How A Mirror Can Change Your Life with Tara Well

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you if you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself, second, and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Welcome to today's episode of Shrink for the Shy Guy. I'm your host, Dr. Aziz. And do you look at yourself in the mirror, like, a lot? I don't mean just occasionally when you get out of the shower or walk by. And what's that experience like for you? Do you like looking at yourself in the mirror? Do you dislike it? Do you judge yourself? Do you evaluate and critique yourself? Is it possible that you could actually use the mirror as a tool to completely change how you relate to yourself, eliminate self criticism, self hatred, and truly get on your own side and then really find your way to being able to connect more deeply with others? That's what we want to explore today. I have a great expert for the show that I'm going to be interviewing who has focused many years of her career on helping people use the mirror as a tool to really heal their relationship with themselves and so much more, as you'll see in this conversation. Her name is Tara well, and she is a research scientist, a motivational psychologist, and associate professor of psychology at Barnard College of Columbia University, where she's been doing research around mirrors and reflections and leading workshops and helping people with this for many years. And you'll see as I talk to her about her wealth of experience with this, not just in helping others, but her own reflections from doing this. And we're going to be addressing a lot of the common questions that might arise, like, do I just stare at myself in the eyes? And also, what, what if I don't like looking at myself? What if I get anxious? What if I feel self critical? We're going to talk about all of that. And the goal here of this episode is to introduce you to something that might be really useful, useful for you, but not just turn into some sort of intellectual like, oh, that's useful. I think I, you know, I know about that now. No, my invitation would be, is if this speaks to you, really, really find A way to test out some of the things that she's practicing. So we get into some practical how to's in this episode as well on, on how to use a mirror to really heal your confidence and your self esteem and so much more. So let's dive into that interview with Tara now. Welcome to the show, Tara. I'm very excited to have you here.

Thanks. Thanks for having me. I'm excited for our conversation.

Okay. So you know, you're known for the mirror, using the mirror as a tool to help really transform our relationship with ourselves, maybe even others and beyond. And so I'm very excited to dive into all of that before we get into how to use the mirror as a tool. What is this something? How did you come across this, Is this something that you were using yourself? So maybe we're gonna have to go a little bit back in time here. What got you into this in the first place? Maybe share a little bit more about your own background and story just so people have a context for where these things are coming through.

Sure. Well, I've always sort of had a relationship with the mirror, a fascination with mirrors. As a small child, we used to have a chrome to on the table and I would look at my image in the chrome toaster for like as long as my parents would let me. I was fascinated with myself and making all kinds of facial expressions and imitating people and it was sort of a way for me to have a friend, kind of like an imaginary friend in a way. I, I grew up as an only child and my parents were older and I had a lot of time on my hands, so, so I, I spent a lot of time creating things with the mirror. But then, you know, as I grew older, as as many of us do, particularly women, we kind of develop a kind of a love hate relationship with the mirror. You know, scrutinizing our appearance, every little, every little flaw. Comparing ourselves with the, you know, Instagram models and the, and the actors on tv. And so I started, you know, just not really wanting to look at myself very much in the mirror. I felt better if I didn't look because when I, once I looked, I saw the problems and these flaws. Yeah, one day I, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and, and I looked really sad. Like I look really kind of like, like I was suffering and, and I hadn't realized I felt that way. And so one of the things that I was doing at the time was I was doing yoga and, and then doing a brief meditation after I did my yoga practice. And so what I decided to do was to start looking at myself in the mirror for like 10 minutes after my yoga practice and just to being with myself and exploring my emotions and how I felt about myself and some of the things that have come up. Oftentimes, you know, when you do any kind of movement or particularly, you know, a yoga movement that kind of integrates your mind and body, things come up during your practice. And it was a way for me to sit with myself and do more listening than really talking, like not saying affirmations about how great I thought I was or anything but this like listening, like what am I really feeling? And in a way that I hadn't given myself time to do in a very long time. Since I was a child and I had all the free time, my time was filled up with all my to do's and a busy schedule. So just giving myself that 10 minutes every day was amazingly transformative. And so as a research scientist and a psychologist, I wanted to explore why that was happening and to see if these effects could be in some ways codified or taught to other people so they could get the benefits too.

Yeah, I love that. And there's something in there, you said that I think is really interesting about the way that we relate to mirrors very differently as we age. I noticed. So I have two young kids, they're, they're seven and nine, both boys and, and they'll, when they look at mirrors or reflections, it's very much what you're describing with the toaster. They're, they're fascinated by it that I move their mouth around and they look at different angles and, and when they, when we play a board game, they love Monopoly. And if one of them wins a bunch of money or gets a bunch of money, they'll stand up on their chair and look at the windows in the room where you can see a reflection of themselves. And they do their celebration dance as they look at themselves in the mirror. Right. So it's, it's such a. And I, and I noticed that it stood out to me. I said, wow. You know, adults use mirrors very differently. It's much more a. Worth determine, like do I look okay? And either I feel good, like oh, I'm looking good today, or I feel bad. It's just instantly linked with some sort of evaluation where it seems like that's completely devoid of that with kids. And it sounds like when you're approach it with this meditative way that you're describing, you're really breaking that, that pattern of evaluation.

Right, right. I think we have a natural fascination to looking at ourselves, into loving ourselves, into loving our own image and to being delighted to see ourselves. And we get socialized out of that, we get shamed out of it in a way that we, we then start to feel like we're not good enough or we have to, you know, always be putting others first or always, you know, improving in some way. We can't just enjoy being, enjoy just being, not doing something to always be better or figuring out what it is we have to be achieving in any given moment.

So let's say someone is intrigued and they say, okay, well actually before I do that, before we get into the, the specifics, why would someone. So okay, that's neat that she did that. But if someone's listening, it's like, do I want to sit there? Because people have this kind of hesitation, awareness, probably because of the evaluation or some other judgment. You know, it's weird or it's narcissistic or something. But what, why would it be beneficial? So I always like to start with the why with people like why would you want to do it? And then we'll talk about how and the objections. But why, why would it be useful, do you think, for someone maybe with social anxiety or challenges, with a self esteem or inner criticisms like how would it be beneficial for that person? Or why would it be beneficial for that person to, to practice something with the mirror?

Well, I think it's important to, to realize why you wouldn't want to do it too. Because oftentimes, you know, we want to have relationships with other people and we want people to notice us and look at us and think that we're great and you know, just accept us and always be there for us, but we're not willing to do that for. So being able to just be with yourself for 10 minutes in the mirror, you're practicing being there for yourself no matter what. You make a commitment to yourself to sit with yourself for 10 minutes every day, no matter what is happening, no matter what's going on, no matter what you look like, and you're just there for yourself. And that in, and in that way you cultivate a relationship with yourself and then you take that ability, that consistency, that commitment into your relationships with other people. We all want people to listen to us and you know, think we're great, but are we willing to do that to our, with ourselves? And how well do we do that for other people when we're always trying to get other people to reflect us? Because oftentimes too, if we don't give ourselves reflection. We're looking to everybody else. Okay. And some people don't always have accurate reflections of us. As you, as you may know, if you're, you know, if you have a social media following, you get a bunch of criticism and, and, and crazy things that people say about you that have nothing to do with who you really are as a person. So the more confident you are in who you really are, the less vulnerable you are to that. And also, I think the more time and attention you can give to other people in your life because you're not always looking for affirmation from them.

Yeah. So it's that hunger to be seen and validated is in some ways satiated because you're, you're doing. You're often that for yourself. And, and that being so hungry for that can actually be detrimental to our connections because we're less able to provide to others for, like, what about me? I'm starving over here. And if we just give that to ourselves for 10 minutes each day, we're a lot more resourceful to be able to connect with others.

And it's also practicing vulnerability because, you know, when most people start doing it, they do get into criticizing their appearance and thinking about how they look and whatever. But if you sit for 10 minutes, you'll go deeper into your feelings. You'll go deeper into some of the uncomfortable places that you might not want to look at and see, but it's, you know, where you need to go if you want to have a deeper connection with yourself and a deeper connection with other people. So it's like you're kind of. You can practice being vulnerable with yourself before you try that out with other people. Like, just, you know, just, you know, before you give a talk or you go to a social event, just sit there and go, I'm afraid. Oh, my God. This is what I look like when I'm afraid. I'm still gonna do it. Yeah. I always tell some of my clients who have social anxiety, you know, be. Let yourself feel like you're afraid, then smile at yourself, go do the thing, come back and look at yourself for 10 minutes after you did it. And sometimes that is enough to break that cycle of, you know, getting so caught up in being, being afraid and being anxious to do something. Because, you know, one of the things that I'm sure you know, know about in your work with social anxiety is people develop a really strong self focus, and they can't get out of the self focus. They're like, oh, what someone sees like that I'm not perfect or my heart's beating really fast or something like that. And so the mirror too teaches you how to shift that focus away. So, okay, now I'm focusing on myself. Now I'm going to turn my attention to other people rather than, I don't know what I look like. I'm not really connected to myself. I'm going to try and find other people that can help me feel like I'm connected to myself. That doesn't work, you know, so you want to, you want to enter a social situation where you might be feeling a little anxious, feeling very connected to yourself and then turning your attention outward to other people.

Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I love that. And, and so when someone sits down to be with themselves in the mirror and they have a history of maybe being disconnected with themselves, avoidance of vulnerability, a lot of self criticism when they sit down, I'd imagine that those first sessions might be fairly unpleasant. Maybe not entirely. I don't know. I'm not going to proclaim it for somebody, but it's possible. So start. It sounds like starting with the commitment, hey, I'm going to do this for 10 minutes a day, maybe setting a time on it, like for a month or something, just to really give yourself that opportunity to not just test it once and then run away from it. So the person's committed, they're going to test it out. Any ideas on how to be with those first few sessions to really ride those waves of whatever's happening?

Yeah, that's, that's a really good question. Well, it's different for everybody. And so what I say is just, just sit with yourself no matter what happens. You know, I mean, and you don't have to do it like this big formal meditation practice and you're sitting in your yoga posture and everything. You can just like hang out with yourself. You can go get a cup of coffee or a cup of tea and just look at yourself in the mirror while you're sipping your tea for 10 minutes and just hang out with yourself. You know, you don't have to, it doesn't have to be this really, you know, important thing that it's important, but it doesn't have to be so serious. The other thing is I tell people is to. They can also focus on their breathing. If they find themselves getting more anxious as they look, then just focus on your breathing. Watch your collarbones move up and down, take some deep belly breaths. Generally, you know, we have a limited attention. We can only focus on so many Things at once. So when you're looking at yourself in the mirror, you're focusing on yourself in the mirror. And most people are focusing on also other kind of critical thoughts and stuff that's going on. But what can you do instead? Focusing on yourself in the mirror and then focus on your physical body, body sensations, focusing on your breath moving up and down, focusing on your, Your clothes against your skin or your hair against your, your, Your neck or, or you know, what your fingertips feel like so that you have these two focal points, your visual and tactile. And you can let go of that monkey mind that's going on because it's hard to think about three things at once. You can only really do, do. And so. And then. And then too, like in any other meditation practice, you just keep coming back to yourself. You know, your mind wanders. Okay, you just start over. You might wander. You just start over. You know, you don't beat yourself up because you can't stay with yourself. And also keeping your gaze soft. Some people try to, like, you know, stare at themselves. And you can almost start to hallucinate sometimes if you, if you stare at one point with great intensity. So I don't recommend doing that. But, you know, you can shift your eyes around again. I, When I work with people who, Their anxiety goes up a bit when they look at themselves in the eye, it. Make eye contact with themselves and just look at your collarbones moving up and down. Look at, you know, look at the front of your chest moving. Feel your. Feel the texture of your clothes against your skin. There's all kinds of things that you can do for those 10 minutes to have a different experience of yourself than you do in, you know, as you're going through your day, typically.

Yeah, yeah, those are, those are great tips on how to, how to navigate this. And one thing about. I think that's really interesting what you said about being uncomfortable. Just look at ourselves in the eye. I think that's. That's a very. There's so much here that goes beyond. I mean, it's a reflection, it's an exploration of who. Who am I and what am I and what's my relationship with myself. So there's one level is like, oh, I'm. It's almost like we can live in our own constructed ego and reality a little easier when we're not taking a moment to look at ourselves. Right. It's like I'm just interfacing with this world around me and this is all going on. I got to deal with this and that and then there's my thoughts and my feelings, and I'm just. I'm dealing with it all. But when you slow down and look at yourself, there's this. This is the one. This is the being that's living all this. And it. I imagine that it can really start to evoke a much deeper experience, especially as you start to work through some of that initial noise of the. Of the criticism. So it seems very. I know that experiences I've had with mirrors, where I'm really settled in them, it tends to evoke a very profound exploration of what. What. What am I really? Who am I really?

Yeah. Yeah. When you can let go of all the layers, of all the labels that, you know, other people in society puts on you and get underneath that to just the. The profoundness of being alive. Like, I'm a human being. I don't know how I got here. I'm just here. It's, like, fascinating, like, what. What is this? You know, and it's that initial wonder that I think we have, that innate wonder that we kind of get, you know, educated out of or. Or, you know, distracted out of or, you know, finding. Finding that wonder that we have that I'm sure you probably. You feel that when you're playing with your kids, you know, because they can see much easier, you know, of. Of how we can just fill a space with our own. Our own light, our own own being without needing to again be in an improvement, kick or have every moment scheduled out.

Yeah, well, speaking of that every moment scheduled out, there's a sense of control there. And I think that wonder. I've seen this in my own experience, that. That awe and wonder can feel amazing or expansive, but it can also be scary if you need to understand everything, if you need to have control with your mind, because the wonder just blasts that wide open. There's no. I don't know where I came from or what all this is. And if you. If you need to know, it can be quite scary to go to those places of. So that's. I often see that. Sometimes I think we get wrapped up in the. My nose goes like this or whatever. And it seems like that's such a big problem and I'm going to worry about it, and I'm going to research plastic surgeries and I'm going to hate myself. And. And it's all this very absorbing layer that underneath is. Well, I don't want to go to that raw. I don't know what I really am or what this existence is place that's Even scarier. So I'll stay up here with the nose issue. But speaking of that, what about people who, when they look in the mirror, they have a pretty obsessive, harsh, judgmental focus of certain body parts. And that's kind of their go to when they look in the mirror. They check their. You know, for many years I had an insecurity around the area around my eyes. And so when I was, when I had my worst social anxiety, if I looked into a mirror, I would just look at several places, including around my eyes, have a experience of disgust or revulsion, and then go about my day. So talk about a confidence boost right there. But for people that have those, because I know it's very common, certain body parts that they don't like and they're just looking at them and they're feeling disgust, how would someone. Is it just keep doing it and eventually that changes? Or are there other ways to work with that particular pattern?

Yeah, it is surprisingly common. It seems like everyone has something and it's just a question of degree, of how harsh, how cruel they are to themselves and how often they're cruel in this way. One of the main things that I ask people to do that I can be a very powerful exercise for some people is to shift your focus from. Because basically when you're criticizing yourself, you're objectifying yourself. You're looking at yourself as an object in the mirror that's not pleasing, and you're picking out something that's not pleasing, and then you're having a disgust or rejection emotion to it. So instead of doing that, look at yourself as the person who's receiving that criticism. Look into your own eyes as you're, as you're telling yourself you're disgusting, you know, and, and really let it land how cruel you're being to yourself, you know, because nobody's there. It's you saying that to yourself. You know, maybe someone said that, something like that to you in the past, but you're hanging on to it and then you're, you're replaying it and you're hurting yourself. You're using the mirror to hurt yourself over and over again. So look at the effect that that has on you. And that was sort of like, you know, when I talked about that moment of truth when I saw the sadness in my eyes. Yeah, I was, you know, spending a lot of time criticizing, you know, something I'd said, something I'd done. And I, I looked at myself and I was suffering and there's nobody there. It was just me. I was creating my own suffering based on what I was saying about in my head, you know, so. So I think that is one of the ways that this technique is so powerful and can be so actually life changing. I don't think that's an exaggeration, because if you can. If you can use the mirror to see how just really unkind you are to yourself and how you're inflicting that suffering onto yourself with your habitual thoughts, that you can really decide to stop doing that. You know, it's kind of like that moment of truth when you realize, oh, I'm doing it. It's up to me. I can stop anytime. You know, it's not easy to stop if you're in a habit of doing that. But. But taking responsibility for doing it, I think is really key. And the mirror can help you do that.

Yeah, that's a really important point because I think, think most people, because the inner, that pattern of, of mental criticism is so habitual and loud and repetitive that it seems like it's autonomous and out of my control. And that's one of the key things to making the shift is, well, like any thought, you might not have control of the inception of every thought, but how, how are you relating to it? Are you perpetuating? Are you kind of jumping on the bandwagon, being like, yeah, you're going on the ride, isn't he? Yeah, I agree. You know, it's really interesting what you're saying. It reminds me that one of the techniques I learned from a parenting book a long time ago, which is very helpful, is when your kid's doing something that you don't like and you want them to stop the most natural impulse. And I, my wife and I'll still fall into this. You know, you're washing the dishes and they're over there, and then they start fighting and you're like, stop it. You know, put that thing down. Get away from him. And you're yelling from across the kitchen. And it's way less effective than if you were to pause, dry your hands, walk over to them, get down on their level, look at them and say, hey, you know, you're doing this thing and he's doing that thing. Can you put that over there? Right? You, you connect basically. Like, no, duh, but it's, it's. It's so much easier to be harsh with someone when you're yelling from across the kitchen or when someone is giving a critique on a comment on social media. Whereas if you were to really look the person in the eye and say that thing. It's a lot harder to do. It's a lot more painful. You, you feel bad yelling at your kid or telling that person they're terrible if you were to say it to their face. And so I. There's a similar way in which when we're going about criticizing ourselves, we're not looking at ourselves, we're just almost yelling at ourselves from across the house in our heads all day. And then when you're describing this and you slow down and you're actually saying the criticism right there, it evokes a compassion that is very. You feel the, the pain versus this hardening that can occur when we're just doing it without actually making eye contact with ourselves.

Yeah, that's well said. Yeah. Yeah.

And so let's talk about that Taking, taking control or realizing that we have control. So let's say someone says, okay, I'm doing it to myself. How do I stop, though? I've been judging myself and harsh myself for 20 years. I, I see I'm doing it. I, I see that I'm the one who's saying these awful things to myself, but sure doesn't feel like I have the ability to stop. Feels like it's coming. It's got some momentum to it. What are some ways that you help? Obviously, over time, practicing the mirror meditation is going to be an integral part and other ideas or thoughts you have on helping people really start to reclaim that. That power that they have.

Yeah, I mean, I think one of the first steps is really to feel the grief of it, to realize how much time you might have lost and opportunities you must have lost because you must not felt good enough and that. And you need to have some degree of, of self, love and compassion to be able to sit with yourself in that grief of feeling like, you know, it's sort of like most women I know, and probably a lot of men too, but they always thought like when they were 18, they thought they were fat and then they were, you know, when they were 25. Now they're, you know, in their 50s and they're, oh, my God, I can't believe I didn't think that I looked good when I was tea. Look at me now kind of a thing, you know, so you don't want to. And that's just one example. But we all kind of have that thing where I thought I would, I thought I wasn't good enough then look at me now. Anybody who's had the aging experience has that kind of throwback. So to, to kind of Nip that in the bud and just go, you know what? This is, this is who I am. And this is as good as it gets for today, I think, can be very helpful. I also think that you can do some self compassion exercises. Many people associate mirror meditation with mirror work, which is a technique by Louise Hay that was developed in the 70s in which she had people say positive affirmations about themselves in the mirror. And that was considered kind of woo, woo and out there for academic psychologists like myself. But, but there have been some studies now that have shown that if you take the time to say some compassionate phrases to yourself in the mirror, that it actually does help calm, soothing people report experiencing more soothing emotions and they also have more heart rate variability, which is the ability to sort of downwardly regulate our emotions when we're feeling distressed. And that's a major way that we can calm ourselves down. But it's important that you say phrases that are realistic. So what I say in my book is if you think you're old, fat and ugly, you don't just say I'm young, beautiful and skinny and think that you're going to feel great. You want to do something that, that's realistic. And again, I, I like focusing on body functions and saying, you know, I'm so grateful I have this strong, healthy body. Grateful for the air I'm breathing and I'm grateful for my eyes. And you can go through all your senses and, and find something that you're grateful for experiencing that. You can also have some phrases that you say that are based on that commitment to yourself. You know, I'm here for you and I'll always be there for you. Say that to yourself every day for 30 days and see what happens. You know, you know, what would you say to your partner, you know, your, or your best friend, your partner who's feeling distressed? What would you say to someone you love who's being too hard on themselves? Okay, those are the kinds of phrases that you can say to yourself in the mirror.

Yeah, yeah, I love that distinction. To come up with phrases that are, that are. Because if you, you know, if there's an evaluation of I'm old, fat and ugly, you're just tr. You're still playing the same game of, well, I'm going to evaluate myself really great. And then it's just two sides of the same coin. And if that's the game you're playing, then one day is going to be up and one day is going to be down and your worth is still based upon your weight. And your age and whatever other qualities. Right. Versus this gratitude, I think goes to, it's a much deeper root that, that digs beneath that surface layer to really hold us in to something that is, that is much more stable. And I think that one's really important too because we, we take those things for granted. And the eyes are, who cares about my eyes functioning, right. And until they don't, and then you have an issue and you have a health problem and you got a cataract, then you go get it removed or whatever and then, and then for a little while you're automatically grateful for a month or whatever you say, wow, thank you for my eyes. Right. And then after a while we habituate and then it's back to like, oh yeah, but they do this with stupid crow's feet. Terrible. And so I think that that practice, the daily practice helps us come back to that. And I think, think that one is one of the biggest. I, I feel that because I've been studying this for so many years and I help people often with one of their sources of self hatred is their appearance and their image. And I myself suffered with chronic pain for 20, 20 years. I'm 40 years old now. So yeah, maybe it was. Yes, maybe more than 20 years. But anyway, and so I'm, I'm totally healthy now and I run marathons and further and stuff and, but I just say, man, you know, the fact that your body can function is amazing. And until we lose that, we don't, we don't really, really know. And it's a shame because people will look at our bodies and we'll be obsessing over these really insignificant surface layer shapes and that have no actual make, make no difference in what our body can actually do or not. And, and we really are disconnected from the gift that is this body that, that functions well. So I think that I really appreciate, that's really struck a chord with me about this coming back to it daily because it doesn't automatically happen. I don't know anyone who's automatically grateful for all the functioning in their body unless they just had a near death experience or something.

Right.

So this is a great way to tap into that and I think it really creates a this, it's almost like a protective buffer or membrane from the messages of the media and society that are saying, hey, your worth is your eye wrinkle quotient as opposed to I have eyes that can see.

Yeah, well said. Yes. You know, there's always a, the other thing about, you know, doing mirror meditation. It's a very low cost thing. There's really no special equipment in quite a low. I love people would buy my book. But a lot of the these techniques, that cosmetic techniques are quite costly. So there's a great economic incentive to keep telling people that they need to buy more and more things to help themselves feel good or to be acceptable to other people, people and that kind of thing. So yeah, I always like to keep an eye out for that. Am I getting a message that I'm not good enough because someone wants me to buy something?

Yes. And what do you say to clients? Because this comes up with people I work with and I'm curious how you approach it. What about people saying, okay, I can accept myself more, I can do this and love myself more. But the truth is I'm not as young or as good looking as I was or as others. You know, maybe I'm one of those people that never looked like the, the beauty standard. And so the truth is I'm not going to be as attractive to people. So I can love myself, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to be as desirable. What is your sense of how you might help people with that concern or fear?

I don't think that, that. I oftentimes think that the ideas that we have about our desirability based on our appearance are again constructed from the media. I think that everyone is beautiful in their own way. I don't mean that in kind of a, you know, woo woo sense, but that's the other thing that you find from doing your meditation. Because I've worked with supermodels and I work with, with average intelligence people. I've also worked with people who have facial disfigurations and different kinds of things, surgeries and you know, things that you know objectively their body is not, you know, meeting that beauty standard. But being able to find the beauty in your as you look at yourself in your own eyes is always possible. There's that wonder and that transcendent experience that you can have when you kind of tap into your own humanity in a way and then you can radiate that out and then you find other people who can see that in you too. And you know how to see that in them because you practice, you've practiced seeing it in yourself. If you can see your own humanity and you can see your own beauty, regardless of what's happening, regardless of what your body actually looks like, regardless of what what society tells you, then you can, then you can see the beauty in other people and People want that. People are hungry for that, to be seen for who they really are in their beauty and appreciate it. And so, you know, the majority of people would rather be with an average looking person or a person with some flaws or configuration who loves them and sees them very deeply and appreciates them, than a supermodel who's like, you know, rejecting and, you know, superficial or whatever. I'm not saying that all supermodels are superficial by any means, but it's just those inner qualities that you cultivate also as you age. I'm not, I'm somewhat older than you too. So as you age, you cultivate those qualities as well because you can't rely on your external appearance as much so that you, you can draw people to you based on how you feel about yourself. We'd all rather be with someone who feels wonderful about themselves, that doesn't need our affirmation. It feels wonderful about themselves and then they turn and they shine their light on you and they see you as wonderful. You know, that that is very powerful. That is very, it can be very healing for people and it can certainly improve the quality of any kind of relationship you have, your ability to do that, your ability to just accept yourself and then, you know, you're not going to want to be with somebody who, you know, I mean, that's, you know, one of the controversies is, you know, older men with younger women, you know, you know, men who are my age and they date like 25 year old women or something like that, or 18 year old women. It's just like, that's sort of like your level of, of, you know, what you care about, you care more about what someone looks like physically than you care about what's, who they really are inside, then that's what you care about. But, but, but it's like anyone who has, who sees their own inner value and they see their own worth is such a loaded term too, because that again, it applies some kind of comparison. But feeling that deep appreciation for your humanity, a deep sense of comfort that you have for yourself is very attractive to a mature person. Okay? It's very attracted to another person who feels that about themselves. And so it's sort of like what they actually look like is kind of nullified. It might, you know, be initially something important, but to sustain a relationship you have to, you know, be able to appreciate and love yourself and then be able to reflect that to other people. I, I talk, I have a couple chapters in my book about reflecting other people and how we're influenced by Other people's reflections of us. And so, you know, the trick is not a trick, but, but as life goes on, you know, if you want to learn more and more how to cultivate relationships with people who can see you deeply and appreciate you deeply. Beyond the superficial, because, you know, eventually all the superficial things fall away over time. Yeah, so, so, so that, that becomes very, very attractive to people.

Yeah, absolutely. There's so many different things you said in there that I are, I think entire conversations and things I've seen in my own life. And there's a, there's a depth and not just what you said there, but I think in general that that might, might come from just your work that you've done. But I'm gonna, I'm gonna say comes from the mirror meditation. There's a, there's a certain something that these, these, these upper layers can, can fall away as, as we do. It sounds like this, this work. So I think that's very often it's interesting when I talk with someone. It's not, it's not just what they're sharing or their approaches are, it's also who they are. And I think you're a reflection of, of some of this deeper work that you are helping people do in the world. And so many great liberating insights there. And just that, that last segment about seeing beyond the, the physical. And I feel like that's a choice too. It's a choice of claiming your own reality and not being a sheep of the system. You're like, well, I'll just think whatever the. They tell me to think. It's like, well, what, but what, but if, if you follow the standard party line from, from the general. I'm gonna put the media in one big category here, but you know, the whole industries around aesthetic beauty and stuff like that, then basically we're all afflicted with this horrible incurable problem which is called aging. And, and it, even though it's gonna happen to everybody, look out. But we have cures for this thing. And, and it just. If you take a step back and look at that, you're like, but this is cool is, this is crazy. And if we don't claim something different, we're destined to, to spend a good number of years in fear and suffering and really diminishing or an impoverishing of our life and our relationships that by no means has to be that way you can really claim. And so I think that's a commitment I have. And my wife is, is 10 years older than I am. And so she's at this stage where there's more of that. Oh, wow, I'm, I'm aging and you know, oh my gosh, I have to confront these things and I, I have this commitment that I keep affirming with her is like our responsibility, our job is to when this stuff comes up, heal it and claim something deeper and not get sucked under the undertow of these things. And so I feel like this is really affirming for that. And anyone listening, I really encourage you to, to, to find that commitment in yourself and then so much more is possible. And speaking of that, if people are intrigued to find out more about how to do this meditation, where we'll start with the book and then also any other ways if someone wants to learn more from you, how, how might they do that?

Sure. Well, my book was published in June of, of this year, 2020 22. It's called Mirror Meditation. So if you just simply Google mirror meditation, my name Tara. Well, or even if you just Google mere meditation, it will probably come up definitely on the first page. And that is a, a book that's filled with practical exercises. The, the, the subtitle is the Power of Neuroscience and Self Reflection to overcome self criticism, gain confidence and see yourself with compassion. So there's a lot of, of kind of state of the art neuroscience research in it, as well as some practical exercises for readers to do to make friends with themselves in the mirror. And then the later chapters also talk about using reflections in your relationships and how to some techniques to overcome social anxiety as well as to get more comfortable being seen in the world. Many people have great ideas about how they'd like to get their ideas out in the world, but then they're afraid to be seen. So there's some exercises to help you practice that and also the power of your own gaze and how you're seeing other people and how you can use that in a way that, that might be very helpful and supportive to them. So I hope you get the book. I also have a website, mirrormeditation.com and you can also contact me. I do groups, I do private, private individual sessions. So you can have a mere meditation party. I can do, I do groups on Zoom and I also do individual consultations to help people, you know, manage some of the issues that we talked about, including social anxiety, changes in their appearance, changes in their appearance after surgeries, all kinds of different things. That's completely confidential and I'm happy to do it.

Yeah, well, fantastic. Definitely. If you're listening to this and you're resonating with Tara's teaching, as I highly recommend reaching out. And I just know from my own experience that there's people that know their stuff, and that's partly from research, but it's also. You're clearly fascinated and passionate about exploring this and learning, you know, from your own experience, which I think makes for the most powerful combination. Right. There's a. This is part of what you're doing.

Pleasure talking with you. I love talking about it and being able to share this technique because I think it is so helpful to so many different people. It's not just like one little niche of people find it useful, but anyone who's willing to look at themselves and devote a little bit of time to it is going to get some value out of it.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you so much for sharing with us.

Thank you.

That brings us to the end of the interview. But before we conclude the episode, there's one more thing we got to do, which is turn this into action. Time for action. Action. Action. So your action step for today is going to be to test out a mirror meditation. Just look at yourself in a mirror for go for 10 minutes. I mean, I. I would recommend. And I'm gonna. I'm gonna play along here with you to do 10 minutes a day for 30 days. That's what I'm gonna experiment with. And look, if you don't want to do. The mirrors in my house are not in the greatest places. Like, they're in bathrooms, and I don't want to hang out in the bathroom. So. But what I'm gonna do is simply hear this camera on my computer. So I'm gonna sit down in my office and at some point I'm gonna flick on this camera and just look at myself on. On a screen and look at my own eyes on this screen for. For 10 minutes and really just connect with myself and practice this and see what comes up. And I'm gonna invite you to do the same. Whether it's. She mentioned someone, you know, who did all the selfies, right. Just looking at their phone. Well, just use your phone to look at yourself. And obviously, if you can get an official mirror, maybe I'll get in a mirror, little mirror somewhere in this office for that. But regardless of it was this camera or mirror, just start with something, something you can do right away. Because if you listen to this and say, okay, great, maybe I'll start that in a while. No, like, how about today? Right? When would now be a good time? Because life happens. We get busy, and there's probably subtle resistance to doing this because it's strange or it's uncomfortable or whatever else feelings might come up that we're trying to avoid. So let's just dive right in while there's momentum, while you're inspired and make that commitment. If you're not ready for that, just test it out for two minutes. Just look at yourself for two minutes. Because what I predict you're going to discover is that there is so much to heal there with, how you relate to you, and this is going to be a powerful aid in doing that. So give it a shot, test it out, and if you're called to learn more from Tara or work with her directly, then definitely reach out. We'll have information about her@drinkforthshyguy.com you can just go to this episode and we'll have some links down below on this particular show. All right, thanks for being with me today. Until we speak again, we have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. We'll talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know any anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to socialconfidencecenter.com.

Sam.