picture in my mind

Recently, amidst our endless rabbit-hole-type discussions,

E and I talked about the red pill vs. blue pill analogy iconized by the Matrix movie:

I still remember the day I watched this when I was 12. It didn't help that Keanu already had a place in my heart heeeee (he was my first crush since Speed the movie). I was enraptured by the movie; everything about it: the story, the special effects, the characters... and I like to think, the depth of the themes in the plot somehow seeped into my young mind even then too. It remains one of my favourite films to this day.


"This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill -- the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill -- you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Remember: all I'm offering is the truth. Nothing more."

We all like to think we want to know the truth; until we've seen it. Then maybe we wished we could have remained happily ignorant again. Because once you've woken up, the work starts. And dang it, it's so hard. It's so hard. And wrought with endless pain, it seems. And no matter what, there's no going back and wishing you had taken the blue pill instead. This is an analogy for many things in life. But one of the biggest is depicted in the movie itself too: if you have woken up and understood the futility of the way a system works in your life, can you make yourself go back to functioning within the system without a care in the world? If you're smart enough to understand and see how horrid certain things are in this world, can you close your eyes and pretend it doesn't exist? Do you envy the endless bevy of happy, blissful people who are enjoying and partaking of that empty system? Do you wish you could be one of them?

There have been many days, particularly the ones I probably lacked sleep, when I wished I could drink a potion or something, to forget, to erase, and not having to know or have known something or several things that upended my life. In particular, I remember The Draco Trilogy by Cassandra Clare, when Ginny asked Hermione to help concoct a love potion for her -- then Hermione was all, "It's illegal! You can't use it on Draco to make him love you!" Ginny was damn pissed because of course she knew that; she meant the love potion for herself. It's not illegal to administer a love potion to yourself. She wanted to take a love potion to make herself love Seamus instead, and make it all easy and dandy. No complications. I wish I could take a love potion, set my eyes on some random dude, and then be done with the whole thing and please all the necessary SJ people of the world, and not have to grapple with all my inner turmoil.

In fact, isn't this why people take drugs in general.
To numb the pain of life.

Okay, I'm going to climb out of the rabbit hole and get back to work now.
(There are a gazillion reports I can't seem to finish.)
And pretend the rabbit hole doesn't even exist. Go, SJs!