Saturday, out of absolutely nowhere, without warning, without context, crossing the hallway toward the bathroom, a being shouted into the wind—or rather, into my ear—"Morticia!" It doesn't offend me. I like her, her elegant shadow, the silence that speaks. But what resonated inside me wasn't the name, it was the freedom with which certain people feel entitled to name other people's bodies, to touch with words what doesn't belong to them. I once defended a woman (who, by the way, doesn't hold any sympathy for me, lol) because another called her "fat," as if it were an insult, a sentence, as if someone's body summed up their essence. You may not like it, you may not like it, but pointing the finger at the shell is shallow, it's cruel... someone else's appearance will never tell you anything about them. NEVER! And, more than anything, it's disrespectful: someone else's appearance is none of your business. It doesn't define you, it doesn't authorize you, it doesn't belong to you. We know nothing, or almost nothing, about the lives of others. We don't know the battles others have fought in silence, the invisible scars, the nights too long. To hurl words at what weighs down in silence requires little for those who carry nothing but their own ignorance. Speaking of others is often speaking of the emptiness we carry. Cultivating new perspectives, understanding without invading, or even choosing silence—this is the delicacy of those who choose to be human, even when the world unlearns. Each one has their own path, their stumbles and new beginnings, their subtle mistakes, their successes and attempts that almost no one sees... "Everyone knows the pain and delight of being who they are." If everyone tended their own garden, perhaps the world would flourish. If the voice turns to the body of another, let the first ear be that of your own silence. Judgment arises from inner shadows, projections of a self that doesn't look at itself. Before judging another, face your own mirror and listen to the silence that dwells within you. What inner shadows do you project onto others? Looking at oneself is the first step toward understanding, sustaining who one is, and silencing what only reveals the lack. And we move on—light, perhaps, or at least more whole. #existentialpsychoanalysis