The Poser

I think as I creep up to the not so ripe age of twenty years old I find myself consistently investigating what I've truly honed in on. Frankly, its led to this perpetual battle of indecision. Have I become in expert in anything? Even the most minuscule task? Beyond my charming ability to type extremely loudly, I've concluded the answer to be at its face, no. This sort of answer brings me back to the classic Rick Rubin quote of "I have no technical ability, and I know nothing about music." Yet, a simple check of many prominent hip-hop albums credits denotes his name proudly. But to me, I easily see the underlying brilliance. It's some contrarian construction of the idea that the ability to create isn't defined by some canonical obedience to common skill.

The connecting thought here is, well, do I even need to be an expert in some common skill at this point in life ^[*]? Perhaps only an expert can answer this. So, I remain to not know the answer. What I've discovered though, is that there is something pretty about compulsion in the attempt to learn. In example, friends of mine were always apart of chamber orchestra. I'd attend their concerts, typically sitting farther in back, and would feel so envious at how magical the pieces seemed. My buddy (the concert master) had such a knack for swaying as he played (one might even say dancing), that his performances felt like a religious experience. I'd exit the concert hall having been peeled of all my hopes to ever exist in that same aura of his. Somehow, I found naivety towards it. And so one day I picked up a viola and for a couple months I played for hours everyday. It was rooted with the want to a taste some glimpse of "expert". Eventually, it came a day where I had to perform in front of an audience with a very simple solo accompaniment. I was much older than everyone else, in fact, many people at my level were likely six years old. I didn't care much. I knew who I was playing for: my buddy. Though as I got up on the stage, I looked around to find the audience empty of him ^[**].

I played good. He'd never know it though. I stopped playing after that and haven't played since.

I like this moment of mine. Retrospectively, I'd felt so much joy playing that instrument. I've identified that this joy was merely from the hope of wanting to be an expert like him, but rather how good the compulsion to understand what I thought what once was magical felt. So returning to my monologued question of expertise, I'd wired myself early on to never care for it to begin with.

Great, now this sounds like a shitty autobiography.

But I want to introduce the contrast of this. Something of the nature where the inherent goal for compulsion is to make others think you are an expert. Let's define a person who portrays these traits as The Poser.

A Poser is likely to place themselves around Non-Posers. Non-Posers being their complement: an expert. Sure, one might think that osmosis could take place but I hold the argument that in these tragic situations it doesn't. You see, The Poser will quickly pick up on the general vocabulary of the experts. It takes minimal effort to do so as mimicking is much less of an effort than full reenactment. And so when The Poser enters a group of non-informed individuals they portray themselves as this false expert through this newly and cheaply developed vocabulary. Sadly, The Poser also realizes that this act can only go so far. The Poser must perform! So in some measure of disbelief, The Poser is allowed entry to the experts field. Upon arrival, they're likely met with the following binary: act humbly, accepting non-expertise or assume expertise and attempt to assimilate fraudulently. More likely than not, The Poser will do the latter. At this point, they likely find that truly existing in these expert environments is very hard. Some iterations of failing to assimilate may even be required to reach this conclusion. So what do they do? They return to their audience of non-informed individuals.

This is when The Poser becomes the most powerful. The Poser casts onto an audience an image of themselves that could even be beyond expert-like, maybe even some newly formed meta-expert that has never been seen before. There might even be a moment where an audience member picks slightly up on The Poser and points out a flaw in their grand scheme. The Poser will remove them from the audience. This goes on, and it could go on forever. That is the reality and inevitably of The Poser. Eventually, they run out of informed audience members to remove and can remain blissfully ignorant.

But experts catch on eventually. They need not even identify The Poser, because it isn't worth their time. So they too remain blissfully ignorant.

I'm The Poser.

^[*] Common is a little loose here, but just some implication of a skill that is sought after.
^[**] If you're reading this, text me where you were that day years ago and maybe I'll forgive you :Q