My own best friend

‘I am a student,’ I said to myself one day. The full-sized mirror in my bedroom choked and coughed. ‘Really?’ it said mockingly. Stunned, I looked at it closely to comprehend the source from where the voice was coming, but the surface of the mirror was flat. A talking mirror only existed in fairy tales, I thought, nothing to do with reality. As if reading my mind, the mirror spoke again, amused at my perplexed look. ‘Is that so?’ the voice asked.

‘Who are you?’ I inquired in a low whisper, unsure of whom I was talking to. I went nearer, my eyes fixed, examining the mirror more closely.

‘I expected that question!’ it said and chuckled. ‘Nobody knows me except a few lucky ones, and some people even claim that they are students! The ones who learn to seek, the ones who find and discover new things, yet they seldom discover me!’ Dumbfounded, I gazed at the mirror in total disbelief, but this time I was quite sure that the voice was coming directly…from somewhere inside the mirror.

‘People are always concerned abut how others look, behave and dress. What they should do and what they should not. Even when they look at me in the mirror, they are only obsessed with what-others-think-of-them philosophy, they see themselves through the eyes of others and they see others through their own eyes. Poor souls, they spend their whole lives in the end, but the only thing they are unable to discover throughout their lives is me.’ The mirror continued to speak in its gruff voice, ignoring my small gasps of shock and fear.

‘How can one discover you? Are you the magic mirror that speaks only the truth?’ my question hovered in mid-air among its hysterical laughs.

‘Oh yes! I speak nothing but the truth, but Heavens No! I am no magic mirror!’

Frustrated with the puzzle-game it was playing with me, I questioned one last time, ‘Then, who are you?’

‘Don’t you know that mirrors are always a reflection of the person standing in front of them?’

‘Yes, but…….’

‘I am the REAL YOU!’ it yelled out in exasperation.

My mouth hung open. ‘The real me?’ I inquired.

‘Yes, you. Only you. Of all the things in this world, have you ever gotten a chance to know yourself?’

‘Ermmmm…’ I looked down at my feet, thinking what to say.

‘No, you don’t know yourself. You don’t know who you are, what are you capable of? Do you know your strengths and weaknesses? Your shortcomings? Where you need to improve? What to do to become a better person? What good and wrong you have done so far? What are your dreams and aspirations? What is true happiness?…….. You are not your own best friend…,” saying this, the mirror went silent.

The words pierced my heart, ripping it apart and penetrating my soul. “I am not my own best friend.” The words haunted me and made me realize from that day onwards of how difficult, but how important it is to be your own best friend.