Q: If the false self is dismantled how does one continue to make a living and live life with other people who are all animating false selves?

A: The real question being asked here is:

“Without illusion, how do I continue to participate in illusion?”

You’re not actually asking about practical survival, you’re asking whether life is still livable when the “you” that lived it is gone. The false self hears its own death sentence and scrambles for continuity. The question sits upon the assumption that functioning in the world requires falseness, that truth and livelihood are mutually exclusive. That’s the lie being protected here.

“Can I stay in the dream once I know it’s a dream?” The answer is that you can, but not as the dreamer you were. The play goes on, but the actor knows it’s theater. Work happens, words are spoken, bills get paid, but there’s no one behind it trying to be real or right or good. Just life doing what it does.

This type of question is common in the Deconstruction Phase where the architecture of the false self is collapsing, and the mind panics, asking, “Who will live my life if I’m not here?” It’s not a logistical problem, it’s a death rattle. The identity is dissolving, and its final defense is practicality: “I have bills to pay, people to talk to.” But that’s not truth, it’s fear disguised as reason.

What’s real is simple: life continues. It doesn’t need you, not the narrative version, not the one trying to manage the dream.

So the forward-moving question isn’t “How will I live without a false self?” It’s: “What is it that lives when the false self dies?”

That’s where to look now.