Everyone who uses social media is familiar with these strange and mysterious illusions, which allegedly contain the answers to our deepest psychological secrets.
Most people glance at these images and forget about them. However, every now and then, there is one that catches our attention. The detailed sculpture below is one of those. An entangled biological mesh creating the shape of a human face. The rules are easy. Do not cheat. Your first animal will show what your biggest personality flaw is. Although these types of assessments are generally not based on rigorous scientific principles, they do incorporate an interesting concept known as pareidolia. In other words, pareidolia is the human ability to recognize significant figures in a seemingly arbitrary image. What you focus on first tells a lot about the current condition of your mind.
If your eyes were instantly drawn to the magnificent lion seated majestically upon the crown of the head, chances are that you are a person of strength, power, and prestige. But as with every creature in this image, there is a shadow side to the lion as well. That dark side is arrogance and rigid pride. Being drawn to the image of the lion means that your biggest flaw could be a failure to accept when you are mistaken. Being in a position of authority and thinking of yourself as a protector makes you automatically think that admitting fault will undermine your position. Your craving for admiration turns into a hunger for control, which makes it hard for others to give you negative feedback without you taking it personally.
If the eagle was the creature you picked, your personal flaw would likely be detachment or hyper criticism. An eagle symbolizes clarity and accuracy. Eagles soar high and observe things from above. This helps you understand situations from afar very well, but at the same time, it may make you seem distant or detached. The problem is that while observing events from above, you fail to consider the messy emotional aspect of people s actions. Perfectionism may be one of your flaws. You see the world in terms of right and wrong, efficient and inefficient, and you struggle to tolerate the ambiguity that makes human relationships so complicated.
If you were more focused on the two coiling snakes at the bottom of the statue, you are a very intuitive person who likes to keep things close to your chest. In that situation, your flaw would be either manipulation or secretiveness. Snakes are symbols of transformation and change, but they are also creatures of secrecy. If the snake was the part of the statue you paid attention to first, then it is possible that you like to keep secrets for yourself. That is not to say you have malicious intentions, but there is a sense of secrecy or even manipulation that surrounds you. You know things that others do not, and you prefer to keep it that way.
The fish are placed inside the heart of the face, symbolizing emotions and the subconscious mind. Should the fish be the first thing you see, your flaw might be escapism or indecisiveness. Fish flow along with the current. You may discover that when faced with problems, it is your natural tendency to swim away instead of dealing with the problem directly. This shows an inability to hold a stance in regard to important matters because you prefer to keep things fluid and prevent others from being displeased. Although this allows you to adapt easily, you run the risk of losing yourself to your surroundings.
Most individuals can easily see the nimble swallows flitting around the area of the forehead and brow. This suggests that your fault could be restlessness or lack of focus. You are an individual who likes to look into the future, but this is because you never stay still long enough to finish one idea before starting another. While your head is constantly brimming with ideas, you might not have enough of the earth energy necessary to put these ideas into practice. Your flaw would be giving up on anything when the thrill wears off. You are a starter, not a finisher, and that pattern holds you back.
If you have seen the smaller and earthier animals such as the otters at the mouth level or even the cubs at the head level, your weakness will probably be dependency or people pleasing. These animals stand for relationships and socializing. If you spotted these animals first, then you place more importance on social harmony than your own happiness. This is what some call the nice person weakness. You do not want to risk rejection, so you keep quiet about your own needs. You say yes when you want to say no. You smile when you want to scream. And over time, that pattern erodes your sense of self.
Why would individuals perceive varying perceptions from the same set of geometric shapes and shadows? The human brain does not operate like a camera in terms of perception. It operates like a narrator. In order to make sense of the perceptual mess around us, we rely on top down processing. Psychologists describe this as a technique that allows us to apply our prior knowledge and emotions to our perceptual experience. The flaw that shows up as a result of such an analysis is not a scar etched into the depths of your soul. It is an indication of how you spend your psychological resources in the present moment. What is seen is determined by how the person perceives reality at the time. If you are extremely conscious of your vanity recently, then the image of a lion will be like a flashing neon sign for you.
The purpose of this task is not to criticize you or humiliate you. Quite the contrary. The purpose is to help you perform what the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung called shadow work. This approach suggests that one should identify the elements of their character that they try to hide because they seem unacceptable. Once you become acquainted with your shadow, you become whole. Acknowledge the flaw without judgment. Do not blame the test or say it is off. If you identified with the snake and are now acutely aware of your proclivity for secrecy, just allow that awareness to be. Admitting a weakness does not mean you are a bad person. It means you have become self aware.
Find the virtue within the vice. One of the most appealing qualities of Jungian psychology is that it suggests there is virtue inherent in every vice. The lion s arrogance might simply be untrained leadership skills. The fish s escapist tendencies may actually represent the potential for a very creative imagination that still needs to be focused on something meaningful. Act and integrate. Once you identify that you are dealing with a certain pattern, you empower yourself to make a choice of another kind of reaction. Learning about something is the first step toward change. When next you find yourself having the desire to swim away during an emotional discussion, you can remind yourself of the fish. Having identified the behavior as learned, you can challenge yourself to stay in the discussion room.
In the end, this picture is a demonstration of Gestalt psychology, the idea that the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. Your brain will finally solve the puzzle and see the human face. But without the presence of the intricate and sometimes contradictory animals, there would be no such human face. We are all living manifestations of such instincts. We are never just one entity. We are lions, snakes, fish, and birds all in one. Our greatest flaw is often merely our weakest part. By paying close attention to the first thing that we see, we obtain a small but priceless advantage over ourselves. We go from being subjects of invisible powers to becoming masters of our fate. What was the first thing that you saw? More important, what are you going to do with your discovery today. All you need is the mirror before you. Simply look until you see yourself completely, warts and all.
