Mirror
I believe that our experiences and beliefs are nothing more than a mirror into our unique perceptions of ourselves and our place in the world.
Are we safe? Are we loved? Do we have good friends? Are we financially healthy? Are we physically healthy? Do we have purpose? Do we live in a good place? Do we feel whole?
Do we deserve any of the above?
I think this foundational frame is based solely on one question: Do we love ourselves?
With our warts, imperfections, thinning hair, sagging skin, protruding bellies, nose hair, etc.
Do we love ourselves as we are? In all of our imperfect perfection? If we do, then I think the world opens up for us.
I think this is issue is a critical basis for the many health problems we face. Experiences are neutral, until we define them through our perceptions and judgements. The judgments we make of others likely only reflect the way we judge ourselves.
Thus, to heal the world, we need to heal ourselves.
I have blogged that based on Einstein’s famous equation of E=mc2, we are all just connected energy beings - doors of the same house and droplets of the same ocean.
Whole and in unity together. Our individual appearance is likely a projection of our collective creativity.
I say this since all mass is made up of energy and atoms, and atoms are almost solely space/air/nothingness (a hydrogen atom is 99.9999999999996% empty space) held together by energy. Nothing is really solid, it just appears that way in our interactions with objects in our world.
Thus, our living experiences are entirely relational and based on our unique perceptions and beliefs that are driven by our ego. What we believe and how we perceive these interactions defines our lives.
I think it also defines our health.
This may underlie the critical relationships to despair, separation, hopelessness, traumas, chronic stress, and the lack of resilience that has strong associations with our health and longevity (see these related issues in previous blogs from the world of Anne Case and Angus Deaton; Elissa Epel and Elizabeth Blackburn; the adverse childhood experience survey; the Gallup wellbeing survey; and the Blue Zones work by Dan Buettner).
Our deepest held beliefs define our lives - like a mirror.
Illness, addictions and disease may in fact be a reflection of the pain, suffering, fear, traumas and separation we feel deep inside ourselves.
Resilience is a buffer to childhood traumas that contribute to the risk for disease. But, what is resilience? I think that resilience is nothing more than the capacity and capability to see ourselves with love that enables healing.
Resilience is the energy that allows us to change our mindsets and perceptions from the lens of fear, scarcity and separation to the lens of safety, abundance and wholeness. Once we see life through this new lens, we will appreciate the many miracles in each of our lives and change the quality of our experiences, our interactions, our friends, our communities, our nation, our world, our lives and our health.
Why? Because each of these is only a reflection of our relationship with ourselves.
If we choose to see the beauty in ourselves, we will see it in everything and in everyone else.
This is true wealth. This is heaven on earth. This is wholeness. This is health.
Almost heaven.
(Want to delve more deeply into the research and thinking that has led me to these observations? See the Case and Deaton report from the Brookings Institution; the Epel and Blackburn study at PNAS and their article on aging at ted.com; the CDC webpage on Adverse Childhood Experiences; the latest health data from the Gallup-Sharecare Well-Being Index; and the work of Dan Buettner and his team at Blue Zones.)