Seeing Myself Through Someone Else's Eyes

"Sometimes the only way to get a good look at yourself is through someone else's eyes.  If you're lucky, you'll like what you see.  Or you'll learn from it."  ~Zach Braff in "Scrubs"

I love that show so much.  You have to have a particular humor to really enjoy it and understand it to laugh at it.  I've watched the full 9 seasons a couple times but I just recently decided to watch again cause it had been awhile.  They always have something enlightening to say at the end and this quote came from an episode in the first season..

What I see when I look in the mirror is nothing pretty.  I see a body and face I don't recognize anymore.  When I don't look in the mirror, I feel like the same person I was before the accident, maybe even a better person, but then I FEEL my physical body and my face and the scars that cover them and it brings me to tears.  But if I was to look at myself through my friends' eyes, I might see something else if only I allowed myself to see something else.  Some of my friends have told me I'm their hero.  Pretty much all my friends have told me I'm brave and an inspiration.  Many have told me how far I've come and how pretty or beautiful I am, how kind and generous I am.  But my anger at everything that has happened and continues to happen (ex. bad healing, contractures) clouds my vision through their eyes.  I just can't see what they see.  If I could be at peace with what happened and let go of my anger, maybe I could finally see what they see and be happy.

If I could see myself through my friends' eyes and my family's, I think I'd like what I saw.  I know I would.  Who doesn't want to be someone's hero?  Who doesn't want to be thought of as brave and an inspiration?  Or beautiful, kind and funny?  Those traits are like the gold stars of life.  But I'm no hero.  I just survived an accident.  How does that make me a hero?  Sometimes I wonder if these things are just said to lift me up so I don't get so hard on myself.  What makes me so brave?  Because I go into surgery after surgery?  A friend once blogged about me and said I was brave because I went into surgery after surgery knowing I'm a hard stick for the nurses and knowing that it's hard to intubate me and knowing that something could go wrong because it has so many times in the past.  But I go into surgery after surgery because I hope upon hope that whatever is being worked on will work.  I go into surgery after surgery because I really don't have much of a choice if I want to improve my life.  And I know I'm definitely not physically beautiful or pretty as I once was.  But I will agree on one thing that people see in me and that's kindness.  I would do anything for my family or friends.  I want to please them in anyway I can.  But I am still honest to a fault so I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.  But thank you to all my incredible friends and family who see me as all those things because I can't see them for myself.  I just can't.  But thank you for seeing such beautiful traits in me.