By: John S. Morlu II, CPA
I’m exhausted.
Not the kind of exhaustion that comes from hard work or long nights, but the kind that comes from watching a species forget who they are.
The kind that comes from scrolling through a digital zoo where everyone is performing, pretending, and begging — not for food, but for attention.
There’s a kind of despair in this world that’s not about hunger anymore.
It’s about emptiness.
People are not starving for bread — they’re starving for validation.
We’ve built a civilization of beggars wearing designer sneakers.
People who can’t afford three meals a day are walking around with iPhone 17s — filming their hunger, hashtagging their misery, curating their despair for an audience equally lost.
The new poverty isn’t financial. It’s spiritual.
We don’t know who we are without being seen.
Avicenna’s Flying Man
More than a thousand years ago, the Persian philosopher Avicenna (Ibn Sina) imagined a simple but radical idea:
What if a man were created in mid-air — floating, suspended, cut off from every sense?
No sight.
No sound.
No touch.
No world.
Would he still know he existed?
Avicenna said yes.
Because existence, he argued, isn’t proven by feedback — it’s known by awareness.
That’s the Flying Man — the being who exists simply because he knows himself.
Now look around.
We’ve reversed the experiment.
We live surrounded by everything — lights, sound, data, faces, dopamine — and yet we’ve become less aware of ourselves than that man floating in nothingness.
We don’t know we exist until someone “likes” it.
We don’t feel alive unless we’re seen.
We’ve become digital ghosts, dependent on algorithms for proof of life.
The Flying Man needed no audience.
But this generation can’t breathe without one.
The Poverty of Validation
This world is full of people pretending to live rich while dying broke — not in money, but in meaning.
People who buy expensive phones but can’t buy peace.
People who wear brands they can’t pronounce but can’t stand themselves.
People who say “I’m grateful” online but curse reality offline.
We used to hide our wounds. Now we market them.
We’ve monetized misery, franchised fake happiness, and built an entire economy around insecurity.
Influencers teach people how to “manifest abundance,” while half their followers can’t pay rent.
We’ve created a generation of people who can’t tell the difference between self-worth and self-display.
And the saddest part?
The beggar with the iPhone 17 doesn’t even want food anymore — he wants followers.
He doesn’t want help — he wants recognition.
He’s not trying to eat — he’s trying to trend.
This isn’t poverty — this is vanity in rags.
The War for Self-Awareness
Avicenna’s Flying Man proved that consciousness is self-evident.
You don’t need the world to tell you who you are.
But modern life has made us addicted to mirrors — mirrors made of pixels, metrics, and other people’s opinions.
We’ve forgotten the quiet dignity of existing in our own company.
We can’t even walk alone without reaching for a phone, as if silence might expose the truth — that we don’t know who we are without witnesses.
Our conversations have become theater.
Our empathy has become performance.
Even our charity now needs an audience.
We don’t give to help; we give to post.
We don’t pray to connect; we pray to be seen praying.
We don’t live to learn; we live to impress.
We’ve replaced meaning with metrics.
Faith with filters.
Purpose with followers.
And we call it progress.
The Cult of “Somebody”
The saddest lie sold to this generation is the idea that you must “be somebody.”
You already are.
You were born somebody.
The miracle was complete the moment you took your first breath.
But social media turned being into branding.
Now everyone’s hustling for visibility — not integrity.
Everyone wants to be known — not useful.
Everyone wants to go viral — not virtuous.
It’s the same sickness Dostoevsky saw centuries ago, just with better Wi-Fi.
Man’s not searching for truth — he’s searching for attention.
He doesn’t want to be good — he wants to look good.
He doesn’t want to live — he wants to trend.
And when the lights go off, he doesn’t know who he is anymore.
That’s not evolution.
That’s extinction with filters.
The Flying Man Still Lives
The Flying Man doesn’t need applause.
He doesn’t need validation.
He doesn’t beg to be noticed, liked, or shared.
He knows his worth in the silence of existence itself.
You can strip him of wealth, status, followers, and even senses — and he would still whisper, “I am.”
Meanwhile, we’ve built skyscrapers and apps, connected the globe in milliseconds, and yet most people still whisper, “Do I matter?”
The Flying Man lived in nothingness and knew he existed.
We live in everything and still feel nothing.
That’s the tragedy.
So Here’s the Truth
If you have to prove your worth, you’ve already forgotten it.
If you have to perform your peace, you’ve already lost it.
If you have to beg to matter, you’ve already been deceived.
You are already somebody.
Even if no one claps.
Even if no one sees.
Even if no one validates.
The highest form of wealth is self-awareness.
The deepest kind of freedom is not needing an audience.
So put the phone down.
Walk into silence.
And remember —
Avicenna’s Flying Man had nothing.
No followers.
No status.
No proof.
But he had one thing this generation lost:
the awareness that existence itself is enough.
Final Thought
Stop begging to matter.
Stop performing poverty.
Stop mistaking noise for meaning.
You’re already somebody.
Now act like it.
The world doesn’t need another influencer.
It needs more Flying Men — aware, grounded, and free.
Author: John S. Morlu II, CPA is the CEO and Chief Strategist of JS Morlu, leads a globally recognized public accounting and management consultancy firm. Under his visionary leadership, JS Morlu has become a pioneer in developing cutting-edge technologies across B2B, B2C, P2P, and B2G verticals. The firm’s groundbreaking innovations include AI-powered reconciliation software (ReckSoft.com) and advanced cloud accounting solutions (FinovatePro.com), setting new industry standards for efficiency, accuracy, and technological excellence.