Vonnegut’s Disturbing Quote Explains Why Life Reality Is Not Always The Whole Truth
The mask becomes the reality
All life is performance.
We are all storytellers. From the mundane to the life-changing, the narratives we spin, internally and externally, shape who we are. Our identities are tied to the stories we tell to ourselves and the world.
As writer and humorist Kurt Vonnegut says in the opening line of his novel Mother Night, “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
It’s both terrifying and liberating.
Vonnegut forces us to confront the uncomfortable reality that our identities, those very things that make us “real,” are often constructed, at least in part, through pretence.
We are social creatures, wired to connect and be understood. So, we wear masks not to deceive but to present versions of ourselves that are most acceptable in society. Our self-perception, then, becomes heavily influenced by how others perceive us.
The judgments and reflections become building blocks of our own identity. We perform for an audience, but their reactions shape the performance itself.
It creates an identity loop.
