What I am about to tell you might shock you and even make you a little angry. Most will not believe me and refuse to except this fate that we have created for ourselves, but it is happening and will inevitably destroy the Human Race if we do not stop it. We are entering into The Age of Narcissism. If we do not prevent this age from furthering, our humanity will cease to exist. Let me explain:
The basic story of Narcissus is about a mythical character who falls in love with the reflection of himself not realizing that it is only an image. He is so in love with the image that he can’t leave the sight of it and dies. The part of this story that I want to pick out and elaborate on is the pond that Narcissus sees his reflection in. The progression of the pond is what has sent us into this new age. The pond became a mirror, the mirror became a photograph, the photograph became a video, the video became movies and television, movies and television became the Internet, and now the pond has become Facebook, Youtube and Twitter. In the times of mythology a man would go without seeing his reflection for a long time. Today we not only see the reflection of our body multiple times a day, we see the reflection of our lives almost constantly. The pond has become so vast that there is no way we cannot see our reflections. By putting our pictures, videos, and statuses up on our Facebook profiles we have externalized our humanity into something that is not real. We are falling in love with the image of our lives rather than falling in love with our actual lives. The lives that we have created on Facebook, Youtube and Twitter are becoming more real than the lives we are actually living, and just like Narcissus, we will all inevitably destroy ourselves by destroying our humanity. Welcome to The Age of Narcissisim.
Now if that did not shock you, this will. I am Narcissus. Yes, I said it, I am Narcissus and I have already destroyed myself.
After I found out I was a part of the world, I had a shocking realization. For you to understand that realization, I have to bring in another reference to a movie that most of you have seen. Fight Club. I had the exact same realization that Edward Norton had when he realized that Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) was actually himself. I witnessed the split between the image of myself and my actual self. I realized that the person I saw in the mirror was not me. I was me.
I was Narcissus.
(to be continued)
Bassnectar – Timestretch - Put on your headphones, bump this loud and you too might have a realization.
