Living fiction

[loveofreason]

Reality is fiction.

All our lives are stories.

Comment.

[tom]

Who is the author?

[Dissident]

Some sadist... So... ourselves?

[loveofreason]

Multiple authors. Multiple perspectives. Myriad stories.

And yes, we make our own stories to explain our lives (and protect ourselves from information/experience we can't process.)

[Ogion]

This the thread of shortedness in statemments?

Humans are story-tellers. Through stories we understand the world. If a thing has no story we could listen to (or tell) it is pretty mysterious to us...

Ogion

[loveofreason]

Yep. This is the easy reading thread.

So long as it stays on topic!

I have a fictional Ogion in my mind. You are a character in whatever story I tell myself about your participation in this thread.

How is that character related to you? Is it an accurate representation in any way? How can I ever know? How many Ogion's exist in how many stories? Are they just as real as the Ogion in your own mind; your self-reflection?

[Ogion]

You know, there will be at the very least as many fictional Ogions as there will be observers observing 'me' (in terms of this forum that is my posts).
But already alone in my mind there are very many fictional Ogions. Not that i am schizophrenic or something. It is just that i of course use stories also to understand me myself. And since ones own personality is not simple in any terms there will be many different stories i imagine myself in. In one i am the lazy loser, who really can't get anything done for himself and will probably end up having to rely on the state and /or parents for survival. Then there is one Ogion who is the main character in a story of chivalry, selflessness and altruism, in which he gets to be a hero of these characteristics. Then there is the Ogion who is just hedonistic, lying in bed all day, eating stuff and reading on forums and such ;) This goes on and on. Though there exists an instance where all these different Ogions (as well as some of the fictional Ogions of other minds, like when you tell me how you perceive me) gets mixed together and where their aspects are constituting the compound feel of "self".
Ok, now i brokke the easy rread paradigm...I'll stop then ;)

Although being a pursuer of knowledge and 'truth' (y'know, being INTP) i think that these things in the end have a purpose of usefulness. The basic function of the stories is to give us a useful basis to act upon...

Ogion

[tom]

Building on Ogions point. There could well be an infinite number of "me" all from different perspectives and times. However only one of these "me's" is typing this and not all of the others are true from my perspective.

[loveofreason]

Do you have any right to 'ownership' of those 'mes' in other people's heads? Any copyright over your character?

If they're wrong, or don't match your self-understanding... if the sum of stories regarding you builds a character that is contrary to the one being the sum of the sub-set within your mind... does this impact upon you?

Would your 'real' self be threatened by all the other-selves?

Do we even have a legitmate claim to our own self?

What if we have no perception of how others see us? Does our ignorance protect us from responsibility for the impact of our character in the lives of others?

Maybe rhetorical questions all...

[Ermine]

I'd say I have a bunch of different aliases wandering around. They don't usually run into each other though. My world is a large place so you don't meet anyone twice unless you want to.

[Ogion]

Since i am not so into copyright at all, i'd formulate it differently.
I don't think we have any and should have any 'say' over the 'avatars' other people form in their heads from me. I mean, it's their creation, isn't it? I think there goes as much of the other person in it as it does from me.
Tough over my self-perception i should have the rights, whatever rights available. It is, when in doubt, the only thing that really is just mine. I should have at least the say about me myself. (Though people get thrown in a 'mental house' when other people think they are mad. So their they get robbed of the say over their selves, don't they?)

Ogion

[loveofreason]

Hmmm...

yes, at some point we decide another person's reality isn't valid, which is essentially assassinating their self. Granting it no rightful life. This happens in day to day life and not just with psychotic patients etc...

I agree, I don't and cannot 'own' whatever images people form of me, no matter how inaccurate I think they may be. These other 'avatars' belong to their creators, made as much from their minds if not more so than of mine and my actions/words/appearance.

But back to the invalidated self - the self-constructed character that is unacknowledged by those around... We live in our heads, don't we? With the tales we tell ourselves. INTPs seem most vulnerable to not finding their personal story understood, and to being seen predominantly in the roles constructed for them by others...

when someone rejects your personal story, (assassinates your 'self'), but inhabits your space all the time, in what space can one live? Where does one find life and validation?

where am I going?

I think I'm overwhelmed by the 'others' that aren't me. Is it possible for one to be killed by a role? By a character based on themselves created by other people?

Sorry this is not coherent, I think I may be closing in on why I experience the presence of certain people in my life as life-threatening when the target is denied identity. A threat to identity equaling a threat to self.

Blather.

[Waterstiller]

The self never gets assassinated; it just gets trampled on and gets smaller and smaller as its screaming becomes sharper and sharper until it's so dizzyingly shrill it kills the body off to end the suffering.


Or it starts to fight its way out from under all the shit and gets really strong and then nobody can mess with it. Or something in between.


“It's hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.”
Sally Kempton

[loveofreason]

The self never gets assassinated; it just gets trampled on and gets smaller and smaller as its screaming becomes sharper and sharper until it's so dizzyingly shrill it kills the body off to end the suffering.

Yes, that's it. Well said.


Or it starts to fight its way out from under all the shit and gets really strong and then nobody can mess with it. Or something in between.


“It's hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.”
Sally Kempton


I've clawed back from the abyss more times than I can remember now.

But it seems to follow me. :p

I think I have to designate my life's motif as the battle against subsumation of identity. But is it all in my head?

Why does survival come down to supremecy of story? To which version of reality gains legitimacy? To which characters gain ascendency?

[EloquentBohemian]

I think I have to designate my life's motif as the battle against subsumation of identity. But is it all in my head?

I think that everyone is in a "battle against subsumation of identity" because it is a natural part of our psyche. Even when one chooses to become submissive to some extent, it is to find a level where one's identity still remains intact. Oft-times, one finds that fighting every battle only wearies one and to find rest and rejuvenation, one must occasionally subject one's self to that which may injure identity; but after rest has brought back one's strength of character, overcoming what one has subjected one's self to becomes a simpler matter, for one has come to know the 'enemy' and its weaknesses.

Why does survival come down to supremecy of story? To which version of reality gains legitimacy? To which characters gain ascendency?
Not so much as "supremecy of story" as on-going fluctuation of a story which is a stream of consciousness. The events change, the actors change, and the primary protaganist, one's self, has survived by either adapting or adapting to the challenges presented by living one's life. There are really no 'versions', rather different aspects of the protaganist emerge to address various streams of the story. The 'version' which gains legitimacy is whatever the current momentary cohesion of aspects is present at any given time. Ultimately, you are the one who writes your story, your myth and the characters within your myth.
We are creatures of flux and movement, showing various shades of our aspects which move as inter-twinning shadows across the foundation of our personas as we pass like fluid statues through life.

[Perseus]

The self never gets assassinated; it just gets trampled on and gets smaller and smaller as its screaming becomes sharper and sharper until it's so dizzyingly shrill it kills the body off to end the suffering.


Or it starts to fight its way out from under all the shit and gets really strong and then nobody can mess with it. Or something in between.


“It's hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.”
Sally Kempton


The Eagle (INTP) scream does not sound very much different from the derisory Wolf's (ENTJ) howl to the Earthlings (S). I saw a Gallic Eagle lady scream before she was beaten by her boyfriend. I thought it was Artisan play at first, until I recognised the subtle differences. Only another Eagle would know, or perhaps a Skylark (ENFP).

Report at:

http://soredragon.blogspot.com/2008/11/chapter-27-pet-shop-bears.html

[Jennywocky]

To continue with Boh's comment, we might not even know what our identity really is until we subject it to potential injury against another.

It's easy to play a role that is a part of someone else's narrative, then later realize it wasn't actually you at all... but who is "we" to begin with?

In Donaldson's "The One Tree," the tree's guardian is invisible and unseeable, but the more that Brinn strikes him, the more substantial and fleshed out the guardian becomes.

The bumping and bruising helps define us in some ways.
I think those who have been suppressed and squished know themselves in ways that others do not.

[Reverse Transcriptase]

I was thinking about INTP's chameleon ability from another thread. Do you think that using the chameleon helps hurt our true sense of self? If we're putting on a mask, does the mask just act as a tool for our self, or does the mask strike back at us?

I have this mental image of a mask with hooks on it, that dig into our skins. I think when you use a pseudo-character around someone, it's hard to change it.

“It's hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.”
Sally Kempton

I'm really not sure what that quote means.

Great thread.

[Ermine]

“It's hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.”
Sally Kempton

I think it's easy to understand. If an enemy gets inside your head, it can control you. That goes for external enemies that get inside your head, and yourself, as your worst enemy.

[Reverse Transcriptase]

“It's hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.”
Sally Kempton

I think it's easy to understand. If an enemy gets inside your head, it can control you. That goes for external enemies that get inside your head, and yourself, as your worst enemy.

"Outposts in your head" makes me think of actual philosophy, or agreed upon facts.

But to defeat one's enemy, you usually have to understand them. To understand them, you have to know what their philosophy & values are. You have to share their memes. It's hard to keep your memes seperate from enemy-memes- and if you are doing a good job at keeping them seperate, then you're not really doing a good job of truly understanding the enemy's memes.

If you don't understand your enemy's memes... then what are you? You're ignorant and intolerant. Maybe you can win, but it won't be a good victory.

Yeah... leave it to an INTP to find paradox in everything.

[Fleur]

I was thinking about INTP's chameleon ability from another thread. Do you think that using the chameleon helps hurt our true sense of self? If we're putting on a mask, does the mask just act as a tool for our self, or does the mask strike back at us?

I have this mental image of a mask with hooks on it, that dig into our skins. I think when you use a pseudo-character around someone, it's hard to change it.


Or perhaps the mask takes over and becames the actual oneself, while somebody's unconsciously trying to temporize to other people's views?

When we're losing something, we know that we will gain a replacement (it even doesn't need to be exatly same thing - it just have to be with same value as the lost one). Why wouldn't our personality work same way? When we lose a part of ourselves, we feel hollow; it causes us to instinctively seek for a makeshift to fill the empty room and we find it as opinions of other people who're around us - almost like a dry kitchen sponge absorbs water.

Anyway - who says that the mask isn't a part of us? There has to be a substruction to build something up, even the mask. We can't derive a trait from a blue air - it must be there before, sometimes it's just too weak to be noticed and too quiet to be developed. But it's there, somewhere.

The mask isn't always a pseudo-character. Can we call something "pseudo-ourselves" while nobody can find an answer to the old question "What am I?"