Have you ever heard something synonymous to this saying?

Sometimes sayings like this sound so good on paper. You'll repost it, share it, and say it — over and over again — to justify a feeling or an assumption about someone else, but rarely we tend to introspect for ourselves.

I woke up today and asked God to speak to me. I said "Holy Spirit, my heart is open. I am ready to hear from you. Tell me what I need to work on today." God is always speaking; We just need the discernment to listen to Him. Sure enough, I captured something.

I came across a tik tok that prompted me to write down

"Why are you so obsessed with an image that does not belong to you?"

I chuckled and thought "Oh, the girls will love this one". Two bananas and eight hours later, I am realizing that I am the one on the stand today. Anyhow, what I am about to say will all make sense at the end, okay?

Okay, so back to the matter at hand. Sayings like the one up on the jumbotron are common and are used to justify perceived wrongs from others. But I sat down and took some accountability for my own shortcomings.

The shortcoming was that I was admittedly running away from certain things. I was running away from seeing people, talking to them about updates and exciting things going on in our lives. I would often pose myself as "embracing a new journey" or "deconstructing from a life expected from my formative years", but it was a bit of a lie. I was running from something I saw in them that reminded me of "myself".

I was running away from what they reminded me of who I wanted to be, where I thought I would be, what I worked hard to be, but did not become.

I was running away from accepting what I thought life would look like. I was running away from my anger and the shame that the admission came with. I was running away from the fact that I am sitting in the emotions of a (very very) logical decision I made some time ago.

Carl Jung describes this as "the shadow" — the unconscious part of the personality that contains repressed traits, instincts, and desires that an individual does not consciously acknowledge or accept. It represents the aspects of oneself that are hidden, ignored, or denied because they are deemed undesirable, socially unacceptable, or in conflict with one's conscious identity (the ego).

I did not wish to face "myself", aka the people who were experiencing something that I forced to repress down within me. And when I did face it, I would say "I don't need it", "I don't know if I want it", and "Will I ever really get it?"

Yeah. I did not want to face the mirror that harbored the shadow I refused to acknowledge.

[oh, and what's that? that I deserve the love that I desire — even though I was desiring it from a dysfunctional place. A place that was not my own, a place in which I would never receive what I truly needed [or honestly wanted] in my life. A place that would have only destroyed me had I entered. It's a weird feeling, grieving something you know that was not meant for you, in hindsight. Like a really bad sugar addiction.]

I was obsessed with an image that did not belong to me.

Because when things are meant for me, I will be right on time, regardless of the time. Even if you're running late to your own party, the party doesn't start until you walk in.

Anyways, I say all of this to say that you should take some time to face yourself — maybe that quote is actually for you. You may realize that you are obsessing over something that has nothing to do with you, but everything to do with your growth. Be courageous enough to face the mirror and address the shadow.

I hope that made some sense to you. If so, tell me what stood out most. Thanks for reading.

All the best,

Whitney