How do we see ourselves?

How many of us keep hitting the same wall—unable to see clearly, unable to navigate?
At what point do we know we’re ready to try on new specs?

Do we wait until the vision gets so blurry, the migraines so extreme,
that we finally seek a new prescription—
even if we’ve never even been to an eye doctor?

How do we reconcile the fact that things are starting to look… different?

And who gave us our very first lenses?
Who diagnosed us?
Our parents? Our hometowns? Our friends, exes, mentors?

Did we even need those glasses back then?

Did we choose the office where we were examined?
Did we trust that doctor?
Who would we have chosen—
would we have even gone?

Do we resist picking up the new pair,
telling ourselves the headaches are worth it?
I mean—who knows if the doctor even got it right?

And if we do pick up the glasses,
do we endure the dreaded adjustment period—
that time when the old prescription no longer works,
but the new one makes everything look even blurrier than before?

What about when the new prescription finally starts working?
When the imagery sharpens,
when our chronically strained eyes finally get to rest?

Are we aware of the lenses we’ve been wearing all along?
Or do we only start questioning them
when things get hard to see?

How do we deal with the fact that our old glasses are now obsolete—
left to gather dust in a drawer?

And yet—
our headaches are gone.
Our surroundings are clearer.
Our body is no longer covered in bruises.

Because finally,
we can see the wall.

Whether we choose to keep bumping into it…

that’s another story.