George Saunders

And then his whole life, he was working against that to try to sort of assert himself and give himself enough power that he'd never feel that again.

And he did it.

And I think he's just kind of turning to God and saying, I'm correct, aren't I?

Like, I did it right.

That's why you gave me all this power.

Yes, he hears God saying, you did great, you know.

So it's, from my perspective, a moment of extreme delusion, you know, where he's getting exactly the wrong message from the moment he's in.

But, yeah.

From my own experience of being a person, you develop a certain approach to life to kind of keep anxiety at bay, to sort of solidify your view of yourself to make it easier to get through life.

And then it's really hard to peel that away.

He has an opportunity to maybe have a different perspective on his life and he just passes.

Well, I think it's something to look askance at.

Even if, I mean, I think everybody to a greater or lesser extent is involved in that, of trying to get over in some way, you know, trying to push back on the natural fear that we have of being out of control and being like, but I think what should be becoming clear to us is that if you say power is everything, if I get that power, I'm safe.

That's completely BS.

And there's not a world where one person could have so much power as to be above suffering.

There just isn't.

So I think our culture is in a particular moment where we have sort of forgotten that for various reasons.

So it's easy politically and maybe personally to think, if I just get enough of this thing, this power, then I'm safe.

But that's clearly delusional.

Oh, I mean, when you write a book like this, everybody is you.