The greatest lie ever told

Judging by appearances. If you hear a noise, something is there. If you see a flash, something is there. If you touch a thing, something is there. If you taste something strange, something is there. If you smell something odd, something is there.

A series
Of electrical impulses
Fired wildly, obediently
Due to external stimuli.

Creating an image
Of the world
As a result of external
Stimuli.

If you hear a bird chirping
Is it there? Can you see it?
Is it a bear? Do bears make noise?
Bears don't make bird noises.

Do you know? Have you seen it?
Have you heard it? At the same time?
Have you been there
Every time a bear has made a sound?

Can you categorically say
Every bear makes a bear noise?
Can you categorically say
Every bird makes a bird noise?

You can see things that aren't there.
You can hear things that aren't there.
You can blame it on your "imagination".
They are the same impulses, the same machinery.

Would you believe it
If you see it?
Would you kick a ball
Because you know it is there?
Or because you think it is there?

The mind
Makes sense of this world.
Interprets, Integrates multiple signals
From the outside.
It is a model of the world in three dimensions.

Ideas and thoughts,
Emotions and feelings,
Give us understanding of the information.

What we should
And shouldn't think
About what appears to be occurring.
How do we know how to act?

Are we born with morals? Ethics? Beliefs?
Have we already learned the lessons
Of our ancestors of the same form and arrangement?
What makes us act?

Who makes us act? Is it us?
If a child playing
Has fun throwing rocks
Would the parent also throw rocks?

The parent tells the child
Throwing rocks is bad.
The child then thinks it is bad.
The child then knows it is bad.

Has the child made up his own mind?
The fun he used to have
Is now replaced by something else,
Fear.

All fear about how to act
In response to the world
Comes from ideas.
The idea that throwing rocks is bad
Was not the parents' first.

His parent warned him, and his, him;
Travelling further back
Into eternity. An infinite,
Elegant mess of chaotic processes and destiny.

A three dimensional portrayal of a four dimensional universe.
The mind is the most powerful sensor.

How do you ask a question?

What is this thing? Do I have it? I am it. It is not something you can own. It's the dust, grass, air, water, stars that make us. We are these things. In this arrangement, what can I do? What do I do? How do we act, think, feel about things? Why? There are reasons, most of which are redundant now. But we still feel as if we live on the savannah. I feel as a wounded lion would when he has been usurped. We are animals with simple emotions, chemical reactions inside that determine how we act. Are we at their mercy? Is life predictable? Can emotions be manipulated? Can they be fully understood?

Sit here
In the bed
Think about all the things
Someone once said
Is it truth or lie
Or simply their version?
Can it apply to me
Are we really all the same?
Show me proof you feel
The same things I feel
Give me an indication
You think the same things I think
And we can be the same
One life

What makes a man?
What makes a woman?
Physical, mental differences
Different chemical compositions
Determine what we are.
Can there be a way
To control them?
Strip them of their power,
So long our saviour,
Now our tormentor.

Changing a winning formula
Is the hardest thing to do.
Have the courage to change.

Is changing a way of self-protection?
Why not feel these things?
They are unpleasant.
They impact my life.
They form my decisions,
And cause me strife.

This journey is hard,
Is that just the way
That men become men?
So many people
Slaves to their whims
Determined to feel
That endorphin bliss.

Surely the most satisfying thing
Is to defy your emotions
And even still,
Win.

The battle is always worth it.