I just wrote an article for the Masters of the Secret affiliates that I called The Mirror Dance.
It’s all about that phenomenon I’m sure you’ve noticed, where the relationships you have with other people reflect back to you certain things about yourself.
Or perhaps you haven’t noticed that, because a lot of us are in denial when we first encounter it.
“That can’t be a reflection of me,” we say… “I don’t even like that characteristic.”
I was going to post just an excerpt from it here, but once I started trying to edit it I realized that the whole thing was required.
So here’s my article, which will be posted soon on the Masters of the Secret blog too:
The Mirror Dance by Heather Vale
I spent my whole life, until a few years ago, denying what I had been told time and time again growing up: “The things that annoy you in other people are the things that annoy you about yourself“.
I’d protest, “But how can that be? I hate that person because they’re mean, and put other people down, and act as if they know everything.”
Meanwhile someone behind my back would be saying, “I hate her because she’s mean, and puts other people down, and acts as if she knows everything.”
Touché. What goes around comes around.
Welcome to the mirror dance.
Would you care to dance fast, or slow?
The truth is, we’re all capable of every emotion and character trait. We just express and repress them to different degrees, and that reflects what we see in others.
The reason it annoys us to see traits in other people that we haven’t come to terms with ourselves is because we’re in the process of hiding from those traits. Denying that we have them. And as we all know, being in denial is a pretty strong state that can convince us that what we’re denying really doesn’t exist.
So we’re constantly dancing through life reflecting ourselves in the mirrors of others, and vice versa. But what happens when one mirror is so crystal clear that almost every trait you have is reflected in one specific other person?
If you’re like me, you’ll probably start off treasuring the friendship that person gives you, because you have so much in common. And you’ll probably want to work with them because they have the same vision, mission and purpose in life that you have. They want to accomplish the same things, change the world in the same ways, dream the same dreams.
And then you’ll start noticing the things that annoy you, that also annoy you about yourself, whether you admit that or not. And as you’re running away from them, and seeing them constantly reflected in the mirror, you’ll argue and fight with that image.
But what good does it do to fight with your own reflection? All you’ll end up doing is breaking the glass if you hit it too hard.
The solution is to love that mirror, and all that’s reflected in it… the good, the bad, the ugly… and the beautiful.
In fact, if you can shift your perception a bit, you’ll see it’s all beautiful. The good is beautiful because it makes you feel good. The bad is beautiful because it balances the good with the law of polarity (remember what Dr. Demartini says in his interview for Masters of the Secret: you can not be 100% positive, everything is a 50-50 balance of positive and negative).
And the ugly is beautiful because it shows you very clearly what you need to work on, what you don’t want to face, and what you can overcome with love and gratitude. It’s beautiful because it forces you to grow out of your comfort zone into the magnificent creature you truly are… and are meant to discover again.
The interesting part is, the more time you spend with your mirror, the clearer you see the reflection. Soon it gets to the point where you know exactly what each other are thinking without even saying it. And you know immediately when the other person does something that you do the same thing – like it or not.
You will see yourself reflected in every person you deal with, ever. That’s the puzzling way life works. But if you’re lucky enough to find the person who reflects you so much that you think it’s uncanny, and constantly shake your head in amazement, just smile and enjoy the ride.
Because trust me… you’re about to learn more about yourself than you ever wanted to know, and yet you’ll treasure everything you learn.
And, better yet, if you’re lucky enough to fall in-love with this mirror and feel your heart skip a beat every time you look into it, congratulations ! You’ve just put yourself into an arena of love that few ever step into, much less master: The art of self-love.
We’ve all heard the clichéd phrase, “It takes one to know one.” But, what it really means it that you cannot feel, see, or experience something in someone else UNLESS it is also inside you!
So, if you feel, see, or experience appreciation, respect, happiness, excitement, conversational compatibility, humor, inner peace, extreme support, and deep meaningful passion in your mirror, kudos to you for having amazing qualities of self-love.
The meaning of life is to play the game, have fun… and learn along the way. And what better way to do that than by dancing in the hall of mirrors, feeling true love, and seeing yourself reflected with every step you take?
And now… let me leave you with the Billy Idol video my article reminds me of: Dancing With Myself:
Keep Unwrapping the Mysteries of Life!
