What a beautiful quote! I think it conveys a message that we have the potential to do, be various things, even opposites. We can be positive or negative, loving or selfish, warm and caring or cold and distant. We are the source of our own problems but we are also the source of the solution to those problems. We have gifts and the ability to share those gifts.

I feel that it’s a quote about interconnectedness and Oneness. Underneath, we all share a basic sentience or experience. We all have very similar qualities and not just humans but animals and insects as well. All sentient beings have needs and desires, interests, are capable of pleasure and pain, joy, and suffering. What we see in our own self, if we look closely, we can see it in others. And what we see in others, we can find in our own self when we look deep within. 

The end of the quote about the mirror seems to indicate that we are very similar and maybe how our actions even against our self can affect others or our actions against others can affect our own self. It also seems like someone offering to take on someone else’s pain. That is beautiful selflessness! Don’t hurt yourself, hurt me if you must hurt someone!

I love the quote and what it seems to mean and there are probably so many, many interpretations we can come up with. I think it just flows beautifully even without thinking about the meaning.

It also reminds me of this:

“Remember that everyone you meet is afraid of something, loves something, and has lost something.”

Again, a message that conveys that underneath, deep within, we are very similar, we are one. Never feel alone, whatever you feel, pleasant or unpleasant, joyous or painful, someone somewhere is experiencing something or has experienced something quite like it. This can deepen our empathy & compassion. Let’s remember how it feels to be happy, accomplish something, have something pleasant happen to us and be happy for others just as we would for our own self. And let’s recall how it feels to be in pain, scared, anxious, to be filled with sorrow and want to help heal & uplift others as much or even more than we want our own pain soothed. Let’s remember how it feels and refuse to inflict that upon someone else. But let’s show compassion & deep understanding to those who attempt to inflict pain upon us.

“…Would you rather throw stones at a mirror? I am your mirror and here are the stones.”

xoxo Kim ❤