Oliver's Struggles with Himself

 When Anatoly  Knyazev finds out about Oliver's secret identity, he tells Oliver not to listen to "what that woman (Talia) is telling you.  "What's inside is inside you," said Anatoly.   I've been thinking about that line, and thinking it might be one of the most so significant  lines from the episode that was filled with many wonderful lines.

Whatever we watch or read, we tend to bring into it our past experiences and our own life choices. This is what makes stories so compelling.  Oliver struggles with the bad that is in him, and he somehow thinks the island made him that way. He has yet to realize that inside very human there is the capacity for evil or to be or do bad things.  I am a Christian.  (Don't worry, I'm not here to preach or persuade) I just want to share how I can relate this to my life.  The Bible tells me as a Christian I have two natures living in me. The new man is the one that trusts in the completed work of Christ, while the old man, that sinful flesh I have, wars against the new man.   

Anatoly is right that what's inside him is inside him.  We can just look at his life prior to the island, he certainly was deceitful, he used people for his own end, while at the same time we can see the guilt he had for doing these things, so he had both the good and the bad already there.  The island experience brought the bad to the fore, but Oliver didn't know who or what to trust, so he trusted only in himself. .  The good and the bad within him.  Oliver used to think the bad inside him would  win out and that he would never have the capacity to be good, but we saw that because of Felicity and Diggle, he could learn to trust, and he could be a complete person.  This season, he comes to terms with all that lies within him.  Chase thinks Oliver is totally evil, and he wants Oliver to recognize that, but Oliver isn't totally evil, he knows the way out.  When he comes to terms with who he is, he will win out against Chase, and Chase will be defeated.  Oliver will find the light that's within him, and he will win.

Felicity has a parallel path to Oliver.  She thought she left the bad behind her when her boyfriend went to prison.  She made a choice to move toward the light. Her life  trials that she had undergone, now seem to draw her back to that darkness that is within her.  Like Oliver that light/dark lie in the human heart, and she will have to deal with that.  Her love for Oliver and his love for her, will be the driving force, I think.  She will understand herself better, and thereby understand Oliver better. 

Life is complicated.  There are not always easy choices to make.