There was fog outside. It covered everything in misty tendrils and cast our tangled garden into soft-focus, so the bare rose bushes looked as though they were covered in thick spiders’ webs, and the grass turned a muted shade of Payne’s grey.

It took me quite some time to realise that there was no fog outside – the issue was with our “blown” windows. The double glazing has lost its seal and the gap inside gets condensation, creating a misted outlook.

It made me think. How many times do we get something completely wrong because of our preconceptions or because we have a misted “window” onto life?

There is someone in my family for whom I have little time. I sometimes say, “Water isn’t wet enough for her.” It occurred to me recently, however, the only reason I have this opinion of her is through the words of my mother. Now, I trust my mother. If she says this person constantly complains about everything, then I believe her. But I have not spent much time with this person for several years; she might not complain if she and I were, for example, to meet for coffee.

It can work the other way, of course. Another person in my family is very critical of my sister. This used to hurt my sister greatly, until she decided not to let it disturb her composure – to realise that the fault lay not with her, but with this other family member. That was a case of there really being fog outside and not in the window.

It takes a great deal of self-awareness to recognise the “fog” on our own windows and to compensate for it. Equally, it takes confidence for us to know that our own windows are clear, and we are seeing what is really there.

How many opinions do we hold because we are seeing through another’s eyes and have not experienced it for ourselves? Of course, if enough people agree on something, there is likely to be some truth in it, but not always. There are some things, like politics and religion, that are always going to split a population down the middle. If we expose ourselves only to material that confirms our own preformed opinions, then we remain foggy. We need to look through as many windows as possible to have a properly informed opinion.

This also applies to our view of ourselves. I’m sure many of us here do not always have a positive opinion of ourselves. I would suggest that we are looking at our reflection through a foggy window. One thing that is very beneficial is to ask a friend what they like about you. I’ve done this in the past and it’s been illuminating – friends see qualities in us that we cannot see for ourselves. Once you have another opinion, you see yourself in quite a different light. There will still be that foggy window, but you can recognise it for what it is and realise the light outside is clear.

Mary

A Moodscope member