Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

One of the exercises I faced recently was to sit and reflect with two versions of myself: my internal self, who I am when no one is watching, and my external self, what I like to call my Visible Self, the version of me that moves through the world and gets seen.

At first, I expected the gap between them to be small (especially considering all internal work I have been doing...!). I thought maybe there would be a few differences. Maybe some small adjustments? Just normal things...but when I really look at my answers, I realised something uncomfortable: I have become very skilled at adaptation. Not in a dramatic way or a dishonest way; but seeing it all written down in front of me, I could see all the little adaptations, all the subtle ways we learn to become easier to understand, easier to accept, easier to love. I realised how much editing happened before I became visible.

And then, whilst reflecting at all of this, it came to mind a scene I will never forget: my son at around one year old standing in front of a floor-length mirror. He crawled closer, stood up and looked at himself. He smiled. And then, kissed his own reflection.

The feeling there was pure lightness and joy. There was no embarrassment, no performance, no critique. He wasn't judging himself. There was only recognition.
I think children arrive at this world with this effortless relationship to themselves. They simply are, and there is so much love in that.

Maybe children aren't admiring themselves at all. Maybe they are simply recognising possibility.
Recognising themselves and their beauty before the world teaches them to become someone else.

But then life happens. And we start to collect expectations and roles. We absorb feedback about what is “good” and what is “bad.” We inherit ideas about who is acceptable. Who is too much. Who is not enough. And layer by layer, we build a Visible Self, because deep down we all carry the natural instinct to belong. So we adapt.

And the Visible Self can be beautiful. Probably it will be protective. It can be even so successful and accepted, that we forget what it cost us to build it. And slowly our internal self becomes quieter, just waiting. Waiting to stop performing survival and start choosing expression.

So lately I've been wondering: If judgement disappeared…who would you allow yourself to be?
What parts of you would become visible?
And maybe the harder question: How much of your internal self have you been dimming down?
Not because she disappeared, but because your Visible Self became so large that she stopped getting a turn.

I see so much on Social Media about "new version of yourself", or "become her". But I don't believe we have to become something new; I think we are born with everything within us. Like that one year old saw on the mirror in pure recognition.

Maybe becoming ourselves isn't about becoming more.
Maybe it's about removing enough layers to recognise our own full reflection again.
And then, once we do, to smile at it and give it a kiss.