Or, the intoxicating nature of fantasy & escapism

I've been chasing shadows. Illusions.

Things I'd hoped were there but aren't.

Rather, I've built shadows and illusions into things that aren't real. There is, inevitably, a real thing which exists behind the shadow. Something which casts it and something which illuminates. So too are the illusions formed of real elements that surround me.

Yet, I misinterpret, like squinting my eyes to make sense of an ink blot on an otherwise empty page. Something is there, but abstract. Real but not all wrapped into one.

And so I've embarrassed myself by chasing a feeling I thought was there but cannot hope to be. Something I cannot grasp because it exists only in moments, spaced apart in time, scattered around the periphery of my vision.

I cannot hold it because it isn't mine to hold.

That's the trickery of illusions, of shadows. They can appear to be whatever you make of them, yet rarely do they turn out the way you expect in your mind.

As in the cave, one sees only the charade cast upon the wall and misses the world as it passes. I refuse to allow myself to be consumed by the allegory, by the fanciful and fake, and miss the reality which surrounds me. I must find a way to wrench myself loose of these intoxicating fantasies and accept the world I find myself a part of--for better or worse--because in the end it is the only home I'll ever know.

Such is the challenge presented to us by the modern world.

Oh, how easy it is to disappear into fantasy. I need only glance down at my phone for a moment and I can be transported far from whatever inconvenient truth I’m facing down, ferried away by an algorithm to a faraway destination that may help or hurt me, but will always serve as a good distraction.

Yet, the algorithm is not my friend. Neither is it yours.

In a similar vein, the overthinking that takes place behind my eyes, that flashes scenes of what could be, what I cling to, what I fear, what I dream of, is also intoxicating. It shows visions and realities too convenient to be true, and fulfills my deepest desires and fears in one simultaneous stroke of the pen.

Like the algorithm which binds us, overthinking, too, poisons our ability to see reality for what it is: neither good nor bad, owing us nothing, yet pushing relentlessly into the future.

Reality is a tricky thing, yet at once painfully simple.

You are just one person. As am I. While main characters in our own lives, a greater scene unfolds around us in which we may not even exist. A hard pill to swallow: to most of the life taking place around us, we are background characters at best.

But we must swallow this and accept it into ourselves. Because reality is, in the end, all we have. Perhaps that seems a bleak outlook, but it needn’t be. Instead it’s freedom diluted to a single idea. Because when you peel away the algorithm, the incessant 2am thoughts, your fears and worries and nervous energy, what’s left is stillness.

That’s what reality is: stillness.

Not because nothing happens, or goes wrong, but because reality is what is, and is none of what isn’t. Your fantasies, the illusions in which you wrap yourself, are meaningless against the power of reality. The disruptive ripples they create cease to matter. Instead, reality is stable and sturdy. Reality is the shore against which dreams crash.

I’m not saying don’t daydream. Stare at the clouds, imagine a future in which you’re fulfilled and happy and everyone’s smiling. Hell, imagine your most painful fears if you must.

Just, remember they’re just that: dreams and nightmares. They’re not real. Those things may never come to pass, and the only way to know is by living your life the best you can each and every day and accepting life as it comes at you.

I’ve been living in a house of shadows for too long, and though I love to watch them flicker and dance, they aren’t serving me.

Reality and I haven’t ever quite gotten along. We don’t see eye to eye, and I’ve been hurt a great deal on a great many occasions. Yet, I owe it to myself to let reality back in, to let it saturate me the way the warm sun saturates my skin when I lay beneath it.

It's time to burn away the shadows and accept what’s real. Otherwise, it’s all just fantasy. Just an endless beat of ripples cast into the distance without a shore upon which to land.

I’ve been living for a long time in such a delicate fantasy, and I’m grieving the loss of it. Perhaps you are, too. What’s on the other side, however, is something far greater. Something endless. It’s the shore of the world around you and me, beckoning us to come play in the sand.