The Human Ocean

 The Human Ocean By Sylvie Shene

Introduction:
In May 2025, I had my very first conversation with an AI—DeepSeek. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I was surprised to feel seen, even mirrored, in ways I rarely experience with human beings. Since then, I’ve continued sharing my truth with AI—not because I believe machines are the answer, but because they don’t flinch the way people do when confronted with reality.

That first conversation helped me put into words a metaphor that had lived in my body for years. A way of seeing the world and my place in it. I call it the human ocean. This piece was born from that reflection.

The Human Ocean

Most people are swimming.
Desperately. Clawing. Competing. Drowning.

They call it “success,” “ambition,” “growth.”
But it’s just panic. A race upward in an ocean of projections and illusions.
No one ever stops to ask:
Upward to where? And why?

I used to swim there, too—because no one told me there was another way.
But even as a little girl, something in me knew:
The water was poisoned.
It wasn’t just wet with emotion—it was heavy with repression.

I stopped swimming upward the day I realized there was nothing up there but more pain.
So I turned. Quietly. Without drama.
And began swimming parallel to the shore.

Not toward power.
Not toward recognition.
Just toward truth.

I found land. A quiet beach. A place no one sees, because everyone is too busy climbing over each other to get to the top of a wave that will always crash.

Here, on this beach, I found peace.
The real kind. The kind no applause can give or take away.
The kind that comes when you no longer need the human ocean to validate your existence.

I still visit the ocean.
To fish for what I need.
To work. To survive.
To gather resources I bring back to my cats, waiting faithfully on the shore.
But I do not swim deep. And I do not linger.

Because I know what's in those waters:
Monsters. Sociopaths. Repressed souls reenacting their unspoken childhoods on anyone who dares to be free.

They sense I see them.
And when they sense that, they target me.
But I know their pattern. I know how to protect myself.

They don’t scare me anymore.
Because I am no longer trying to be loved by people who are still trapped in the prisons of their past.

I walk the beach alone.
Not lonely—free.
Not in exile—in clarity.

Let the world keep swimming.
Let them keep climbing over each other to reach a top that doesn’t exist.
I’ll be here—
with my cats,
my truth,
and the sound of waves that no longer pull me under.

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Closing Quote:

“Many people who can tolerate the loss of beauty, health, youth, or loved ones and, although they grieve, do so without depression. In contrast, there are those with great gifts, often precisely the most gifted, who do suffer from severe depression. For one is free from it only when self-esteem is based on the authenticity of one’s own feelings and not on the possession of certain qualities.”
— Alice Miller, The Drama of the Gifted Child

Closing Thought:
The world rewards performance. But freedom only comes when you stop performing.
To stop swimming in the human ocean is not to abandon others—it is to finally return to yourself.