It’s that time of year again…cooler weather, leaves begin to change color and yes…Halloween. Today as I walked through the store, I noticed all the Halloween costumes, candy and masks. Not only were the children excited, but the parents seemed just as excited. I thought to myself, how many of those adults actually wear a costume ALL YEAR LONG? How many of us wear masks and are unwilling to remove them? Better yet, how many of us even realize that we’re wearing a mask? And when I say us, I’m including myself.
Some of the masks that we wear are:
1. The Jones’ Mask - This mask is worn when we are trying to keep up or surpass our neighbors. And not just the ones who live next door to us. The Jones’ include our relatives, our co-workers, our friends, and even entertainers. We are so busy trying to get what we THINK the next person has that we forget to be thankful for what God has already blessed us with. And because we are so afraid that someone just might have a little more than us, we continue to wear the mask. I call this one the mask of ‘envy and greed‘.
2. The Mardi Gras Mask – Although Mardi Gras is celebrated worldwide in countries such as Brazil and Australia, Mardi Gras is usually associated with New Orleans, LA….The Big Easy. When wearing this mask, we only want to deal with what we consider easy. We don’t want to do the hard work. What I mean by hard work is the work that is necessary to improve our lives and our livelihoods. Instead of saving and investing, we want to spend and create debt. Instead of feeding the soul, we want to feed the flesh. I call this one the mask of ‘easy doesn’t do it‘.
3. The Spa/Facial Mask - This mask is usually worn by women, but some men wear it on occasion. Sometimes we get so caught up in the physical that we will damn near kill ourselves to ‘look’ good no matter how we ‘feel’ on the inside. Hair, check….nails, check…makeup, check…..shoes, check…..dress, check…..inside, EMPTY. I call this one the ‘look good at ALL cost’ mask.
4. The Religious Mask – I better not touch this one too much. Wouldn’t want to be called a heathen or an atheist. But this one is usually worn to cover up for everything else. We get to blame Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, Allah, Jah, Yashua… not to mention all the other deities for whatever is going ‘wrong’ in our lives. Someone has to be the ‘blame’ cause it’s certainly not us. We can’t be responsible because we don’t have that kind of power. We are simply ‘humans’. But I’m here to tell you, that you are not a human having a spiritual experience. It’s just the opposite. You are a spiritual being having a human experience. I call this one the ‘God save me’ mask.
5. The Drama Mask – Do I really need to explain this one? Some people don’t want anything less than a life filled with confusion and to wreck havoc in another person’s life. It’s as if nothing is right, unless things are going ‘wrong’, terribly wrong. Their relationships suck, their job sucks, their children won’t listen, they have little or no money, bills are piling up. Know someone like this? Yeah thought so. I call this one the ‘I love confusion’ mask.
and last but not least
6. The Halloween Mask – Halloween is associated with fear and death. If we continue to wear the masks listed above, not to mention all the others one out there, that’s exactly what you will find behind the mask….FEAR and DEATH. You will find people afraid to live a life of pure joy. You will find a person who is dying on the inside. The sad thing about wearing this mask is that a person can be so afraid to remove it that they never realize that their life depends on it.
I am endeavoring each moment of the day to pull back the layers, to expose my true self, to remove all my limiting beliefs and my masks. How ’bout you?
In-love,
J-licious
© Copyright 2009/10/26 Jacque Keil All Rights Reserved
