Reflection

Episode 2: Autopilot

"Align to the city!"

I was new to the city, not expecting to observe so much difference in the environment when I had decided to move. I encountered the system in a very sudden short period of time. Everyone had a responsibility in the system, and I was being introduced to it as a newby. Like an ant colony, I felt that the direction of the system was clearly defined in the people's minds and everyone around me was guiding me towards this direction, but indirectly.

One of the first people I met in the city was the boss. I met him at the office for the first time in the job interview. At that time, I was not aware of the system, but his behavior seemed strange to me. His reactions and his words were so fluent that I was astonished how he doesn't pause for a second to think and reflect.

Everything sounded predefined for him; he was the only driver on his own road, but with no detours. Later on, I realized that everyone in the system was somehow trying to achieve this level of fluency in the hierarchy; There would be no need to plan, no need to schedule, no need to think most of the time; they lived on autopilot.

That night, I was bored alone in my room, visiting social media; boring posts by people, giving worthless opinions, posting repeated photos, exaggerated and fake news ... Suddenly, I started scrolling faster and faster for no reason. Photos and posts started to appear in a glimpse and I had to decide and classify each post as approved or not according to my own opinion. "Man, it is so hard to become a citizen here". I felt a combination of pleasure and fear in my mind, but something was holding me from changing the context of my mind or stopping me from doing what I was doing. I was feeling numb and very focused, Intensely concentrated on the task I was doing. This was both a test and a training for me to align my mind towards the preferences of The City. And that was my first exposure to the autopilot experience.