yourbluehair

i have been thinking often as to how qualities like “good” and “bad” aspects of a person are defined and thought of. and how a person may become self aware of qualities “good” or “bad” for themselves.

i do think that if a person were to hypothetically exist in a single space, and live properly, they would never gain an understanding of qualities of “good” or “bad” about themselves. for example, being a kind person, or being forgiving, for good qualities. and for bad ones, say insecurities, or rudeness. almost all good or bad qualities too i think only come from the perception of others upon the self. there is no innate good or bad qualities besides ones that aid in survival and ones that dont: it is only whether the sociatal aspect of living determines if ones qualities are good or bad.

i think this interesting because it is the percetion of others that in fact defines, at least i think, ones percetion of themselves.

a person by default i dont think at least contains any self awareness about themselves. it is only the existence of others that forces one to be self aware as an attempt to socially adapt to what is around them.

for example, lets say a person is growing up around someone, say a father, who plays violin. that person will then interpret playing the violin as a quality of goodness. it will make their father like them more.

but lets say the person too is shamed by thier father at some point for say being too skinny. That person will then think, “i must be fat then”, and consider fat to be a good quality and skinny to be a bad quality.

it seems to me from a young age and primarily from parents perhaps that qualities of good or bad in regards to ones self perception begin.

if one exists in thier own space, they are nothing, it is only from the perception of others that they become a living thing. that is that they are judged.

There are many examples of this in a broader sense too. if someone is shaped physically different than others, they will feel ashamed of themselves. not because they were ashamed of themselves to begin with, but because they realize they do not look the same as other people around them.

i dont believe that things like shame and guilt are innate feelings. they are bred from people around them. thats because shame and guilt are from external things. you feel shame because of other people, and guilt because of other people.

but shame and guilt aid in love. love is simiarly a social feeling. shame and guilt are feelings that we feel to help get closer to love. if we feel shame for something we have done something wrong and we can not do it again, or else this person will stop loving me or i will not be accepted anymore by some group. guilt is the same. all feelings i think are ones to aid in maintaining a connection of love with one another. especially feelings like shame and guilt.

it is an aspect to being a human being that is really interesting to me and also comes off really complicated if you think about it.

it makes me wonder if you were to hypothetically remove the social aspects to living, what would be the true feelings left to a person? perhaps just ones for survival. things like fear, being cautious, et cetera. but then, is that a human being? a person is not just thier desire for love, but their feelings of guilt and shame.

there are many examples though in people of deep rooted convictions due to things done by parents or particuarly difficult life experiences in their childhood that had damaged them. in spite of one trying to get over those things later, it had dug deep and rooted itself in ones self perception, making them think: “because of what happened in the past, this thing that one said or thing one did, which had caused me guilt or shame, even if what they did was wrong, has become a deep rooted insecurity for me, and i will never be able to get over this in spite of the fact that i was misjudged and i did not deserve to feel guilt or shame at that moment, and it will stop me from being able to love and feel accepted by anyone and most importantly myself”

this is a fairly major theme in the script i have been thinking about a lot called confessions of a mask. the notes i make are of a similar style as to what this blog post is. my 150+ pages of notes are often me thinking of psychological aspects to the character i want to write, and also on japanese art history around WW2 and japanese culture around WW2, and of course many other things. i plan on working on the script again later this week. should be interesting to return to that.

the character is a homosexual and also has a lot of personal desires repressed. he also is fairly insecure in a lot of ways. one thing i noticed planning the script is that those insecurities and repressions can not just “exist” in the character. They must be established as a response to the environment around him. he represses because he is aware that he can not express these things. so early on in the script, it must be shown in scenes why he will, as he gets older, repress certain feelings and desires. i dont know if im making myself clear really here, but i understand what im trying to say so thats the most important part. his insecurites too can not just exist as character traits, they come out as a response to things that happen to him. before then, he is not insecure. i need to keep that in mind when writing out more psychological aspects to the main character.

sorry for any grammar mistakes…