Robert posts an entry on his Livejournal, a collection, really, of blog posts from his MySpace account. In one, he talks about identity and introspection:

An example: I have a friend who has way too much free time and ends up participationg in the game of self introspection multiple times a day. Now, dont get me wrong i think that self introspection and realization are great things. In certain doses. Well this person is constantly reinventing himself. When i say constantly i mean every 6 months. And i mean drastic reinvention. Moving to forign countries for 3months reinvention. I, personally, dont think that is healthy.

Which gets me thinking.

At a certain point, the ‘constant reinvention of identity’ becomes your identity. We all have continuity in our lives, even if that continuity consists (paradoxically) of change. David Bowie is the perfect example—is he a specific character, Ziggy Stardust, or is he the procession of characters over his career?

Or think, analogously, of the American government. Is the American government any given politician, of any given year? Any specific law? Or is it a series of decision making processes, a set of traditions?

We’re far more comfortable with institutions being the dynamic results of inbuilt processes and perceptions. We expect more stability from individual human beings—they’re supposed to keep the same processes and perceptions, yes, but we also expect them to keep the same clothes and address, or else it freaks us out.

I’m not precisely sure who you’re talking about—it sounds like it could be me. Certainly I get rather introspective, rather often. But it might not be. So I’m going to speak in the abstract.

Your friend’s efforts at change might only breaks from my past inasmuch as he (or she) is dissatisfied with substandard previous performance. They’re all a grasping towards the same future that they’ve always been moving towards. If they seem like random moves, that’s only because you haven’t seen (or don’t believe in) in the overall goal the person is working for.

On the other hand, maybe your friend really doesn’t know what he or she wants out of life; and rather than stagnate, they choose to move in sudden and dramatic ways. This process only becomes more dramatic as we get older. More and more of your friend’s friends have seem to have found a stable niche; a cozy corner to rest in; some ideas and a more permanent sense of purpose. Their stability serves to throw your Reinventing Friend’s search into sharper relief. As that subtle pressure grows, from the stable friends, to be stable, the Reinventing Friend takes ever more dramatic steps to try and find an anchor that will hold him or her.

Of course, then again, it could be just chemicals.

The only thing better than recreating something one of your sci-fi idols has done, is for him to recreate something you’ve done.

Several years ago, I made some friends stop off the highway so I could take this picture.

Now Bruce Sterling has made that act even more totally worth it.

The wealth and nature of comments on my short dialectical series of posts—Thesis, Antithesis, and Synthesis— compels me to make a few clarifications:

One. None of these posts should have been read outside their context; the three entries are inextricably linked, and the most noisome comments that have been directed towards me in relation to them have, it seems, been a result of doing so.

Two. Thesis and Antithesis are not, strictly speaking, my ideas. They are rephrasings, and small expansions, of comments left by two readers of this site. I thought each contained a kernel of truth, which leads me to

Three. My ideas on the matter, such as they are, are summed up in the accurately labeled Synthesis. For the record, the “race” seems to me only worth running only if you are primarily competing against yourself.

There’s no surer sign of mental decay than that desire you’ve been having lately, to feel unique. You just haven’t thought things through. Let me explain.

It’s easy, these days, you know, to feel like you belong. Our unprecedented access to information, the ease with which we can connect to others, the multiplicity of viewpoints which we can experience—it’s never been simpler to find someone who shares your interests and desires, or your fears and your enemies. Someone that understands you, that really connects with your soul, you may have gone a lifetime without knowing before, but now, they’re just a click away.

But you know, the modern world, in providing us with these thousand wonderful developments—in doing so it has produced a cornucopia of methods by which to discover the next logical step. Mass produced mediums broadcast the inescapable conclusion; a million blogs whisper into the ether the unavoidable realization, the one that’s been weighing on your mind:

You’re not very special.

No, really, you’re not.

But let’s face facts. You were never very special. Your cog is just one part in the six billion strong human machine. Maybe before modern times, it was easy to ignore this—because you never came in contact with those other six billion. And maybe before these last few years of your life, the idea was easy to ignore for the same reason. But now you’re an infojunkie, plugged in, wired up, and you know all about Them. All of Them. The seething, unwashed Them that comprise the world and in their tremendous aggregatation, make you feel, just a little more strongly, totally and completely generic. Even in this you aren’t alone, and you know it.

We both know that when a country tries extra hard to assert its identity, it’s because it doesn’t really have one. Oh, you can give me that saw, about the fact that no one has the precise combination of CDs you have, no one’s read all the books you have, no one’s had the same experiences you’ve had—but we both know that’s a crock. Someone else, out there, has listened to, or read, or done the same things you have; and they probably did it better. And that unique perceptual filter idea? It’s like there’s a big bag of jelly beans we all share; you might eat them in a different order, but they’re the same damn beans. Establishing identity like this is precisely like winning the special olympics. Geez, I’m proud of you.

I’m sure it won’t comfort you to find out that what you’re going through is pretty common. You remember Kurt sang about it. It’s all a matter of your expectations. See, you went through a lot of your life—probably most of it—with the idea, constantly reinforced, that you had something other people didn’t. Maybe you were the smartest, or the most talented, or the strongest at your high school; and people—your parents, your teachers, your friends, your girlfriend—they told you just that.

But now you’re in the real world. The world where’s there’s 21,500 high schools in the USA, and every single one of them has a senior class vote two people as “most unique.” And they do this Every Year.

Are you ready for the cliche? You were a big fish in a little pond. A pond smaller than you even imagined, back then. And now you’re finding out that you matter even less than you thought you would.

So what’s the answer? Geez, I should hit you. Maybe that would make you snap out of this. The answer, as you already know, is simple, as simple or simpler than the idea that’s got you down:

Originality is not a moral virtue.

Oh, it’s something people tend to like, that’s for sure. Novelty always wins crowds. But if I remember right, you never wanted to be popular. You just wanted to do the right thing. Very conformist of you—conforming to an idea, that is. And if that idea takes you someplace others go too, well, alright, and if it doesn’t—there’s your uniqueness. Just wanting to feel special, that doesn’t make it happen. Ask Canada. This is the mental—and moral—decay I mentioned at the beginning. Get over yourself, and get thinking again. Big pond, little pond, it shouldn’t matter. Swim where you should. Swim like there’s no pond at all.