It's Hard To Read The Label When You Live Inside The Jar

                                                  Photo by Bryan Garces on Unsplash

What’s behind what you are going to read below?

I read these lines in an article, "It's hard to read the label when you live inside the jar". They inspired me to write the lyrics for a song. One day maybe the lyrics will be set to music, and performed - with a music video and all - with different people holding up posters of all the negative self-talk lines – such as I am useless, I am unhappy, etc.  Always wonderful to dream! Isn’t that’s what our imaginations are for? On to my song lyrics…

It's Hard To Read The Label When You Live Inside The Jar

I read this line in an article

It made me stop and think

How a tendency to label ourselves

Can take us to the brink

I am a mess

I am unhappy

I'm a disgrace

Can't show my face

I am unhealthy

I am a loser

I am a black sheep

A hopeless user

I am unappreciated

I’m not worthy of love

I am a basket case

Lacking the good stuff

It's hard to read the label when you live inside the jar

To thrive in this world, you gotta see yourself from afar

You are as unique as a 1 in 7 billion stars

That's who you are

No matter what someone says

Including that silly voice in your head

You are a star

To see yourself, look at yourself from afar

Don't try to read your label from inside your jar

Don't spin your wheels

Don't drag your heels

No matter what someone says

No matter what anyone says

Including the persistent, pesky, unstoppable, messy voice in your head

See yourself from afar, you are a star

So stop

For heaven's sake, stop

Stop reading the label from inside the jar

I am never going to recover

I am never going to be any good

I am never going to get anywhere

On and on…blah, blah, blah

Stop saying all these things you are saying to yourself from inside the jar

Stop - cut yourself some slack

Stop - take those things back

Stop - seeing only lack

See yourself from afar - there's abundance, you are a star

No matter what anyone says

Including the voice in your head

You are a star!

You are not the label you think you see from inside the jar

Come Home NOW!

Where did you go without me?

Don't you know I miss your face?

What's a tail but to wag?

But you've disappeared without a trace.

I sniff at the space at the bottom of the door.

Trying to find your smell.

Finding nothing, I get on all fours

But there's nothing as far as I can tell.

Nose having failed, it's time to bark.

To bring you back where you belong

Bark, bark, when that doesn't work...

I start to feel forlorn.

I let out a complaining whine

Turn around, come back home.

I'm miserable without you, can't you see?

Hopeless on my own.

Whine, whine, don't you hear me?

I just don't understand.

How you could leave me

Now or at any time.

When you've given me so many signs...

you love me!

All that petting and rough-housing,

And playing catch

Letting me lick your face

Your fingers ever ready to give me a tummy scratch.

Bark, bark, you could have taken me with you.

It's what you should have done

We could have gone to the park.

Or I could have sat beside you in the car.

We could have taken it for a spin and had so much fun.

In the car, on the road

Doesn't matter where.

We belong together.

We are a life-long pair.

Sniff, sniff.

Bark bark.

Nothing seems to work.

I let out a big sigh.

And position myself at the door ready for your return.

P.S. This post was inspired by hearing a puppy whine for its owner next door.