Holding Up A Mirror To Our Own Self Interests

I finish reading an incredible novel yesterday. Red Dress In Black and White by Elliot Ackerman was a great book that caused a great deal of thought and reflection. Before I go on, let me just say, “Read this book.” I have several notes from yesterday as I finished up the book, but one of the lines that caused great reflection was, “She held up a mirror to my own self interests.” We all have self interests. In the policy side of my world I call this ‘turf,’ but we all have self interests. Rightly so, and there is nothing wrong with that. Reading Red Dress In Black and White, made me realize how important it is to hold up a mirror to those self interests often and reflect.

In doing a little research on mirrors, I found they were invented in 1835 as we know them today. Prior to that people used reflections in water or other polished items to get a distorted view of themselves. Click here for a pretty good history of mirrors. Think about it; mirrors changed the way we walk through the world. We can’t help ourselves, but to look in a mirror or in a window reflection to see how we look. There are huge psychological impacts of so clearly being a subject of ourself. Mirrors give us a perspective on how we look to the rest of the world. Now that we have mirrors and we all have looked into one, we can use the great metaphor given to us by Elliott Ackerman of holding up a mirror to our own self interests.

Mirrors allow us to see what we really look like. When it comes to our self interests we need to review how those self interests are affecting the trade-offs we make related to our personal and professional life. Sometimes there is even an intertwining of our personal and professional lives. Now, I love the fact that we have become a society where the private actor can pursue the personal and commercial interests we choose. But, don’t forget, this can lead to greed, vanity, envy, and pride. Which in turn can lead to selfishness. We need that mirror held up in front of us occasionally so we can reflect (pun intended) on how our actions are affecting others. In other words, to stay with the metaphor, have we become ugly.

We will never change the fact that we are self-interested creatures. This is what allows us to have passions and drive. We do, however, owe it to those in our community circles to reflect on how our own self interests are impacting those in our web of influence.

Byron's Babbles