Illusions...My Hidden Life

Watching a magician perform a neat trick with slight of hand is a thing to behold.  Even though you know it's only an illusion, it still amazes you! How did he make it look like he was doing one thing, when, really, it was something totally different? You see the hand he wants you to see, and are totally unaware of what his other hand is doing. Even when you try to watch him carefully, you only see what he wants you to see.
Illusions aren't only performed by magicians. We normal people perform them every day. Think "Facebook"....

On social media we paint a rosy picture of our lives. We let the world see the good hand. And sometimes we give peeks into our real struggles. Usually only when we are desperate enough to ask for prayer or help. But often we only show the illusion. After all, what would people think if they knew what our hidden hand was doing? The illusion that we had it all together would crumble. They would know that what we were showing them wasn't the real us...
I hear people talk a lot about the illusions and problem-free lives that people portray on FB, when in reality their lives are crumbling around them. People scoff at "those" people. But really, we are ALL "those" people. We all have parts of ourselves and our lives that we don’t blast all over social media. And I think that's ok.  If you want to paint a rosy picture to the world, if you portray the illusion, you have the right to privacy and to keep personal things personal. But that can only be healthy on several conditions....

1) If you are married, you can't, and shouldn't, keep one hand hidden from your spouse. You are one flesh.   The spouse IS your other hand.  To be in unity you HAVE to share everything, especially the hard stuff, with each other. Sometimes, as I have personally learned in my own marriage, we keep things bottled up and hidden from our spouse, maybe because we want to protect them or don't want them to worry. Or we keep things to ourselves because we are afraid they will get mad, or it will stir up more strife...so instead, we continue the illusion. This is extremely dangerous to a healthy marriage because, before you know it, that one hidden thing has blossomed in multiple hidden feelings, hurts, thoughts, and behaviors, and your whole marriage has turned into just a show. It literally becomes a case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. So talk to each other...with open hands! Be honest, even when it's hard.  Share the truth of your feelings with grace.  Because if you avoid the hard talks, you are left with only the illusion.  You are left with one hand doing one thing and  the other doing it's own thing and nothing getting done and just a big ol' mess! And that will be harder to deal with than the hardest of "deep" talks.
 

2) Share your secrets with a trustworthy sidekick.  You need to have people in your life who DO know what's really going on. They are there to help you and walk along side you. They encourage you and give you the necessary tools to get through the hard moments. They can be your sounding board when you’re trying to work through something.  They can let you know if something is a good idea or a bad idea. They help you carry your heavy bag of tricks and let you lean on them if the show falls apart. Basically, you need an outsider (NOT your spouse…and I would say not even a family member) who knows all your junk.  They are a neutral party.  They are there just to be your sidekick. This only works though, if, again, you talk to them…with truthful, open hands!

…Honestly, I fail at this one. I’ve come to realize lately that I keep people at an arm’s length.  I perform in front of them, draw them in, put on a good show, but I don’t really let them know what’s going on. I am great a surface friendships! (Doesn’t that sound lovely and alluring!) I have tons of friends. I do. But as for soul-baring deep confession friends? Not so much. I’m horrible at letting people see past the illusion. My trick of the trade is to let my guard down just enough to show some vulnerability, but keep it in place enough to also protect myself from sharing the truth. I'm a control freak and I think should be able to walk myself through success. Also, I’m afraid…Afraid they’ll see my failures, my struggles, and they won’t see me the same, afraid they’ll see me as a fraud.  The problem is, I long for intimate friendships, but I build walls to keep them away.  I’ve only recently realized that I’ve kind of always been this way. Even as a child, I over-analyzed everything, every nuance (except I didn’t know what that word was!) of every relationship.  It’s like I am always trying to figure out what people expect of me before I let down the wall so that I know how to perform the best and best control the situation.  Letting down those walls...well, sheesh, when you figure it out, let me know how to do it!

3) Don’t trick yourself. Ok, so, really, this is probably the first step to gaining a true side-kick and letting those walls down (which means I need to work on this one as well...ugh...why I am writing this?!). If you want to be a "one-man-show", you can.  You will be in control of each action and show.  But, ultimately, the best shows have sidekicks.  If you trick yourself into thinking you don't need help, you'll fail.  So don't trick yourself.  That means you have to be real and honest with who you are, what your strengths are and what your limitations are. You have to admit to yourself those areas where you are creating illusion. You have to allow people to give you pointers and criticism and you have to be willing to ask for help. Why? Because if you don’t, you start to live your whole life on a stage. You lose who you are. And that would be a very lonely existence.

4) Remember the Stage Manager/Director/Producer sees everything…Yes, I’m talking about God. He is not fooled by smoke and mirrors, or slight of hand. He sees everything you are doing. He knows best how to direct you and sees your flaws when you try to do it your own way. He shakes His head when you ignore your sidekick or have hands that aren't working together. Listen to Him.  Because our show is really His show. And His show isn’t about illusion. It’s about transparency. It’s about grace. It’s about representing Him. And He is the Great Redeemer of broken people. He sees the big picture of the show and He knows best how to make it truly applause worthy...

So it’s ok if you don’t want to tell everyone on FB that you are struggling financially, or that your marriage is in a rocky spot, or that your kids are driving you crazy, or that you are mad at God for something in your life, or that you made a horrible decision that you are dealing with.  It’s ok.  I don’t even mind seeing your illusion.  It’s a safe spot to be in within today’s “here’s my life” and "look at how great I am" world.  I feel like I, myself, land there more often than not. 

However, we can’t stay there. We can’t live there. It’s not sustainable. It’s an illusion. So let’s all be sure that when we ARE on the stage, our right hand knows what our left hand is doing (spouses), our trusty sidekick is backing us up, we aren’t fooling ourselves, and to always remember Who we are ultimately representing. And grace. Let's always offer grace to all the other people who are performing all around us. 
It's hard to be on life's stage. 
Let's cheer each other on!