Awareness Through Film: The Truman Show
How Much of Your Life is Actually Yours?
What’s up friends? I have a question for you today. Can you imagine waking up one day and discovering that everything you’ve believed for your entire life was a construction of someone else’s planning? Think about it – the neighborhood you grew up in and the neighborhood you now live in, all the people you’ve ever met, and all of the personal relationships you’ve ever formed – were just part of some imaginary story created with you at the center and you never knew. Well, that’s the premise of the movie I wanted to examine briefly today – The Truman Show.
The movie, as you probably are very well aware of, stars Jim Carrey. He plays Truman Burbank, an ordinary man living an ordinary life in the suburbs of his town. As we start to learn more about Truman, we see that he doesn’t know that his entire existence is being televised and broadcasted to the world as a recurring television show. With him as the unsuspecting leading role, everyone he encounters is an actor. And his home, including the city he lives in, is nothing more than an intricate and elaborate television stage. Seems pretty far-fetched based on how we sense life as most of us possess the ability to perceive the differences between what’s real and unreal. But what’s really amazing and what grabs my attention the most drawing me into this film is the fact that Truman lives, eats, sleeps, and breathes within in surroundings without ever finding the need to question them.
The Moment
As we get deeper into the plot, eventually Truman starts to notice that some things just don’t seem to make sense or add up. And these inconsistencies he starts to notice suddenly begins to make him suspicious. People begin appearing in the same anticipated places or without any explanation, strange events would occur randomly around him. As these things unfold, all of those closest to him mysteriously and oddly deject all of his curiosity. Spoiler Alert! In the end, Truman makes his way to the end of the only world he’s ever known despite it being completely simulated. And at that one doorway that leads to the real world, he’s faced with a choice: stay within the familiar, albeit pretend, world he’s only known or make the choice to step into a life, a new reality, that he has had no experience with. This was a game-changing moment for Truman….and me.
Let’s Look Again
Do you see any similarity to real life? What in your life have you always accepted as truth or fact simply because that’s just the way it’s always been? While Truman may be a fictitious character in a movie, what it’s showing us is that we all, in some shape or fashion, grow up bounded, fenced, or surrounded by some kind of expectation? And if we look deeper into those expectations, do we find that we are given or we inherit ideas about how things should exist or how things should be looked at? For example, how do we define what success looks like? Is it the same for everyone? How about beauty? Is there one standard definition of beauty? How do we view money and its significance in society? Sexuality, social status, religious and spiritual beliefs, gender roles….I can probably name at least 50 others.
These are just a few examples of ideas (moreover, other people’s ideas) of how we should define ourselves. These are examples of how principles can be placed on us in the form of expectations. If we are not careful to observe, they can be burned deeply into our brains. So deep that they no longer exist as a separate thought or choice; they become what’s expected. Unchecked or unacknowledged, then they easily become facts.
The Truman Show becomes especially parallel to our real, everyday lives. We can easily think that, well, all Truman needed to do was escape. Once he got out, then he would realize the truth, and everything would be fine. But that’s not his greatest challenge – getting out. Consider that Truman’s biggest obstacle was accepting that everything he trusted may be someone else’s version of a truth or worse, not be truth at all.
Reflect
In all my years here (in my reality - 😊), one thing I learned later in life. There is a real and noticeable distinction between living our individual lives for ourselves, always reflecting who we truly are versus the life that one has only and simply learned to accept. Trust me, if you choose the latter, more power and grace to you. Not every expectation is corrupt or harmful. We do not need to abandon our parents’ expectation that we grow up and be productive and compassionate human beings who instinctually help others. That life, that expectation is needed. But if it’s that we need to grow up, be a doctor, and make a million dollars, maybe there is call for an examination of expectation here.
Awareness allows for that examination. It affords us an opportunity to look at what and where these influences are stemming from and if they are within our best interest for living a life that’s truly ours. That kind of curiosity becomes important, no, it’s imperative. I mean really, ask Truman Burbank. This is the moment where I insert one of those Kind Rebirths messages.
KR Connection
Truman’s shows us that when we are aware, it doesn’t always start with having the answers. It may begin with just recognizing that there are some questions that we have to ask. Maybe complacency has kept us from answering them. Maybe it’s fear. Whatever leads you down whichever road, know that some things you’ve always considered as truth or factual may have been something you’ve inherited from somewhere else. And that’s fine. It may be a road you want to continue, or it may be one that you want more clarity on. Realizing that is your Kind Rebirth moment. So, what I took from this film isn’t that we, like Truman, need to escape what may be the falsehoods of reality or a life that was handed down. In truth, we all need to be mindfully aware that we deserve the opportunity to recognize how we are living them and that we have a choice.
Question to Consider:
Which life are you living: the one that you have consciously chosen or the life that you’ve been handed down and learned to accept?
