an invitation to see {self-portrait challenge}
Two years ago, my daily practice, for two months, was to look in the mirror for a few minutes everyday. I began this practice after reading an article by Elizabeth Gilbert in Yoga Journal (read more background about my previous experience with this meditation here and here).
A few weeks into this practice, I realized I had stopped just looking at me and instead had started seeing me. I began to see the beauty in the curves of my face and how my eyes sometimes seem to smile and the fullness of my lips. I began to see wisdom and truth. My internal self-talk began to soften.
For a few months, I have been thinking about starting this practice again. After a confusing couple of moments while on a trip this summer, moments that brought up that harsher self-talk, I found myself standing in front of a mirror and pausing.
I stood there and looked myself in the eye and felt myself begin to crumble a bit. I was honest with myself about the feelings that had surfaced and could feel that invitation to simply "lose it." In that moment, I took a deep breath, and looking eye to eye with me, I felt an invitation to seek some refuge within this meditation I had spent time with two years ago. So much emotion knocked inside me as I looked at myself, trying to see beauty. I didn't want to give into that internal pull to lose it, as I needed to exit the bathroom at some point in a manner that seemed pulled together. So I stood there watching the shadow of my earring that the light from the skylight was creating…I just watched the shadow on my face and how light seemed to dance around it. I took in that moment and found my breath.
The next day, I found myself standing in front of this mirror again, and I focused on the way my bangs brushed across my forehead. The day after that, I focused on the slight curve of my lips right before a full smile spread across my face. And on and on. For about three weeks now, I have spent a few minutes each day just looking at me…trying to see me again.
Earlier today, I stood eye to eye with me and felt that self-talk soften just a bit.
This reflection mediation has become my practice yet again.
I am trying to see me…to see more than what someone else might see when making assumptions or judgments…to see more than what I see when doing the same. I am looking at the shadows and the light and trying to give myself permission to crack open a bit more.
I am standing eye to eye with me and trying to let the shadows dance their way into the light and shine just a bit.
I am giving myself permission to see beauty.
I am giving myself permission to see me.
(read Elizabeth Gilbert's full article here)
*****
updated in 2011: Self-Portrait Challenge (SPC) was a website and community that encouraged people to take and share self-portraits. I loved this project! However, I am sad to report that it no longer has an active website, so I have removed links that appeared in the posts connected to my participation in this project.
liz lamoreux
Reader Comments (14)
thank you for posting this liz, it really speaks to me today and prompts me to action
yes, yes, yes. LOOK AT YOU, you are beautiful! inside and out. your words are something i need to read each and every morning, noon and night - thank you for saying what you did.
your photograph reminds me of one i took of myself last october - standing before the bathroom mirror, hair wet, wrapped in a towel and nothing else.
http://ornamental.typepad.com/ornamental/2007/10/the-naked-truth.html
i wrote from the heart of my own insecurites, and surprise, surprise - received one of the nastiest comments i've ever read. it is good to be open, good to be vulnerable - even when those who see an open opportunity to stomp all over us just because it makes them feel bigger, stronger, better about themselves.
remember what you said to me, just last week? i do. sage words. thank you, friend. xo
This post speaks to me as well. Your experience is so beautiful; it touched me deeply. Aloha, Olivia
beautiful...
you rock.
in so many ways.
:0)
Wonderful post and wonderful portrait!
i used to do this thing that i never even realized i did until duke pointed it out to me and asked me to stop ... everytime i looked in a mirror, i made a face at myself, not a good face, not a loving smiling face but sneer or a growl or a eye roll or a tongue out face.
i don't anymore, now i look at myself and smile and i think i really started doing that when i took up self-portraiture, learning to see me. its a good thing and i think i could use some of that again .. am thinking i will start again in september, for me.
you are so beautiful and lovely ... that is what i see in all your photos ... smooches! xo
Bravo - doing what few people actually allow themselves to do.
This is beautiful...you, the picture, your writing, the message...all of it...just beautiful. Thank you.
Funny how the universe works -- I've lately realized that I don't really look at myself when I glance in a mirror. So I've been trying to look past the ever-increasing amount of gray hair (wow, when did that happen?), and at least smile at myself for a bit. And after a shower, perhaps look at my body, with all of its "faults," and appreciate it in that very moment. It helps. Thanks for this post!
lovely and inspiring post.
and beautiful, gorgeous you!
beautiful post....inspiring thoughts!
thank you for this!
oh my...big juicy tears flowing here...you have done (and said) the thing that terrifies me..that looking REALLY looking in the mirror...if I am going to find any peace with myself, within myself, in this lifetime, I need to look in that dreaded mirror...this aging me is scared stiff ...who will look back?
grasping at words here...i am speechless
you are so so brave...
Thank you; as always. I may try this practice. I had a particularly sad experience at my daughter's wedding, feeling so, so, unattractive and I know that it's time for some self compassion. Thank you again.