Are You Really Who You Think You Are?
Truth is a rare and valuable commodity these days — are you prepared for the Truth?
I might have jumped on the bandwagon a bit late, but once I started watching HBO’s Westworld, I was hooked: I was drawn into an alternate world in which you could play out your fantasies with sumptuously fleshy, warm-blooded robots. At Westworld, you could do whatever you like — steal, rape, murder, or fall in love — within the confines of an immersive, AI-interactive amusement park. What would you do with all this glorious, uninhibited, no-consequences freedom?
But forget about you for a moment, and let’s talk about the androids of Westworld.
Midway through the first season, there is a scene in which one of the androids (aka “host”) wises up to reality, then engages with two human workers from the tech lab and threatens to break out of the amusement park. The host demands an explanation for its confusing maze of déjà vu memories that seem to be on eternal loop, as well as its flashbacks of different personas constantly electrifying its synapses. I know what the hell is going on, the android tells the lab technicians, projecting a clear sign of awareness: Consciousness. Or so it thinks.
Shocked and fearful of the android’s superior strength, the technicians, now held at knifepoint, cautiously reveal the computer program that brought the android to life. They reveal the code that dictates the android’s specific behaviors, personality traits, language, custom idiosyncrasies, and, through a unique algorithm, even the exact words it is speaking at the exact moment it is speaking them, in real-time. The android stares wide-eyed at the tablet computer trying to decipher the code, and in trying to understand what it all means, the android locks up, freezes, and shuts down. (Processing… Processing… Cannot Process… Cannot Process!) The android simply could not handle the load. It could not handle the Truth. Everything it thought it knew, felt, or believed, have been programmed into it — they were not its own.
Who are you, really? And what do you really think, feel, believe?
You are not an android. (Unless, of course, you are.) If no one were to program into you their own beliefs, opinions, notions and ideas about people and things — not your parents, educators, friends, or the internet — how would you actually move about and behave in this world? What things would you believe? What choices would you make? If you were not born into a Christian or Muslim or Buddhist or Liberal or Conservative-leaning family, with all their set beliefs impressed upon you at birth; if our society didn’t sway you this way or that way because of your gender, your skin color, your height, your perceived attractiveness, your socioeconomic standing in life; if… if… if… then — what type of person would you truly be? Without any kind of influence, who is the REAL you?
And, how would you treat others? How would you act? How do you act now when no one is looking and you feel free to be as you are without pretense? Without any kind of influence, what would you deem right and wrong, or good and bad, or fair and just?
Our understanding of ourselves is so limited — our own Truth is often hidden from ourselves, pushed deep beyond our reach from an overwhelming social system that rewards and punishes us for a host of things we could barely keep track of, let alone navigate successfully. While the following is a generalization, it seems to play out throughout our human history: In this world, if you want to survive, if you want safety and security, and if you want to succeed, you must belong to a tribe, and you must think and speak and act as that tribe does. (You know the saying, When in Rome…) Do so, and you are protected and rewarded. Do not, and you are cast out and severely punished.
Rebels and visionaries who eschew tribalism often become heroes, with many of them broadening our views and improving the world. But they also die young, and though they leave us with legends and legacies, many leave no progeny; meanwhile, our ultimate goal, our instinct as a species, is to live, and then live on in our children. How many of us are willing to sacrifice our lives to stamp out questionable ideals within our community? How many of us are even willing to risk excommunication from our tribe, or relinquish all our tribe-related privileges? Ah, what is a human to do, when doing the right thing might be in direct contradiction with our instinct to survive? But I digress.
You are not the labels society has stamped on you.
Who are you?
How would you even begin to answer this question? Perhaps we could start by acknowledging our human fallacies and assessing what we think we know, what we think we should say or do or be, who we think we are. But recognize: You are not the labels society has stamped on you. Yes, these labels simplify our lives in many advantageous ways, but they also hinder and limit ourselves, sometimes dangerously dividing ourselves along arbitrary lines, lines with no meaning in the larger scheme of things. (Blond vs. Brunette; Vegan vs. Omnivore; Bible vs. Koran vs. Myth vs. Science.) In the end, the universe doesn’t give a damn about any of our human-made labels or what we do to ourselves and each other — we all die and return to the earth just the same. So often we walk around simply parroting other people’s beliefs and ideas about who we are, who we should be, and what is our truth. But perhaps we’ll find it doesn’t really matter… does it?
Curious about our human quirks? Here are more stories on that:
The Trouble with Our Convictions (poetry)
How We Create Rebels and Heroes
Are You a Romantic? (NOT a romantic story)
