Let's Pretend We're Not Competing.

That will be the goal: That we're not competing with each other, and internally, with ourselves.  That we don't care, because somehow, deeper down, our urge to care is something we're nervous about.

We'd rather, perhaps, stay detached and aloof, or reclusive and drunk, you know, I know, and we're walking around with bullhorns, third-eyes that scream out with ferocity at the minutest of interactions.

Because we're scared, deeper down, of communicating with someone and having our message actually conveyed. It is better not to engage and somehow not be pegged into a number, into a boxed reality that can be compared to other boxes.  Better to "stay out of the system," that is, to pretend.  Better to pretend.  And while we pretend, everyone else pretends.  Except for those willing to engage overtly, who we immediately scorn and judge for reducing themselves.

And when we pretend and those others don't, the cruel fact is that those others will have advantages over us, and have more access to the things that we, deep down, actually think might make us happy, were we "given a chance" to acquire them.  If not for all the assholes out there ruining everything, right?  Right.

The trick, it seems, is not to pretend we're not all assholes sometimes, and not use excuses to keep you from getting what you want.  Otherwise, you know, we have to face the fact that we might not want what we say we want, and instead, simply want to label all of the other people--that is: the convenience of ignoring reality simply becomes reality, and the reality we tell ourselves becomes delusion.