I’ve
been thinking a lot about roles lately. How we interchange between them in
order to get things done. We change personas at least twice a day while
struggling to remain us. Colleague, friend, parent, sibling, partner, lover,
acquaintance, stranger; yes, even as a stranger you change and transform. You
have to go by the unspoken, unwritten protocol of politeness, decency, and boundaries.
We always have a role to play, but the mask in question only needs to be worn
in the presence of someone else.
What
happens when we are alone? Alone and aware. Are we ourselves? Or do we play the
‘I’ role? In essence, my question is, is there an us? Or are we a series of
masks we have created ourselves?
Don’t
misunderstand me, a percentage of this mask is always made of us, and the
number varies according to each person’s personality, self-confidence,
self-reliance, resilience, and so on. But the rest… the rest is weaved with
social convention, rules, and expectations. The stitches are made slowly, so
you don’t feel the needle going in. The technique is so eloquent in the
verbalization of its interaction with your soul that you appear seamless, uncut,
and whole.
But
you aren’t, are you? You are exhausted, fragile, fragmented, almost invisible.
The cracks in your skin are seen only by you, provided you even look at
yourself. What then? Do you even try to heal? Fill them with pieces of you so
you don’t disappear? You can start now, it is never too late. But let’s assume
that you’ve identified that. You’ve worked out a way to get past it, live with
it, learn from it, even use it to your advantage.
You
return home; walk through the door, close it behind you, place your keys on the
table in front of the mirror, and look. Do you see the mask? And if you do, do
you take it off?
Please,
take it off.
Tell
me what you see. How much of you is left? Do you recognize yourself? You need
to look at the eyes. Ignore everything else. Don’t blink.
Are
you still in there?