Nineteen

Victims of Conformity 2:
(click here for part 1)

Then there are those who want to fit in with a certain group of people because they want to experience the sort of attention that particular group receives. The problem is that those people are trying to fit into a group that they don’t belong to, they’re not qualified for it, and it doesn’t even match their personality that the result is a confused pretender. These pretenders do certain activities just so they can talk about doing it and hope to be accepted by a certain social group. For example, a pretender would go spend money to watch a basketball game, not because he/she enjoys the sport at all, but just so he/she can go back to their friends (some of which are genuinely into basketball) and talk/brag to them about their experience. In reality, the pretender is forcing the basketball game experience onto themselves in hope of developing a passion for it, artificially. What’s more, when the pretender starts talking about their new experience in this field, they talk in a way that makes it sound as if everyone else is completely deprived of such an experience. These pretenders are none more than victims of conformity. Their personality lacks the appeal of uniqueness, their actions have no real motive or reward besides having the opportunity to talk about them. They also tend to be judgmental towards people with real talents and who receive attention they deserve. The pretenders have this idea that if people don’t talk about what they do, they probably don’t do it. For example, based on their reasoning (or lack of for that matter), if I do not talk about how I gave money to charity, then I didn’t do such a thing. This is because they are used to talking about everything they do and hope to receive attention for doing so. Many of their judgments are based on inaccurate assumptions, manufactured by limited views of life.
So how do I feel about those victims? Well, I don’t feel much and I don’t let my ego be touched by their poor judgments. When I achieve, I do not pull up a banner and blow horns in celebration. If you overrate yourself and give yourself too much credit, you’re not leaving much room for people to credit you.
Oh so you got yourself a date? Good job, now go and puzzle out which face you’ll put on for the night.