It’s true that objects form the bulk of our day to day activities and concerns.
But René Girard shows us that all objects and objective desires are transient. What matters is other people. The objects are not the point.
The way we perceive, value and care about those objects is overwhelmingly colored by the opinion of the role models we care about. It’s our opinion of the role models and mediators that drives us, shapes our behaviors and determines our actions.
There is no logical reason to dye our hair blue. But when our role models dye their hair blue, so do we. Until they stop dying their hair blue and we stop too, keeping quiet about ever liking blue hair.
Before long we convince ourselves that blue hair is bad and we never really liked it. We refract and reassemble our memories to fit a new reality presented by our role models and mediators.
We shift our past according to those we admire.