The meaning of context
If you’re a reader, you’re probably aware of the word “context”. Every story is set within a context. Without being familiar with the context, it’s very hard to appreciate a good story. Every good movie first sets up the context of the main conflict - the characters, their lives and motivations, the milieu they belong to, and so on.
Why context matters
Other areas where context matters are education and morality. Good education happens when students are able to link the concepts they study in class, to the context of their day-to-day lives. Morality, and the definition of right and wrong, is inextricably linked to the context of prevailing social norms.
At a very individual level as well, as I live, every moment of my waking life, my awareness and understanding of what is happening is deeply linked to a context - a private, inner context. While I’m sitting on a desk, writing this essay on a laptop, I’m simultaneously aware of a context that this experience belongs to. There is a back story to how this event has come to pass, who is this main character who is typing, what he is typing on, why he is writing and what he is writing about, where he is sitting, the environment he is in, the city, the country, the people he is sharing this home with - all of this is context, which I may not consciously note at every moment, but which forms the context for my mind to make sense of whatever is occurring in my life at any moment.
I may be living my life in the present moment, and my body may be experiencing the sensations available to it, in this here-and-now. But my mind is utilizing these experiences for building the context, the main story of this character I call ME, all the time.
Society demands context
When we’re born, and are mere toddlers, we don’t have a lot of context in our minds. But as we grow, the demands placed on us by adults require us to create, and maintain, this context. For instance, even the simple ability to speak the words of a language require a child to form, and constantly refer to, a context in her head. Because words are just sounds, the association of specific sounds with specific actions or objects is a learned context. Even the name people call us by is something a child learns over time, as she learns to build and refer to a context in her mind.
Once a child starts school, the demands on her to build a deeper, more complex context become even more. The ability to write the language of adults around them, to understand concepts of newer languages like math and science, and make logical connections of concepts; most importantly, the ability to have acceptable social interactions with other children and adults - all of these require constant context referral and building.
And because context building as a child is rewarding, we tend to devote more and more of our loving attention to this act, until it becomes a habit - automatic, and compulsive.
Context fuels creativity
My context is the story of me - who I am, where I come from, where I belong, my name, gender, my habits, my talents, my failures and my successes, my potential and my aspirations, my dreams, my journey so far and where it should go, my people and my social image, and so on. And I’m referring to, and building, my context, all my waking time. In this story, running non-stop in my head, I’m the main protagonist, the hero, and everything that happens, happens to me, and I think about it, make meaning out of it, and build my story. It’s all simply fascinating.
It’s no wonder that we all love stories so much, and spend so much time, attention, and money on movies, TV shows, and novels. Social media is basically storytelling by individuals, and almost the entire field of marketing is about storytelling. Many businesses, for instance those in travel, education, real estate, beauty etc are foundationally linked to our obsession with our contexts. Most of our desires are linked to how we want our context to unfold and shape up.
But has it gone too far?
This all would seem neurotic and a disease, if it were not so pervasive as to feel like the normal way to live. Building and maintaining a context to refer to has been a crucial aspect of human beings’ ability to coordinate and build a world together. But we’ve probably taken this a bit too far.
Because to most people, context has started to feel more real than real life. We’re so identified with our contexts that we’re killing each other and destroying the planet. Which is weird, if you think about how a huge part of the contexts we keep in our heads and call our own, are not even originally ours, but created by others before us and passed on to us by our parents, teachers, and adults. For instance, the language that we speak and think in terms of, is completely borrowed. Money and what it represents, our nationality and language, our religion and practices, gender norms, what we value in life, indeed our very names - all of these are what we would die and kill for, and all of these are borrowed, not our original creations.
What about you? Do you identify with the protagonist of the story in your head and are experiencing its trials and tribulations, or are you aware that it’s all just a thought?