Sometimes the person I am meets the person I wanna be and I have a real identity crisis.
It is a strange thing not to recognize my own work.
It can be an embarrassing thing to quote my own words thinking they belong to someone else!
And yet, what a nice surprise to find parts of me that I really like!
It makes me wonder what my criteria is for judging myself.
You might say there is no need to judge yourself, you are what you are, but the truth is we all do it all the time; and no one teaches us how to do it. At least no one taught me how to do it.
I grew up learning what I call false modesty, what some cultures considered placating the gods, but what, under any name, is not particularly healthy in my opinion. It's that old idea that, "You aren't pretty if you think you are."
Okay, no one wants to hang out with Narcissus, but there is a lot of leeway between self centered-ness and what some might call simple honesty, or perhaps just an appreciation of the truth.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. How many parents and grandparents hold up that toothless bald wonder and marvel at its beauty? But perhaps what we need to realize is that they are looking with their heart and the heart can see beyond surface details and freckles and even intelligence.
Many of us are good at seeing others with our hearts. What we need are magic mirrors on the wall. Ones we can ask, Mirror, mirror, tell me please... show me how the world sees me.
Or maybe we don't.
It is a strange thing not to recognize my own work.
It can be an embarrassing thing to quote my own words thinking they belong to someone else!
And yet, what a nice surprise to find parts of me that I really like!
It makes me wonder what my criteria is for judging myself.
You might say there is no need to judge yourself, you are what you are, but the truth is we all do it all the time; and no one teaches us how to do it. At least no one taught me how to do it.
I grew up learning what I call false modesty, what some cultures considered placating the gods, but what, under any name, is not particularly healthy in my opinion. It's that old idea that, "You aren't pretty if you think you are."
Okay, no one wants to hang out with Narcissus, but there is a lot of leeway between self centered-ness and what some might call simple honesty, or perhaps just an appreciation of the truth.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. How many parents and grandparents hold up that toothless bald wonder and marvel at its beauty? But perhaps what we need to realize is that they are looking with their heart and the heart can see beyond surface details and freckles and even intelligence.
Many of us are good at seeing others with our hearts. What we need are magic mirrors on the wall. Ones we can ask, Mirror, mirror, tell me please... show me how the world sees me.
Or maybe we don't.
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