5.24.21
It is true that we cannot see ourselves through our own eyes as we actually are. A mirror will always reflect reversed and slightly bent light. A camera lens will always distort an image. Optical aberration will always limit us in this way.
A more reliable way may be by hearing ourselves described by others. And even so, there are filters that are consciously or unconsciously applied to us, by ourselves and others. How rare is it when someone sees us, really sees us? If that ever happens, do we actually want them to describe what they see, flaws and all? It may be what we think we want. But sometimes the more we strip down the filters and distortions, the more raw and clear our image becomes, the more intimidating it gets. Perhaps it is almost foreign. Would we even recognize ourselves without the distortions? Lately I’ve been pondering all of this, and wondering: if we can’t even see ourselves accurately, how do we even know who we are?
I wonder if the answer to this question begins with the question itself. How do we know who we are? Instinct and habit says to look out. Out at a reflection, out at an image, out at other people. But perhaps the best – and only reliable – way to know who we are is to instead peer inward. That is, if we dare.
The perplexing nature of my own reflection has been haunting me for this reason: Recognizing it to be unreliable, I have forsaken all attempts at seeing myself with mirrors and photos and descriptions from others. What I’ve found as I instead peer inward is someone entirely different than who I assumed I was, than who reflections and others told me I was. I say from experience, it can be incredibly difficult to meet ourselves for the first time in this way. Sometimes it’s downright terrifying.
Pema Chödrön says that “fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth.” She has a traditional Buddhist take on fear that challenges our natural response to recoil from it. Instead, she argues, we must lean into it. “At times like that… there’s nowhere to hide. We see it as well as anyone else-better than anyone else… The kinds of discoveries that are made through practice have nothing to do with believing anything. They have much more to do with having the courage to die, the courage to die continually.”
I have experienced so many different kinds of grief in the last year. There are stories to be told about that in time, but this story I am living now is about grieving the loss of a self. This is not at all as tragic as it sounds. No, just the opposite. Chödrön reminds, “rather than realizing that it takes death for there to be birth, we just fight against the fear of death.” I am tired of fighting against that fear.
As the second decade of my life comes to a close soon and the third one opens, I am preparing for a death of the old and a rebirth of the new. I am preparing a funeral for who I thought I was and a birthday for who I am. That does not come without intense fear and trepidation. Without crushing sadness and grief. But what awaits on the other side of those things is, hopefully, life.
I’d love for you to be there to meet me, too.
Love always,
T.
Terrah Holly Writes 