PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER

What we knew about the island is what we perceived about the island. Perceptions are reality unless the perceptions are deceptions. Then our perception is wrong.

What do we truly know about the island?

It looked like a tropical island.
It had palm trees, beaches, ocean currents, a reef, volcanic mountains and bamboo groves.

It also was "moving" away from the freighter. Daniel's rocket experiment data proved it.
It also "vanished" without leaving a massive void in the ocean space which would have created a massive tsunami. Instead, it was just a ripple on the ocean's surface.

So we have something that looks like an island but acts like a  . . .

Space ship.
A portal to another dimension.
An illusion.
Something else.

We were also told that the island needed "protection." Protection from what? It seemed that human beings could exploit the power of the island's core for evil purposes, but we never saw anyone actually harness that power. We saw individuals turn the frozen donkey wheel, but that exercise merely teleported those turners off the island. The Dharma Initiative drilled into the electromagnetic pockets in an attempt to harness the energy, but the only things that happened were time traveling bunnies and The Incident.

Like nature, the island seems untameable by human hands.

But the entire series undercurrent was the need to find an island guardian. In the first instance, Crazy Mother killed a Roman woman to steal her new born sons. She took those babies in order to have one of them replace her as the guardian of the island. That role went to Jacob. And after Jacob killed his brother, he sought to replace himself. He brought hundreds of candidates to the island to match wits with the apparent dead spirit of his brother, MIB. But the goal was the same as Crazy Mother: to give up the burden of the guardianship.  The role went to Jack for a short period to re-set the island cork and rescue Desmond from the light cave; but then it was transferred to Hurley, who also did not want the job.

But what exactly was the job? Ben said it was anything Hurley wanted to do; he could make up his own rules.

Ben also remarked that the island was like a Magic Box; if you wished hard enough, your dreams could materialize.

So, it is possible that the real connection between the island and human beings is the runaway, uncontrollable dreams of human beings that the island could actually give them - - - if there was no governor - - - something to stop someone from becoming a god.

We were told that Hurley merely wound down the island, shut down the air drops, and went to the sideways world church reunion. But there is a huge gap in between these activities. First, the sideways world is in the after life. Second, if Hurley was alive on the island, how did he get to the sideways world if he was an immortal guardian? Did he have to trick someone into taking over his island guardianship in order to escape the island's hold on him?

It would seem so. Unless Hurley's grand wish was always to have a group of close friends, a woman who truly loved him, and a place where everyone could come together in peace and tranquility. Then his Magic Box moment would have been the sideways church reunion.