It's Halloween today. Time for all the little ghosts and goblins to come knocking on your door. Often we know who's behind the little masks and costumes. But sometimes we get fooled.
It's a good time to think about our own masks.
We all learn from a very young age to cover up some of who we are and what we feel. We just feel safer that way. Sometimes we even grow up in families where our very survival depends on not showing what we think or feel, on not showing who we really are.
There comes a stage in life, however, when we realize that our masks hold us back. We don't feel real. We don't feel authentic. We want people to know us more fully—at least some of the people near and dear to us. It will always be true that we'll reveal more of our selves to some people than to others and that we'll always reserve some form of mask for certain people in our lives. But by and large, we'll feel better about ourselves and about life if we can shed some of those masks. Perhaps we can put on a much lighter, smaller one for those from whom we need some protection?
Little by little, as we shed more of those heavy masks, we begin to feel far more comfortable in our own skin. We trust that who and what we are is really OK. We believe that we can be loved for who we are—not for who we'd like to be.
Today is a good time to check out your masks. Anything need shedding?
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