Something to Call Your Own (the fabricated "you")

Is there really anything in your consciousness/mind that you can genuinely call your own?

You were taught to form words in order to use the language you were taught to convey the concepts you were taught...you were taught what to be angry about and what to be sad about....you were taught what brings pleasure and what brings pain, what to avoid and what to embrace.

Even your creativity is channeled through the world's categories.

You were taught to feel in accordance with categories of thought through which you process data and respond accordingly.

But ALL those categories were learned and everything in consciousness was given to you by the world....everything except, maybe....consciousness itself.

So now you excitingly attempt to develop your ‘self’ through all manner of technique, strategy, ideology and skills. But even that is learned.

You are a 'Master of Mimicry' and you cannot be anything beyond what the world says you can be.

Is all your self-development merely delusional subterfuge? Are you're merely further developing something you were taught to be? Is there really such a thing as an "authentic self" or is that simply an already sculpted self becoming more complexly fabricated, so  as to seem genuine in a world of fabricated mimicry?

Is there really any part of "you" that is NOT a construction fabricated by the world outside your head?

If NOT, then who cares? Why not let it all go and stop defending and preserving it? Stop acting like you're hurt when insulted or angry when annoyed. Why grieve over death, when grief is nothing more than an emotion you experience when accessing learned categories of interpretive thought?

Why care if someone hurts your feelings if, in fact, you were taught HOW to feel? It's not really "you," because essentially, all emotional pain must first be interpreted cognitively (thought) before it is felt. If I insult you, through the categories of thought you've learned, you will apply a conditioned interpretation that will result in an emotion. But if the interpretation comes from learned concepts, how can you report that you genuinely feel hurt, since there was nothing genuine involved?

"You" exist as nothing more than a robotic fabrication of an absurd world (but even that interpretation is a learned construct).

Is there something else deep within or under all the fabricated absurdity? Is there something there that is truly “you”?

Is there really anything in your consciousness/mind that you can genuinely call your own?

Finite players continually develop the self in order to prove ownership, while infinite players realize that not even consciousness itself...

...can be called your own.


Artwork by Thasher317 - Self-Portrait as Escher