Mirrors And You

You think ghosts don’t exist? Think again. Look in the mirror. That being, standing there- the very presence of which is akin to someone locking eyes with you, shouting at you condescendingly. Your mind, a mere plaything in its hands, a puppet on a string. 

See those two eyes staring at you? Those two tiny pupils in those two tiny eyes- they go up and down, scanning you from head to toe: judging you. As they catch sight of your grime-filled nails, your ink-stained fingers, you hide your hands behind your back. The eyes reach your face, and you look away. Won’t take it anymore, not again, not again- you try to run away from this mirror of self-doubt and twisted truth. But the brain never listens. It will force you to look into the mirror, peeling your eyes away from consciousness. It will snatch all power from you. Disable you to think for yourself. Heights of docility will be reached; heart and soul will be surrendered to the unhealthy perceptions of the mind. 

Every time you see an act of kindness, it is that ghost in the mirror- that ghost within you- that disables you to simply accept it. “It’s a scam, it’s a scam. Pure kindness doesn’t exist; personal gain always acts as an incentive. There is always an ulterior motive.” And when you find out that the act in question was indeed hypocritical, you thank the ghost. There is some masked reassurance in knowing that you’re not the only bad person out there. It is that ghost in the mirror that has built you your bubble of fake, validated happiness. Forcing you to wear the clothes, watch the movies, listen to the songs, read the books, follow the traditions, that the others are in return for emotional security and false contentment. 

That ghost is what keeps you up at night. Thinking about what could’ve been, what should’ve been, what could be, what should be. And once the darkness and solitude of the night is dissolved by the bright rays of the rising sun, you think to yourself, “Alright, new day, time to do something new, time to be someone new.” Ha! How juvenile that thought is. For every morning, every day, the self-doubt and self-hate of yesterday is reignited by a meeting with a mirror. 

It is only much later, when you reach the end of the tunnel, that you realise how distorted that mirror really is.