We all felt confined and isolated in more than one way recently as limits have been imposed and restrictions forced us to delve into ourselves and consider what world we [want to] live in.
Each one of us has a unique set of experiences shaping our personality and therefore, reality, but we all share that same reality even tho we each see it from a different perspective. Our eyes might not lie but our perception will always be a small fraction of the whole and as long as we interpret the world with our body we’ll be limited by our senses and stuck in one of the polarities sides.
To release from this narrow vision we must expand behind our material and conscious self, welcome and forgive our shadows, open our heart’s eye and talk the language of unconditional love through kind gests and meaningful actions. We must embrace what we loathe or is unknown in ourselves and others with the same respect and compassion as we do with what we know to love, only then can we unify with our inbuilt duality, start to see the other also as part of ourselves and understand how it is to be underneath their skin.
It might be hard not to see borders when we grow within a body, protected and limited by our biggest organ, the skin. It is a container of the self meanwhile separating from another and it is natural to feel it as a boundary even tho it’s also what brings us together by touch.
Each of us is enclosed by this physical limit, staring at the other as if separate but if we are able to envision humanity as one being, we understand how we are all interconnected just like the cells and organs in our body. For this to happen we need to understand that our skin might be waterproof but is not a wall, it might hold us but does not define us, it might constrain but also lead us to the closest intimate contact with another.
We ought to learn that borders are not only what divides us but also where we meet, just like our differences are what complements us. Like the line drawn by the water streaming between the valley or the ocean that keeps continents apart meanwhile joining them, our skin is both a border and a bridge between the self and another. If we let it grow too thick we might lose ourselves behind it but if instead, we lessen our skin borders and nourish the contact it provides, we’ll see and be part of the world as the whole it is.
Credits
Story & Words – Diana Matoso
Photography – Fernando Matoso
Fashion Designer – Rachel Brunton
Nail Artist & Photography Concept – Shiene Mann
Retoucher – Olia Sequeira
Model – Chloé Smith-Mitchell
Makeup Artist – Benazir Thebo
Model – Rozie Ayesha
Model – Donna Marie
Hair Stylist – Heide
Location – Holborn Studios
Published on Humanity VIP debut magazine