When Do You Put on a Mask?

We just had Halloween here in the states. That got me thinking about masks. People wear them for a variety of reasons. When do you put on a mask?

 

For Fun

Sometimes masks are just for fun. You get to pretend to be someone else or see if you can keep people from guessing who you are. You can be mysterious or shocking or funny – somebody different than who you normally are. It can give you the opportunity to be creative.

 

For Medical Reasons

Sometimes masks are worn because of health reasons. Maybe to protect yourself from germs or allergens, maybe to protect someone else. It might be required (think surgical team in the OR) or it might be voluntary.

 

To Keep from Being Recognized

Sometimes people wear masks so that they won’t be identified – celebrities can try to be incognito so that they can be out in public but not draw attention to themselves. Of course, there are also the people who are committing crimes and they wear masks too.

 

What About Non-physical Masks?

I’ve been talking about actual physical masks so far, but there are also the other masks that we could wear. Sometimes we wear masks to keep people from seeing who we really are.

 

Is It For Safety?

Maybe we don’t feel safe being seen. This can happen when we’ve had experiences where being seen or heard was not safe. Sadly some children grow up in homes where it physically wasn’t safe to be seen or heard. Many other children weren’t physically in danger, but there were negative emotional consequences to being seen. So they learn to stay under the radar and protect themselves by being as invisible as possible.

 

Or Is the Real You Not Good Enough?

Other times, we may believe people won’t like who we really are, so we pretend to be someone else to get along or be loved or achieve some other goal. This can happen when we grow up with people who only seem to love us if we behave a certain way – it’s conditional on being other than our authentic selves. This can establish a pattern of pretending to be the person you think others want you to be. It can be exhausting, and can create a constant level of stress, worrying about people discovering who we really are. Because being ourselves is “not enough”.

 

Is It Intentional?

We might know when we’re putting the mask on, why we’re doing it, and choosing to do so. But for some of us, we’ve worn those masks for so long that we don’t even know we’re doing it anymore. We might not even know who we really are now!  If you are ready to take off the mask but need help feeling comfortable doing that, reach out. Schedule a free phone call and we can talk about a good place to start.