Thilo Frank’s Mirrored Room. Image google search, source unknown… appropriately
My son has an infinity mirror in his bedroom which startled the electrician who installed it. He thought it was ‘just’ an illuminated mirror and nearly fell through the imaginary black hole it creates when he switched it on to test it. Tiny LED lights are mirrored back into ‘space’. I take great delight in showing it to people… it always elicits the same surprise and delight, from child to adult, and it reminds me every time I see it of moment from my own childhood.
Standing between the two mirrors in the rather swish cloakroom of the store, I saw my reflection stretching, apparently, to infinity. I was fascinated by the fact that I could see myself from both the front and from the back… a view we seldom see. Not only myself, but others in the cloakroom and objects too; a vase of flowers, an ormolu clock behind whose gilded face I could see the tarnished brass door with its little keyhole. My memory of the event is vivid, though I was, perhaps only five at the time. The mirrors were flat, thin planes, yet the depth incredible.
My mother, when she had finished applying the coral pink lipstick she always wore, explained about mirrors and showed me how they reflected into each other anything that was poised between. To me, back then, it was magical. That is the kind of childhood magic that never seems to fade.
A little older and I began to see a parallel magic at work; we ourselves, or so it seemed to me, are poised between the mirrors of reality. Consciousness seems to stand somewhere undefined between those mirrors. Look one way at our reflection and we see the layers of mind and intuition, intellect and emotion… all the things that go to make up the personality we know, right on through to the senses and the body within which we move through the world. These, of course, are all tangible, measurable things… aspects of ourselves with which we are familiar and comfortable. Even the intangible aspects are measurable and we see ourselves reflected clearly, eye to eye as it were, as we gaze into the glass. Around us are the objects that make up our world and they accompany the layers of self through the infinite reflections; a familiarity that is both comforting and vaguely disturbing.
What if, I thought, just as with the mirrors, behind us the reflection stretches just as far? We can see that ‘rear view’ reflected before us, but we cannot turn and see it clearly, eye to eye, for then we have altered the angle of perception, turning ourselves again to face our face. Yet always behind us, is as much as we see in front; an unfamiliar, almost alien view of our Self that we cannot look upon directly; only its reflection is visible to our eyes. What then, I thought, was this alternate view of our Self? Were we catching a glimpse of something beyond the tangible reality we know; looking out across the plain of the Soul to the essence of our Self? So many layers… seemingly infinite…yet the being thus reflected was a single point of consciousness… all the layers occupying a single spark of life.
The whole idea fascinates me as much as the mirrored room did when I was a child, and I still feel the same sense of adventure and magic when I seek to gaze upon those reflections. This idea of reflected layers of reality even weaves itself through the books written with Stuart France as stories that tell the same story dance through the pages, layer upon layer. And that leads me to wondering if reality itself stands between such mirrors? If the world we observe spins off beyond the known into unknown realms? The possibilities are as infinite as the reflection in the mirror… and then, of course, you have to ask, are we ourselves but a reflection, and if so… what is It that is poised between them mirroring facets of becoming?
wow, that looks amazing
It does 🙂
Just wow…I bet that is awesome to see..that poor electrician he won’t forget that in a hurry 🙂
I won’t forget his four-letter reaction in a hurry either when he switched it on the first time 🙂
Ha Ha…I bet his reaction was priceless 🙂
It was. He jumped a mile 🙂
Ha Ha, I can just picture it….I would love one of those mirrors though…
They are rather good 🙂
I have similar thoughts about “reality” Sue – but never expressed as wonderfully as you do here.
xx, mgh
Thanks, Madelyn. I imagine we must all ask these questions at some point. xx
Perhaps. The are there to BE asked, however, and some of us chose to focus there.
xx,
mgh
Yes, I agree. It is far more important to ask the question than to get the answer 🙂 xx
Wise words, Sue. I often wonder if we’ll learn the answers after we shuffle off this mortal coil. I hope so. Inquiring minds like to KNOW. 🙂
xx,
mgh
You can kKnow without knowing 🙂 xx
True – but sometimes frustrating here on the physical plane.
xx,
mgh
Yes, it can be 🙂 xx
Time travel stories are based on this premise. It always makes my brain explode a little :-0
The anomalies and the types of paradox time travel brings up are real mind twisters… I wonder if we can ever get to grips with some of them.
Reblogged this on anita dawes and jaye marie.
Thanks for reblogging, Jaye x
Mirrors are very strange things, and I used to think they were untrustworthy. I couldn’t believe that what I saw in them was the truth. But maybe they show the only truth and it is our brain that misleads us?
I think it is… though we do see an inversed reflection and never quite the reality we imagine.
But why don’t mirrors reflect what we see?
For a start, they reflect three dimensions in two…and what we see within them is always reversed to our eyes.We think of our own reflections as true, yet they are far from what others may see…
and that might be a good thing!
My hips would agree 😉
You see, posts like this….the reason I should never read blogs before the first cup of coffee. Very deep, Sue. Head spinning. What if…indeed ?
This is why coffee is a gift of the gods, Van 😉
Beautifully written and thought provoking piece. Many thanks for sharing!
Thanks, Leeby.
No worries. Best britches. (Tis the season)
I haven’t forgotten 🙂
Indeed. Who could forget in this kind of weather.
Still mild here…for now…
Soggy though…
Reblogged this on Sun in Gemini.
Thanks, Steve x
Reblogged this on Stuart France.
Brilliant. Mirrors are magic and this has realy got us thinking about reflections and dimensions and the whole universe, except there are multi universes…
Im not about to argue with a multiverse 🙂
Thanks you for sharing, Traci.