What’s wrong with simply being ordinary?

Today more than ever, there seems to be a very fine line between what is fantasy and what is reality… what is truth and what is fabrication.There’s a growing inability for connecting with one another in real ways as  many appear to be entrained by tendencies of narcissism and arrogance. The escalating number of internet gossip sites and blogs are encouraging millions of people especially our young to launch their own on-line “pseudo-selves”– promoting their personal dramas and storylines in a rather impersonal and exploitative manner- building and reifying an “I” that may be very separate from being the person’s true identity.

Lower censorship standards with cable TV, the rise in “Reality TV”, and the relatively open accessibility to the internet has helped to foster and manifest a troubling endemic in this country with how we see ourselves- especially when examined in the context with how we seem to mirror our society’s icons- even those who live a lifestyle projecting real dysfunction and pathology. There is a growing tendency for the impressionable to condone, forgive, and even idolize those who are revered but yet engage in very troubled behaviors- and it is these troubling melodramas that are viewed by many as simply harmless fun. Glorifying the outrageously narcissistic appears commonplace as does forsaking human empathy for the sake of a good story.

With a proliferating attitude of “any attention is good attention”, we seem to be normalizing for our youth in real-time what often appears to be uncensored and untame. We appear to be losing our capacity to discern the difference between normal and acceptable behavior for the times, and outright pathology. We glamorize troubling behavior as if it is now just the “norm”- slowly but surely unraveling the very fabric of our social consciousness- seemingly detached or indifferent to growing societal indiscretions. Our mass media messages appear damaging without balanced commentary. For example, just look at “Reality TV” which exploits narcissistic behaviors for dramatic effect- and we, the audience, are invited to indulge.

Larger than life identities- mental fabrications and formations of “self”- appear to reinforce and reify our growing tendency to want to escape the mundane and the ordinary- to live vicariously through those we seem to idolize either consciously or subconsciously. Our disquietude and discontentment appear  deeply rooted in personal inadequacies- and strong, entrenched feelings of not being enough…

To ease the pain and the discomfort with ourselves, we invent a “pseudo self” and mask our inadequacies with a fabricated sense of “self” that appears all so real as the layers have been intricately woven, scripted, and conditioned over time- so believable that we, ourselves, may no longer be able to discern what is merely a projection of our “self”- a virtual disconnect from one’s true being. In the
absence of a true and authentic connection with one’s “self”, one is less likely to modulate thoughts and feelings out of genuine regard for one’s own well-being let alone the well-being of others. As these tendencies continue to proliferate our society at large, the social consciousness- the moral and ethical fabric that preserves our sanity- becomes at risk to being reduced to a mere disingenuous projection…

We ask ourselves these questions… how do we see ourselves?; what are we mirroring for one another?; can we honestly inquire and examine who we really are in the midst of all this fabrication?; and do we have the sense to wake up and discern what is truly important to living an ordinary yet complete life?

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