Displays

I saw this picture today while doing some picture surfing this morning. It is a picture from National Geographics 2013 Picture contest, still ongoing. It resonated with me in three deep, yet different ways.

Firstly, the grandeur and beauty is apparent. You simply can not miss it. Yet how often in our everyday lives do we allow our natural gifts to simply be what they are and display them? I am talking about display for no personal gain, simply being who we are and displaying it with no apologies. Without wondering who is staring at us or judging us. Without even knowing ourselves that we are displaying that divine spark which is the essence of who we are.

Secondly, how often do we as humans put on a display to mask the trueness of who we are due to fear of myriad things? We walk into a room with a grin painted across sanguine lips to belie our inner feelings of not being welcome of fitting in. We talk loudly to drown out the greatness of others which might somehow reveal our own inferiority. We talk loud to be the center of attention because we crave it.

Or the displays we put out into the world to make and keep friends? The displays to not be stigmatized by homosexuality, HIV, poverty, homelessness, lack of education, past abuses, mental and mood disorders, etc. The display to appear we have the happiest marriage and homelife?  The display we are better than our actions and choices.

Or how about, when we put on  display the list of issues in our lives in search of sympathy and pity? The parental displays of helicoptering where we pretend to be a parent we just simply cannot be every moment of the day? The display of apologies for our friends, families, and children when we feel they are being judged and by extension, us as well.

Other displays are familiar to us all. The person who won’t say no because they so want to be liked or wish to appear to be doing more than the next. The person who displays mock friendship yet waits with baited breath for you to leave.

Of course there are those who display for what appear to be selfless reasons but the display of them actually negates their good. Such as, how one is greener than the next or one is more zen than the next, and so on. The very display of what are good intentions many times are simply negated by verbalizing them.

Last but certainly not list, it made me consider what I want to display to myself, my husband, my children, my friends, my co workers, society, and the world. I won’t sit here and tell you I’ve now written out this fabulous list of my new displays but it has created an internal dialogue where I am considering what I do or do not wish to display each day. I think it’s an important conversation to have with one’s self and perhaps once I have a deeper handle on the displays I wish to show and those I wish to go, I won’t feel as though I am on display but rather displaying the me I am meant to be.

I want to get to a place where I and this world need not even know the word display. There will be no displays because we will have accepted the  strengths and weaknesses of ourselves and humanity. In that we display without knowledge and that my friend is a trait and ability worth striving towards. I think it will be worth the journey.

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