You are walking the city, with a friend. You’re having some kind of conversation. When they pose an idea, or ask a question, you respond. Over the course of our lives, we humans develop a set of social habits about how we act and what we say. It would seem that the eventual goal is to do, and say, everything right. Never hurt someone with your words, with your actions. It’s a noble goal.
But for every good social habit, for every good aspect of your personality, there is a flaw. And it is the contrast between our perfections and our flaws that define us. If we were all perfect, there would be nothing to separate us. There would be nothing to see in each other, except reflections. It is because we, each of us, have different sets of contrasting flaws and goods that we are even able to define the two.
If nobody was flawed, you wouldn’t have anything to say to your friend, walking the city. You’d know their every response to you, and they’d know your every response to them. But because we are flawed, separate, you know one thing, and one thing only, about what they will say. You know it will surprise you, and make you happy.
We make mistakes, of course. When talking in person, whatever comes out of your mouth is final. You can’t truly take it back. Even if you immediately regretted it. This might seem bad, but take comfort in the fact that whatever you said, is you. It came from you. It’s what you ‘would say’. When you said that, you weren’t hiding anything about yourself. With this knowledge, you can change yourself, into someone who wouldn’t say that. It doesn’t have to be a massive, fundamental change. Just a small tweak.
As time passes, this process lets us become who we want to be. We build the goods we like, and take on the flaws we mind least. But in this day and age, we have found a method to bypass this, to avoid shaping ourselves. That method is the internet. Online, you can perfect what you want to say. Consider it over and over. And finally, when you think it’s perfect, you can send it.
Often, the people we choose as our closest friends are the ones with flaws and goods opposite of our own. Because when we’re with those people, we are interacting with all of the goods we don’t have. When you’re in a place where you don’t know the right thing to do, they do. And when they don’t know what to do, you do.
When we first notice people like this, we naturally want to talk to them. To get to know them. But so many people choose to do this online. They send messages, perfected, edited, to try to make the best first impression possible. This is a grave error, because when you hide your flaws, you are hiding your goods. They have no way of knowing what actually defines you. They have no way of realizing that you are synchronous with them.
They might see this ‘perfect’ projection of you, and do the same with themselves. You won’t see the things that initially interested you anymore. Your interactions will become games of making the perfect impression. And eventually, you will know their every response to you. They will know your every response to them. And you will have nothing to say.