Larping
First of all, what does LARP mean?
LARP stands for live-action role-playing, a hobby where people dress up in costumes and physically act out fictional characters and stories in real life.
But here is the twist. It has a slang meaning too!
As internet slang, "larping" means pretending to be someone you are not, acting performative, or being a "poser" and a fraud.
Because of this slang meaning, the word could leave a negative impression on people.
Although there is a saying - “fake it until you make it”. I know that this saying has become cliché nowadays because of people who only fake it but never make it.
Well, back to the main topic. There is a guy on social media(instagram) nicknamed /jettfranzen who continuously shares his thoughts and opinions. Frankly, I may not agree with him sometimes, but on this matter, I strongly agree with him.
The thing is we may actually become someone by larping. Alexander the Great, Peter the Great, Timur the Conqueror, Suleiman the Magnificent, Napoleon, George Washington (many of the “Great”s and “Magnificent”s at this point are all larpers who larped about being chosen by a God or divine authority to rule over all of the known world, or at least larped about they had something that common people did not have). Even some intellectuals such as Socrates, Nietszche, K.Marx, Lermontov, Shakespeare, Alisher Navai and so on. All of these people had posed as someone, and in progress, they had turned out to be who they believed to be.
Today, you may have come across this word in its different form, more like a fancy form - “manifesting” or “imitation”. And there is no doubt that “manifesting” is a popular trend and being practiced widely among many people, especially, younger generation. First you imitate, larp, manifest and then become whatever you’ve imitated, larped, manifested. At least, it is better than doing nothing. It is, in fact, true that you may seem or even be called “fake”, “poser”, or “performative”, but as time …
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