What I want most is to be free, which maybe doesn’t make sense because yes I am perfectly free already today as I am. So what do I mean? I just want to be me. I don’t really want to do anything else. I want to spend every second of every day doing things I find meaningful. I want to share who I am with others. That’s the only real thing I have to offer. Everything else isn’t real. Companies aren’t real. So, career advice and climbing any sort of ladder is a sham. A lot of knowledge isn’t real, so it doesn’t matter that I can learn or teach someone X, Y, or Z fact (but yes to approaches to life). Money definitely isn’t real. What is real is us, and the time that we spend on Earth.
By extension, the most valuable (in my opinion only real) moments of life are when we take the time to interact with the core of others, not their shells. Friendships, relationships, peaceful company, dialogue. What’s it like to be you? Why do you do things that way? Why are you that way? Who are you? What are you proud of? What are you battling? Without others, we are islands. I’m not deep on the philosophy, but there are some that go as far as saying without others we don’t exist ourselves. If nobody cares about the core of you, then do you even exist? Of course our bodies exist. That is certain. It seems there can be quite a lot of literal existing and not an equal amount of real existing.
I want to engage with the world on my terms. But I’m not doing that. I want to be myself. But I’m only myself sometimes. I want to work really really hard on stuff and it not feel like work. But I have a job that is okay for a whole lot of practical reasons. I’m letting my shell do most of the living. I’m not that real. The little bits of me that escape are the little bits I cherish – shouldn’t it be more? I think so. At the same time, I think people, society, is content enough to deal with my shell and not me for the most part. So it’s interesting, and sad. It’s expedient. It makes sense. This is the real world and things need to get done. This isn’t a utopia, you have to acknowledge that this is how things are. And I do. Because of the factory default flaws that come with being human, I put forth my shell. I’m doing that, to my detriment. It also causes confusion. When are people interacting with Erick because they are interested in interacting with Erick and not his shell? The lines get blurry.
The ‘way things are’ feels like the ultimate theft of the gift of life. Life is beautiful. It is also very very scarce, particularly for those of us that are alive. Why does living mean I get taxed of the only thing worth anything – life? Isn’t life free? Why do I need to sacrifice it to the societal structures and systems in place? It’s outrageous and offensive. I think about taking life back, and the follow-on is that that would be lonely, not in a physical sense. For months of living in the ‘real world’ (which is actually the fake world) maybe I get a small handful of real interactions. The ensuing void I can fill with all the fake bs that I convince myself is rewarding. If I leave the void empty, and I don’t have something to fill it with – I think that’s what I find scary.
How would I fill the void on my own? I can’t count on others stepping away from their shells. I can’t even do it, really, after all. Not yet at least. Reading helps a bit. Thousands of years of ancients providing real tidbits here and there actually accumulate to more material than I could digest in the rest of my life. That is great, but they are also dead. Right now I think it’s better to get the real deal from another living human.
There is also an element of well if everyone else is doing it, do I really know better to not do the same? The answer is no. I do not know better. Already skeptical by nature, it’s that much harder to leave the fake world behind. I’d be going off of nothing more than belief. Maybe stronger than potential loneliness or doubt is the fear of what lies on the other side. What if it’s not better or there’s nothing, and you have to come back and settle for the fake world. Then it certainly was wiser to never question in the first place – not an original thought of mine but I get it now.
I feel pretty sure that the answer to this pathetic angst is just do it. Just do it. Just do life I guess. Or, whatever is worrying me, don’t let it worry me. To which I say fair enough. It’s like when you tell an addict to stop smoking. Easier said than done, but it’s what you have to do. In a literal sense it’s technically possible. When it doesn’t worry me anymore in the future either because I don’t care or because I found out some answer I may look back and think how stupid I was to feel this way. But right now I feel this way so it is what it is.
One thing I will do is take action (to try to free myself anyway). Luckily or unluckily, my curiosity tends to win out over my fear. Right or wrong who knows haha, but it’s reassuring at least that trial and error is often the best approach we can use anyway. If it turns out I made a dumb mistake, at least I chose and checked. I relieve myself of the pressure of knowing and turn it back into a sort of adventure without a set ending. Do something, see what happens. Do more or do less. Tweak. Keep tweaking. Keep seeing. Keep exploring.
