Authors and Playwrites

[Golden Applesauce]

This bit of insight came from an anime episode, of all places.

So anyway, the character in the anime explains that life is a story.  Life starts when a person can distinguish himself from the environment, and from that point on people live not in reality but in a story loosely based on reality, with themselves as the main character.  The problem with this is that the world is fundamentally indifferent to people, and therefore people have conflict when they have to adjust the world so that it fits their story of themselves as an important character.  The way out of this trap, the character says, is to regard yourself neither as a main character or a supporting character, but as the Author.

Thoughts?
And how would one go about adopting the Author archetype, anyway?

[BADGE OF HONOR]

Isn't that just solipsism?

[Jasper]

It sounds like self help talk, which generally turns my stomach.

[Abramelin]

I find this an interesting thought

It doesn't look like solipism for me, although it's near that. It doesn't say that everything out their is only you imagination, it says that your view is influenced and changed, the things are changed for you just because you think about them.
I agree to that.

The Author... maybe it means that you're acting and not only reacting (on enviroment and/or your feelings) ?

[the last yatto]

theres been two movies around this concept of breaking the third plane, one is coming out soon with Adam Sander about dreams coming true (Bedtime Stories). and there was another one where this lady was writting a book that some one paradox was this others guys real life (forget the name)


maybe this could be the Gonzo outlook of life?

[LMNO]

I find this an interesting thought

It doesn't look like solipism for me, although it's near that. It doesn't say that everything out their is only you imagination, it says that your view is influenced and changed, the things are changed for you just because you think about them.I agree to that.

The Author... maybe it means that you're acting and not only reacting (on enviroment and/or your feelings) ?

That reeks of THE SECRET®.

[Golden Applesauce]

It reminded me a lot of the BIP concept.  The statements "Don't be a character in your story, be the author!" and "Don't be a prisoner in your cell, be your own warden!" seem to have a lot of similarities.  Just thought that a different take on the old metaphor might yield some new insights.

[LMNO]

Your cell is internal.  The bars are physical and psychological limitations of your own perceptions and thoughts.


Changing your bars doesn't change experiential reality.  At least, not in the way you're implying.

[Orion]

What IS the author archetype anyway?
Surely it's more like narrating what's in front of you,
but it seems to imply that they are changing the world in front of them.

Although I guess just people watching you can write a lot of stories and be the author of their lives.
Unless you wanted something ridiculous in your story and decide that 'that man' was actually a dinosaur in disguise and that within a few seconds he will be chased by the anti-dinosaurs police squad.

[Verbal Mike]

This is interesting because it coincides with something I have been thinking about in the past few years. At some point I realized that true stories feel very different in retrospect from how it actually is to live through them... And this made me start trying to experience my life as a story... Sometimes this is an interesting perspective that can maintain morale during hard times... I just find myself thinking what a great story this will all make, and that somehow makes it more worthwhile to me (as an author-wannabe.)

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I think this is a worthwhile view... and I think it may be very much like the BiP. While LMNO is correct, the BiP focuses mostly on the internal state of the individual, their perceptions and beliefs. However, thats what I perceived the OP as discussing as well, we perceive a reality that is based loosely on the Really Real Reality, with ourselves as the Main Character (We perceive reality through the Bars of our BiP, with ourselvess as the Prisoner).

The idea of Author, or Warden or my personal view of manipulating how we feel about the constraints in our perception and biology all seem to be similar to me. That is, by taking control of your Prison, or Story, or Black Iron Prison(/Golden Sphere of Possibility/Silver Spaceship of Exploration/Yellow Submarine of Introspection/Whatever) you can modify how you perceive reality... As Warden of your BiP, or Author of a third person story, or the Interpreter of your constraints, you interact with a different perception of Reality.

That doesn't mean its any more or less real that what you perceived before, just that its different and perhaps less darkly seen.

I think.

[LMNO]

Ok, that I can get behind: An existence that's more active (writing the story), and less passive (reading the story).

[Golden Applesauce]

Something from a totally different angle:

Have you ever solved chess problems?  Chess problems are solitaire chess, with the board set in a specific (and often highly unusual position,) and the player solves the problem by forcing either an outright win, or just a huge swing in his favor.  (E.g., white to mate in two, black to win a rook and a bishop in four, etc.)  Most of the time, the board is set up so that it initially looks like the player is losing, and extremely creative (or outright bizarre) moves are required to turn the tables.

Here's the weird thing.  When you set up a problem in front of a good chess player, they are usually able to solve it and win the game.  If the position occurs naturally in a game, the odds are much lower that the player will recognize that a bizarre and unorthodox strategy will even be able to win the game, much less identify it.  When they do, however, the game is the stuff of legends.  It's now a story about the time Grandmaster Collier went from being behind three major pieces behind to forcing a win - by sacking his last rook and finagling a forced mate out of two pawns and a knight.

The difference, I think, is that when the player identifies the game as a puzzle that may be solved, he approaches the situation differently than as a game in which he is behind in board position.  The reality is the same in either case, but by the player changing his orientation to the game, he can find different courses of action.

In the same way, could approaching life as a story, in which the extraordinary is par for the course, affect the way one acts?  Could approaching life as a story of which you are the author affect the way one acts still differently?

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Ok, that I can get behind: An existence that's more active (writing the story), and less passive (reading the story).

True enough!

Or, we could consider it in a model agnostic light... we can perceive ourselves as the Protaganist and see reality from that perspective, or we could see it from the perceptions of a side character, or the Author (detached and in third person).

I wouldn't argue that any of those positions are best, but it might be really useful to cycle through them... IN SOME SENSE

(Goddess, I'm parodying myself now)

[Golden Applesauce]

Ok, that I can get behind: An existence that's more active (writing the story), and less passive (reading the story).

True enough!

Or, we could consider it in a model agnostic light... we can perceive ourselves as the Protaganist and see reality from that perspective, or we could see it from the perceptions of a side character, or the Author (detached and in third person).

I wouldn't argue that any of those positions are best, but it might be really useful to cycle through them... IN SOME SENSE

(Goddess, I'm parodying myself now)

I've definitely noticed that I'm a lot more aggressive than normal when I work from the perspective of the hero, and a lot more likely to say/do totally bizarre shit when I view myself as a side character to someone else.