Self-Simulation is the Void
| Will Bamberg
Self-simulation is the void. Imagining how you look through the eyes of others splinters your awareness, draining you and disconnecting you from the world.
It’s taken me over a decade to learn this. As a youth with little idea who I was, I instinctively turned to others to validate my place and self-worth. I was constantly running a little simulation in the back of my mind of how I looked to friends and peers. I shied away from anything I saw as embarrassing or vulnerable Singing, and to a lesser extent dancing, were my peak triggers of self-conscious terror. Thankfully, despite this I found my way to high school musical theatre, which gave me the space to put myself out there and practice shedding that fear.. I wanted desperately to be liked, so I could like myself.
The problem with this way of being is it’s not real. You can’t possibly replicate the way another person sees the world. You have no idea what people are thinking, much less how they feel about you specifically. Most of the time they’re simply not paying attention to you anyway—we’re all the main character of our own life. The stories you conjure about how people see you are informed only by your own beliefs, fears, and insecurities.
Self-simulation is worse than ineffective, it actively degrades your experience and capacity. With part of you caught up in a cursed loop of self-referential imagination, you can’t be fully present in the moment. You can’t perceive the richness of the world around you. You can’t enter flow or perform at the best of your ability. After all, doing your best means giving it your all.
As I’ve grown into a version of myself more centered, confident, and comfortable in my own skin, I’ve come to understand that self-simulation is really about control. And beneath control, the desire to be loved. I want to be loved, dearly. I’m quite open to connection. I yearn to be enmeshed in social fabric, to exchange and make joy with loved ones.
And because I want it so badly, and it hurts not to have it, I try to control. Subconsciously thinking, if I can only hold tightly to the way people view me, I can influence their perceptions. I can make myself more likeable. I can be more attractive, and be loved a little more. So I judge myself, before anyone else can, as if that will protect me.
I have such empathy for this part of me now. I love you for caring so. Thank you.
That strategy just doesn’t work. Simulating people doesn’t bring you closer to them, it walls you away from them. Masking your insecurities in caricatures of others only warps your reality. It twists you up until you can’t tell perception from projection. It sends you spiraling in recursive overreaction to noise. Self-simulation is a cruel, false mirror. Turn away from it!
Granted, easier said than done. Instincts rooted deep in identity and narrative can’t be dislodged by wishful thinking alone. Nor will reason be your savior—this is the domain of the heart. Ultimately, you have to call upon your own arbitrary self-sovereignty. Choose to be on your own team, because you are you and you’re all you’ve got. Take the leap of faith of loving and believing in yourself. Nobody else can give you permission.
The rest is self-soothing and surrender. Notice when your body ratchets up the tension as you fixate on something. Take a moment to breathe. Breathe. Draw your awareness out of your head and back into your body. Then let go and go for it. Release what you’re holding and act. Whatever happens, pick yourself back up and recognize yourself for trying. With practice, your nervous system will learn. You’ll gather less tension, and dissipate it more easily.
There’s good news, too—you do have the power to influence how people view you! The way we relate to ourselves is the biggest driver of how other people relate to us. Humans connect with authentic, thriving humans. By expressing yourself, you will resonate with people You have to make a wave to find resonance.. The only catch is, you never get to know. You don’t get to be certain. You have to birth that trust and belief within yourself, for yourself.
This shift in worldview can be painful. It means knowing the rawness of being seen. It means bearing the truth that some people won’t like or love you, whatever you do, however you feel about them. It means cultivating your own esteem instead of outsourcing it to others. But it’s worth it—it will bring you joy, it will teach you to bloom, and it will one day bring the connection you desire.
So, let go. Surrender what you can’t control. Accept that you’ll never know how people see you, and see yourself in full color. Muster the courage to free yourself and love yourself unconditionally, without waiting to be confirmed or validated by others.
Self-simulation is the void, a tragic form of fantasy that serves only to isolate and diminish you.
Come back to life.