As reality shrinks into a dark abyss, I find myself in an empty void. I forget everything; my name, my age, the things around me. It is as if I was born again, into a world that I can create with my mind. And in my mind, I am a baby; an innocent bag of flesh, just waiting to conquer the world with the secret insanity that I held myself with. I am pampered, and I have my family hanging at my every babble and talk. As I stagger and begin to walk, my parents held my hand. Soon enough, I began to walk on my own, eat on my own, and I begin to not depend on my family on every little thing. I fell asleep on my own bed, thinking of how cool it would be when I grow up, unbound to the chains of my parents.
As I open my eyes, I see little children running around, without a care of the world. I join them, and I become part of their world. For a moment, I do not care about everything else. I only have these children, carefree and untouched by the sore reality of the flesh world. I stay with them for a while, and I laugh so loud that some people would call me indiscreet. Then in a blink of an eye, the little kids were gone. I find myself alone again, walking along the depths, not knowing where to go. What I do know is that I have to follow my bare feet, which were having cuts and bruises because of the small rocks I stumbled upon. The strength of my sole was tested, and though I winced and cried a time or two, I kept going, excited to learn what else is in the depths of my mind.
Then I found myself in a room full of mirrors; mirrors of different shapes, of different lengths. In each mirror, I looked different. In some mirrors I was tall, in some mirrors, I was small. In some I was a blur and some I looked as naked as a new born baby. I felt stripped, I felt judged, and I ran away as fast as I could. But I could never run from them and the more farther I ran more mirrors appeared in front of me. Then I stopped and looked at myself. As I studied my body, I saw that it was developing. My mind too, was more open, more developed in a way.
I was then put in a box, a box filled with facts and numbers and the proper grammar. I was taught this way and that, and my mind grew bigger and stronger. I had developed reasoning and judgement, and when I did I saw mirrors of other people, and I began to see them from a different view. I criticized most of them, some I envied. I wanted to be a part of their world, a part of their group. I tried my best to fit in the mirrors; I even changed my structure and the way I was. I found myself squeezing in, desperately trying to be the same with the plane of their life. But no matter how I tried, I was different. After a while, I got tired. I haven’t seen my reflection every since I was fascinated by trying to be one of the people. And so I searched and searched through the mirrors, but I could not find the reflection of me. I began to wonder what I looked like, if I looked like the people I criticized. I became mad, insane, driven into finding the mirror that held my face. I began to break every glass, and I stopped looking at other people. I got bruised and hurt, and I got scars everywhere. I was laughed at and judged, but I broke all the mirrors, knowing I had nothing to lose. And then, at the end of everything, I saw a lone mirror, standing proud and unmoved. I stopped, as my sanity returned. My heart began pounding like a maniac on drugs, and I saw my reflection in the mirror. And I hated what I saw. I was disgusted as I saw a young woman, who looked at everywhere but herself. I realized that the more I envied other people, the more I wanted to be a part of their world I didn’t have time to create my world.
And so I started over. I picked up myself, and got my head on straight. I took a part of my mirror, so I won’t forget how I looked like. As new mirrors replaced old ones, I began not to care about them. I put my head up, and began to walk on my own. I heard whispers and taunts and names that ridiculed me, I tried my best not to care. I became stronger and mightier, able to stand on my own two feet. I learned that the things I learned in the “box” could never be enough to be able to be on my own in the land of mirrors. And at one point, I saw my own reflection again. It was on another mirror, and as I checked the small piece from my own mirror, I saw it was an almost perfect match as how I saw myself. It was a brighter mirror, with more colours and it sparkled. I smiled and I twirled at my reflection, and I felt comfortable. Low and behold, the mirror became a man. He smiled at me, and made me laugh. And he walked with me through life. And as I began to regain my consciousness, I saw a mirror in his eyes. It was the same reflection before he turned into a man, a reflection of who I was in his eyes. As reality pinched me back into its cruelty, I held in my heart the memory of the land of the mirrors.
