How well do you know yourself?

Isn't it strange that the person you see the least in your lifetime is you? Literally and otherwise. 

Sure, you see pictures of yourself all the time- and if you're a narcissistic person, you end up seeing it more often than most- but that doesn't quite tell you anything right? I mean, the complex facial poetry, the tiny changes in body language... you know what it feels like from the inside, when you're saying something or portraying a certain feeling, but you haven't seen those expressions ON yourself. For example, when my mother is just about to scream at me, I know exactly what is coming my way just by looking at her face. For years and years, I've watched her facial muscles change in a million small ways- pain, happiness, discomfort, a grin, a squint, a confused look etc. In fact, I know her so well, I can tell her sub-emotions too- like a mixture of disappointment and relief, or a combo of excited, proud and slightly anxious. With people who you know so well, they don't even have to say anything most of the time, you just know it from all that internalisation.

When I meet new people, I look forward to getting to know them better. I'm excited about learning the little expressions that become familiar to me- their adoration, admiration, confusion, alarm, boredom, restlessness  and the like. Sometimes I like predicting it and finding out if I'm right- like for example, I know when a friend is going to throw a slight pout right after she says something funny, or how my sister will pucker her eyes just before saying cheese to a picture.

I pride myself on being intutive with people and reading them right (I try!), so it brings me a ting! of happy when I discover I'm right. With the people I care about, I feel especially proud- like these people are mine, ya know? And those little things about those people become a part of me forever. In fact, when I have fall-outs (romantic relationships and otherwise), this is the part that is hardest to let go, the part that becomes the hardest to leave behind. Such is the intensity with which we (or maybe it's just me?) observe and absorb people's expressions and portrayal of themselves.

Which brings me to the point I was making earlier- it's strange that the expressions we throw out are the ones we're least familiar with. We can feel it from the inside, but our best imagination will still fall short of how it actually looks. By the time we've conjured up a look- some image of what it must look like- it's gone, changed, or mixed with another expression. If we had to step out of our body and our mind and just observe ourselves, would we be able to guess what an expression meant- a little scrunching of the nose, or the bite of a lower lip, eyes lowered or palms twisting? 

It alarms me to think of the answer- perhaps I won't recognise what I'm thinking or how I'm about to react. How little we know of ourselves in a lifetime, if we don't even know this. This is coming from the fact that we're supposed to know ourselves best- better than anyone else. 

And yet, we know so very little.