Life & Therapy

One of the less charming aspects of living in an old house is the attraction mice have for them, and the ease at which they enter.  So many cracks, holes, nooks, crannies!  When you have mice in your house, it is incredibly tempting to go into denial about it all.  It is completely understandable that you don’t want to admit that you are rooming with rodents, but ignoring it has some big consequences.  Mice do nothing but chew, poop, and breed, and they do all three in great abundance.  The more you try to ignore them, the more they are multiplying in the dark shadows of your house.  Eventually, you won’t be able to ignore them because they will be everywhere- chewing on things, pooping on things, eating your food, possibly your wiring, and generally making life miserable for you.

Sometimes, we have traits, tendencies, or desires that we don’t like to admit to ourselves, and sometimes we push them into the shadows of our minds, pretending that they don’t exist.  Like mice, these things don’t go away if we just ignore them- instead, they get bigger, and more complicated, and eventually overwhelm us when they come to light.  An extreme example of this would be the politicians or preachers who are overly-identified with being virtuous, but who suddenly get caught in acts that go against their self-proclaimed morals .

The first step in dealing with mice in the house is to admit that they are there, and to shine a light in the dark corners to see where they’ve settled.  It may help us to know that many, many people struggle with mice in the home- we are not alone, and there is nothing to be ashamed of.  The first step in dealing with the parts of us that we’ve hidden from ourselves is quite similar.  We can shine a light into our own dark corners, without shame or judgment, opening up to our full selves, rather than fighting what is true.