A mother is braiding the hair of a little girl while the little girl seems engrossed with something in her little hands. As she looks into the camera, presumably seeing herself in the reflection, she utters out a short and shocking line:
"I'm so ugly."
It takes a few seconds for her mother to realise what her daughter just said. And she is in shock, as any one of us would be.
Feeling her mother's reaction, the little girl turned to look at her mother and muttered, "What?".
"You are not ugly. Don't say that. You are beautiful. The most beautiful little girl I know..." The mother went on to tell her daughter.
At that moment, you could see the progression of change in the daughter's eyes, one from surprise, to suppression, to a burst of emotional tears.
As the mother continues to shower the little girl with her most heartfelt perspective of her most precious daughter, I have a flurry of thoughts:
You could feel the suppressed hurt and sense of hopelessness which burst out with the tears of the little girl who could not be more than 7 or 8 years old.
Then you hear the voice of the mother who is the only other person as hurt, or even more, than the little girl amidst the echo of that short but heavy sentence.
I could imagine the wonder, the love, the excitement which the mother must have felt years ago as she held this same little being as she was just brought into this world. The words must have been the same:
"You are the most beautiful, most precious, most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me."
At that point, this same little girl could only receive and accept this love. And right now at this point, this same little girl has been in the world for years, out of the safety of the womb. Exposed to more than the words of her mother. Experienced the words of the world. And here she is, echoing words from the outside, seemingly having forgotten those original descriptions placed on her.
"I'm so ugly."
Little does she know that she is not stating a fact, she is echoing opinions. Opinions formed not just by other's opinions, but also opinions based on her own reasoning and logic. And she has learnt to base her being on these opinions, as facts.
And that is only human. Right? Meaning is placed in words, and as we scribble, and utter, and doodle, and mumble, meaning is being put forth everyday. And as we read, and listen, and skim, and skip, meaning is being absorbed into our beings every second. Our very being is based on the meanings we have absorbed, accepted.
God, being the only being in existence, without a cause. He is the only being, whose opinions are facts.
"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you..." (Jeremiah 1:5)
As I mull upon the opinions which have come to form my identity today, many of them makes sense! I'm really not that good-looking. I'm really not doing that well. I'm mediocre. Some of them makes even more sense then what the words in the Bible say of me. But, which is a fact and which is an opinion?
If I were to believe that the Word of God is inspired, echoes of Words of my actual Father in Heaven, entailing the Spirit of the Creator and Saviour of the world: which is the real reality?
Last thoughts on the mother who let loose all of her love for her beloved child. How desperately she must have been hurting, wanting, desiring for her words to once again form the identity of the beautiful little girl. For her words of love to be able to comfort, strengthen, realign the precious little girl, how much more our Heavenly Father who is Love Himself?