‘But you are happy. It’s your birthday.’
In a recent discussion on the lost self, philosopher Alain de Botton talks about the moments in childhood where our feelings are overwritten by an external script. We are told how we feel, what we want, and who we are, until we are utterly alienated from our own truest thoughts. He calls the later part of life an archaeological excavation, a slow unspooling of someone else’s layers.
However, the unspooling he refers to is not an innate part of our evolution. Much of our script will remain intact and will indeed, stay buried. We may be unaware that it can be rewritten, or it may be just too frightening to examine.
If you do return to the rooms of your past, do you graciously accept the curated story or, do you look for what’s hiding beneath the dust?
Artwork: Mothballs and Missed Birthdays | mixed media
Audio: Original atmospheric soundscape created in Suno.
Series: Secrets, Lies & Liberation
To follow the unravelling of the inherited script
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