The weak passages

Source: services. flikie.com

 

 

I look at myself in the mirror and there's a clear moment when I, the watcher, am looking at somebody else's face. I know it to be mine and yet it isn't. It's a strange feeling. I'm not a completely separate entity but I am looking at myself without judgement and with a bit more love, as if it's somebody else I am looking at.

It's funny how some of us find it easy to forgive others but we have so little mercy for ourselves.

I'm very tough on myself. I hate it when I don't function according to plan. It pains me when my reactions to certain situations, sometimes, are not the most dignified. I punish myself when I do something I regret. But one day I look at myself in the mirror and realise I can maybe try and love myself the same way I'd love somebody else. Talk to myself as if I am talking to a scared child, encourage myself and give myself emotional comfort. Would I forgive this person staring back at me for all the stupid things she's ever done, for all the times she has been weak and disappointing? I guess I would.

I try it for a few days. Every time I catch a glimpse of my face in some sort of reflective surface, I tell the girl in the mirror how wonderful she is. And it works. My inner dialogue changes and I stop judging myself so hard. I start wearing red lipstick and smile to myself more often. I stop caring about not being perfect. Because maybe I am.

Maybe it's supposed to be this way: maybe it is the 'weak passages' that make the strong ones stronger.


'When I was thirteen or fourteen years old, I use to take lessons in musical composition. Not because I was a child prodigy but because of my father's quiet tact. It was during the war and a friend of his, a Jewish composer, was required to wear the yellow star; people had begun to avoid him. Not knowing how to show his solidarity, my father thought of asking him just to give me lessons. (...) 
(...) I retain my admiration for him, and three or four images. Especially this one, seeing me out after a lesson, he stopped by the door and suddenly said to me: 'There are many surprisingly weak passages in Beethoven. But it is the weak passages that bring out the strong ones. It's like a lawn - if it weren't there, we couldn't enjoy the beautiful tree growing on it.' (Milan Kundera - Testaments Betrayed)