When a baby is born, its experience of new forms is utterly fascinating to it; it laughs at our funny faces, funny noises, and the jingling trinkets we hang above its cot. But after a while its vision 'congeals' and it soon begins to 'make sense' of the forms/objects around it. Moving objects lose their fluidity and solidify into mummy, daddy, toys etc. baby no longer hits objects to make them move, but picks them up to analyse them (and later bangs them, etc.). The baby is trying to ascribe meaning to his environment through a solitary research. We 'help' him along by showing him what things are for: the salt-shaker is not a musical instrument, the fridge is not a hiding place, and the cat is not a toy! This is the first and most crucial step to socialization – and what I call systematic murder of the artist.

The point is, left to his own devices, Baby would create a world for himself defined by his own meanings. How we fear that! "Are you going crazy?" we say to the errant child. And indeed, that's all that a madman is, one who has defined the world purely for himself.

Take away our essential selves and we slowly die: the youth beaten into submission at school becomes a 9-5ing dud whose only release is Public House (pub) philosophies; the able man forced to retire at 65 immediately develops cramps and conditions; the radical MP, once elected, loses touch with his people.

What we see, hear and feel – what we know, is, in the final analysis, a product of ourselves – that is to say subject in the end to our own interpretations.

A friend tells us his problems but we make the final decision as to the importance of his problems (in our lives). We may believe in an Eternal Force but conceive of it differently. The final point of reference, in any analysis, is ourselves, the individual, I. (It is interesting that the pronoun I is the same as the roman numeral for 'One' (I), while the noun 'One' is also defined as a self or person as in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest) So Plato was right that words lose their meaning immediately they are said or written, because the next person to hear/read them attaches their own meaning to them, albeit in the narrow range of 'possibilities' set by our socialised consciousness.

But what also happens in our interactive lives is that our singular opinions, even or especially the most diverse, get aggregated by the many.

Experiments have shown that members of in a group tend to tone down their views to be somewhat in line with the dominant at the expense of the individual's conviction. Marriage and Politics are all about compromises.

Talking of politics, it is said that democracy itself is not 100% representative because only the majority opinion is heard. The minority therefore live under a tyranny of the majority. True democratic principles therefore have to take cognisance of the voices of the few, which is somewhat achieved by representative democracy (e.g.: D'Hondt's method).

This means that in our present human circumstance, not all our individual opinions/aspirations are expressed/attained.

 And, we can safely say that those majority views expressed are nothing but the result of socialisation from the day we were born, and therefore not 100% ours. It seems as if this nebulous being called society is continually tricking us into doing its own bidding. And what's wrong with that? I'd say it means we are living in a world not of our own making and therefore :

We can only ever be subjects to Circumstance.

The problem is, we take those opinions that are wily foisted upon us by society to be axioms of living. Just because they've stood the test of time does not make them immutable or wholly relevant. For if they are right rules by which we should live, then we should stop wishing for better and life would be bliss.

We cannot prove anyone else's thoughts absolutely. But we can our own. And since that's the only thing we can know definitely, then that's what we have power over, that's our most powerful tool. And if we can change our thoughts we can change our perceptions, then our actions – and our abilities.

"The power – is Yours!"