When I look in the mirror a secret stares back at me. The image lays bare my tortured soul. The reflection is the self I hate. The self that haunts my waking thoughts and crawls into my dreams. Deep within my soul it festers and spews forth its poison. I cannot escape what I was, and I tremble to think that it may be what I still am. In an instant I find myself in the scorching fire of my past, resurging to remind me of my sins, and the very chains of Hell bind me there. At the end of the path before me I believe there is redemption, but my feet falter with their burden of steel. The ground around me burns with condemnation for the wicked. Every smoldering breath anchors me further in despair, and I am all alone.

I shut my eyes in defiance and a Voice calls out to me. ‘This place is not what is, nor even what was’.

“Help Me!” I scream.

The sound of my torment echoes through time and the Voice answers me ‘Only you have the power to break these chains. This prison is of your design and your heart alone can free you’.

Opening my eyes again I beat at my chains. I struggle through the pain and suffocation around me and suddenly…

‘This place is not who you are, nor even who you were’.

Tears well in my eyes as I recognize that this time, the voice is my own, and in a sacred harmony it resonates with the Voice I heard. There is freedom and redemption in the shadows of my past. I open my eyes and that cursed mirror is gone. All is bright and beautiful, and for the first time in a long long time, I breath Sweet Air.