Changing the Reflection in the Mirror

Posted on by stilllearning2b

On the day after I was left, I looked in the mirror. I saw a woman who had been discarded. Thoughtlessly thrown away like some worn-out or unfashionable sneakers. Good enough to be walked on, but no longer deemed worthy of the necessary closet space.

Some days when I looked in the mirror, I saw someone who wasn’t good enough. As though looking at a negative, I saw myself for what I was lacking rather than for what I possessed. “No wonder I’ve been abandoned,” I thought, “I’m obviously lacking.”

Other days, the reflection in the mirror seemed too loud, garish even. Fearing that my riotous reflection would clash with others, I pulled back, pulled in. I turned down my volume in an attempt to evade rejection.

We all have a particular reflection that we’re prone to glimpsing when we look in the mirror –

“I’m stupid.”

“I’m lazy.”

“I’m a piece of shit.”

“I’m weak.”

“I’m only valued for …”

“I’m too much.”

“I’m broken.”

“I’m a coward.”

Words that were spoken to us in childhood by trusted adults or inferred by internalizing and personalizing the actions of those around us.

And without our conscious awareness, that reflection becomes the lens through which everything else is filtered.

I first became aware of my self-reflection in the early days of my relationship with my now-husband. He would get angry about something (which was a new experience for me to navigate since my ex carefully tucked away any ire) and I would begin to panic.

Not because of the words that were said.

But because of the words that I heard.

It’s not what the words say. It’s what the words say to you.

If you believe that you’re worthless, a slight criticism becomes confirmation of your inferiority.

When you see yourself as a piece of shit, the slightest mistake that hurts another becomes evidence that you’re a jerk.

If you’re convinced that you’re only valued for your looks, a passing comment on your appearance supports the belief that people only care about your physical presentation.

Each remark – whether it be positive, negative or neutral – is heard within the context of our beliefs about ourselves.

We assume that others are seeing the same version of us that we see in our own reflection.

Have you ever had someone compliment you on your courage or strength in a moment where inside you were feeling scared and weak? It can be challenging for us to comprehend that how we feel inside is often not how we present ourselves to the world and that others may have a very different view of us than we do.

When it comes to ourselves, we hear what we believe.

In my case, if somebody insults my responsibility or work ethic, I can easily shrug it off. Those are character faults that are in no way present in my own self-image, so it is simple to see those barbs as poorly aimed and meaningless barbs. But if someone says something that matches the reflection of the worthless woman in the mirror? That hits close to home and can even become part of the portrait reflected back at me.

No matter how much the people around you change, what you hear won’t change until your own self-reflection does.

Here’s the hard part – you can change the people you surround yourself with. You can set and uphold boundaries about what sort of commentary about yourself you will permit. But as long as you still identify with that negative reflection, who will continue to hear the words that confirm your self-belief.

If you want to change how others treat you, it starts with changing how you see yourself.

Why We Struggle to Believe Things Can Be Different

Posted on by stilllearning2b

I recently turned (gulp!) forty. Something about those milestone birthstone birthdays encourages reflection.

So I found myself thinking back to my thirtieth birthday…

Ten years ago, I awoke with the determination to learn to run a mile. My first efforts were pitiful, as I barely managed to cover a quarter of my goal. But it felt good to try, like I was giving aging the finger. My birthday gift that year was an assortment of running clothes to aid in my new goal.

Later that evening, I enjoyed a birthday dinner with my then-husband. I was completely in love and completely unaware of the duplicitous life he was leading. Ten years ago, I was finally feeling competent at my job and happy with my position teaching gifted and accelerated math.

At thirty, I reflected back on my twenties, to getting married, moving across the country and starting my career. My twenties had been a time of growth and change; and at thirty, I felt like I had arrived. I felt like I had done my evolving and that I could, with relative certainty, envision how I would be going forward.

And now at forty, I look back at the changes I’ve made over the last decade and it makes my head spin. Far from my expectations of my personal evolution slowing, my thirties were a time of incredible – and incredibly challenging – change.

That first quarter-mile run morphed into a completed marathon a few years later. That fabrication of a husband simultaneously destroyed me and resurrected me. After a few years of navigating a new system, I found myself back in an accelerated math teaching position.

My thirties were a period of destruction and rebuilding. Of losing one love and finding an even better one. Of impossible goals and painful journeys.

I hardly relate to the woman I was at thirty. She almost seems like a former friend. Her name has changed, her outlook is different and even the results of personality inventories have morphed. The changes have been so drastic and so complete, it’s difficult to comprehend.

And now at forty, I feel like I have arrived. Like my period of growth and change is over and now, with relative certainty, I can envision how I will be going forward.

Even though I can be almost guaranteed that I will feel the same way a decade from now.

In fact, research has shown that people inevitably underestimate how much they will change even into their eighties, continually expressing that now they have become truly the person they were meant to be.

It’s easy to look back and see the evolution, but it’s difficult to imagine that transformation continuing forward.

When we try to envision our futures, we rely heavily on our pasts and our present. It’s as though we’re trying to create a new painting using scraps of the old canvas. We can imagine some change, but we struggle to accept that everything could end up different than it is today.

On the one hand, it’s scary to think that we are always evolving, always becoming. That any feeling of “making it” will always be fleeting. Yet the realization is also exciting. Our futures may be unknown, but they are also unbound.

I just hope that my next decade has a little less drama than the previous one…