There was a television show some years back called The Peripheral. In the show, there were technological avatars called peripherals that a human host could inhabit and control via a VR headset.
What was interesting though was that when the human host was disconnected from the peripheral, an internal program within the peripheral would take over and control it, providing basic functionality for safety and security of the device.
What I find interesting about this is how it relates to how our ego’s function in a similar way. In effect, when we’re not consciously aware and detached from the moment, it’s like we’re not connected and thus our ego takes over automatically.
Within my Life is a Role-Playing Game framework, this is understood by seeing your ego as your avatar or “ character” that you as a “player” are playing. So your identity is not really you. It’s just a character you as a player are playing.
Why is this important?
Because we can become trapped and caged in our programming.
For example, societal programming is effectively a Socialized Mind. It is a script or program defined by society that was encoded in you as you grew up to keep you safe and secure. It also helped you have a sense of belonging and eventually a sense of self-esteem, especially in your work.
When a person shifts to a Self-Authoring Mind, they are learning to unlearn and relearn (i.e. Alvin Toffler) by recoding themselves. They do this by going beyond fitting into to survive and beginning to step out and thrive. This requires understanding oneself at a deeper level, figuring out what you want out of life versus what society expects and wants out of you.
This is why I’ve always said that the future isn’t about learning how to code but about learning how to recode yourself (which embodies what Alvin Toffler meant about unlearning).
But here’s the issue. Even when we recode ourselves, we can still get trapped in our own encoding, especially because it is our own “self-authored” coding.
But if it’s our coding, what’s the problem?
It’s because it’s an interpretation of who we want to be at a point in time. And that sense of who we want to be can change over time but our scripts may not because we’ve become so immersed within them that we believe they are us, even though they aren’t.
Here’s an example of what I mean.
I’ve had moments recently where I’ve become fully aware of myself as a “character” because I keep repeating these reactive or responsive self-authored scripts of doing things in life automatically because they’re familiar and comforting, perhaps even nostalgic and heartwarming at times.
So it’s like I’m stepping out of my “self” as a “character” and I’m seeing these scripts from a “player’s” perspective as something I’m stuck within. And I’m tired of these scripts, the repetition of them because they feel restricting. In effect, it feels like I’m on autopilot and just calling in my life versus actually be consciously aware and immersed in the experience of the moment.
This is effectively the NPC aspect of yourself that is similar to the autonomous program that protects the peripheral avatar in The Peripheral television show when the human host isn’t within it. It’s helpful. But it can get between you and your ability to experience life fully.
So I’ve been thinking about this and I asked myself the question, “How could I step past this automatic programming and scripts that I’ve created for my ‘self’?” And it dawned on me that I just need to be consciously aware that they exist.
So every morning, it would be like waking up and thanking your ego as your “character” that it is keeping you safe but also telling it that you as the “player” are fully aware and here now to take over the experience.
In other words, it would be like saying, “Thanks, I’ve got this. You don’t need to do anything at the moment. Just let me be for now, until I need you later.”