Existential Content For Troubled Beings

Are you "You" or the idea of "You"?

August 22, 2020 by Rahul

Thou shall not be perplexed by the title. You as a whole surely reflect the individual you perceive to be. Fairly remarkable. However, given an opportunity to describe the individual within you, your vaguely created persona would cease to exist. Scribble down a few personality traits that define your individuality. In the process, you would immerse in the train of thoughts whether the objective definition accurately aligns with the reality. If your consciously created, emotionally verified and pragmatically presented scribbled persona exhibits a true reflection of thyself, in a metaphysical context, then I proclaim you as "Zeus" and demand you stop reading any further.

My naive self scuffled to construct a theory that rightfully aligned with my reality or my idea of reality. A flow of emotions rushed through my veins screaming detachment from the reality just after I jot down two sentences. Despair washed me over soon as I came to a realization that the authentic me is coherently distinctive from the idea of me. "But No Bro, you're just going through an existential crisis. You will get over it with all the positivity and kindness you're surrounded by." Quoting Descartes, "I doubt therefore I think therefore I am".

My existence within the boundaries of reality is certain. Perceiving reality without questioning its reliability is doubtful.

Discovering yourself is a continuous process. Sensual, emotional, and physical experiences shape your personality regardless of the empirical decisions you take. The "You " is not resistant to changes. It is not constant and gets reformed in a timely manner. Simply put, your objective definition of the "You" is open for alterations at any point in time. Dire circumstances or unanticipated events have a strong tendency to drive your emotions. Potentially, the impact could damage or beautify your perceptions about the preconceived notions of reality. Positive or negative, deterministic or nondeterministic, it counts. Conditionally biasing on your morality or principles, certain character traits do remain constant. For instance, your ethics would refrain you from giving an uppercut to a tramp if they sneak up on you gently asking for coins (Mine would).

Unknowingly, your subconscious mind plays a vital role in constructing a reality that appears to be supreme. You feel content, pleased, or at worse victorious. To the root of it, your mind intoxicates you with endorphins that create a state where you accept You are what you think you are. Making sense of it logically, you tend to lead with a personality you desired to be subconscious. You're a product of a never-ending battle between the conscious and a subconscious thought process. A character, a personality you conceive paints a picture of you to the external world. Internally you're uncertain and constantly seeking validations to enhance the imaginary character. Simplifying it further, your consciously created hypothetical persona exists only within your logical mind. It never made it to the outside world. In summation, your idea of You don't exist.

For a better understanding, let's divulge into our perception of reality. As stated above, your mind accumulates perceptions by metaphysical experiences shaping the reality around you. Assuming the former is true, the concept of reality either exists in your perceptions or doesn't exist at all (hypothetical again)! Since your childhood, the reality you perceive today is being "forced" onto you. The true nature of "You" has never been given a chance to exhibit in a free context. You are no different from a tree or any of the biological organisms magically created. Everything else is a result of patriarchal or matriarchal systems formed in order to institute a hierarchy. Blame it on the creator who thought it would be cool to fix a Frontal Lobe inside your central processing unit.

Rewinding to the thinkers' era, where legends smoked crack and discussed our being while taking sips of mead had satisfactory conclusions. An idealist approach defines reality as a phenomenon that takes place inside your mind but not in the physical world around you. Does this justify that your existence is limited only to the chambers of your mind? Inductively yes, because the physical world around you wouldn't exist if you don't perceive it.

Ancient Indian philosophers describe 3 different states of your existence. The awake you, the dreamer you, the stateless you. Awake you face the reality in your controlled mind state. The dreamer you have zero control over the reality that is presented to you as dreams. The stateless you (not dead) but having to experience nothing that is scientifically classified as the NON-REM sleep cycle. The only constant entity in those environments is "You". Are you convinced that you exist but the reality around you keeps changing? Most of the analytical thinkers would. However, the antagonist I disapprove. If "You" is the constant, your behaviour across different states will be persisted. If you happen to dream about yourself performing an activity your "ideal" self wouldn't, there is a higher probability that multiple behavioural traits are executed in different realities. Different realities, Different "You"? Almost.

Many western/eastern philosophies have "tried" convincing us with a cliche statement - "You" or Your Existence is often found within Yourself. Not quite adequate. The reality of your living is uncertain but not of your death. Death, a reality, never distrusted, not perceptually constructed, never experienced yet we all succumb to it. Is death your only reality? Inarguably yes, death is real. A conclusion could be withdrawn -

The idea of your existence to its fulfilment truly lies in Death.

Death is an interesting way to look at existence but I could rant about it another blog post. Your presence in the reality could not be more than a mere idea, a thought, that light of consciousness focusing on behaviours that seem meaningful to suffice your self-obsessed needs. Finding meaning in nothingness should be the new cool. Being a biological creature, you owe only reproduction to the creator. Everything else leads to nothingness.