Facing who we really are

#5 Ideas on a page

Welcome to the Ideas on a page column, the premium section of Wait! Just Listen, on ways we create and express ideas in long-form. It is a space where I share my personal notes on ideation and writing, that I’ve cobbled together through the past decade and a half as a writer and academic. Think of it as a melting pot of literary ruminations distilled into short actionable essays.

If you are new, jump into the archives with a cup of tea (or coffee) in hand.

Subscribe below for either the paid or free plan if you haven’t already. Your support is invaluable in ensuring the continuance of this humble handcrafted literary project.

---

By Skyaliens

The digital media age is one of paradoxes.

Technological advancements in the last decade have turned us into avid documentarians with the ability to capture even the most irrelevant aspects of our everyday lives, from bed-hair selfies to random snaps of our dinner. We generously refer to these creations as ‘content’. And with the aid of some algorithmic magic dust, a selection of these ‘slice-of-life’ images and videos find their way into the feeds of specific audience communities.

Whilst these candid reproductions of our lives are frozen in time, maybe even for posterity to reflect upon, they are, despite their granular focus, fragmentary and discontinuous snippets, far from a complete and cohesive portrait of a person.

One would imagine that historians of future generations, maybe a 100 years from now, will be graced with countless reams of visual meta-data. They would be faced with a perpetually contradictory and incomplete stream of narratives, that reinforce just how mind-bogglingly complex personhood is to make sense of.

Through our obsession with carefully curating snippets of our lives, there is a strange sense of comfort in knowing that our ‘complete selves’ will never truly be summoned for the world to see - a mercy that saves us from the tyranny of a final verdict on who we are.

But is this really a good thing?