Psychological patterns, self, sentience, consciousness

Pretend that everything you say to someone is being said by a parrot that is perched on your shoulders.

Pretend that this bird has been absolutely trained to automatically speak memorized lines according to the sounds it hears being spoken to it.

Ask yourself,What is the difference between the part of me that spontaneously creates verbal responses to others and this parrot?

What difference does it make to others if I “really” mean my words or am just “running a script”?

How often do I “parrot” my words that I have been “taught” to speak by my upbringing?

How can I mean every word I speak?

How amazing is my brain that it can perform so rapidly and error free in such an automatic way? Am I benefiting as much as I might from this obvious power I possess?

When I dream at night, how like the parrot are the characters in my dreams? Do my dream’s characters “mean” their words? Why are my automatically generated words different from the words spoken by dream characters?

How do I mean?

Why do I feel like I am the creator of my words when I have no proof of any sort that “I” consciously participated in their manifestation? Why does my mere “being there” when the words happen constitute authorship?

If a book, written entirely by a computer, were given to me by a friend who said it was a good book to read, what would my first reaction be to this? Is a “core self” necessary for me to believe that words have been authentically authored?

How often am I aware of my “core self” when I think, speak and act?