Everyone's Mirror Has Two Faces. Which One Are You Seeing?

It's so true. My mirror has had two faces most of my life: 1) My actual physical face and 2) the face that was merely a representation of all of the negative judgments I continually made against myself.

The face I have primarily seen in any mirror since childhood is the face of harsh self-judgment that I projected onto my outer appearance. I've rarely seen my REAL face; the one that is beautifully free of all self-judgments.

I've seen my face/body of harsh self-judgments since grade school, when I first began over-eating to medicate away the emotional pain of growing up in an alcoholic/ codependent household. In those days, all I saw reflecting back at me in the mirror were the horrible judgments I made against myself for becoming fat. 

Most of those judgments weren't even mine. They had been shoved down my throat by family and kids at school: "Fatty, fatty, two by four," "Hey, fatso," and "You're going to be fat all of your life, just like your father's sisters." But I chose to believe the judgments of others when they told me that I was now unacceptable because I was fat. In grade school, I couldn't see the REAL me, the one beneath the emotional pain I was medicating away with food. All I could see was the fat that had attached to my body as a result. The REAL me was lost under the fat.

In high school, I lost all of the fat, but then developed terrible acne. The acne was a result of all my stuffed emotional pain from the trauma I experienced at home. It got so bad that my face was nothing more than a painful mixture of active pimples and large scabs. Again, I got hell from my family and from the kids at school who called me "Zit" instead of Charlie. So when I looked in the mirror as a high-schooler, I only saw the ugly acne. I was never able to see the REAL me, the beautiful reflection of God that radiated from inside me. I couldn't see that I was kind, loving, empathetic, compassionate, intelligent and creative inside.

In college, I still struggled with some acne, but mostly I struggled with all of the permanent scarring and pot-marks that were left all over my face from the teenage acne. Looking in the mirror was still a painful experience of seeing nothing but ugly judgments: All I saw was someone who was now too thin, facially scarred, unlovable, untouchable and totally unacceptable. I was beyond being "not good enough." I felt nothing but shame about being me when I looked at my face in the mirror.

That was the same face I continued to see in the mirror until I entered Recovery in 1995. Even then, it took several years of counseling and CODA meetings before I realized that I had never seen the REAL me in the mirror. I had only seen the many terrible judgments I'd made against myself. 

Now, I look back at pictures from when I was younger and I go "Wow! I was pretty good looking, despite the fat, the acne scarring and all of the other negative judgments I had made about my own self-worth-- which was non-existent before Recovery. Today, I feel much better when I look at myself in a mirror. Sometimes I still see judgments, but I'm also better equipped to dismiss those judgments and to see the REAL me: Someone created in the image and likeness of God, who radiates beauty from the inside-out.

So yes, for most people, every mirror has two faces. The question is "What face are you seeing?" Are you only seeing the face that's covered with all of the shame and negative judgments you and others have made against you? Or are you seeing beyond your personal brokenness and seeing the REAL beauty that is YOU in the mirror?

If you've only been seeing the ugly face/body of self-judgment, now's your chance to choose to look beneath those judgments and see the truly beautiful/handsome you!