This post is a response to a question initially posed on Quora, and can also be accessed via “https://www.quora.com/Is-it-okay-to-be-different-and-not-be-like-everybody-else/answer/Antonio-Amaral-1“
Got news for you… you ARE different.
You may think similarly to many others.
You may like similar things.
You may do similar things.
You may believe similar things.
You may be so similar in so many ways that it’s hard to differentiate your identity from the group identity you are affiliated with, but you are different.
You don’t have any choice in the matter because you see through your own eyes, hear through your ears, think with your mind, and have different experiences, even if your experiences are defined by strict adherence to a group protocol.
You are different because no one else can live your life. Your experiences, thoughts, and feelings are irreplaceable, making you a unique and significant individual.
You can share as many details of your life, thoughts, beliefs, ideas, and dreams as you want, as much as anyone else is willing to tolerate, but they will never know life through your eyes.
Here is an example of how different individual perspectives are through an issue that went viral about a decade ago. It was a photograph of a dress which, dependent upon the context of one’s biological composition of rods and cones in their eyes, their state of mind, and the lighting in the room at the time of examining this photo, people would see either a black and blue dress or a white and gold dress.
Physically, psychologically, geographically, and within the context of your environment, you ARE different. You cannot help but be different.
You should acknowledge and embrace that fact about yourself and the human condition before deciding how much you might want to be like everyone else.
Wanting to be like everyone else is a generally healthy desire to feel like one belongs somewhere, that they have a place in this world, a community, and a family that supports their existence and accepts them for who they are as they are.
Belongingness is a crucial component of a healthy psychology. Belongingness is a fundamental need we all share in different ways.
We have survived and prospered as a species because we are interdependent beings. We rely on our community bonds to achieve our potential. When we work together, we can accomplish miracles through a force multiplier called “synergy.”
To this degree, wanting to be like “everyone else” can be a healthy motivator to fit in with one’s community and explore one’s unique contributions to achieve one’s potential through support from one’s community.
The downside to being “like everyone else” is to subsume one’s identity to the group and lose one’s sense of identity. The negative consequences are many, varied, and often horrifying, as we have been exposed to numerous nightmares arising out of toxic conformism to a group’s identity and mandates.
Ranging from the inculcated fears of communism that hyper-capitalists invoke as their favourite boogeyman of doom to the cyanide-infused Flavour-Aid victims of cult conditioning, we have all been exposed to the inherent danger of toxic conformism.
Human societies and groups have all evolved along a vector resulting from the conflicts we’ve experienced between two oppositional poles in our thinking about which is the preferred option for a social contract — independence versus conformity.
Neither in their pure form is healthy for any society or group.
The major problem with wanting to be like everyone else is that you can’t be like everyone else precisely because you can’t know what everyone is like beyond the superficial characteristics you identify that make them appear similar to your perceptions.
Your unique perspective identifies similarities unique to your viewpoint. All your efforts to be like everyone else are attempts to be what you imagine everyone else in your group is like.
It’s a subjective approximation of what you perceive as reality, not an objective representation. It can’t be because everyone is just as unique as you.
No matter how hard you try to be like everyone else, you will fail because there is no “everyone else” outside the confines of your imagination. You may even associate yourself with large groups where everyone agrees that everyone else is like them. The reality is that they’re just agreeing with themselves and validating their bias with people who validate their own by acknowledging others who express a similar bias.
It’s a rabbit hole of agreement in which the similarities are no more profound than wearing similar clothing.
The worst part of all of the effort to be like what one imagines of everyone else is that one loses sight of one’s own identity, unique nature, unique path in life, and the unique nature of one’s potential contributions to the world.
It’s almost a paradox in which the more solidarity humanity can achieve, the more we all benefit from the synergy of united effort. At the same time, the more homogenized we become as individuals, subsuming ourselves into a group, the more exposed we are to decay and threat by systemic collapse.
As in all things, the answer to your question is that it is much better to consider this:
There is light within dark and dark within light. While acknowledging this, one arrives at the most crucial understanding of the nature of dichotomies: neither one nor the other is superior — or can even exist without the other because they both exist as a dynamic.
In essence, the best way to be okay is by finding a balance between the two that work best for your unique you.
Temet Nosce
thotbag 