Eliza - Well, the nice thing about the roles we play...or might decide to play...is that you are free to take them on at any time you desire. The important thing is that they don't take you on which is what happens when you get so caught up in the role that you forget that you are anything BUT that role. That's when the role has taken you over, made you its unconscious servant, and you are, in essence, under its control rather than being in charge of the situation. You are no longer able to drop it if you choose, because you're forgotten that you have the choice!

Thus do people get completely overtaken by their political roles, their religious roles, their gender roles, their role as "boss" or "underling", their various socially acquired roles....and once taken over by a role they lose much of their original spontaneity, their humanity, their flexibility, and their self-awareness. They get lost in the role they are playing.

That's sort of like an actor in a play who forgets that he is in a play. He might be playing a villian in that play...he might be playing a hero...she might be playing a patriotic and loyal German fighting for the Nazis in WWII...she might be playing a feminist crusader in post-modern America... ;-) Whatever the role is, good, bad or indifferent, you've gotten lost in in it once you can't see beyond it anymore. And you will then fight the endless battles which that that role seems to demand of you...and feel righteous in so doing. Many of those battles may be pointless, they may be harmful to you and others, and they may not serve you well in the end. An inner state of peace would not opt to fight such battles at all. You see them raging constantly on this forum, in the world, in politics, in human relations, inside us, and all around us.

A role can end any time you decide it's not serving you any longer. You just take a clear look at it, let go of it, and stop playing it. But it can only end if the "actor" realizes it's just a role. If they firmly believe they ARE that role at an intrinsic and permanent level, then they are trapped by it. And they will keep fighting just as that role demands of them until they either wake up from it....or die. Whichever comes first.

So did thousands of young Japanese in WWII go forth on Kamikaze missions or suicide charges, and they gave up their lives. They played out the self-sacrificing role that their society had taught them...to the very end. Unfortunately, within that rigid military command structure even those individuals who were self-aware enough to question and possibly drop that role had almost no possible way of doing so. A great tragedy, and it consumed a generation of brave and very capable young people. That's how powerful a political/social role can become.

Every role automatically assumes its own rightness and its innate justice (whether or not it's truly right or just). And that is believed by those who take up the role and they serve it righteously...unless and until they experience a dramatic re-appraisal of the role they've been playing. Then they might see through it and drop it...usually for another role. I've met some people who turned from deep belief in a religion, for example, to deep hostility toward all religion (or at least that religion), and I've met people who did the exact opposite. They exchanged one militant role for another. They became taken over by the new role they had chosen and began fighting the new battles it demanded. They got lost in the roles they were playing.