COMPARE AND CONTRAST
When thinking about a title for this piece, I was tempted to call it “Self-Portrait II,” as it’s a kind of sequel to a recent column that appeared on these pages, entitled “Self-Portrait.” To avoid confusion, I put aside that idea. Still, the concepts in this article are a continuation of the ones presented there, though coming from a different angle. It’s all part of the ever-fascinating study of how a person sees himself.
In the earlier column, we talked about how we often fashion our self-image by imitating and emulating those we admire. We also showed how something can trigger a change in the self-portrait that we carry around in our heads. Remember the story of the young boy who was going nowhere until he asked a “bomb kasha” on the Gemara which showed everyone, and especially himself, just how good he could be?
As that anecdote illustrates, even if we start out with a negative vision of ourselves, along with the low self-esteem that comes with it, an unexpected incident or remark can show us to ourselves in a kinder light. In this new mirror, we suddenly see ourselves differently. We have a whole new persona to embrace and grow into.
But there’s another side to the coin. If the way we view ourselves can sometimes be falsely negative, it can, and often is, also misleadingly positive.
On a purely tangible level, have you ever looked at a photograph of yourself and been appalled. “Do I really look like that?” In our minds’ eye there is a picture of ourselves that’s usually younger and more attractive than we may sometimes appear in reality. When a camera catches a less flattering version than the one we cherish inwardly, it can be disconcerting!
Similarly, and more importantly, we do the same thing with regard to our characters. We inwardly endow ourselves with all sorts of positive traits. We like to think of ourselves as intelligent, intuitive, compassionate and considerate. That’s why there’s such a sense of shocked disbelief when we act or speak in a way that doesn’t sync with the portrait we’ve painted for ourselves. “Did I really say that?”
It’s so hard to synthesize the two different “me”s: the perfectly nice one who lives inside our heads, and the occasionally not-so-nice one that appears out in the world. There’s a sense of cognitive dissonance. How can such a pleasant person make such an unpleasant comment? How can such a compassionate individual feel so distinctly lacking in compassion for someone she envies? How can such a considerate person be too self-involved to notice the pain of someone close to her?
When this kind of thing happens, we get all shook up. We don’t know which version of ourselves to believe. Am I a good person or a bad one?
Maybe the answer should be: “I am a good person with some weaknesses, like everyone else. I permitted one of those weaknesses to get the better of me just now, and I regret that. But because of my belief in my basic goodness, I will do teshuvah for my misdeed and go on to try to do better next time.”
It takes maturity and a certain wisdom to be able to think this way, and then to live by it. To understand that the negativity within us does not disqualify us from being members of the Good Humans Club. It’s simply the challenge that Hashem gave us, a tool to help us turn into the people we were meant to be.
Our lives are a series of obstacle courses. And the main obstacle is often ourselves.
Post-Facto Editing
Have you ever had this experience: You have a conversation or interaction with someone, and afterward find yourself reviewing the dialogue in your mind, trying to figure out how it could have gone better? Both the things you wish you’d said or not said, and also the things that the other person did. You take that already performed playscript, and you edit it.
What’s the point of doing this? After all, you can’t change the past. I think it’s done in an instinctive effort to console ourselves for a perceived faux pas. To try to make ourselves look better to ourselves.
Maybe we can’t go back in time and change what happened, but in the recesses of our minds we can revise reality a bit with the help of our wishful imaginations. Even just getting a handle on how it could or should have happened can be empowering. It shows us where we went wrong. It gives us a goal for the future. Next time, we vow to ourselves, we’ll do better.
Confronting the Gap
In high school, when preparing for our English Regents, I remember an essay that asked us to “compare and contrast” two characters or plot lines in a story. In real life, we do that all the time.
As children, we constantly measured our “stuff” against those of our siblings and classmates. We jealously guarded our perceived rights and privileges. The child inside us may still be clinging a little too tightly to these self-destructive comparisons. When it comes to status and the material arena, a great deal of unhappiness can be avoided if we quit measuring our lives against those of other people. If we stop comparing, we’ll stop feeling that other people are our competitors.. and the need for self-protection drops away.
Spiritually, as we’ve said, the opposite is true. Comparing ourselves is a positive act if it leads to moral improvement. It’s very useful to take on a role model to serve as a paradigm for the person we’d like to become.
Emotionally speaking, too, there’s one kind of comparison that actually works for us. We need to learn how to “edit” ourselves before the fact rather than after! And the first step in doing that is by aligning our inner eye with the more realistic outer one. In other words, by comparing and contrasting our private self-portrait with the persona that we actually are in the world.
Passing a mirror, we can be horrified to realize that the disheveled or otherwise unappealing figure we’re looking at is… us! Coming face-to-face with a discrepancy between how we’d like to picture ourselves and how we actually look can be dismaying. Confronting the gap between how we prefer to view our character, and a more objective assessment of the same, can be equally jarring.
Inside, we have beautiful ideals and intentions. How those ideals and intentions play out in the real world can be another story altogether.
When we daven in the morning, we bless Hashem who opens up the eyes of the blind. To some degree, we are all near-sighted when it comes to ourselves. We have blind spots which, both in our dealings with others and in our quest for spiritual growth, can wreak havoc.
Let’s daven that Hashem gently opens our eyes to the reality of who we are. And that He then helps us do what it takes to line up that reality with the beautiful people we yearn to be!
