Gazing into the Light
Most people don’t realize that the human eye has a blind spot—a space where vision simply vanishes. The mind, ever resourceful, fills in the gap, crafting an illusion of completeness so seamlessly that we never suspect anything is missing.
But sometimes, those blind spots shield us from truths we aren’t ready to see. Sometimes, they let us live in a world drenched in light, oblivious to the shadows lurking just beyond our perception.
I once believed love was like standing in the warmth of an endless summer sun—radiant, all-consuming, impossible to ignore. It wrapped around me like golden silk, weightless and infinite. I thought it was meant to be something that dazzled, something too beautiful to question. The way sunlight dances across the ocean’s surface, the way laughter lingers in the air like the echo of a song, the way two souls align as if gravity itself conspired to bring them together.
But there’s another side to that light. Stare too long, and it burns. It leaves traces on your vision, ghostly reminders of something too bright to forget. It can deceive, creating stark contrasts where there should be harmony.
I didn’t recognize the shadows at first. Or maybe I didn’t want to. I told myself love was supposed to be intense, overwhelming. That the moments of distance, the uneasy silences, were nothing more than flickering candlelight in the glow of something greater. That the weight in my chest was just the price of passion, not a warning of something unraveling.
He knew how to make me laugh, how to pull me into the kind of moments that felt eternal. He traced invisible constellations along my skin, spoke my name like a secret meant only for me. But when the light shifted—when his voice lost its softness, when his touch turned to absence—I convinced myself it was just another trick of perception. That love, real love, required patience. That if I just held on, the warmth would return.
I turned away from the quiet ache, from the nights spent waiting for his words, from the way my own laughter had begun to sound unfamiliar. I ignored the small fractures forming beneath the surface, certain they were nothing more than illusions, distortions caused by the brilliance of what we once had.
Blind spots give us the luxury of believing in something just a little longer. They allow us to mistake longing for devotion, to paint over cracks with golden light, to convince ourselves that if we close our eyes and wish hard enough, love will stay.
But when I finally stepped back—when I let my vision adjust—I saw everything. The spaces where love had faded. The parts of myself I had quieted to keep the illusion intact. The way I had mistaken being needed for being cherished. And as the truth settled in, searing through me like the afterglow of staring too long at something too bright, I understood.
Perhaps blind spots aren’t failures of perception. Perhaps they are small acts of mercy. They give us time to gather the strength to face what we aren’t ready to see. They allow us to hold on to something dazzling, even if it was never meant to last. They let us believe in the magic of love before we have to accept its reality.
And maybe—just maybe—our blind spots don’t deceive us.
Maybe they protect us.