who are you when there’s nobody to impress?

Berkeley once asked, if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to perceive it, does it still make a sound?

It is a rather odd feeling to wake up and not feel obliged to take on a society full of different people with different opinions on you. Instead, you wake up, have coffee, listen to the rain or embrace the sunshine and each day attempt to find a different way to numb your brain for the 5th week in a row.

Sat in my parents garden listening to some psychedelic rock sent over by an old friend, sipping on water from a mason jar and a metal straw, perhaps in order to feel some kind of a connection to the outside world of ‘aesthetics’, ‘images‘ and ‘vibes’. This past month has probably been one of the strangest of all time, finally -unwillingly, yet finally- free from all the outside judgement (that usually leads to the inner).

After being in a new space for over a whole month now, I have started to think: Who are we when nobody sees us? What happens when all the masks we put on depending on social situations are made redundant? Do we still exist if nobody thinks of us?

Berkeley says “the objects of sense exist only when they are perceived; the trees, therefore, are in the garden no longer than while there is somebody by to perceive them.”

Who are you when there’s nobody to impress? Who are you when the only one to perceive your existence is yourself?

(I, sadly, do not have the answer as most of the time I fail to see myself separate from the eyes of the outside world. But if you do, feel free to send it to me.)

The thumbnail image is a part of Primavera by Botticelli, to somehow honour the spring we are all missing.