Bright Eyes

“Introverts don’t necessarily dream of an extroverted world.”

In the theatre of life, when the curtain goes up, and the lights go dim, a hush fell across the audience in anticipation of the start of the play. 

The actors look out to glimpse their audience. Yet hidden from their view, beyond the penumbra of the stage lights, a pair of bright eyes peer toward the stage; Two eyes that reflect the stage lights, two eyes that marvel at the action on that stage, two eyes that well up with doubt that trickles down their cheeks. 

The action of these actors on the stage beckons these two bright eyes to play.  A lightness fills these bright eyes to rise, but like the chains that burdened Marley to haunt Scrooge’s dreams, those bright eyes remain fixed in the darkness.  Iron chains forged by voices of false dogma. 

“Children should be seen and not heard.”

“Spare the rod and spoil the child.”  

“You can’t do sports; it’ll take away from your scholastic achievement.”

“So, you want to be a starving artist?”

“What, are you stupid?”   

A short life filled with the rhythmic mantras of parental negativity and personal inadequacies.  And in time, the curtain closes, and the actors leave. And there in the back of the now dark theater, those bright eyes close, with the resounding thud of the iron door echoing down the corridor of a personal prison.  Iron doubts hold the mind tight.

Within their solitude, they are swaddled by their loneliness and become lost in their thoughts. They decipher the world around them but cannot find the motivation to step out of the shadows and stand under the bright stage lights of life.  The bright lights that are only matched by their own bright eyes.

Solitary confinement becomes a welcoming home, and the Stockholm syndrome is complete.  Introverts paint the walls and create open windows with an imagination that flourishes under the chains of doubt.  You’ll see us if you look at the edges of the picture.

On the periphery of the day to day, you’ll see the introverts at play. Amongst the trees that circle the open field of grass you’ll see the bookworm reading.  Between the lines of the book the introvert dives into a portal of imagination that disengages them from the cool shade in the busy park.  On this focused journey they find the stimulation that is missing while others play.

Living “a life within” verse “living within life,” is the binary choice that many introverts feel.  The dogma of “either or” affixes introvert to remain just a pair of bright eyes look out from their life within the boundaries of their minds. 

Dispensing with this false dichotomy of an “either or life” is my life’s mission. Introverts can excel at both.  We can learn to step out on to the stage, and upon conclusion of the play, we will retreat to the comfort of the silence of our mind.

Bright eyes can learn to see the world from the periphery and learn to be upon the center stage.  It starts from the acceptance that great novels arise from the eraser shaving of a thousand rewrites.

We are primed to experience the most significant tool of advancement ever created, the experience of failure.  And for us lucky ones, an epic failure or two will catapult us towards impossible goals.

“Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.”, is our blessing and not our curse as we rise from the back of the theatre of life and walk toward the stage, with our bright eyes ablaze.