she wasn't accustomed to her powers yet, nor had any solid plans or strategies in place...

* ''Franchise/GreenLantern'': This is pretty much how Hal Jordan got his ring. Green Lantern Abin Sur heard a prophecy from Qull that his ring would fail and he would die, setting off a chain of events that would lead to [[ComicBook/SinestroCorpsWar Sinestro turning evil and spreading chaos across the galaxy]]. When Sur went to Earth to investigate this prophecy, he was terrified of his ring failing; so much so that, with prodding from Atrocitus, he lost his belief in his own abilities and succumbed to fear, [[EmotionalPowers thus ensuring the ring would indeed stop working for him]]. This led to his death, Hal getting the ring, and everything else that came after.

* A couple of ''Comicbook/SpiderMan'' stories deal with his TimePolice counterpart from the year 2211 and his arch-nemesis Hobgoblin 2211. It's revealed the Hobgoblin 2211 is really [[spoiler: his daughter Robin, who, while researching breaks in the "multiverse" throughout history, and how to stop them from continuing to destroy reality, is arrested by her father for things she is innocent of now, but will do in the future (namely murder and screwing around with reality), and placed in a virtual reality prison/paradise. Her boyfriend, however, attempts to free her by using a virus to shut down the computer she's attached to, which also drives her completely insane as her mind is affected by the virus. Now totally nuts, she then dons a dimensional/time traveling suit and goes on a rampage through time and reality, erasing people (usually Spider-Men) from existence with RetCon bombs. As a result, not only do her father's attempts to stop her from becoming the Hobgoblin directly cause her to do so, but she herself becomes the cause of the very breaks in reality that she had discovered (though that's less a prophecy than merely [[StableTimeLoop an ironic turn]])]].
* ''ComicBook/SupermansPalJimmyOlsen'': One issue has Jimmy helping a scientist who has a psychic transmitter that might prove reincarnation. To his horror, he discovers that all his past incarnations were close to one of history's great men (Julius Caesar, Richard the Lionheart, and Abraham Lincoln) and somehow brought about their deaths. Concluding that he has to separate from Superman to protect him, he crashes a helicopter on an island that Superman knows the Superman Revenge Squad booby-trapped. Of course, Superman refuses to be deterred, and in the process of trying to get his guilt-stricken friend to listen, he gets hit by a kryptonite beam, apparently killing him. Luckily, it turned out Superman was momentarily PlayingPossum to get Jimmy to stop running and hear him out.

* ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda2'' has the GenocideBackfire version: Lord Shen hears that he will be defeated by a "warrior of black and white", so he destroys the panda village in the area. This act eventually causes baby Po to be sent to the Valley of Peace, which allows him to become the Dragon Warrior and get the training he would need to fulfill his destiny, and indeed, he defeats Shen and ends his ambitions of conquest. It goes into full ProphecyTwist territory with how Shen dies: Po was willing to offer Shen mercy. However, Shen continued to attacking, cutting ropes holding up Shen's creation, a giant cannon. The cannon falls, crushing him. Shen, who through his colored plumage (not to mention through the constant Yin Yang motifs throughout the film) is also a "warrior of black and white." Shen not only caused his own defeat by Po, but also caused his defeat by [[HoistByHisOwnPetard himself]].
* Taken literally in ''WesternAnimation/TheLEGOMovie'', where Vitruvius admits that he made up the prophecy about "the Special" because he knew that it would inspire hope and bring about an actual "Special" by the hidden potential found in everyone.

* Unlike most examples, ''Film/TheMatrix'' series as a whole [[JustifiedTrope justifies this trope]] in that those prophesied about actually WANT to fulfill the prophecies made by the Oracle. Also further justified in that the Oracle may SEE the future, but she usually doesn't TELL the future. That is, she doesn't tell the Zionites what the future actually holds. She just tells them what they need to hear in order for that future to come about. Of course, the Oracle was a memetic program designed to understand and manipulate human emotions. Go figure.

** When Neo asked the Oracle if he was the One the first time he met her and she told him "No, not in this life", she was speaking the truth. He wasn't. [[MetaphoricallyTrue Not at that point in time, anyway.]] This may also count as an inversion when her telling Neo that Morpheus would die for mistakenly believing Neo was the One unless Neo did something about it eventually led to Neo dying, and getting resurrected in a blatant Christian metaphor, and at THAT point he becomes the One. And, of course, gets himself crucified a few films later.

* ''Film/{{Paycheck}}''. And not ''Paycheck''. The newspaper scene pretty much plays this straight [[spoiler: with the machine that can see the future]], but the rest of the movie subverts this. Specifically, [[spoiler: the machine sees in the future that there will be a plague. So, leaders use the machine to see who will get the plague, round them all up and keep them together to prevent it from spreading. Surprise! They all get the plague. The machine predicts a war with another country, so leaders launch a preemptive strike against the evil country and the result is a war. By seeing the future, the leaders create the future, which they then see. It's weird and circular but makes sense: the machine doesn't so much see the future, it sees the future that ''the machine'' will create merely by existing]].

* In ''Film/TheTenCommandments'', Pharoah Rameses I on advice from his High Priest Jannes orders the massacre of all Hebrew babies born at the time predicted that a Hebrew male would grow up to deliver his slave nation from bondage. [[NiceJobBreakingItHerod It does not work]], as the one surviving male baby Moses is secretly adopted by the pharaoh's own daughter Bithia to actually grow up to make the prophecy come true.

** That story is played with in ''{{Literature/Discworld}}'' when '''Death''' runs into Rincewind and tells him they have an appointment in another city and asks Rincewind to please hurry and go there, even offering to lend him his horse. Rincewind refuses. Of course, it was the same city Rincewind was planning to run to in the first place, making it a sort of accidentally self-defeating prophecy.

* Of course, as mentioned above, the ancient Greek fable of Oedipus Rex (later made into a play by Sophocles), which ended in Oedipus gouging out his own eyes and his wife/mother hanging herself.

* In the Victorian heist novel ''Any Old Diamonds'', the main character's WickedStepmother always feared that high society, and her new stepchildren, would not accept her because she's a lower-class woman who married a duke. So she rubs her wealth and rank in everyone's face all the time, and is in general a huge {{Jerkass}}. (It doesn't help that are some nasty skeletons in the closet regarding her ''first'' marriage.) So yes, high society hates having her around and people only invite her to things when they absolutely have to, because she's ''totally unbearable''. The protagonist notes that there are other women who married into the nobility after careers as dancers and actresses who are now well-accepted after the initial classist hiccups, because they're actually nice to people.

* Creator/CSLewis' book ''Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia: Literature/TheHorseAndHisBoy'' is, in theory, based around one of these; the revelation of the content of the prophecy sets in motion the very events that were predicted. Of course, [[CrystalDragonJesus Aslan]] has a carefully judged paw on the scales of the universe throughout - pushing boats to shore, scaring the horses, propping up the central character's failing morale, and generally helping the characters complete his GambitRoulette. No doubt giving the dryad the plot-triggering prophecy was all according to plan.

*** And, of course, [[spoiler:the prophecy says THE valonqar, not HER valonqar - which means the prophecy may actually refer to some ''other'' acknowledged set of notable siblings' young/er/est member, and Cersei's bloodthirsty plotting has left ''many'' of those with a serious wish to take revenge on her in its winding wake]].
** She also seems to be on her way to fulfilling her own personal interpretation of the part regarding her children - "gold shall be their crowns, and gold shall be their shrouds". She sees it as "they'll be crowned, then they'll die and then you'll be left with your life wrecked and you'll die" -- even though there are other interpretations. They're all born blond -- aka "golden-haired" (which is a bit odd for Baratheons), hence... they may not necessarily need to actively rule anything (with her as the puppetmaster of their lives) to meet the "golden crown" conditions -- but, [[RegentForLife that's what she aims to do]], regardless of the known risk. And, as pure little Lannisters, "golden shrouds" are pretty much a given; red and gold are the House colours. It also does ''not'' necessarily say that her children will definitely die before her to make everything she wants to go down the drain enough to have her weep buckets (although it's heavily implied by following the mention of shrouds), but she certainly fears that it definitely does. [[spoiler:However, the way she [[MyBelovedSmother raised Joffrey]], partly thanks to her worries, helped turn him into a monster, which set him up to be killed by the Tyrells to protect his bride, Margaery Tyrell... which then allows her to marry the more pliable Tommen... who becomes a boy-king at a ''very'', very unstable time liable to generate numerous ways to get him torn from Cersei's smothering grasp, turned against her, maimed and/or killed: all outcomes she'd not want. Meanwhile, Myrcella ''is'' "taken" from her and sent to Dorne as part of an arranged betrothal, surrounded by people with a more progressive outlook which, if she adopts it, might distance her enough from her birth family to actively fight Cersei at some point. Although the Dornish ''also'' have little cause to love Lannisters, despite Myrcella being an olive branch between kingdoms, so that not only had the chance to lose the prospective Princess her looks through misadventure, but could still blow up in the way Cersei expects... And, all because Cersei refused to undergo another political marriage, mainly so she could remain at King's Landing to keep a paranoid eye and over-firm grip on the "[[HeirClubForMen more important]]" boys.]]

* All prophecies in the ''Literature/SwordOfTruth'' series are self-fulfilling. Richard, the main protagonist, also makes a strong argument for just letting things run there course as part of it. Throughout the series, just about every prophecy has been twisted because of interpretation, and no one knows what the actual meaning is to properly use. Even then, there are "dead branch" prophecies because some are either-or. Combined, this meant that trying to invoke a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy or prepare for it could actually prevent or impair it.

** A prominent example is with Cole Turner in Season 5. He repeatedly attempts to win Phoebe back and be good, but no matter what he did to try to convince her, Phoebe and her sisters adamantly refuse to accept him back and even try to kill him, stating that he will never be anything more than an evil demon. Eventually, Cole [[SanitySlippage goes insane]] and decides to [[ThenLetMeBeEvil just roll with it]].

* Averted in one episode of ''Series/StargateAtlantis'', the crew meets a man who can tell the future (correctly) and even show his visions to other people. The team suggests that they are self-fulfilling prophecies, however even events that could not have been self-fulfilled through the prophecy turn out to be true.

** Callisto's parents were killed during Xena's reign of terror, so she naturally assumed that Xena or one of her soldiers killed her folks. After she became a goddess, she accidentally ended up in her old village on the day of the attack. While trying to protect her mother and her younger self, she accidentally kills her father and is forced to kill her mother in self-defense. [[spoiler: Of course, by the end of the episode, Iolaus went back and changed history so that Callisto never went back to that day, so said SFP never actually happened...]]

** See also the myth of Perseus' birth. See, the oracle at Delphi told King Acrisius that his grandson would kill him, so he decided to prevent his daughter Danae from ever bearing a son by locking her up in a brass tower, where her weeping drew the attention of Zeus and he sired a child with her. Once Acrisius found out, he locked them up in a coffin and floated it out to sea in the hopes that they would drown[[note]]In ancient Greek times, it was considered a ''much'' greater and more unforgivable sin to directly kill a family member than it was to abandon them and leave their survival to fate, whereas under modern mores, the latter is not considered much better than the former[[/note]], but a fisherman found both of them and took them in. And even though Perseus never sought out revenge against Acrisius, he ''did'' end up accidentally killing him. As Perseus returned home from his famous quest, Acrisius learned he was still alive and fled to the remote city of Larissa. Turns out Perseus got shipwrecked there too, where he entered a local athletics contest, and accidentally caved a crowd member's head in with a discus. Guess who that crowd member was.

* This is the plot of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime''. Zelda has a vision that Ganondorf will take the Triforce from its hiding place sealed within the Golden Realm, sends Link to preemptively collect the {{MacGuffin}}s sealing the Golden Realm that Ganondorf has been attempting to obtain, and of course Ganondorf follows Link into the Golden Realm and takes the Triforce when Link unseals it. This sort of thing happens a lot in the series. Specifically, Link himself was sealed away because, as a Hylian child, he was considered too young to be the Hero of Time. Of course, the Hero would have been unnecessary if he hadn't been sealed away for seven years, letting Ganondorf take over. If Link had in fact been a Kokiri, or else a little bit older, he would have succeeded in stopping Ganondorf because he would have gotten the power first.

** This is basically the quarian-geth conflict. Robot servants start asking their creators things like "Does this unit have a soul?" The creators panic, expecting the robots to rise up, and try to shut them down. Robots fight back, creators get kicked off their planet. Centuries later, most quarians - including their representative in your party - still maintain the geth would have turned on them anyway and wiping them out was the only option...until Legion shows up. The whole mess becomes even more ridiculous in the third game when it's revealed that the Geth [[spoiler:''didn't even try to fight back at first''. They only initially fought to defend the Quarian minority who didn't want to shut them down from the other Quarians. The Quarians were always their own worst enemy]]. This "Morning War" became a cautionary tale to the other races, who took the exact wrong message from it and made this Self-Fulfilling Prophecy law throughout the galaxy. One sidequest in the first game involves an AI who self-destructs rather than talk to you, even if you try and negotiate.

* There are several of these in ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', most notably the prophecy Velen made about M'uru, the Naaru Kael'thas stole from Tempest Keep. He prophesied that M'uru would be stolen, tortured, and enslaved, but it would lead, in the end, to the redemption of an entire race, adding even more Light warriors to Velen's army of the Light that he ALSO prophesied would be the end of the Burning Legion. A powerful, godlike being went willingly into torturous enslavement ONLY because Velen saw it. If Velen had never had the vision, the blood elves would never be redeemed. Arthas heard about Tirion being so powerful and an unstoppable force of the Light that he started to fear a confrontation with a Tirion at full power, so he attacked only when Tirion's army at the Battle of Light's Hope Chapel was defeated by his Death Knights, which lead to the redemption of Darion Mograine and a few other Death Knights, as well as giving Tirion possession of the EXACT WEAPON he needed to kill Arthas: the Purified Ashbringer. The Ashbringer rejected Darion ONLY because he was in close proximity to Tirion as well. If Arthas had never sent Darion to kill Tirion, the sword would never have switched allegiances and been purified to become the only weapon capable of defeating the Lich King.
** Velen sharing his vision of the gift of Sargeras with his two brothers, Kil'jaeden and Archimonde. One could argue that this didn't do anything at all, but...perhaps KJ/Archi LIKED the future Velen showed them so much that they totally ignored the fact that it would turn them into the greatest monsters in the universe. KJ is a genius, so perhaps he thought he could escape the bad parts of the future, while Archi was arrogant and likely thought no one could challenge him once he accepted Sargeras' gift. [[spoiler: Kil'jaeden is RIGHT. He has never been killed and eventually took over leadership of the Burning Legion once Sargeras was disposed of. He was merely punted back to where he came from after his defeat at the Sunwell. Archimonde was killed off by WISPS, quite possibly the weakest creatures in Azeroth, after assaulting the World Tree.]]

* In [[http://www.creepypasta.com/the-gift-of-mercy/ The Gift of Mercy]], an alien race from the other side of the galaxy discovers humanity after picking up radio signals from Earth, and starts studying us, concluding that we're all a bunch of barbaric savages obsessed with violence and killing, but fortunately much too stupid to ever be a threat to them. Then we develop space travel and they start getting a bit worried. Then we start ''deliberately'' sending radio transmissions out into space trying to make first contact, and they collectively shit their pants in terror. "They knew we were out here, and they were coming for us." They scramble to build a WMD to wipe us out, the titular "[[MercyKill Gift of Mercy]]", and launch it directly at Earth. They aren't exactly ''happy'' about doing this, but see it as a [[NecessarilyEvil necessary evil]] to save themselves. Of course, crossing the entire galaxy takes a really long time even at lightspeed, and in that time we evolve so much that we all become {{Transhuman}} pacifists who make some of the most beautiful art the galaxy has ever seen. Alas, there is no way to stop the Gift of Mercy from reaching its target, Earth and most of our solar system is obliterated, and the aliens are left wracked with guilt over committing a genocide that turned out to not have been necessary after all. Then, a HopeSpot: it turns out that millions of humans still survived on other colonized planets that were far enough away from Earth to have avoided destruction. The aliens breathe a collective sigh of relief that they didn't actually wipe us all out after all... [[OhCrap and then they get a message from us]]: "[[IronicEcho We know you are out there, and we are coming for you.]]"

** In "Squid's Visit", [=SpongeBob=] goes to great lengths to get Squidward to visit him, to the point he "borrows" his vaccum cleaner as bait and even redesigns his house interior to look like Squidward's, down to the smallest detail. In the end, he gets more than what he barganed for when Squidward has to stay with [=SpongeBob=] when his house gets burnt down from a casserole left in the oven, but [=SpongeBob=] has to sleep outside on the wreckage.

** On a similar note, calling your child stupid, lazy, slow, etc., in order to make them a better version of themselves, not only is unfair to them, but it ultimately backfires as this would crush their self esteem, and be exactly what you’re were trying to avoid to be in the first place, since, you know, what’s the point of trying to be better if all what you gets is to be still treated like garbage because of unrealistic and unhealthy expectations?

* An example from the UK in 2008 or so: a two-day strike at an oil refinery in Scotland wouldn't have affected petrol distribution in the slightest as several days' reserves are stored off-site. However, as soon as news of the strike got out, queues appeared at petrol stations all over the country - even those areas which got their petrol from completely different refineries. This, of course, meant they sold out of petrol quickly, leading to local news stations running stories about petrol stations running short, which led to more people trying to fill up before the nationwide fuel drought struck their beloved motor...

* UsefulNotes/WorldWarI was one: everyone was convinced it would happen, so it did in spite of the few sane people who tried to avoid it (who included the Tsar). Also {{subverted|Trope}} with [[HomeByChristmas the idea it would end soon]]: the Triple Alliance ''had'' a plan to make it end by Christmas, but it fell through when Italy declared neutrality (thus depriving the German Army of the diversion they needed to take Paris and kick France out of the war). Hell, the war was ''predicted almost to the day'' by UsefulNotes/OttoVonBismarck himself twenty years prior, and he even predicted it would be caused by "some fool thing in the Balkans". As ''[[WebAnimation/ExtraCredits Extra History]]'' will attest, the lead-up to the war is an utterly tragic comedy of errors, even starting right from Franz Ferdinand's choice of date to visit Sarajevo, which was a day of pride for Serbia. When he was assassinated, ''everyone'' was trying to achieve their goals while also trying to avoid the European war they feared would happen, only to be foiled by incompetence or twists of fate.

* The PlaceboEffect shows that this trope works even on a physical level: If a patient takes a neutral substance (such as sugar pills), but believes it's a treatment that will make them feel better, the belief can be enough to make them actually recover. There's also a negative counterpart called the "Nocebo Effect": If the patient is told a neutral substance will have negative side effects or cause harmful symptoms, they're likely to experience those symptoms as well. Notably, both effects don't just work on subjective symptoms, such as pain or mood, but on things that can actually be physiologically measured, such as heart rhythm and blood pressure. While the effect isn't fully understood, the current theory is that the patient's expectations have a lot to do with the outcome of the treatment. YourMindMakesItReal, after all.
** In short, the brain-mind relationship is yet to be fully understood, but while the brain as a chemical computer (and assorted limits) of course influences the mind and thus chemical imbalances cause distress, it's becoming apparent that the mind is powerful enough to force the brain into doing things as well, thus forcefully solving the chemical imbalances and hence the person becoming healthier.

* Two of the symptoms of borderline personality disorder (BPD) are an intense fear of being abandoned and feeling emotions extremely intensely. A person with BPD may be scared and worried that their loved one will leave them. When their loved one does something that upsets them, even if they didn't mean to, the person with BPD sees it as a sign that their loved one doesn't care about them and/or is going to abandon them (in other words, they shift from seeing them as a good person to seeing them as a bad person, a behavior called splitting). They get angry and upset and lash out at their loved one, which damages the relationship and may cause the loved one to eventually leave.

** Prior to Goku actually fulfilling the prophecy, Vegeta tries unsuccessfully to invoke this trope, declaring that Frieza was [[WhatAnIdiot an idiot]] for destroying the Saiyan race because he feared their potential power...but keeping the strongest one of all alive. Vegeta incorrectly believed that ''he'' had become a Super Saiyan at this point, and Frieza gave him a [[CurbStompBattle rude awakening]]. Since DeathIsCheap in the ''Dragon Ball'' universe, though, Vegeta was brought back to life and got to see the fulfillment of the prophecy anyway.

* In Volume 6 of ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'', Oz states his reason for keeping secrets and not telling the whole truth is that he fears if he, people would turn on him. Looking back at the actions of those who already turned on him, it becomes clear that their reason is ''because'' Oz kept his secrets instead of trusting them with the truth from the beginning. Oz later [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] what he's been doing, comparing himself to the protagonist of another story who ran away from her mistakes, but instead of learning from them, merely ended up spreading her failure.

** Reginald [[spoiler:knew about the apocalypse in advance, and killed himself to give his children a reason to [[PuttingTheBandBackTogether reform the team]] and work together to stop it]]. However, his death leads to Klaus using his return to the Mansion as an excuse to raid Hargreeve's office for items to pawn for drug money. One of those items was an ornate box in the desk possessing a notebook, which Klaus threw in a dumpster on his way to the pawn shop. This leads to Leonard finding the notebook, which leads to [[spoiler:Leonard finding out about Vanya's dormant powers and how they can be awoken]], which becomes a direct cause of the apocalypse.
** When the Hargreeves siblings learn about the impending apocalypse, they start working together to prevent it. However, in the process, they alienate and belittle [[TheTeamNormal Vanya]], on the grounds that because she lacks a superpower and was never part of the SuperFamilyTeam to begin with, she'd just get in the way if she tried to help. [[spoiler:Turns out she ''does'' have powers, and those powers - combined with her fragmented mental state, caused by the abuse she suffered from her family and her new boyfriend (who's only dating her to exploit said powers) - are what cause the apocalypse.]]
** Why did Sir Hargreeves and Pogo [[spoiler: force Vanya to take antidepressants to suppress her powers as a child then eventually brainwashed her to forget she even had them]]? [[spoiler:Because Hargreeves deemed Vanya's powers too dangerous for her to control. This is the same reason why Luther decides to lock up Vanya in a soundproof cell despite [[TraumaticSuperpowerAwakening seeing her clear distress over what's happening]] ''and'' despite the protests of the other siblings. Vanya discovering the power suppression, combined with the abuse her family always doled on her because of being "normal" and Luther's bone-headed decisions results in her [[FaceHeelTurn snapping]], [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal murdering Pogo]], [[DestroyingTheAbusiveHome destroying the Hargreeves Mansion]], and becoming the ApocalypseMaiden. The kicker? Vanya's superpowers [[PsychoactivePowers are tied directly to her emotions and mental state]]; if she wasn't constantly emotionally abused throughout her life and if Luther actually comforted her instead of treating her like their father did, the destruction her powers brought forth when they reawoke wouldn't have been as devastating as it was, and she could have learned how to control them in due time.]]

** Prior to Goku actually fulfilling the prophecy, Vegeta tries unsuccessfully to invoke this trope, declaring that Frieza was [[WhatAnIdiot an idiot]] for destroying the Saiyan race because he feared their potential power...but keeping the strongest one of all alive. Vegeta incorrectly believed that ''he'' had become a Super Saiyan at this point, and Frieza gave him a [[CurbStompBattle rude awakening]]. Since DeathIsCheap in the Dragon Ball universe, though, Vegeta was brought back to life and got to see the fulfillment of the prophecy anyway.

* In ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure'' that's exactly the working mechanism of Thoth, the Stand of Boingo, one of the antagonists. Thoth takes the form of an indie comic book, describing future happenings or actions taken by his user and his immediate peers. Thoth is so accurate, even if following a leap-and-bound narration that makes it slightly hard to understand at a quick glance, that every attempt to change or foil the events already written in its pages will ensure the very same event takes place, and exactly as described. One other way to interpret what Thoth is doing is that it generates a single image that describes all the ''possible'' futures in some oblique fashion. [[spoiler:With Oingo: If he hadn't panicked at Joseph's early arrival and taken Jotaro's guise, the bomber orange would have been left in the car...and would have been the one Jotaro began peeling to slake his thirst. With Hol Horse: If he'd relied on the clocktower instead of his fast watch, the bullets would have hit Jotaro at the same time as the water burst.]] In other words, it's accurate for both the "default" stance ''and'' the self-fulfilled results.

--> '''The Arishok:''' Fixing your mess is not the demand of the Qun, and you should all be grateful!

** It is known that, in the future, a Sorceress will rise to conquer the world and attempt {{Time C|rash}}oppression to attain godhood. Therefore, future societies persecute potential Sorceresses. When Ultimecia is finally born, this persecution plants the seeds of unending hatred within her, causing her to lash out and devastate the world.

** Then there's King Croesus, who was told that if he attacked his neighbor, a great empire would fall. Think about that for a moment -- obviously, it's going to come true, since whichever empire lost the war would fall. Croesus just didn't consider that it might be ''his'' empire. This is lampshaded in ''ComicBook/TheCartoonHistoryOfTheUniverse''[='s=] version, where Croesus' response is "What kind of answer is that?! I might as well flip a coin!" Also, when Croesus complained to Apollo and his oracle after his campaign turned out a disaster, he got the response: "You should have asked which empire instead of assuming that it would be [[UsefulNotes/CyrusTheGreat Cyrus]]' empire that would fall." As a matter of fact, if people got an unsatisfactory answer from the oracle in Delphi they could ask for another one, and Croesus as a favoured benefactor of Delphi easily could have done just that. (…or attacked a neighbour that wasn't an empire.)

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Encanto}}'': Bruno’s talent is the ability to predict the future. However many of his prophecies work this way. For instance, when he said “it looks like rain” during Pepa’s wedding, she freaked out and her weather powers go haywire (it doesn’t help she’s very emotionally unstable), or when he said a woman’s fish will die (since it was living in a bowl and not a ), or a man would get fatter (well, this is what happens when someone overeats or has a slow metabolism), or the priest will lose his hair (it’s called “ genetics”). Because people tend to do exactly what the prophecies say, they immediately label Bruno as a jinx.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Encanto}}'': Bruno’s talent is the ability to predict the future. However many of his prophecies work this way. For instance, when he said “it looks like rain” during Pepa’s wedding, she freaked out and her weather powers go haywire (it doesn’t help she’s very emotionally unstable), or when he said a woman’s fish will die (you know, like every mortal animal), or a man would get fatter (well, this is what happens when someone overeats or has a slow metabolism), or the priest will lose his hair (it’s called “ genetics”). Because people tend to do exactly what the prophecies say, they immediately label Bruno as a jinx.