What do you see in the Mirror?

When you look in the mirror, what do you see? Humans begin recognizing themselves from a ripe old age of 18 months according to Google.

I know a little bird name Little.  A little lovebird.  Before Little, I hated lovebirds; they would always peck and bite at me like most of the women in my life.  So beautiful and colorful these lovebirds are on the outside, so mean and predictable on the inside.  All except for Little.

Little has free reign in my house, which has its share of mirrors.  Little likes to fly into mirrors, but bounces off nicely and uninjured. When Little confronts a mirror more slowly, he looks quizzically at his reflection as if he was regarding another one of his species.  A little put off at first, Little is also frightened, and then doesn’t know what to think as the movements in the mirror – mirrors his by more than just a little.  The real question is how Little would react to the knowledge that - what he sees in the mirror is himself.  Would it disrupt his life, would it affect his flight patterns and confidence, and/or his view of reality?

Humans typically recognize themselves in the mirror.  Not being able to do so denotes a major connotative impairment.  But given the ability to perform this rather primitive human task which is clearly not shared by all living species or even all members of the human race (blindness, dementia, psychiatric illnesses), a more existential question is WHY humans look in the mirror.  Is it to affirm the contemporary image of their existence, or simply to visually craft a plan to adorn their face with color and definition?

You might ask whether humans see in the mirror what others see when they are looked at. Do we ever ask others what they see when they look at us to compare it to what we see when we look at ourselves? If we look in the mirror and see someone who is different than others recognize us to be, whose perception reflects reality, the one looking at us or our own?   If others compliment us about our skin – that it is smooth and lacks wrinkles, but we seen many wrinkles and imperfections when we look closely into the mirror, whose eyes see reality?  Surely, we cannot accept as truth what others see with their eyes over our own.  But why would we readily accept our hypercritical self-analysis over perhaps a more impartial view of the same? Would we really prefer to recognize more defects in our skin than others are willing to share?

 Lets make matters worse! We know that not everyone agrees with how they see us; two humans may have different views. One may see us as attractive, one as ugly.  Are we both ugly and attractive – beauty in the eyes of the beholder and all of that….  Whose eyes should we accept and believe, the one that makes us look good, or the one that makes us look bad.  Or does that depend upon the day of the week.

When we look into the mirror, does it tell us who we are, or only confirm who we are not?  Does it make us happy or make us sad?  Can we change the lighting around the mirror to change the view, take away shadows and wrinkles, erase age and fatigue? When we do this, do we really feel and or look younger and less wrinkled?  Why do we bother to pretend?

When we look in the mirror, are we trying to determine who we are? How much of what we are on the inside reflects what we look like on the outside?   Just a little?

I hope whoever is reading this is only a little confused. I was trying to be a little clever, but my little brain is limited in what cleverness it is able to deliver.