Everything that happens to you and everything you do will be most significant in the space between. It happens when you sit in silence, when you’re asleep and dreaming, or when you’re gazing at the sun peeking through springtime clouds. Or an unexpected outcome shakes you from your comfort zone.
Maybe you call it spacing out, but I call it tuning in. There’s an alternate reality that we ignore most of the time. We drown it out because we want to numb ourselves from any fear or pain it might induce. We need a pause from ordinary life to feel what’s real.
When you’re in between spaces, you’ll notice the magic. When you drop in, you’ll hear what people don’t say, you’ll know what to choose and why, and you’ll live while you still can.
We’ll reflect on what someone said or how they looked when they said it. We all know things. We know that whatever lurks beneath surface politeness and occasional fake smile is what they’re dying to share with you but are too afraid to reveal.
We won’t escape death, but we try to defy and deny it. We cut and paste our faces when we know we won’t have any faces one day. Our skin will sag despite our efforts to remain youthful. We should be so lucky to be able to age.
Aveda discontinued the only concealer I use, and I didn’t replace it with anything. I let the world see my bare face again.
I’ve been wearing makeup since 1983, so it’s a big deal. From the moment I got pimples, I picked at them and then tried to cover the scabs, and later when they became scars. Twenty years later, I developed rosacea and continued to hide the red blotches on my cheeks.
One day last year, my rosacea mysteriously disappeared, but I kept wearing concealer. When the young lady at Aveda told me last week that my concealer was no more, I considered it a sign.
Life is too goddamned short to hide who I am. I liberated myself from trying to make myself perfect when no one on the planet could pull that off.
After living for half a century, I realize I’ve been hanging onto the wrong things. Why do we do that? We get stuck in past feedback loops. Teenagers can be cruel because they’re critical of themselves.
Those kids who thought of me as not good enough are middle-aged and don’t care anymore. So why have I still been worried about what you all think of me? I was living in the past.
When you live somewhere other than the present moment, you’ll face inner conflict. As the older, confident, beautiful woman I know I am, I let go of the shit that no longer serves me. I’m not conflicted.
Why stop ourselves from living when we know we’re going to die? We might not have tomorrow, so why do we waste time focusing on garbage? I thought you threw that useless waste into the bin yesterday.
One day you’ll realize that everything matters and nothing matters. We are insignificant, yet we find significance in many things. Let the sun shine on your beautiful face, whether it be clear or spotted, smooth or creased. Sink into the space where we accept our flawed human selves.
Come on now. Let yourself sink into that space. That’s where you’ll find serenity amidst the human condition and all its stressors. You’ll find the courage to let the words fly out of you like songbirds. And I promise, you won’t need to rearrange anything. You’re right where you need to be.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Drazen Nesic on Unsplash
