"The Myth of Lost" Sample Chapters
"The Myth of Lost" Sample Chapters
"The Myth of Lost" Sample Chapters
THE MYTH OF
LOST
Solving the Mysteries and Understanding the Wisdom
MARC OROMANER
iUniverse, Inc.
New York Bloomington
The Myth of Lost
Solving the Mysteries and Understanding the Wisdom
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any
means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording,
taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written
permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in
critical articles and reviews.
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any responsibility for them.
Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Now What? How the Wisdom of Lost Can Apply to Your Life . . . . . 159
Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Notes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Acknowledgments
S
o many bizarre events occurred at just the right time to make
this book a reality, and for that, I guess I need to thank the
mysterious powers of the universe. First, it arranged it so that
I would continually catch intriguing episodes of Lost, enticing me to
watch. When that didn’t work, it then used its henchmen to try to
convince me of the show’s brilliance. These destiny guides materialized
in the form of friends and co-workers—most notably, Eileen Connell
and Brad Eisenstein, who were both incredulous that someone of my
spiritually-obsessed caliber did not watch the show and insisted that
I immediately begin doing so. Their attempts failed, due mostly to
a really big book I was working on that had severely limited my free
time. Therefore, the universe decided to help out by giving me lots of
free time. It did this by causing the computer I was using to write my
book, to die. While I was in the process of getting a new one, Brad
lent me his Lost—The Complete First Season DVDs. After about three
episodes, I was hooked.
My friend Scott Schwartz deserves thanks, not only for watching
most of the Lost episodes with me, but for putting up with my obsessive
rewinding and freeze-framing of various scenes—even before I had
decided to write the book.
For providing valuable feedback on an early incarnation of The
Myth of Lost, I am very grateful to my brother, David, and my friend
and former co-worker Jennifer Daniels. Thanks also to fellow TV book
author, Tripp Whetsell, for his marketing advice and suggestion to
shorten the book’s title, which was originally: The Myth of Lost: Solving
v
THE MYTH OF LOST
the mysteries of the hit ABC TV show and understanding how its wisdom
can provide valuable insight into the meaning of our lives. Just kidding; it
was never quite that long, but it was close.
Then there’s a whole list of people I need to thank for their talents
and expertise that helped make this book a reality. This includes (but
is not limited to) my publishing attorney, Alan J. Kaufman, Esq.;
everyone who pitched in at iUniverse, particularly, Brenda Kluck,
Kelli Shute, and Jason Straw; the many editors, most notably, Melissa
Watkins Starr, who worked diligently to translate my manuscript into
something resembling English; and Jimmy Ng, my friend and co-
worker who not only created a surrealistically cool cover design but
accommodated my desire to have lots of hidden images for readers to
uncover. Production master Andrew Addino also deserves recognition
for his help with the book’s plethora of marketing materials (you are
going to help me, right Andrew?)
I absolutely have to thank all the Lost fans out there who inspired
me to write this book, especially those who contributed to Web sites,
blogs, and podcasts that triggered my imagination and my memory,
helping me to recall the thousands of minute details about the show.
This book’s acknowledgments page would not be complete without
thanking the shamanic creators and producers of Lost, particularly
J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof, and Carlton Cuse. They have inspired
millions of couch potatoes to become active participants in solving the
mystery of a TV show, and in so doing, have reenergized our desire to
solve the mysteries of the world around us. While they might not realize
it, I believe their contributions will help guide this world in a more
enlightened direction—depending, of course, on what their ending for
the show turns out to be. Regardless of the ending, however, I’d like to
think that Lost has inspired new hope for a whole new beginning for
all of us.
Finally, for all their support, I am tremendously grateful to my friends,
family, and everyone who followed along with my progress while I was
working on the book—even though most of them didn’t even watch
the show it was based on. Your energy not only helped me overcome
many challenges, it also helped convince the universe to bring about the
writer’s strike, which bought me the extra time I needed to get this book
out there. As Lost teaches us, everything happens for a reason.
vi
Preface
L
ike all great mythology, Lost reveals hidden truths about the
inner workings of our world. Somewhere, deep within our
subconscious, we know what these truths are. When we hear
them—even when they’re disguised as mythology—they resonate with
us, creating an incredible vibration that makes us feel enlightened. In
other words, Lost is more than just a show. It’s a microcosm of the real
world. How the series ends isn’t nearly as important as what it is teaching
us in its weekly episodes. Lost is perhaps one of the greatest psychological
experiments ever conducted on a mass of people simultaneously, and
this fact just might end up playing into the resolution of its storyline.
While I don’t believe that this “audience is the experiment” direction is
where the show is heading; if it is, it definitely could result in an eye-
opening and unexpected conclusion. For this ending, it would turn out
that the TV audience has been part of the Lost experiment all along—an
experiment designed to teach the world that we are all connected, that
we should look for clues in the universe, and that everything happens
for a reason.
At the very least, Lost has been hugely influential in getting jaded
TV viewers interactively involved in a show, as its many clues encourage
them to search the Internet for answers. For these reasons and many
more, Lost has ushered in a new era of TV programming—one where we
are active participants in what we are watching. Acknowledging these
vii
THE MYTH OF LOST
viii
Preface
ix
Why Lost Is Alive
C
onsidering that I’m a pretty big fan of science fiction, having
grown up with old Twilight Zone and Star Trek reruns as well
as being a pretty regular X-Files fanatic, I guess it’s pretty odd
that I didn’t have much of an interest in Lost when ABC first aired it
on September 22, 2004. Perhaps, having recently come off the disap-
pointing last two years of X-Files, I just didn’t feel like getting involved
in another one-hour sci-fi drama that would only let me down in the
end. A one-hour show is a pretty big commitment, and since this one
starred that guy from Party of Five, I figured it would end up being
nothing more than a typical, made-for-TV movie. Boy, was I wrong.
In spite of my misgivings, I somehow managed to catch five minutes
of the Lost premiere. I think it was when the monster was roaming
about. Now, I like monsters. But the fact that this one was invisible
didn’t speak too highly of the show’s budget. (I’d missed the million-
dollar airplane wreckage scene that had eaten up most of it, leaving
nothing for anything else). So I began channel surfing and probably
ended up on some Seinfeld rerun—probably the one about going with
the opposite of all your instincts.
Fast forward to May 25, 2005. By this point, I had totally forgotten
about the show. I’d hear people talking about it from time to time,
but I’d also hear about Paris Hilton’s The Simple Life, too, so I wasn’t
particularly concerned. Then, after managing to miss all but five
1
THE MYTH OF LOST
2
Why Lost Is Alive
3
THE MYTH OF LOST
cases, I was severely let down by what ended up on the screen. No! I
would not let it happen again! This time I would share the fulfilling
ending with the world—the ending that the universe intended us to
hear—whether the creators knew it or not.
4
When Shamans Lose Their Way
T
he solution contained in this book most likely won’t end up
being exactly like what the show’s creators have in mind for
Lost. In fact, it might not even end up resembling their solution
in the least. Doesn’t matter. Why? To understand that, you first need to
understand why certain stories strike a chord with society, while others
completely fall flat. In a nutshell, successful stories all do one thing:
they reveal hidden truths about the way the world really works. While
we all have access to these truths, they’re hidden deep within humanity’s
collective unconsciousness. Once we begin to hear them, however, they
resonate with a part of us that had been forgotten, creating a beautiful
vibration that just feels right.
Star Wars did this for a lot of people—a story about how a simple
farm boy with big dreams goes through a series of challenges to unlock
his destiny, using a mysterious force in the universe to help guide him
to success. In case you didn’t know, the simple farm boy is you (whether
you’re simple, have ever worked on a farm, or for that matter, are even
a boy). We all have longings to play our part in the universe, so that
movie resonated with society and created a sensation.
Lost is yet another example of a story that is trying to tell us
something without shoving it in our face and making it obvious.
Usually, a good myth will disguise the truth it’s based upon. It does this
because the rational, conscious mind isn’t what’s aware of this truth—
5
THE MYTH OF LOST
the unconscious mind is. So, in order to reach that part of you, the story
must speak a language that can sneak past your logical, thinking brain
and head down to the cellar of your deeper consciousness. Not only do
all good stories do this, all good art does this as well.
The language of the universe is much too complicated for our itty-
bitty human brains to comprehend. That’s why it must speak to us
through channels that go beyond what we can fully comprehend. The
universe imparts wisdom that isn’t apparent on the surface, but can
only be found between the lines. This is the realm of symbolism and
metaphor. It is the realm of the artist, storyteller, and poet. Yet often
these creatives themselves don’t even fully understand the very messages
they are relaying to us mere mortals, for they are only doing their jobs
as channelers. Without this understanding, the conscious, rational
mind—and ego—of these channelers will usually interfere with the
purity of the message they are meant to convey. This leaves the message
muddy at best, and completely warped at worst, explaining much of
the confusion we are experiencing in our society today. If only our
mythological delivery system could be as pure as it used to be.
Not too long ago, most of mankind lived in tribes or clans. In
order to survive, it was extremely important for people to be able to
get along with the environment in which they lived. The problem was
that mankind didn’t always know the best way to go about doing this.
Luckily (though, according to the wisdom of Lost, it probably wasn’t
just luck), certain tribesmen were born with or developed magical
abilities that enabled them to interpret the supernatural energies of the
universe for the rest of their fellow tribesmen to understand. Perhaps
even more fortunate, in cases where these abilities were not inherited
or brought about through some sort of illness or trauma, they could
often be learned with intense training. However they came upon
their abilities, the magical tribesmen who had them were known as
shamans, and they would often gather their clan around a fire and
explain mysteries in the guise of stories. Members of the clan would
then pass down these stories from generation to generation, creating
legends of their people. Many of these stories form the mythology that
has become the foundation of just about every classically themed story
we tell today. Truth be told, these ancient myths are all ingrained in our
collective psyches.
6
When Shamans Lose Their Way
Really, there are no new myths. Only new ways of telling them,
using modern scenarios that are easier for us to relate to. Star Wars
is the same myth as King Arthur, which is the same myth as Aladdin,
which is the same myth as The Odyssey, which is the same myth as
David and Goliath. In all these tales, one individual must call upon
their inner strength to fight the odds and, with the aid of a special
weapon, conquer a powerful evil so that they can bring peace to the
land. Similarly, Lost is based on the same myth as The Matrix, which is
the same myth as The Wizard of Oz, which is the same myth as Alice in
Wonderland, which is the same myth as the ancient Greek philosopher,
Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” from his work, The Republic. These myths
illustrate that life is an illusion that requires us to go on a quest to
discover who we really are and that we can go home at any time simply
by waking up to this truth. (Just click your heels together, Dorothy.)
Interestingly, this is also the same myth as that of the Messiah, a.k.a.
Neo, a.k.a. the Wizard, and a.k.a. the White Rabbit (“I’m late! I’m
late!”). In Lost, the messianic archetype is known as “Him.” And “Him”
is he who will awaken the lost gang to their truth if the show’s creators
know what they are doing. This brings me back to why they may not.
When George Lucas wrote Star Wars, he was channeling the
myth of the coming spiritual awaking which resonated with an entire
generation that is now helping to bring it about. When he wrote the
three prequels, however, he was telling more of a political allegory (i.e.,
Gulliver’s Travels, which is about the incessant bickering of humanity
and all its stupid rules and laws) than a great mythical truth. Episodes
I-III of the Star Wars saga tell the tale of what happens when culture
gets so caught up in propaganda, bureaucracy, and what it views as
morality, that it turns a blind eye as a madman rises to power with
hopes of taking over the world. Now, I have no doubt whatsoever as
to why George Lucas was channeling this story when he was—it was a
moral lesson that society needed to hear to warn us about the times in
which we currently live. I just don’t think it was a message on par with
the original Star Wars, especially since it ended on a negative note for
the hero. A true myth should never do that. The aim of the myth is to
uplift and inspire. Taken as a whole, all six Star Wars episodes do this,
but the first three episodes just don’t do it as well. They focus more on
special effects than story, and this was why there was such a backlash
7
THE MYTH OF LOST
after they came out. There are a number of simple changes these films
could have undergone that would have made them as powerful as the
earlier films, but that’s a discussion for another book. My point is that
sometimes shamans lose their way.
That’s right: artists, writers, and poets are, in effect, modern day
shamans. The only difference is, instead of sitting around a flickering fire
to experience their stories, we now view them from the flickering light
of movie screens or TV sets. We still prefer to be in the dark to receive
our myths—partly because we’ve been doing it for thousands of years
and it has become ingrained in our psyches, and partly because being
in the dark matches our state of mind before we are enlightened.
The Matrix trilogy is the perfect example of a story in which the
shaman lost his way. The reason the first movie was such a success was
because it accurately updated the Messiah/Life-As-Illusion myth in a
creative and interesting way that hadn’t been done before. We were left
wondering, “What if life really was just a computer program?” Pretty cool
thought. The second and third Matrix movies, however, got too caught up
in fighting and special effects to continue the myth. The way the trilogy
ended—and sorry for ruining it, but trust me, I’m not spoiling anything
that was worth seeing—Neo made a deal with the computers so they
wouldn’t pick on the helpless rebel humans anymore. They promised
to leave the rebels in peace in their little underground misery known
as Zion while the rest of humanity continued its oblivious existence in
the matrix. This sends out the message that mankind will never be free
from the illusion. Nobody wants to hear that. Like Lucas, the creators of
Matrix got too caught up in an allegory for the current state of affairs and
not the hope—the myth—we are all meant to strive for.
If the writers of The Matrix had continued with the myth, it would
have ended with Neo sacrificing himself to the evil computer virus
known as Agent Smith. Once this happened, all of Neo’s energy would
have been sucked into Smith and spread to all of his victims—which
was basically all of humanity by that point. And since Neo was aware
of the Truth, his energy should have served to wake up everybody from
the Matrix illusion. Every human on Earth, given the energy of Neo,
should have broken free from the Matrix’s hold on them and woken
from their pods as Neo had in the first film. Imagine, an angelic choir
singing as the entire human race finally starts to wake up—confused—
8
When Shamans Lose Their Way
and pull out their plugs! Without the power from these human minds,
the machines in the real world would have run out of juice, causing
them to freeze in their tracks, saving Zion and all the rebel humans
outside the illusionary matrix. The film would have then concluded
with the underground Zion inhabitants coming to the surface, the
smoke clearing, and billions of enlightened humans emerging from
their life-long confinement in the illusionary world. At last, a new
world could now begin, fulfilling the Messiah/rebirth cycle myth.
I’m sure that everyone would have liked the ending of the Matrix
trilogy a whole lot better had it concluded this way. It’s a much
more inspiring message than the actual ending, which had mankind
continuing to live in the illusion under the shadow of the machines,
as we do now. Just as in the movie, the money and spectacle of our
illusionary, material world defeated the message we were meant to hear.
In other words, the bad guys won. That’s why we all walked out of the
final Matrix with a bad feeling in the pit of our stomach—something
was off. The movie had lost its soul—the powerful myth of the first
movie. That’s why it totally fell flat.
As for Lost, I’m getting a bit concerned. Having already been
disappointed with Star Wars and The Matrix, I’d hate to have my
dreams smashed to pieces yet again with what is a truly great mythic
TV show—especially since it involves such a greater time commitment.
That’s why I’m attempting to nip it in the bud, getting the message
out there just in case the writers have lost their way. So far, I don’t
think they have. So there’s still time. However, there is reason to worry.
The universe (the island) has tipped me off. Beginning with the early
episodes of the third season, the artistic integrity of the writers began
to get compromised by network pressure for ratings. This was why Lost
started looking more like a soap opera than a great mythic show. Look,
if we want to see senseless violence and gratuitous sex based around
a thinly veiled excuse for a plot, there are countless other television
programs to choose from. Bring back the myth of the show, I say! This
is only one of the reasons I began to get worried. There were other hints
as well from as early as the first season.
Like most people who watch Lost, I was always on the lookout
for clues. And when I reached the episode where Charlie’s band,
Driveshaft, sings their infamous one-hit-wonder, I’d thought for sure
9
THE MYTH OF LOST
I’d found another one. Only problem was, I’d misheard the lyrics.
Ironically though, my version actually made more sense and was more
in line with the myth. I thought the title of Driveshaft’s song was “You
Are Everybody.” Another clue to be sure. This title not only fits in with
the recurring Lost theme of all the characters being connected to one
another, as illustrated in flashbacks which reveal how the lives of the
castaways were often intertwined before they’d ever met, it also fits with
the mythic message of the show—that all of us are connected.
It wasn’t until I reached the end of the first season DVD set, however,
that I discovered the horrific truth. Included on the compilation was a
bonus disc which revealed how the title for the Driveshaft song came
about. Turned out that one of the Lost creators had picked it up from the
rantings of an angry audience member on an old episode of Donahue,
and it had become something of an inside joke amongst the Lost crew.
“You all everybody acting like it’s stupid people wearing expensive
clothes!” is what the woman apparently said. And that line became
the chorus for the Driveshaft song—“You All Everybody,” as in “y’all
everybody,” not “You Are Everybody” as I had mistakenly assumed.
Why had the show creator, Damon Lindelof, witnessed this
outburst, and why had it struck him so funny that it had stayed in his
mind all these years? Was it so that Driveshaft could have that exact
line as the title for their song? Or was he meant to translate it using his
shamanic superpowers into something more appropriate for the myth
of the show? Methinks the latter was more likely the case. Lindelof
missed a golden opportunity to add to the mystique of Lost by, instead,
poking fun at an obviously uneducated woman’s shortcomings. Is it
any accident that the name “Damon” is a variant of “Damian”—the
child of Satan who starred in the Omen films? I’ll leave that up to you
to decide.
Okay, that was all a bit tongue-in-cheek, but little clues like these
are often indicators of larger truths. Just as how a single droplet of
water contains the same reflection as a huge lake, so too does a small
truth reflect a big one. Little things mean a lot. Similarly, it has been
said that “how you do anything is how you do everything.” So if the
show creators are missing some of the smaller truths when writing the
smaller plot points, chances are they are probably also missing some of
the bigger truths when writing the bigger plot points. In other words,
10
When Shamans Lose Their Way
they might not be fully tapping into the collective truth that Lost is
based on, and therefore they may be misinterpreting some of it.
Case in point: the way the Lost pilot was originally written, Jack was
meant to be killed by the monster at the end of the two-hour episode.
The writers did this because they wanted to break the old Star Trek Red
Shirt Rule which stated that the show’s main characters could never be
harmed. Only new characters, who always wore red shirts on Star Trek
to signify their lowly ensign ranks, were expendable. Boone actually
mentions the phenomenon in one of the later Lost episodes. Problem
is, most everyone who read about the Jack-dying scenario hated it.
Why? Because we identify with the heroes of stories. We are meant to
live vicariously through their adventures. A hero can’t die before his or
her adventure has even begun. We are left without anyone to identify
with, breaking our connection to what’s going on. The hero is meant
to inspire. He can be killed, but only if he dies fighting for what he
believed in, as William Wallace does in Braveheart. Otherwise, what’s
the message? That we should give up before we even try? Who wants
to hear that? It goes against the myth. Yes, the whole Red Shirt Rule
is cheesy, but you know what? It works. These days, it’s better to make
it less predictable than the obvious Star Trek way, but the rule should
still be more or less in place. The writers, in trying to shake things up a
bit and leave audiences utterly lost, were being too subversive—leaving
the truth of the story almost unrecognizable. After realizing their
mistake, the scene was rewritten to have the plane’s pilot get killed by
the monster instead, leaving the classic aspects of the myth in tact. Had
this not been done, Lost would have very likely been cancelled after
the first few episodes. Interestingly, Greg Grunberg, the actor playing
the pilot, who sacrificed his role for the good of the show, went on to
play one of the heroes in the popular NBC show, Heroes. Just as his
character followed the path dictated by the rules of mythology, so too
did his real life.
While I respect the show creators for trying to go against the
predictable formula, there’s a reason that formula is in place and has
been for thousands of years—it works. When we experience a story,
we are the heroes. We are the ones who are meant to rise up and face
our fears in our own lives, and, of course, we are meant to succeed.
This is what good stories inspire us to do. That’s why they make us feel
11
THE MYTH OF LOST
good—they’re getting in touch with our soul. But the show creators
almost blew it. Yet again, another hint that they might not be totally
on track with the mythic message they are translating for us in Lost.
Admittedly, it’s easy to get distracted from the message when you have
deadlines, executive pressures, and many writers working on one story.
Not to mention a story that has to go on and on and on and still
keep audiences involved week after week. There’s also temptation in the
form of sex, violence, and special effects. Hopefully, network TV and
budgetary restraints will prevent Lost from wasting too much energy in
these areas. But it can still end up missing the myth if the writers get
too caught up in details to lose us on the big message. Shaking things
up a bit is fine, and Lost writers have kept it interesting by killing off
major characters like Boone, Ana Lucia, Mr. Eko, and Charlie. They
just shouldn’t go overboard, or else they risk sacrificing the show’s
mythic message in favor of an attempt at originality that doesn’t ring
true for anyone watching.
12
Myths in the Media
I
’ve been throwing around the term “myth” a lot without having
really explained what a myth is. In layman’s terms, a myth is a
story that attempts to explain the mysteries of the universe using
characters and situations we can understand. For example, there are no
myths involving radioactive quarks residing in the pseudo-stratified,
glandular, columnar, ciliated, epithelial tissue of a dead Australopithecus-
afarensis’s doppelgänger floating near Rigel Kentaurus, because no one
could understand that. Usually, when we think of myths, we think of
the stories of the ancient Greeks or of some “primitive” tribe somewhere
in Africa. Truth is, we’re still creating myths to explain our world to this
very day and incorporating the message of older ones into our modern
ideas about life.
Technically, our Bible—the good book that we base much of our
culture on—fits the definition of a myth. That isn’t to say that it isn’t
true—some myths such as Robin Hood or King Arthur may be based
on true events—just that it’s a story that serves to explain why we’re here
that features the exploits of heroes, villains, and supernatural beings. To
be fair, the Koran, the Torah, and the Book of Mormon are also myths.
Ironically, Dianetics is not a myth in the traditional sense because it is
a set of ideas and practices, not a story with gods and monsters. Then
again, using another definition of myth, “any invented story, idea, or
13
THE MYTH OF LOST
14
Myths in the Media
15
THE MYTH OF LOST
16
Lost Is a Microcosm of the Universe
S
o far, I’ve sort of been making you go through a lot of wax
on/wax-off, paint the fence, and sand the floor, without really
explaining how any of this relates to Lost. Well, let’s review some
of the points I’ve made so far, and I think you’ll be able to see where
I’m going with all this.
!" Lost is more than just a show. It’s a microcosm of the real
world. How the series ends isn’t nearly as important as what it
is teaching us in its weekly episodes.
!" Usually, a good myth will disguise the truth it’s based upon.
It does this because the rational, conscious mind isn’t what’s
aware of this truth—the unconscious mind is. So, in order to
reach that part of you, the story must speak a language that
can sneak past your logical, thinking brain and head down to
the cellar of your deeper consciousness.
!" Lost is based on the same myth as The Matrix (which is also
the same myth as The Wizard of Oz, Alice in Wonderland, etc.).
These myths illustrate that life is an illusion that requires us to
go on a quest to discover who we really are and that we can go
home at any time simply by waking up to this truth.
17
THE MYTH OF LOST
!" The message our myths are now sending out is that we are
God. All of us.
!" The superhero is not going to save us—we are the superhero
and are meant to save ourselves.
!" Each of us has a unique role to play in bringing about the
world’s salvation. Each of us has a special gift, something
we’re good at … something we feel deep down … something
that’s waiting to be called upon so that it might lead us to
our destiny. (The NBC show Heroes perfectly illustrates this
myth.)
!" The idea of using an isolated location to represent the world
at large is common to many myths.
In other words, the island of Lost is really planet Earth. All the
people on Lost represent all of us, and all the things that happen on
Lost are the things that really happen on our world, but our world is
just too big for us to notice. Just as the island seems alive, sometimes
our world seems alive, leading us to chance encounters and events that
almost seem scripted. And whenever we follow the clues, or listen to
the whispers, or act in spite of our fears, we usually are rewarded by
getting one step closer to our destinies—one step closer to getting off
our illusionary island.
According to the myth of Lost, the world we live in is an illusion—a
materialistic wonderland created to help us experience ourselves
as individuals. Why should we have to experience ourselves this
way? Because we’re really all one. We’re all God, the light, energy—
whatever you want to call it. We’re not actually individuals at all. You
are everybody! Just to clarify, I’m going to expand upon this “world as
illusion” concept a bit further, using our familiar notion of God to
explain why our universe might have been created to begin with.
Let’s pretend that you are the almighty biblical God. You created
yourself, and you know exactly how you did this. In fact, you know
everything, you are everything, and you are all-powerful. There is
nothing you can’t do. There is nothing that isn’t you. And there is
nothing you do not know. Except for one thing—you don’t know what
it’s like to not be you. Of course, not knowing something is impossible!
You’re God—the all-seeing, all-knowing, almighty God! You know all
18
Lost Is a Microcosm of the Universe
there is to know, but because of this you don’t. You don’t know what
it’s like to not be you, since you are all there is. Ladies and gentlemen,
we have a paradox. Instantly, there’s a big bang, and an illusionary
world is created which is made up of God split into all these different
segments. Now, all these segments are still a part of God, but they
don’t know that, enabling God to learn what it’s like to not be Himself.
In other words, God is experiencing Himself without realizing He’s
doing this. The paradox is solved, and our universe is created. We are
all God experiencing Himself. We are all the mind of God. That is why
we’re here. All we’re trying to do now is remember this so we can all
consciously become God once more and the process can start all over
again. This is the truth that so many stories have been plugging into for
thousands of years. And this is the hidden truth of Lost.
Just for the record, when I speak of God in this book, I’m not
trying to force any religious belief on anyone. I’m just using the
concept of God because it is one everyone has heard of. If it makes you
uncomfortable, please feel free to substitute God with Buddha, The
Light, cosmic consciousness, universal energy, The Supreme Being, or
Eric Clapton. The point is I’m using God because He’s the being that
the most people believe in, so it’s just easier. If you don’t believe in God,
you probably at least believe in energy, so use that. They’re the same
thing anyway—invisible, omnipresent, can’t be created or destroyed,
all-powerful, can make toast, etc.
Getting back to Lost, you’ve probably noticed that all the characters
on the island have … hmm, how to put this delicately … issues. Issues
that have drastically affected their lives (or lack thereof ) before the crash.
Now, according to the Lost myth, life is an illusion that requires us to
overcome our fears and bad habits so we can grow as human beings.
And once we’ve recognized this truth or conquered our challenges, we
can leave. How has Lost shown us this? I’ll use a secondary character
from the first season as an example—Leslie Arzt.
Leslie Arzt was a high school science teacher and, because of this,
was very conscious of cliques. On the island, he complained about
how certain influential castaways all seemed to be a part of a popularity
clique that he and most of the other survivors were not a part of.
Despite this, he volunteered to join Jack, Kate, and Hurley to search
for dynamite at the Black Rock with Danielle Rousseau because—as he
19
THE MYTH OF LOST
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