.jpg)
If I touch that place where our hands meet
If I look you’re there looking back at me, with eyes of kindness.
Are we literally and visually falling down the rabbit hole of that much feared word ‘narcissistic’ and the myth of Narcissus?
No.
We’ve been told not to fall in love with our own reflection in both subtle and bold ways so often that we look away. Look as far away as we can.
We throw stones at the water to shake up and distort our reflection.
We hide from the waters edge, from the cameras lens out of fear of being called that 12 letter word.
Out of fear of being called self-centred.
Yet it has left us so far from our own centre and we look into the water and all we see is a stranger.
I was so tired of looking at the woman looking back at me with hate.
Tired of making her the enemy.
Tired of mocking her or never letting her be enough.
Tired of fearing that if I looked at her for too long I’d become fixated like Narcissus.
But that is a myth. It always was.
What isn’t a myth is that there is someone looking back at us in the mirror, in the camera, in the water…asking to be seen.
So I’ve been sitting at the waters edge visiting her, the one awaiting me in the reflection, in the camera.
Seeing her with love, despite the fear of what others might call building a relationship with our own self-image. Because I know it’s not narcissistic and how much that word has gotten in the way of connecting with ourselves.
I know it’s about reaching into the water and touching her hand, befriending her.
It’s about looking into the lens and not looking away in shame, not needing to be different but for this to be enough.
It’s about showing up for myself, for ourselves.
And the knowing that if someone else thinks it is narcissistic, then I’ll send them love into that space between themselves and their reflection in the water, in the lens and hope they turn towards themselves with compassion someday too.
*
After seeing this photo the other day after taking the above one the same day, this post spilled out. I hadn’t realized until this point that this photo series I’d been doing with my reflection was woven with this reclamation of my own reflection, back from the hands of this story and into my own.
.jpg)
If you’re wanting to make peace with your reflection, with your self-image especially through the camera lens, come join me for the Be Your Own Beloved class…we start February 1st!