September 29, 2005

The Mask

Every one seems to be wearing masks these days. I just had a class called Business Dynamics wherein we were talking about Corporate Masking. This is a concept where the employees put on a mask to seem desirable to the company. With the exception of a select few, this I think would agree to most of us. We are different people when we are among different people. A subordinate to the boss, a colleague to our coworkers, a friend to our friends, a child to our parents and the list is endless. The question that arises is who we really are? Are we the docile subordinate, are we the affable friend who can be counted upon for any emergency, or are we an enigma, unknown to no one?
After some time of wearing the mask, how can we differentiate between who is the mask and who we are? The time that we spend in the mask becomes more and more and finally there shall come a time when we are what the mask says we are.
Is it not possible to remain who we are, to preserve our identity and live life the way that we want it to be? That requires a higher level of self integrity than humanly possible. There are a lot of restrictions that are placed on a human being by society. The demands that are placed on him require that he wears masks.
In the words of Ayn Rand “Only man is an end to himself”. It becomes the utmost duty of each man to satisfy his needs. He must learn to place himself before anything else and then will he attain what Maslow may have talked about as self actualization. May be one day we will actually see who we actually are. The day that the masks fall off, I hope that each one of us has the strength to face what we have become and that we spare a thought for what we may have become.
29.09.05

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hmm.. quite an interesting Q.. "Man as an end to himself" is pretty true.. and that is ur answer.. be it a mask or not.. it always protects the real you.. the mask is real real important.. it clothes you from the harsh stupidity of the outside world.. Everyone wears his own mask only to save his identity.. the real one..

The Ignoramus said...

Interesting...coz the last few lines in your first blog says something else.

Anonymous said...

hey adi!
that was real kewl! and as for the masks, u were quite true! but dont u think,the masks are sometimes acceptable than the naked face,and that the truth being so bitter, the mask becomes our way of life!!!

Anonymous said...

Hi! Adi, I really liked your blog. Your articles speak a lot.Looks like there's lot of self-introspection going on,which is really good.
As for the article masks,i completely agree with you that we all need to remove the mask and learn to face life without our masks.This i feel makes us strong from inside and outside.

Anonymous said...

Hey Adi, I thk it's better to be a "Roman" in Rome than being a "Whatever(Ur favourite word)" in "Rome"..

Anonymous said...

mask...it's the opinion of observer ...for the person inside it ..need not be ....say it cud be helmat ...it ll also look like a mask right...a protection against dangerous things in the world ,which can crack his head...

coming to ayn rand
"Only man is an end to himself"...

ok..let it be...
Ayn rand stories are fictions.
NO roark..or dagny Galt exists in this world...they won't survive to live in this world....coz they lost their helemts by birth...
such species are not selected by nature to be fit to live...

any human can understand that there is something more han logical things in the world.
ayn rand is not at all complete by itself....its only a part of human tendancy...there are a lot of such human tendancies...and every man is mixture of all.ssome part dominates ...we can't leave the part that does not dominate coz they may do so over time...

this is what I feel.

Anonymous said...

Looks like you are an expert in this field, you really got some great points there, thanks.

- Robson