Seriously. I mentioned that while in Houston, I got to loll around at the Hotel Zaza reading the latest Vogue. Penelope Cruz was on the cover, and there was a feature pictorial of her in the MOST sumptuous ballgowns by Balenciaga and Marchesa. Honestly, I would be buried in ANY of them, and I'm not even planning on being buried at all. (The pictorial also featured a bullfighter, and let me just say, animal cruelty charges aside, WOW. That matador gear is alarmingly attractive when it's half off. Who knew?) But the part that impressed me the most was not La Cruz's obvious beauty, it was this quote: You cannot live your life looking at yourself from someone else's point of view. Genius.
And difficult. This is an issue I've struggled with a LOT over the last year in particular. People feel very free to offer opinions--sometimes critical ones--and the internet provides a very cozy place for anonymity. There are those who could never do what I do, but who feel free to dismiss it with a scornful word or a wave of the hand. These are people I do not understand, nor do I wish to. I think any job, done with integrity and creativity and thoughtfulness, is worthy of respect. (I suspect that the people who are most dismissive and vicious about other people's work are deeply dissatisfied with their own, but I could be wrong. Amateur psychology is a thorny place to wander.)
In any event, I believe Penelope is right. We are so busy worrying about how other people see us, that we forget to see ourselves as we really are. After all, anyone else's perception of us is filtered through the lenses of their experience. What they see is perhaps not what we really ARE. And it's no use trying to GUESS how other people see us because it's hopeless at best. We don't hear the inflection of our own voices, see our own expressions. The most we can hope for is authenticity, an elusive and difficult quality to master. We have to know ourselves before we can show ourselves. And if anyone objects to that, we will remind ourselves that their point of view is simply that: a single point in a very big world.
Comments
Thank you for posting this.
Thank you for posting this. It is so true, especially today for me. I never thought of things this way, but now is the time to start.
Huh, very good point. I think
Huh, very good point. I think I spend a lot of my life 'watching' myself from someone else's point of view. It's something I'd like to shake off.
I'm bookmarking this as one
I'm bookmarking this as one of the posts to read when I get nasty, negative comments.
I don't really know what your
I don't really know what your point of view is. All I know is that you write well and tell a good story. However, I had better see my wife's point of view or I'm a dead man.
Great post with great advice.
Great post with great advice. I wish I could print this off and distribute it to a lot of people. "After all, anyone else's perception of us is filtered through the lenses of their experience." -- perhaps my favorite. I think if we could all realize this we would be much happier people!
I'm not a big church-goer,
I'm not a big church-goer, but I was at a service with my mom a few years ago and that sermon really made me think. The key point was that "What other people think of you is none of your business." That thought has helped me through some tough times and allowed me to brush off criticism from some contemptible sources.