The courage to be seen

It’s an endless yearning, isn’t it? This desire to be seen. To be looked at by another and to sense, without words, that we are known. Deeply known. No raised eyebrows. No sighs of disapproval. None of the subtle cues we take in every single day, affirming our own sense of self that we are, in fact, not enough. To be seen feels like a wholeness. A life-affirming exhale that provides for us exactly that: an affirmation of who we are as a human. No need to fix or edit or adapt even the tiniest part of who we are to gain the nod from another. To just be. Accepted, known, loved. 
 
There you are, messy one. It’s okay. And I love you. 
 
There isn’t single being who doesn’t desire this. The unattached seek it out in the text message of the potential lover they’ve yet to meet. In the shared smile at the check-out counter as they observe him unpack the tube of toothpaste and a dinner-for-one. Could this be the person who sees me? Might this be the person to fill the void of wanting?  Whilst the attached stare numbly across the dinner table wondering if they’re really known at all. If the person with whom they’ve shared a life and a home and years of child-raising has even the most delicate sense of what truly sits within their hearts. 
 
We desire to be understood in a way that we perhaps don’t quite understand ourselves. To have someone speak the truth of our soul back at us, revealing an awareness we had perhaps yet to feel stir within our own hearts. In that silent, reverent space between us that holds a deep knowing. And without saying a word we communicate the soul-affirming words: “I see you.”
 
So why then, when it’s right there before us, looking at us with a tender and sometimes amused gaze, do we do everything in our power to disallow it? 
 
Embarrassed and shutdown, we turn away from the very desires we seek. We place a blindfold over their eyes, deciding on the part of the other that it’s better to deflect or depart. An uncertain giggle, an armoured retort, an urgent glance at the door. 
 
And with that, the moment is gone. And we’ve proved ourselves right.
 
And yet, if we have the courage to lift our gaze for even a second, to hold still in this bathing warmth of presence, we may then see how very wrong we’ve been. That there’s in fact no drought of loving eyes, no shortfall on intimacy, and no vacancy of people already in our lives, waiting and wanting to be that weighted blanket of acceptance. 
 
It’s not the lack around us that’s breaking our hearts. It’s our very own carefully curated fear, that is. 
 
Because being seen requires something of us too. When the other takes a step forward, it invites us to do the same. And with that, we’re asked to take off the comfort of our clothing and to stand there before the other, naked. This is me. I don’t like what I see. But might you? Might you be able to look at everything I am and love me regardless? Could you be willing to withstand the mistakes I make and the wounds I carry and the hurt I inflict, and stay with me anyway?
 
And therein lies the truth: it’s not that another is incapable of seeing us for who we are. It’s that we’re fearful of what they may find. 
 
It’s not the judgement of another we fear. Because it’s not an external acceptance we seek. The longing we have is to feel so great a sense of self-compassion and ease within ourselves, that we’re willing to stand before another and receive love, because of it. 
 
It’s not the inability of another to see us and receive us as we are. It’s that we’re yet to see and receive ourselves. To provide ourselves with the forgiveness and acceptance we think we need from the other. And to stand alongside our own selves, regardless. 
 
Perhaps when Rumi said “what you seek is seeking you”, he meant You. Only You. That what we desire is right here, waiting for us with the open arms of an accepting lover. And that the only necessary action we ever need take, is to commit to holding ourselves with reverence, compassion and care. 
 
Perhaps then, we’ll finally find ourselves in the warm light of our own tender appreciation and gentle acceptance. And perhaps then, we will no longer need courage to be seen.