Since childhood we are fed with ideas and notions of how to be and how not be and then there is Shakespeare’s hip shaking question of to be or not to be. Boxes were created on a mass level, a global level. These boxes were then distributed, we were taught to sit inside these boxes and live happily ever after. Our emotions were tailored, or actions and reactions too. Soon things got so mechanized that we stopped thinking.
Expectations turned into reality. We laugh when we are expected to, cry when we are expected to, brush our teeth and breed baby rabbits when we are expected to. Instead of winding our own individual clocks we became lazy and tuned our lives to what we saw and learned from the mass media. Newspapers, movies, TV series, magazines etc. became our gurus and unfortunately the worst ones became popular. Dare to swim against the tide? you will surely be ridiculed. “Don’t you drink alcohol?” is a frequent question that people ask non- drinkers. Drinking has now become a personality trait. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with drinking responsibly. But the question being asked implies that alcohol is as essential to human existence as water is. Sorry to burst your bubble, but it is not true.
Alcohol is just one of the examples. Our behaviours too are manufactured. What we say, eat, where we go, when we go, what we wear once we get there all of it is taught to us as the definition of COOL. Yes it is cool to be a rebel, but rebels too have responsibilities. Rebellion is not a synonym for stupidity.
We were born with a clean slate, just like Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story. Then he was fed with a standard program with a set of do’s and don’t s. No one liked Buzz Lightyear when he was in ‘Demo mode’. Buzz Lightyear in ‘Demo mode’ meant Buzz Lightyear ‘The jerk’. In Toy Story 3 when Lotso and his lot switch Buzz’s settings from ‘Manual mode’ to ‘Demo mode’ he starts acting like an idiot. Then all his friends switch him back to ‘Manual mode’, once again restoring his friendly, caring self. It is in ‘Manual Mode’ that Buzz has the power to think for himself and the people he cares about. It is ‘Manual Mode’ that makes Buzz who he is.
So turn off your ‘Demo mode’ and switch on your ‘Manual Mode’.
Think about it.
Swathy Tantry 