Just Like Ogres
“For your information, there’s a lot more to ogres than people think… Onions have layers. Ogres have layers… You get it? We both have layers.” –Shrek (Shrek)
They say we shouldn’t make something of nothing. Attributing significance to something that doesn’t warrant it…the proverbial mountain of the mole hill.
I was recently reminded of the less-often-referenced flipside of the coin…making nothing of something. Like a tourist deliberately composing a picture to distort relative size, we like to pretend we can hold the Eiffel Tower in the palm of our hand.
If something of nothing is living in exaggeration, then the converse is living in denial. From either seat, we’re not seeing our lives accurately. Not acknowledging our complexity. Our layers.
Like children whistling in the dark, we can discount, redirect, or patently ignore the events, circumstances, or emotions of our lives.
Experience shows both means of distortion can coexist. In order to distract ourselves from a hard truth, we magnify something insignificant opting for form over substance. And then we go a step further, choosing something outside of ourselves to focus on (the behavior of a neighbor, coworker, or family member), to generate an even greater disconnection from our authentic selves.
We perpetuate these distortions at our own peril.
Minimizing something because we judge it to be painful or distasteful doesn’t make it go away. Repression isn’t resolution.
It is for this reason that we are called to accept ourselves, our circumstances, and those about us just exactly as they are. As compassionately as we are able.
This acceptance presents new challenges, of course. No person is just one dimension. There is always more to learn. But by identifying and revealing our layers, we can connect more deeply to ourselves, the universe, and others. Doing so, in turn, helps review a new layer. And so it goes.
Just like with ogres.
