The idealism in addressing reality
It is a pleasant idea; the notion of being able to escape from reality and be free of all the complications and hardships that life brings along, to be able to escape to another place or time where things are exactly as we wish them to be, to make things as we are and not as they really are. This concept is strongly embraced in “A Beautiful Mind” and expressed through the personality of John Nash; his personality lacks understanding and compassion of human emotion, his brilliant mind has trouble translating into social settings, he is an expert at escaping reality through the imagination and thought of his own min. Illusion is a wonderful thing, from a young age we all imagine different worlds, different circumstances, and different people. As we age the desire for an escape from our own lives never goes away. Of course our illusions progress from candy covered houses with friends like snow white to warm tropical beaches with hunky boyfriends, but still the childish notion lives on within us to always strive for something more than we know is attainable or even realistic. This idea that we can constantly block out the unpleasant things that exist in our lives is not ideal, more often than not frequently avoiding real life problems just causes more to arise. John Nash is a highly intelligent, skilled mathematician, his specialty is cracking codes. Looking at him from a professional view point there is much to admire and aspire to, however from a personal view point his personality is lacking. John’s main defence is being unemotional and unattached from everything and everyone except his work. At what point does avoiding the hardships and complications of reality actually start to complicate every aspect of your life? With this in mind I am going to explore further into the mind of John. His lack of respect and understanding for human emotion keeps him from forming any kind of real relationship; therefor he begins to hallucinate, forming relationships with people who do not exist, as children we find this harmless having imaginary friends, confiding and finding comfort in their presence but as adults… We find it strange, unusual that we would form an attachment to something that isn’t really there rather than finding that trust towards another being. Still we ignore the harmless behavior and do not realize the severity of these day dreams. For John this is a coping mechanism, a way to avoid romantic attachment or emotional disappointment but at what point does pretend cross over to reality? We watch as his relationships with these “people” star off as harmless conversations that he’s