Cleft Lip / Palate Support Group
Cleft is a congenital deformity caused by a failure in facial development during gestation. It can be treated with surgery shortly after birth with highly successful results. Cleft occurs in somewhere between one in 600 and one in 800 births. Cleft occurs in several severities and is divided in two major categories: cleft lip and cleft palate.
I was thinking about what I said to welcome CoronaBorealis to the group the other day, and had a thought that was at first embarrassing but moreso just interesting as I thought it more, which was how much I sounded like Morpheus in The Matrix playing the welcoming committee to the reality beyond the simulation.
So at first I thought, boy, I must be grandiose and deluded. But now I'm not so sure. The last real conversation I remember having with a clefted person was at a party. Simple exchange: "most of it (the social experience, life with a capital "L") is bullshit." "Yeah, it is." Didn't talk to the person much more after that. Somehow that single comment stood as what we established as our most important understanding of each other.
In my experience, the line between the artificial and the "real" can be hard to draw. Often it must be drawn bit by bit, which is why the decision to take the red pill must be made repeatedly. Awakening is a step-by-step affair, involving keeping your balance and somehow staying grounded. And it is so hard to do on your own.
I think there is some usefulness to the Matrix as a metaphor for all this. It expresses the kind of outsider-ness I've felt when I was left clutching standard-issue ideals when kicked to the curb for superficial reasons. Hard to forget when you've had a glimpse of that much hypocrisy. But responding to it is something we can do, perhaps even we must.
So at first I thought, boy, I must be grandiose and deluded. But now I'm not so sure. The last real conversation I remember having with a clefted person was at a party. Simple exchange: "most of it (the social experience, life with a capital "L") is bullshit." "Yeah, it is." Didn't talk to the person much more after that. Somehow that single comment stood as what we established as our most important understanding of each other.
In my experience, the line between the artificial and the "real" can be hard to draw. Often it must be drawn bit by bit, which is why the decision to take the red pill must be made repeatedly. Awakening is a step-by-step affair, involving keeping your balance and somehow staying grounded. And it is so hard to do on your own.
I think there is some usefulness to the Matrix as a metaphor for all this. It expresses the kind of outsider-ness I've felt when I was left clutching standard-issue ideals when kicked to the curb for superficial reasons. Hard to forget when you've had a glimpse of that much hypocrisy. But responding to it is something we can do, perhaps even we must.
deleted_user
Hey Jon I'm thinking the red pill must have something to do with the Matrix? And the Matrix is a movie? Sorry, I don't see much TV or movies because I live on the road most of the time. But I understand what you mean about the hypocrisy. I had a real problem when I encountered it at church and at the catholic school I went to. I then really questioned faith and everything they were trying to teach me there. What was that anyway? Just be quiet and fit in as best you can and definitely don't be your own person. Oh well. I do think that many people run into the hypocrisy wall, cleft or not, we just happened to be blessed with a real quick way of seeing what someone is made of. And that really might be a blessing. Less time wasted, right?
barbieO
Well, stated as always, Jon. Nuff said!
deleted_user
In my academic studies, I've found many ideas about those who live in marginal spaces, or even the negative spaces (as in art & design - negative as opposed to positive space, the "blank" space in a picture), or as I often think, "in the cracks," ideas about how such people have unique and valuable perspectives on the "system(s)" humans have created for themselves BECAUSE they are positioned on the edge or outside. Such people help to define the (social) systems, usually in a passive manner, as sign posts determined by society to mark off acceptable behavior, appearance, perspective, etc. But we can USE these positions to purposefully affect social systems. We can use our vantage point to illuminate the problems with the systems and work towards positive change. But one must first take the pill and realize where one is and what is going on first. So yeah, Matrix analogy is good here.
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