Stories We Live By

       Stories, often a tool for description that has a narrative, a structure and flow. But seldom do we realise them as not just the kind we read, hear or see, but the ones we live. Everything we feel every desire, fear, hope, or heartbreak is, in some form, a narrative absorbed through our senses. Stories shape us. They teach us how to love, what to fear, who we are, and even what to long for. And more often than not, we mistake these borrowed scripts as our own. Stories are unique to humans and their strength, this collective strength more often is conformity. We absorb tales through culture, religion, media, and upbringing. But when the narrative of every short story we come accross are bound by bigger make believe stories of power, money, survival, and greed, maybe the player might as well once step behind to understand the narrative of the frontman of these Squid games of Identity.

Every passing day becomes a process of adaptation, subtly shifting ourselves to match the fluctuating influence of countless narratives. We chase newer stories to drown out the noise of the old ones, hoping to overwrite our outdated emotions with fresh significance. Each decision we make, from what to eat for dinner to whom we choose to spend a lifetime with, is influenced by the lifespan of these inner stories. Our long-term goals, our momentary satisfactions, they’re all projectiles launched from the cannon of belief. Or rather, of chosen belief.

I say “chosen” knowing full well that this too is a borrowed semantic identity fed to me by a culture that glorifies agency. But I want to believe in my ability to choose. Maybe because, like every other mimetic social being, I crave a sense of self. A stable core that says, “this is me,” even when I know it's mostly echoes. 

This reflection found new clarity as I surfed through Google Earth. What began as curiosity turned into an existential gaze. From a god-like vantage point, I hovered above Havana’s densely packed neighborhoods, red-roofed chaos in symmetrical patterns, each block pulsing with the weight of unspoken stories. A click, and I was over North Korea, silent, eerie, and surreal. Large statues and portraits of leaders stared back at me from manicured plazas, surrounded by sparse housing. In contrast, South Korea spilled over with complexity, narrow streets winding through hilly terrain, messy and alive. Then Chile, a long, elegant coastline breathing beside the snow-draped volcanic Andes. I stopped by Gaza to witness the wreckage shaped by the story of the 1950 Armistice border. Ashes and rubbles of hopes contrasting to the technological aspirations. A living hell, authored by the varied stories we’ve chosen to uphold metres apart. And yet, from above, it was all the same. Patches of organized chaos. Symbols of belonging. Markers of belief.

Zooming out did something strange to me. It exposed the absurdity of clinging to any single story as the truth. Every place I hovered over was drenched in its own myth, its own memory, its own pain and pride. And the people below, all of them, like me, navigating life through tales they didn’t author, but came to believe in.

In that moment, I felt both small and strangely liberated. Perhaps we’re not meant to fully escape these stories. Perhaps we’re meant to learn how to live with them lightly, reflectively, honestly. Because if we can’t outrun the noise, maybe we can learn to listen and interpret differently.