If you believe you are a stone cold realist who sees truth as it actually is, consider…
Are you free?
Free to choose your life’s vocation unconstrained by how much money you will make?
Free to spend your non-working and sleeping time doing the activities you enjoy most?
Free to invest the time you need to build healthy relationships with family and friends?
Are you independent?
How much of what you do is reliant on what other people have done?
Of all the words you have thought or spoken, which ones did you create?
How much of what you need to survive daily do you (or can you) produce?
Does self-interest really serve you?
Every hurdle you face to all you desire is due to other people advancing their own self-interest.
Is competition really a good thing?
Every person you defeat in the competition for resources is a person you may need to rely on for the goods and services that support you.
The conventional wisdom inherent to each of these bolded questions is the Matrix.
Truth resides in your responses.