Cargo Cult Reality

When you start to recognize character traits in people, don't think about it too hard. You start to see this plateau of the collective human. In the fruitless endeavor to be 'average', or 'normal' or whatever label you'd like to put on the lowest common denominator, there's a lot of potential left by the wayside that has the capability to seriously depress you.

Like building a shell that looks like an airplane out of bamboo and vines, expecting it to fly, people build these lives that appear to be what they think a life is supposed to look like from the outside, but with no useful substance inside. It wouldn't be a problem if there were others around saying, "Hey, that won't fly," but that's not what happens. Everyone is building these false-fronts of reality. Meanwhile, as they imagine themselves to be about to take some impossible flight, they let the real world decay around them.

There's nothing wrong with imagining you can do something extraordinary. That's what we should be doing. Instead, we spend all of our time building useless facades.

Don't think about it too hard. You'll start seeing all the bamboo and vines. Heck, maybe you like bamboo and vines. What do I know?