Replaced Perceptions

My self-perception collapses, so to speak, insofar as I do not heed the perceived perceptions of others. When I drink alcohol, for example, my perception of myself alone becomes increasingly dominant, and my inhibitions decline proportionately. Ultimately, though, when we exclude from our perception of ourselves the immediate perceived perceptions of others, we replace them with something else, such as imagined posthumous fame or benevolent gods. We do not live without the perceived perception of something. We become the external perceptions that we internalize, regardless of how accurately we perceive them or even whether or not they actually exist.