Every detail of the world that i imagine, every furnishing and fitting, is populated by me with objects appropriated from the real world. I do so by forming opinions about and labelling them according to their conformity to the expectations and requirements that I have of them. Despite my protestations of objectivity and empirical reasonableness, I am only able to see the structure, the design, the surfaces and angles of everything that is not-me according to how i have imagined it. This imagining is always self-referential and self-interested; always from the exact viewing perspective and orientation of my present position.

When these two compelling but incompatible structures come into inevitable conflict the incongruities and unsettling juxtapositions are all dismissed by me as somehow being just imperfect realisations of my design. They are caused by the mistakes of the incompetent, the intransigence of the stubborn, and the obstruction of my enemies. Who that may be – the enemy – depends on what day it is. I usually react with dismay, anger, resentment or frustration, which is understandable because the basic tenets, principles, and rules that govern my world have been contravened. I am the sole arbiter of its conduct. The conceptual validity and structural integrity of my world depends on maintaining this illusion of self-evident and verifiable control.

The terrifying alternative, if it is not true, is that I am confronted with the essential powerlessness of my will in an unmanageable world.