Silly me

Yesterday, I was in a great mood while drafting my daily blog post. In the middle of writing, I took a break and happened to catch sight of my reflection in a mirror. I noticed some trivial flaw in my appearance, a physical trait that always makes me self-conscious. I went back to my writing feeling icky and mildly depressed.

No big deal, right? Happens to people all the time. But my self-consciousness was so distracting, I couldn’t even finish writing my post. I kept looking around at people, almost wishing I were invisible.

My solution was to metaphorically put down my blog and literally pick up my journal and a pen. I started writing, just to myself, but now, I’d like to share a short snippet with you:

Just now, I became highly self-conscious of…

…but then, a line from Tony de Mello sprang to my mind: “You were perfectly happy just a few minutes ago - nothing has changed, only your perception.” Why feel sorry or sad or self-conscious? Nothing has changed.

The effect was powerful. Realizing that I’d literally been upbeat and chipper under the exact same circumstance I was now lamenting jarred me out of my funk. I was still the same; my body hadn’t changed. Only my awareness of it.

Clearly, the physical condition that I was loath to be reminded of had nothing to do with my mood - I could be more than happy despite having it; in fact, I had been.

The point is, my mood was not a direct consequence of having some defect in my appearance. If that were the case, I’d constantly be depressed, because this flaw is never going away. And yet I’ve experienced great happiness - and great sorrow - regardless of my physical imperfections. No need to cut short my happiness now if the same defect hadn’t phased me before.

So be depressed if you’re depressed, or be joyful if you’re so moved - but don’t let a trivial shift in perception disturb you if Reality itself never actually changed.

I almost did. Silly me.