What if you had no life of your own? Every movement, every thought, every action of yours was determined by someone else. Some one else, who decided what the rules were, what was good, what was bad, what was acceptable and what was not. Any deviation and you knew you'd pay dearly. Imagine that there was no concept of privacy. Everything that you thought, did, dreamt was known to the world. The slightest shift from expected behavior and you'd be condemned for life. Every morning, you'd get up knowing that every mundane detail of your day had been charted out for you and that there was no question of non-adherence. You do everything as directed, mechanically, monotonously as if there was no other way of doing what needed to be done.
Imagine now that you could trust noone. Everyone is suspect. Some, because they firmly believe the philosophy that "to be alone is to be in company of dangerous thoughts" and some because you know they possess dangerous thoughts that could get you into trouble. Imagine that there is an omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient authority that governs your life. Nothing is hidden from it. It could be generous when it wanted to, it could be harsh when it wanted to and it could be murderous if your actions left it with no choice. You lived as long as you were on the right side of this power. One step on the other side and you knew that you would become unnecessary.
There'd be nothing left to decide. Your life would have been scripted for you. You'd be like the actor on the stage who rehearses his part a million times to get it right. There would be no scope for innovation or doing things differently. You do as told and instructed. You live in the constant fear that one day you'd make one wrong move and then you'd be of no use to them. They'd simply terminate your existence.
What would it be like to live like this?
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