Are You Playing the Shell Game?
What do you do when the internal vision of yourself does not match the mirror reality?
It’s a shell game. A Me shell, You shell, I shell see shells on the Me Sure game. It is the separation of the imagined internal Self from the reality of the external façade. The shuffling of the pea of me beneath this wrinkled, battle-hardened armor.
My shell. Crisscross, crisscross.
It’s an obvious hustle on my sketchy street corner, of course, but a necessary bamboozling nonetheless. Why? Because the truth of my appearance is projected in full color upon the very sheath of my existence, and it deflates me daily.
Confidence balloon go down. Confidence balloon go pfft.
Deep breath. Eyes on the prize. I must shuffle, I must slide my hard-to-wrangle love/hate relationship with this body across the cardboard of this life. In this neat trick, I must continue to grin even when I do not win.
It’s not sleight of hand—it’s sleight of mind.
Do not look directly at the mark. Smile, but do so without showing wrinkles or tilting the chin so as to gain multiples. Note freckle charts and pleathered sofa skin. Catalog the flab and shag and pockmarked memories. Clench hands, dinged up and damaged from catching on door jambs and mishandled cutlery while marveling at the dryness of the flesh and that one pre-arthritic knuckle. Pinch at the fat rolls that announce themselves at the sitting and skedaddle at the standing.
This is the aging, declining, complaining shell. Note it all, then shuffle the contents until you can’t remember where the disgust is hidden.
It is a stupid shell—but this is a stupider shell game.
The impulse is to say “Shuck it!” and unzip at the shoulders, unbutton at the scalp, then slough, shake, and shimmy this shell right over the hips and to a crumpled mess on the floor. To stuff it in a closet with last year’s fashion and pray it comes back in style at a time when it fully aligns with the “me of me, the who I see” when I close my eyes.
But that’s not how this works. The shell has no zippers and it’s fully seam-sealed. (Thanks, Mr. Mackintosh!) I’m stuck. My Self, held hostage in a hall of mirrors in a horror house, reflects so hard it’s setting me on fire.
Mirrors! Ah-ha! They are the antagonists of this story, with their shiny, holier-than-thou attitudes and flawless shine. They lay in wait in our rouge compacts and go-far cars, in the roadside gas stations, changerooms, department stores, and restrooms of our lives. Waiting to spring instant assessments and pass rough judgments—which we invent on the fly—on a question as old as puddles:
How do you look today?
Pale. Dismal. Disappointing. Tired. Imposter!1
These are just words, and mirrors can’t speak, but it’s interesting to note that the same Self that is held in the internal, the reliable Self that brings the ideas and love and thoughtfulness and joy to my world, is equally capable of these verbal betrayals when presented with a mirror. As if mirrors are the only objects capable of telling the truth. The only oracles worth buying stock in.
Self takes a hit and the critique won’t quit. Once my Self catches a glimpse of my shell—startled from its peaceful reverie to confront the truth revealed in the mirror moment—it has that first-blush reaction. I am garbage. I am hideous. I will never survive this perfection-worshiping world.
Maybe it’s just bad lighting?
It’s the same for everyone, of course. (Except narcissists.) Stripped naked, we can’t help but be held mirror-hostage by our dimpled flesh and veined limbs. Our mishappen thighs, our smile lines that hook our fish lips as the years progress. The assessment is brutal. The dysmorphia, total.
Imperfections in the reflections—that’s all we see. We do not fit our picture. We must criticize it immediately before someone else does, then set about to play the shell game. Pixelate and hide. Dress it up in baggy threads, putty up the holes, and slather on the salves. Find a good hat. Sunglasses. Unless our self-confidence temperature runs hot, we must hustle to hide. Our internals must be given their armor to continue their fight on this battlefield.
Or.
Not?
There is a ghost in the shell, simmering in your mist. An apparition, mirror-bombing the reflection and trying to spook us back to our Selves. Objects in the mirror appear weirder than they are, or so the sticker says. Acknowledge your ghost. See your spiritual Self—the one you try to banish every day—and let it back in.
This is a haunting worth your time.
Sense of Self is a complicated, spectral business. Shell games shift our perspectives and change our views of ourselves and we are convinced as the game progresses that there are defects in the fine print that weren’t caught in the edit. Defects that we must now carry all our lives. But it’s the “all our lives” part that gives the shell its value. Carrying the shell and learning to walk around and function within its existing parameters is what makes us who we are.
Your inner self has no existence without the outer. The body thrums electric. This shell of ours, this husk of us.
It’s weird, though, isn’t it? We are often urged to ‘come out of our shells’, to kick our way out of the dojo and bloom. To shed our ugly2 thing and be who we’re supposed to be, expressing, emoting, and revealing our inner stews. The true you, once relieved of its smothering shell, will say things in meetings, show off art, and dance as if no one is watching.
It’s presented as though it’s our shell that’s holding us back when really it’s our shell that’s holding us up.
The shell teaches us how to protect ourselves. The shell patiently holds the internals of our workings, our souls, or loves and fears, all the goos and symmetries of our complex minds, the ideas, the words, and the deeds.
The physical deeds. The doings.
It’s your shell that does all the work, and it’s beautiful. Through your shell you express yourself, and between you and me, I think we’re doing brilliant work.
Your gnarled branch fingers at the end of your shell’s arms can hold a pen, tap the keys, and express the thoughts held in the interior.
Your whole body shell, even with knees creaking and back aching, can dance to beats and rhythms and jams and riffs.
Hands and mouths and toes can hold a brush laden with paint and apply it with skill.
Instruments can be wielded by the body as extensions of Self, and holy shit, you can just drop open the hole in your face, and song—ACTUAL MELODY—will pour out of your shell with all the enthusiasm and energy of cows released from a barn.
And that’s the magic of your shell.
No mirror can steal that.
Listen, I get it. I feel it myself. Some days you get out of bed feeling fine, wander to the bathroom, and upon catching that first, half-light sight of yourself in the mirror, exclaim: “Halt! Who goes there?!”
We shoot first and ask questions at the same time. Is that a new mole? Was that wrinkle always there? Do I always look this tired?
Bang! Bang! Bang! we shoot our bodies down.
But today, let’s try something different. Today, when we get to the mirror that reflects a vision that contradicts our internal view of ourselves, let’s not play the game. Today, it’s not about how you look, it’s about Self-love.
So, shuck it. Get to that mirror, hold your own steely gaze, admire the playful brightness of your eyes, and when the mirror asks the question, “How do you look today?” repeat after me:
“You feel nice today.”
Yours in tiny thought,
Janeen
This week’s amends…
The Good News
by Thich Nhat Hanh
They don’t publish
the good news.
The good news is published
by us.
We have a special edition every moment,
and we need you to read it.
The good news is that you are alive,
and the linden tree is still there,
standing firm in the harsh Winter.
The good news is that you have wonderful eyes
to touch the blue sky.
The good news is that your child is there before you,
and your arms are available:
hugging is possible.
They only print what is wrong.
Look at each of our special editions.
We always offer the things that are not wrong.
We want you to benefit from them
and help protect them.
The dandelion is there by the sidewalk,
smiling its wondrous smile,
singing the song of eternity.
Listen! You have ears that can hear it.
Bow your head.
Listen to it.
Leave behind the world of sorrow
and preoccupation
and get free.
The latest good news
is that you can do it.
Via Swiss Miss
On Rotation: “I Hope That I Don’t Fall In Love With You” by Tom Waits
Nice and corny (sorry).
Via Boing Boing
Woof! A visitor accidentally bumped into and shattered a Jeff Koons balloon dog. Is it still art?
“Before I knew it, they were picking up the Jeff Koons pieces in a dustpan with a broom.”
Did you know…
… you can watch a video that deep dives into the construction of this post when you become a paid subscriber? Fortunately, this one is free so you can see what the video is like. I embedded that free sample here:
This guy really nailed me. I’m protecting his identity, though I don’t know why. He likes crypto, not clouds. Valid feedback.
It could be worse. Some people are ugly on the inside, too! Like… that guy? 👆