Tuesday, August 12, 2008

The Mask Theory

Mask, is a very interesting item that allow one to cover his/her face for the purpose of disguise or protection. However, if we were to add a "fake" in front of it, it normally refers to certain people who behave differently in front of one another: "You don't get bluff by his fake mask!". I've written this essay months ago, that time I was pretty disturbed by lots of thing. Now things are over, I would like to share this piece of essay with you all.

Back in the childhood, we always hear the adult telling us: "It is sure nice to be a kid, the world is so much more simpler!". Myself, at the age of 21, starts to understand the feelings of the adult who once told me that. Few years ago, back in secondary, I thought that myself had already know the meaning behind the word, and put it as: "There are many kind of people in the society, so better be careful when doing the things, then you are safe (脚踏实地,为上上之策)". This statement had been used for quite some time, so far so good back in the old days in secondary. However things start to change recently, I start to feel that the statement isn't really 100% correct. Why? "Masks" would be the answer behind, I'll talk more on it later on.

There is an old Chinese saying: "The one who get close to the light will turn good, the one who stayed with the darkness will turn bad (近朱者赤,近墨者黑)", therefore people might actually wanted to identify who's the bad friends (猪朋狗友) and who's the good ones (贵人), so that in the future we could actually have a better personality to enter the society. And because of that, myself had developed this weired interest of analyzing people, such as trying to figure out what's going on in people's mind. I like books, especially in the field of science and psychology; but the more I read, the more I felt that a mask is inside people's heart. Amazing isn't it?

Now, things get confusing: "Being a child is much better", "psychology analysis", "masks" these few things doesn't seems to have any relation between each other, so what's their common thing? Yes, there is, it is the "heart" (心). Sounds very hard to understand? (很玄?) Well let me explain with a more simple way: No matter how close are you to a person, or how much you understand him/her, you actually only understand "a particular person when facing you" or I call it "a mask that was worn by that person when facing you". When he turn his back, you have no idea who he is or what is in his mind because you don't know which mask he is using when facing other people, he has become a stranger to you. So, what I think is that, when you collect and gather all these masks together, you'll get a "heart".

Sometimes we really need to agree that as we grow up, more and more mask will be collected from a person. That's why, when we are still a child, we have only one mask, which is the "heart". Everyone are bind together "heart by heart" (以心相对), but as we grow up, if one were careless and worn the wrong mask when meeting the wrong people will send one straight into trouble, giving people the impression of "that fella damn fake!". But I think, no, it is not about the problem of fake mask, it is because people can't be together "heart by heart" (心连心), instead now we have "part of heart" only.

Homo sapiens are too complicated.


P/S: The original context of the essay was written in Mandarin, sorry for any confusion occurs when delivering the message :) My English ain't band 6 after all.

2 comments:

Encik Ayie Yang Garang said...

lion,

i am not sure is the the mask that fake or the face that is fake. the mask can be originally bought from KLCC, (like mine), and the face is the one could be faked.

a person of many faces ppl would say is dangerous than the fake mask.we were bluff not by the mask but by the tongue. the mask serves as hideout. i agree with you on tht.

being kiddies, life is a lot hell simpler. i take the example of iklan petronas, when the kids asked "what is race?? horse race??"

we let our prejudice and skeptic rule out our rational. we always remind ourselves to alert with ppl and we have the setting that "everyone is bad until they prove otherwise". i have different say on this. in my view, everyone is good until they say and act to me otherwise.

we never can be true to ourselves. we wear the mask to please ppl and the real suffering is indeed masked by the mask. i believe we do not have fake mask, but he have a collection of masks to fake ourselves. i may be wrong, and i am more than glad to learn from you.

-Azrin-

Lai Yeong King said...

As I said the essay was written months ago back in the sem breaks, so it is such a coincidence that you had a masked avatar as well >"< hahaha....

"we do not have fake mask, but he have a collection of masks to fake ourselves" is something worth to spend time and think deeper into it. To be honest, the feeling it gives me when I saw this phrase was "really interesting!"

It is sure nice to have such discussion more often in the future, as we can understand each other better and being more "heart to heart"

-lion-