How to See Through Smoke and Mirrors

No one wants to be deceived by others, but the one person deceiving us the most is often ourselves.

To see through the smoke and mirrors, whether placed there by ourselves or others, we must develop clarity.

Clarity comes from seeing things just as they are. Not how we want them to be. Not how others want them to appear.

What we want to see are our deepest desires. These desires come from memory. The deepest memories of what we lacked often have the darkest influence on our desires, and thus our actions.

When we act mindlessly, we act only according to our desires. We forgot to consult our inner wisdom before deciding that yes, we absolutely need that new thing. Sometimes those things do improve our lives somewhat, but of course before long, we want more again.

Desire is a fire that seeks to spread limitlessly.

The human desire for more and more is a fire that cannot be put out. Nor should it be put out though, it just has to be managed. That fire within us is what keeps us moving. When that fire is well managed, it fuels us to be alive. But when that fire is poorly managed, it burns us.

Fire can cook our food. It could also cook us.

To achieve clarity, we must only burn for what is true to our spirit. That is how we avoid burning too much and creating too much smoke. That is how we can see clearly.

When we allow the fire within us to be fanned by too many external forces, that’s when it becomes uncontrollable. That’s when it becomes destructive. That’s when it becomes greed. When greed overtakes us, our inner world becomes like hell, full of fire and smoke.

Anything in the material world that we become greedy for will eventually destroy us. There is no need to speak further about that, we all know. However, what’s often forgotten is how there has always been one thing that we can be greedy for that actually serves us — clarity.

Clarity requires some time and distance away from the material world. This is why the wisest people in history often became so after a period of withdrawal from society. With the time and space provided by solitude, clarity arises much more easily.

Of course, solitude has to be voluntary, aimed at cultivating the inner world. When solitude is not voluntary and devoid of spiritual pursuit, it can lead to madness, as experienced by prison inmates in solitary confinement.

Many historical figures in high positions of power have been known to practice “intermittent solitary retreat”. This is so they can focus on gaining inner clarity, away from external influences, before making important decisions. It’s similar to the more well-known concept of intermittent fasting, but for your sense of clarity rather than your digestive system.

Clear seeing happens when we put aside our identities and ideas, and see things as they are in the present, exactly as they are now without any preconceived notions. Clearing ourselves of the spinning pull of karma, or memories, we can then see through the smoke of all our psychological drama and those of others.

When we become greedy for clarity, what is necessary or unnecessary to burn for becomes very clear. When we have clarity, we can easily recognize when a situation is more smoke than substance because we’ve cleared the smoke from our own eyes. It is then when we’re able to look deeper into any situation than what is apparent on the surface.

Communication experts teach us to listen to not just the words people say, but to listen to the intentions behind them. The wise know to not just listen to what people are telling you who they are, but to observe who they are based on their actions. These are all expressions of our spiritual wisdom, which sees deeply, and much more clearly, past the smoke dancing on the surface.

Smoke is distracting. Have you ever followed the smoke from a campfire? It takes your attention away from what is burning, away from the light of the flame, and before you know it, the smoke has disappeared into thin air, and you’re left staring into the darkness.

The way to not be misled by smoke is to develop inner discipline. This is also called mindfulness. It’s a way to train your mind to keep coming back to the flame, coming back to the light, again and again.

Why do we care so much about light? Because it helps us see clearly.

But remember, for there to be light, something has to burn.

That’s why there’s that saying, if something’s too good to be true, it probably is. That’s why no one and nothing is perfect. That’s why the world will always have problems. If nothing burns, there cannot be light. Without light, you cannot see.

If you ever study creative writing, they will teach you to always start crafting your story by crafting a problem. Many novelists actually start by writing the villain first. Because a hero cannot be created without a problem and a villain to fight against. That’s why the hero’s journey is always so treacherous. That’s why the villain always seems to have it so easy. It’s in overcoming all these problems and defeating the villain that a hero’s story becomes possible. If a hero does not burn, he cannot become the light. And aren’t we all the hero of our own stories?

Now mirrors. Oh don’t we love them. Because guess who we see in them. Ourselves!

Whether we love ourselves or not, we still look to mirrors for our identity. What we see in the mirror can inform our views, but it can also hinder our clarity.

There’s been that long time debate over whether God is a man, or a woman, or balck, or white, or whatever else. But really, does it matter? Because if we’re all monkeys, and we all see monkeys when we look in the mirror, then of course we’ll think God is a big monkey!

Remember mirrors don’t actually reflect reality, it’s flipped. Mirrors reflect the opposite of what is there.

The point is, what we see in the mirror and accept as unquestionable reality can very well be questioned. Even if the distortion is just a simple flip, it’s a reminder that our eyes alone can’t really see the whole truth.

There is a story where a parent jokingly asked a child, “Which is farther, the moon or the next town over?” to which the child replied, “The next town over is farther, because I can see the moon from here but I can’t see the next town over from here.”

Just because we can see something, doesn’t mean it’s real. One of the greatest optical illusions are that of infinity mirrors. When we see one mirror reflected in another and another, along with the mesmerizing lights and colors, we can become easily seduced.

The optical illusions on display in museums are obvious, but there are many more existing in our world today that are not so obvious. One of them is the stock market. It’s more or less a game of illusions, with the mirrors being financial vehicles. If we take what we have and reflect it in one mirror, then another, then another, soon it starts looking like we have more than what there actually is.

It’s not just our eyes that are limiting, but also our intellect. We’ve all experienced situations where things seem to make sense logically, but just don’t feel right. We refer to this as our gut instinct, our intuition, but essentially it is our inner dimensions of wisdom.

When we can align all the powers of our body, mind, emotions, and spirit, we have accessed consciousness at its highest form. In such a state, we can achieve mastery in whatever we do, because we have total clarity.

This is when we can see the most clearly. When we combine all these forces in one direction, the power of that clarity becomes piercing. It can pierce through the confusion of smoke, it can pierce through the illusion of mirrors.