Uno, Nessuno e Centomila is the original, italian title of the last novel by the italian author Luigi Pirandello (see the Wikipedia english page on the title). I’m not really sure if I got in contact with title, in Portuguese (Um, ninguém e cem mil), in Ansião (the vilage I studied and grow in), or if someone gave me this book when I was in the hospital, more than half my live so far ago.
But this post is not about the One, nor about the No one, and not even about the Hundred Thousand. This is just about an epiphany I had this afternoon. An epiphany on how the One and each of the Hundred Thousand get more together or apart as we interact with others, and as it doesn’t really matter if the One grows close with someone else, it’s still one of the Hundred Thousand that will be perceived by that someone else.
And it get even more frustrating when you finally understand that those images of you in the mind of everyone else are not only made of small parts of you and lies you created for their benefit – because sometimes you don’t want other to understand how different you are, but more than anything else, they are made of characteristics of those who project those images on you, trying to get you closer, more similar to them.
But, then again, what is real in everyone we know, what is part of their real self, what is projected by them for our benefit, and what is a projection we create over them, trying to protect us from what is right in front of us, protecting us from the things on them that are not complaint with our view of the world?
I doesn’t matter how much I try to undo the knot in my head right now, two questions keep getting back to me:
- What can we do to let other be themselves?
- Even if we do everything we can, can we really expect other to be themselves and let us know them as they are?
Anyone can help me?