The Mind Has A Vanity All Its Own

For all of
Humanity,
there is phenomenon which has happened in one's own mind since Men & Women
discovered their reflection in a pool of water.

Our eyes like to play tricks with our mind. 

Or is it, 

our mind likes to play tricks with what we see? 

When we are children, 

we look to our reflection 
and imagine someone older. 

We become teenagers 

and the reflection belies a maturity that we are becoming adults. 

Then comes the age of invincibility. 

When we are in our twenties,

our mind tells us to live on the edge.

Because we think so much of life is still before us 

and nothing could possibly stop us now. 

When the insuperable facade of believing 

Father Time 

will let you live forever in your

 Twenties,
and you begin to see the wrinkles,

the mind still imagines itself younger then the rest of the world does. 

Even at advance ages, 

the mind still sees itself attractive to people younger. 

It's not until the advent of the commercially introduced art of photography did our hallucinations about ourselves stop 

and reality sink in. 

Our mind has a vanity all its own. 

It doesn't believe we should know our true age. 

If you don't believe me, 

try not looking at any photographs of yourself for one month. 

It's OK to see yourself in the mirror daily, 

just don't take a picture of yourself. 

Then, 

after the month is over, 

take a photo, 

close enough to see your body 

and face clearly.
Then compare it to a photograph from 10 years prior.

You will feel a little confusion as you think, 

that's not how I look. 

It's the same phenomenon people go through when they hear their voice on a recording for the first time. 

Non of us believe how we sound on the recording, 

and non of us believe how our mind deceives us on the condition of our looks. 

The mind has a vanity all its own.

This is,

I May Be Turning Sixty,
But I Am Still Sexy,
In My Own Mind,

Jim Hauenstein,

And,

“Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist, a master, can look at an old woman, portray her exactly as she is...and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be...and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply imprisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart...no matter what the merciless hours have done to her.”

- Robert A. Heinlein -

That is my story and I am sticking to it!

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