We are never more vain and obsessed with our outer selves than when we hear our own recorded voice or see our image in a photograph.
You know, that hideous and uncomfortable moment when your delusional self-image collides with the undeniable reality of what everyone else in the world instantly recognizes as exactly you.
Cameras and recorders don't lie, which is mostly why we fear them, but these devices do have their limits. They can only capture the outside you.
That's why I loved a recent Flavorwire article on self-portraits of famous authors. Self-portraits don't lie either, but they tell a very different story.
When you make an earnest attempt to represent yourself in ink or oils or pencil, the output of your work may or may not be a reasonable facsimile of how you appear to others on the outside, but it will definitely be a telling reflection of how you see yourself - from the inside.
You can see the Flavorwire piece with 20 famous author self-portraits here. Some of them are simple, some are curmudgeonly. Others are comical or tortured. Sylvia Plath, Henry Miller, Vonnegut, and more. Each portrait gives us a peak into how these great writers see their truest selves.
This self-portrait of Jack Kerouac was my favorite.
As for me, I'm no Van Gogh. My endeavors in the visual arts have never gone far beyond crude drawings of stick dogs and stick cows (which are indistinguishable except for the udders).
In the absence of any artistic talent, I'll offer up a cell phone selfie to which I'm partial (though not everyone is). I'm a little less bearded at the moment, but maybe not for long.
How do you see yourself?
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