So I have successfully come to the place where it is my habit to avoid mirrors.  It is not so hard anymore.  I instinctively look ahead and take note if a mirror is coming in my direction, and I have the habit of looking down or away when one is right before me.  I go most days without seeing my reflection in a mirror.

But it has been more difficult to avoid reflections in objects.  In the metallic spout of my kitchen faucet, in windows bathed in sunshine, on the computer screen, in my coffee cup, and even in the chocolate brown eyes of my friend.  Wow.  I never noticed that before!  We are reflected in the things and people around us.

Which, if you think about it, is true for life.  Our things are reflections of who we are, and our friends are reflections of who we are.  It never seemed more true than now.  When God asked us to take care of the earth and the people in it, I wonder if God understood that in caring for them, we would be working on the reflection of our own souls.  I wonder if God made reflections to occur so many places in the world around us so that we would not forget how connected we are…that we are the same as those around us, for better or worse, and that we will never be left alone…for our good.

What is continue to rise up is a demanding emotion to be myself without outward distractions.  To be real and true and to be comfortable in my own soul.  I can’t even begin to tell you how good that feels. Sometimes we get distracted by our outward self, to the point of forgetting our true self.  This whole journey makes me wish everyone could do it.  But especially I would love it if someone who makes a living on their looks could do this.  Say, what if Madonna, or the Kardashian’s, or Beyonce, went without a mirror…how might that change them?  The other group I would like to see go without a mirror for a time would be all CEO’s and heads of institutions.  What if all the Pastors and Bishops went without a mirror for a time?  And how about teens?  What things would rise up from the inside?

On the other hand, then there are those I would like to hold up a mirror to.  I would love for the homeless folk, those who walk the streets of our cities, to look in the mirror so they can see their beauty and the spark of light in their eyes.  And children, who really don’t care too much about mirrors…I would love for them to see that their light shines so bright and see how their reflection of that light changes the world. And the women who have been beaten down…I would love for them to study the mirror and find their strength within it.

I don’t know what it will be like when I look into the mirror again.  But I do know that this journey is fascinating, and that it is worth the growing pains, the inconvenience, and the diversions tactics.  This road is rising up to quiet down the outside understanding of life, and to put a megaphone on the inside voice of the heart….and it is a journey of deep connection.

Proverbs 17:19 says best:

Just as water reflects the face, so one human heart reflects another.

26 days to go…