Mirror, Mirror, Where am I?

Too many words can go unsaid and too many gestures stifled. So many feelings that should have been shared fall victim to fear. Fear of a faceless imaginary monster that we have placed inside of people we love and care for. A beast that I have come to believe will swallow me whole if I let anyone in. Don't tell them you love them, they might not feel the same. Don't tell them you want them, they might not have that urge. Don't wear that shirt, what does it say about who you were, are, or someday could be? Don't bother deciding on a meaning to life, there's too great of a chance you are wrong. Go through the motions, doing only what you think they may want. Eventually you won't remember what was so hard to hide. Whoever you were stretches thin. Each person you see gets their own version of you, because if you can't find way to smile you may as well make everyone around you do it instead.

    Until they don't. It starts with the ones who once knew you, I think. Assuming that anyone ever did. Your likes, dislikes, flaws and strengths all start to swirl together into a confusing mirrored image of themselves. They wonder where you've gone and if you were ever really there. You haven't noticed. You can't see. This is the most debilitating aspect of the fear, the monster, the invisible beast. You never saw it coming and you didn't notice it while it stayed.  Little by little it drained you like a slow leak in a balloon. Music, art, food, religion, political opinion, love, sex, parenting, social interactions at the lowest levels. One by one seeped out leaving you lifeless and confused. 

    This is not their fault. Nobody beat you down into this hole. Nobody scooped out your soul leaving the mimicking mirror shell. Not even you. Not marriage, not age, not children. The beast is not embodied, but I like to believe it can be fought. Every awkward laugh, one point for me. Every time I uncurl my hands from crippling anxiety and reach out to a person I love, a breath back into the balloon.

      In case I forget again. I am a human being with a purpose. Though I have accomplished many incredible things, I have not found that purpose yet. I will. I am a girl in love with a boy. Though I doubt this and challenge it often, that boy also loves me. I will always crave the epic romance that has probably already run its course in my life. I am a mother, a good mother who often hates herself at the end of the day but knows she did everything she could for her children. I am spiritual in a way I may never find words to explain, but it runs through me sure as the blood in my veins. I am a friend, a friend that sometimes tries too hard to be everyone's best friend. I am emotional in a way that I wish to share but never quite know how. These feelings all embarrass me. Almost anything that i feel deeply becomes the first victim to the fear. Perhaps recognizing this is the only step toward protecting the air I have left. It's time to shatter all the mirrors until the only image left is your own.