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The most fundamental error that we all make is assuming we can understand what it feels like to be inside someone else’s mind and heart.

It’s not a conscious decision to believe this. It’s just a natural assumption we start with to one extent or another. But the more I’ve become aware of this error — first by observing myself and then by observing and re-interpreting others — the more aware I’ve become how pervasive it is.

What’s worse, I’ve realized that almost all of the manipulators in our lives use this assumption to control us.

Imagine you are locked alone in a bare cell with a locked door. You can’t see anyone else. You can’t hear anyone else. You have no idea where you are or why you’re there. You just know you’re alone.

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“Have you seen Julie?” Matt asked me. “She’s pregnant and she’s sitting back there.”

Julie is a casual friend who got married last year. I don’t know her that well and I rarely see her. I had just walked into a restaurant for dinner Friday evening and an employee told me the news.

My first reaction was to express happiness for Julie and her husband, but I suddenly realized I felt something unexpected. My inner emotional mask slipped slightly and I felt … what was this?

Envy.

Instead of pure happiness for Julie — who will be a great mother, by the way — I felt something ugly in my gut. My heart felt cold and hard. There was a powerful hint of anger — self-directed? — and then I realized it was hard to put labels on the things I was feeling.

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I feel like a contradiction lately.

I want to withdraw from the modern world — from the intellectual, psychological and spiritual rot that’s leading humanity down an ugly path — but I don’t want to give up the conveniences that have come with that modern world.

I suspect the internal rot which I see around me inevitably comes right along with the technological marvels we’re building for ourselves — and it requires some kind of terrible tradeoff that I don’t want to make. I want to have the shiny technological toys with none of the downsides.

It’s hard to know where to strike a balance. On one side, there’s an Amish-like life of being grounded in the warmth of community and personal connection. It’s the ideal or fantasy of country life — of being rooted to land and a slower pace and more traditional values. On the other side is a post-modernist life of shallow connection with little meaning, but filled with technological progress and urban excitement — along with opportunities for success and wealth and ego gratification.

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