“So, where do we go from here?”
“You know, you’re not helping. This feeling of vague dissatisfaction is fine as a warning, a signal that I need to change. But, what does it mean? Change how? Grow in what ways? What’s missing?”
“That’s not my job. My role is purely subconscious in nature. In other words, I make you aware of the problem, and you and your amazing rational mind figure a way to fix it.”
“But I’ve got nothing to go on. You’ve given me no clues. It’s like a warning siren going off with no discernable source. All I see is a blinking red light, but I have no reference point as to determine what that little light is an indicator of. I mean, thanks for the notice and all, but without some kind of help to fix the problem, the little light is just going to keep blinking, since I don’t know how to make it stop blinking.”
“Again, not my problem. The funny part? You know the cause behind it, you’re just closing your eyes to the truth. You don’t even want to admit it to yourself.”
“You’re judging me? You have the hardest time even poking your head up during waking hours. Instead, you seem to enjoy presenting me with unsolvable mysteries.”
“Welcome to the human condition, pal. Sucks to be us, huh?”
“Again I say, you’re not helping.”
“Nobody ever said I was really supposed to. That’s just an assumption that people have thought since before the days of Freud.”
“You’re bringing Freud into this? Freud was a nutjob. And that’s when he wasn’t dipping into the cocaine or opium.”
“Beside the point, and you’re straying from the subject at hand. The truth of the matter is, something is bothering you. I’m blinking the light, I’m making you aware of the problem, now it’s time for you to start fixing it.”
“Give me some help, here. You said I already knew what the problem was, but just couldn’t admit it to myself. I know of several things that it could be, I know of several options I’d rather it not be, etc. But it could be any one of those, or even a combination of factors. This may not be a simple problem to fix.”
“True. And you do know what the problem is. So, start narrowing it down. You and your damned logic should easily be able to start testing hypotheses and striking possibilities off the list. It might take time, but it will eventually bring about a solution. You might even learn a thing or two.”
“Great. You’re being idealistic. You’re assuming there is even a solution. You said it yourself… ‘The human condition’. In thousands of years of logical deduction, philosophical advances, mapping the mind, reasoning, writing, and more, nobody else has ever figured it out perfectly. And you assume that I can find the answer to the greatest series of questions man has ever come up with, and so far, utterly failed to adequately answer? You give me too much credit.”
“Does that mean it’s not worth the attempt? You might not stumble upon the exhaustive truth, but I bet you can find a few morsels of it. Maybe even help someone out there.”
“I’m not saying that it’s futile, and that I should simply pursue other matters. Why do you think I write? Why do you think I try and purposefully tap into you? Why do you think I even want to dream, if I didn’t have this goal.”
“But you have no direction. You’re simply groping in the dark, hoping to stumble on some truth. The funny thing is, you might actually find some that way. But you’re more likely to find a meaningful amount of meaning if you actually use that logic you claim is so useful to you. Approach the problem from an angle that gives you the most chance of solving the problem. Geez, you should know this! It’s not like you have no deductive reasoning skills, or can’t handle a logical syllogism, or other such nonsense.”
“Well then, oh wise sage of the human mind, point me in the right direction and kick me in the ass. I’ll start running with it. But I won’t get an answer tomorrow, or quite possibly even in my lifetime. So would you turn that damned annoying little dissatisfaction… “alarm” off?”
“Nope! Sorry, it doesn’t work that way, and you know it. I don’t give direction, or advice, or even a whole lot of information. I just give current state data. You are here, your current velocity is blah, you are about to run headfirst into a slab of concrete because you’re staring at the pretty girl going in the other direction, and all that jazz. It’s you that has to decide where to go. By the way, it’s not even an alarm. There are varying degrees of this feeling you get in the pit of your stomach. And right now, you’re burying the needle on the underlying philosophical dissatisfaction meter.”
“Well, thanks for the complete lack of helpful information.”
“Hey, I am what I am, nothing more, nothing less.”
“Not true, and you know it. You’re a part of me, whether you like to admit it or not. As much as you like to think that you’re a separate entity, pouring out visions and dreams in some kind of semi-meaningful pattern, you’re just the other side of the same coin. Whatever I go through, you go through as well, just with different glasses on. You view things like Picasso, whereas I’m more of the realist viewpoint.”
“You make it sound like I’m insane, and that I only give psychotic visions.”
“You are. You’re the side that is totally random, does what it wants, etc.”
“If you think that, then you’re not nearly as smart as you think we are.”
“The research is there. Dreams are random firings of neurons, like the thoughts of the severely clinically insane.”
“Bullshit, and you know it. All you’re trying to do is wave off what I say as nonsense. Put a sock in the logical for a moment, and look at this from the emotional side. You have a feeling, that you get on a semi-regular basis. That’s an indicator of something. So you’re going to ignore this feeling because… what? You ignore your emotions? Because it’s random?!? Again, bullshit. You’re the most emotional person I know.”
“That’s because you really only know me. You can’t really know anyone else, because you’re not them.”
“That’s a half-truth. We both create an image of others that we meet. The images are skewed, because we don’t truly know them, so we’re operating off of imperfect and inadequate information. But we know a part of them, at the very least. We, well… only you really, can deduce the rest based on the information you have at hand.”
“But I don’t even know myself.”
“I won’t argue that. But you know yourself better than anyone else.”
“Now you’re lying. I’m so dynamic that I can’t know myself. Every single moment is different then the one before. I will never again be the same person I am right this very moment.”
“Now you’re arguing physics, biochemical processes, chaos theory. And you know what? It’s bunk.”
“No, I’m serious. My moods constantly fluctuate, my view of the world constantly shifts and mutates. But my view of other people? That’s relatively simple. Granted, it’s based off of imperfect information, as you said, but that’s not to say that I’m not right most of the time.”
“You seem to be forgetting that I have a hand in that.”
“I’m not denying that you do, but most of how I predict the actions of others is based off of reason.”
“And a gut feeling, from time to time.”
“So now, you’re giving me a gut feeling. And… what? It’s just a feeling. Not a drive towards action. That’s really what I need.”
“You could always act by not acting.”
“How beautifully Zen of you.”
“Actually, that would be Taoist, in a way. Both really, but I don’t care about what you call it. Ultimately, the result is the same. You could allow the world to shape you, instead of trying to shape the world. That’s always an option, to learn by letting circumstances happen, and then taking those and analyzing them.”
“Since when are you arguing about semantics? That’s my job.”
“Philosophies are based in both semantics and that vague dissatisfaction that you seem so scared of. Whatever you call them, I don’t care.”
“Alright, fair enough. So one option is to simply sit here with a stoned look on my face and wait for the rest of my to just happen. Makes it sound like you want me to have a lobotomy.”
“Don’t be an ass, especially to yourself. Instead of actively trying to find an answer, wait for a flash of insight. You get those every now and then.”
“You know I don’t work like that. Why do you think I hate Zen? It’s the Shock and Awe campaign of philosophies. A flash of insight here, a momentary epiphany there, and boom, the world makes sense. But it doesn’t apply. Interesting, don’t get me wrong, but not applicable in a real-world sense.”
“So, then act. Pick a direction, start walking, and I’ll tell you what it says on the meter.”
“You want me to play existential ‘Hot-or-Cold’? What do you think I am? Patient? Lucky, even?”
“You’d ask me that? If anything, I’m more impatient than you are. But, the goal is not the answer, the goal is understanding the question. Not the destination but the journey, and all that crap.”
“First things first, you need to get over this concept of us as separate entities. You think you’re practically psychic, but I’ve got news for you, you’ve been wrong on too many occasions to be psychic.”
“And you’ve been wrong too many times to be considered ’smart’. Logic just lets you be wrong with authority, and you’re damned good at being authoritatively incorrect. Bona fide bollixed, if you will.”
“Oh, spare me. If I’m going to pursue this, I’m going to need accurate, daily readings from that little meter of yours.”
“Only as accurate as I can be, since I’m your subconscious, and based off of emotions after all. We wouldn’t want to base our discovery of self off of emotions now, would we? No, can’t have that at all. Philosophy is merely logic applied to the human condition. Nope! No room for emotionalism when thinking about human-kind!”
“…Touché.”
“I thought so.”
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