Outies, Innies, and the In-Between

I just binge-watched two seasons of Severance, which is saying something because I’m usually more of a YouTube kind of guy. But this show—this show is unnervingly good. The writing is sharp, the premise is unsettling in the best way, and the character development sneaks up on you like an emotional freight train. To me, it’s basically a masterclass in what happens when we mistake escape for closure.

Without spoiling too much, the show centers around a company that offers its employees a radical form of work-life balance. You get a brain implant that severs your consciousness in two—your work self (an “Innie”) and your personal self (an “Outie”) have no memory of each other’s lives. So your Outie drops you off at the elevator, and the next thing you know, you’re back at the elevator again, having already completed the workday—no memory of the spreadsheets, the meetings, or the soul-sapping water cooler conversations.

It’s a concept that plays like wish-fulfillment—at least at first. The dream of skipping the grind and just arriving at the part where you get to go home. And I get it. I’ve wished for that, too. Imagine, enjoying the fruits of one’s labor without remembering the labor. I guess it is kind of similar to fast-forwarding through the awkward therapy sessions and the nights spent replaying every mistake on loop—just to arrive at the part where I’ve finally figured it all out.

But the show doesn’t let you off that easy. It raises an uncomfortable question: can we really escape by simply running away?

Would I want to have an Innie? Tempting, but probably not. Not just because I’m squeamish about brain surgery (which I am), but because I’m starting to believe that life isn’t something to be partitioned. It’s meant to be felt in full—tedium, trauma, joy, and all.

Skipping the middle would mean missing the meaning. And for better or worse, that’s where most of life happens.