Popping the Bubble

There is a legitimate concern that I have seen popping up all over the place lately, the dreaded information bubble. There is a growing realization that we only see what is put in front of us, and the result is a biased view of the entire world. The promise of the Information Super Highway was an interconnected communication era. People were going to have access to the vast stores of data. Towers of bunk would be burnt to ashes. The walls of ignorance and prejudice were to be reduced to rubble. At last truth would reign supreme. Intellects would merge into a communal cyber mind as boundaries fell like so many spent autumn leaves facing the winds of change. Freedom would sprout around the globe like spring daisies shooting up from the tundra thawing after the death of a darker age.

Although we have seen some sluggish movement in that direction, increasingly our world is tailored to us. Our daily ration of data is sorted, filtered, processed, and prepackaged for our convenient consumption by an algorithm inside of a shiny industrial server. The  news rooms play to demographics, factoring in what someone of your race, gender, nationality, religious view, and political affiliation would want to hear about the world. Politicians have gerrymandered and jerry rigged the map to the point that most nations come off as paranoid schizophrenic suffering from dissociative  identity disorder. Same page. It isn't even safe to put these people in the same room. We are becoming so polarized that we can't even agree with ourselves.

Marketing surveys, tracking bots, focus groups, "assisted" web search results, cookie supported targeted marketing, all with the sole purpose of  telling you what someone else wants you to hear so that their agenda can be advanced.

And what do "we the people" do? We consume. Wholesale. We accept the picture of reality painted for us by a class of greedy grinning yes men. Their nodding bobble heads and blank eyes hypnotize as we sign a blank check, leveraging the future against current creature comforts. We keep our heads down, and our guards up. We don't buy slaves anymore, but third world slave made goods are a-ok. Straight off the freight ships, they come direct to our local economy crushing big box store as we point the finger at our neighbor's excess, and squabble over who should most feel the burden of our few pennies saved.

I can hear the rebuttal from the most deeply entranced of our once noble ranks, "But what would you have us do?"

Invest. Wholeheartedly and with wild reckless abandon, we need to invest in everything that really matters. Commit money, time, effort, supplies, or just under utilized thought to anything in your sphere of influence that actually might produce some sliver of benefit to the greater good. Check in on someone else's well being. Support local trade. Clean up a roadside. Better yet, don't throw your trash out to begin with. Get out and exercise. Grow something. Spend the extra coin on something that will last more than a week. That's how to save in the long run versus shopping at planned-obsolescence-co. Make something useful. Let's teach our kids something new today. Support them in learning a practical skill. Hell, go nuts and learn something ourselves. Educate the masses!

Most of us have, at our fingertips, a device that provides access to a near infinite amount of information about anything and everything. What do we do with it? We google and ogle boobs, cats, and celebrity gossip. I now fully comprehend the phrase WTF. Any down moment could be instantly redirected from complete pointless loss to the ignition of that blinding flash of insight that tears you out of the youtube addled delirium, and sets your feet on the path to changing the flow of the space time continuum! Hello, McFly, anybody home?

Find a cause, a purpose, some meaning, and then commit. Be the spouse, parent, boss, or employee that you would want to have with you in the foxhole. None of us can make the world what it needs to be, but we can work out our own bugs. If all the little gears start spinning together, just think of what this massive cognitive machine cold do. Right now, go spend five minutes being productive. Fight apathy. Reject mediocrity. Look over the screen, and observe what is going on around you. I promise the celebrity feline with the nice rack will be here when you get back, and we will all have that much nicer a place to call home. Let's all head out together, awake, refreshed, and driven.

Smoldering Straw Men

I was just sitting here sipping coffee, trying to organize my thoughts on God, the universe, and the ultimate fate of humanity as we battle against the monumental difficulties that define our age. I'm finding it hard to focus on these pathetic little things when compared to the vastness of the problems in my personal life, bills, relationships, hobbies, the outcome of quasi-scripted "reality" shows. My mind is raging against a tide of egocentric worry and doubt, even though I'm resolved to take on the most epic concepts my mind can handle.

As obvious as the preceding sarcasm is, it amazes me how distracting the everyday can be, even against the monolithic issues that constantly loom over us. We compartmentalize our world, focusing on the things that are most direct and present. We all do it. Our psychology is pretty hard wired here. The obtuse and obscure problems are ignored, because they are too intimidating or complicated. Even if the threat is the most immediate, we will still choose to focus on that which we can understand, put a face to, and grapple with directly.

Politicians and advertisers latch onto this analytic curiosity inherent in each of us and exploit it. The most complex and morally difficult questions are boiled down, distilled, and (using the word subjectively) refined to short one liners that can be digested by the populace.

That's right, for a limited time, you too can receive the one cure to the ultimate problem that philosophers, scientist, and theologians have wrestled with for centuries, in a simple little pill. No side affects, no worries, no collateral damage, just send in the one time fee of your slavish blind devotion to our way of thinking. In addition an entire lifestyle, theological belief system, or ethical platform will be thrown in at no additional charge. You can be the happy owner of a mass produced reality, tailored to you. All that is required is that you perpetually contribute to the feedback that maintains the system by not questioning the mechanics behind it.

Yeah, right.

Do me a personal solid today guys. Take your most precious belief, be it about God, abortion, gay rights, gun control, global warming, or tapioca pudding, and play devil's advocate. Attack your point of view viciously and thoroughly. Disassemble it and analyze the structure. What is the foundation? Is it logic or a logical fallacy? Was it a lesson taught by your parents, or an assumption that you formed in a time when you were still scared of the monsters under your bed.

Take the time to burn a personal straw man. Really engage with a question and decide what you truly believe and why you believe it absent of the judgement and prejudices of anyone else. It may turn out that you have no idea why you support one side of an issue, or this may only serve to strengthen your resolve. Either way you should have a more clear picture of why you hold that idea dear.

It is your idea, and something that defines you. Your actions are formed around it. You are not your possessions, or your reputation. You are your beliefs and actions. Shouldn't they receive at least as much brain time as the last viral video you ingested? You deserve more than the manicured half truths forced on you from all sides. You are fully capable of engaging life and paying attention to what is going on outside your plastic bubble, no matter what others think. We aren't beholden to a political organization or bulk subset of ideas because we have a mutual view on a single issue. We don't have to assume the identity of a group just to prove we are as radical or as much of an individual.

It is only once we take the time to purge the half truths and failed logic from ourselves that we can participate in finding universal truth. We cannot possibly hope to help the debate progress until we each stop being an echo chamber for Ceaser churning out distractions for the mob. We owe it to ourselves to reject that which is composed for mass consumption. If we then choose to engage in the debates that shape our reality, we owe it to each other to present more than the untested dogma, which we cling to in an effort to make our realities more palatable.

If we all were to honestly commit to this, imagine how quickly our own little worries would fade, and the universal condition could improve. The death of ignorance yields the world we deserve, built on the ashes of smoldering straw men.

Happiness vs Pleasure

We all have dreams. Each and every one of us. We have motivations, goals, and wants that shape who we are and who we want to be. Most of these are harmless enough, but there are those that are indicative of something deeper. Not just a motivation, but a longing. It is within these deeper desires that the crux of the human condition can be identified.

We are creatures that have cravings. Some people need power, or possessions. There is a drive to obtain success, control, or that item that you feel you have to have to experience a certain level of joy or freedom. 

It is different with everyone, but we all have that one thing that we feel defines us. Or if you are like me, the one constantly changing thing for that moment. It could be the great job that finally makes you feel empowered. It might be that new skill or trait that will give you the ability to be more like the person you have always wanted to be. It may even be as basic as a particular item that unlocks the lifestyle you have always envisioned for yourself. 

Each serves a different part of the psyche, a segment of the personality. At one time or another each of us has had a goal in each of the three categories. From psychological affirmation, as with the job, to something physical in the environment, or the much fuzzier to define items of creativity and personal development that serve the higher self. At times the categories may overlap. That item that you just had to have in school, not for personal needs, but to gain the approval of your peer group. This is a physical item serving a psychological goal. The layers of these three aspects of a desire can get hopelessly entangled in ever more increasing ways, till a person becomes frustrated and doubtful that the goal can ever be achieved. What most miss, is that it is not the goal causing the stress, but the motivation.

Why do we crave these things? Why do we fill the holes left by their absence with vices, and poor replacements? Why, even after we attain these things, does the apatite not go away? 

Could it be that the goal was just the solidification of a stronger drive. Something much more essential, more elemental, lurks below. Religion, Science, and Philosophy have all posed answers to those questions. Hypothesis stem from the Buddhist's souls yearning to escape rebirth, to Maslow's hierarchy of needs, or the philosophical realms of aesthetics and dualism.

Ultimately they all indicate the same thing. We crave happiness, but settle for pleasure. The reason we have these wants is simply answered. We want to be happy, but some logical fallacy has convinced us that there is some prerequisite that we have to attain first. 

Chew on that for a second. There is no prerequisite for happiness. If you polled every truly joyous person in the world there would not be a solid physical indicator for happiness. It is internal, it is pervasive. They are happy, because they allow themselves to be happy wherever they are with whatever they have. Joy springs eternal because they allow it. They still have needs, goals, and motivations, but are not defined by them. 

In the last post I talked about the spark. Happiness is the same way. It is everywhere. When you begin to focus on it, and foster it, you'll see it. You have to concentrate on seeing it at first, but that primal joy is there in even the bleakest times. Train your mind to accept it by looking for it anywhere. On a physical level, your brain is designed for pattern recognition. If you concentrate on happiness for a few minutes each day you physically build neural pathways strengthening your ability to perceive happiness. Once you have identified it, you can really tell the difference between that and the instant gratification pleasure you get from whatever thing you try to use to fill the gap in yourself. I will beat this concept to death. Happiness is a skill you refine through practice.

Your goal today is to spend a little time concentrating on happiness. Not the thing that you feel will bring you happiness, but the emotion itself. Think back to a moment when you were truly happy. It could be the birth of a child, a wedding, a day sitting at the beach doing nothing at all. Whatever your little happy thought is, just reflect on it. It is proven science that just smiling engages the part of your brain responsible for happiness. Just intentionally smiling for no good reason puts you into a better mindset. Hold onto that feeling, and bring it up to the front of your mind throughout your day. This will require you to slow down once or twice, but I promise it will be worth it.  As of this moment you are responsible for your own joy.

What Now?

Hold onto this moment. Enjoy it's uniqueness, and savor the brevity. Although there are many moments piled together, uploaded, and hyper linked, there are none more real than the one your are experiencing right now.

Take even the smallest second to stretch into your day and think about that. Fully engage the present, not because of what now will become, or what implications now has on the moments that have just passed. Feel it. Live it, because this is it.

Right now is yours.
Eventually doesn't exist.
Someday already passed.

This is not about meditation. I promise I'm not going to pounce on you with some philosophical or theological insight. There will be no request to participate in any ritual sacrament. I just want you to absorb, through every sense at your disposal, all that you can about this moment.

This is the reality of your life. This is truth. The world that is set before you is the current product of all our communal thoughts and deeds. The way things are is just the way things are. Accept it entirely with no preconceptions, assumptions, or doubt. All the chaos, insanity, and depravity we observe and participate in each day are irrefutable facts already rough hewn from the mountain, etched in the stone, and cobbled together into the foundations of our existence. Every path that has ever been intersects here. Every choice ever made forms this. Here we all find ourselves, connected, merging into the perpetual present.

Together we are sharing a world filled with horrific and beautiful things. From the mundane to the awe inspiring, we are surrounded by a hurried tumult of complicated motivations fighting and clawing to find their means. Tides rise and fall. Worlds whirl about their axes. Stars explode. Galaxies collide. Universes blink in and out of being like so many candles on a cake, as time soldiers on to an unknown end. Yet here we find ourselves, in this moment simply being. As if oblivious, we pose for the iris of an unseen camera as it records now for all eternity.

That snapshot is us.

With all the darkness in that frame, if you were to zoom in to any point far enough you could still see the spark. Within all the structures, systems, relationships, and organisms lies that briefest flash of pure crackling energy that even now fuels you. It seeps through the cracks in even the most monumental piles of rubble and ruin. It burns across the most vast plains of disparity. It engulfs and consumes even the most treacherous avalanches of apathy. And it grows more intense because you have just acknowledged it.

Even the darkest times have a seed of happiness, a desire for strength, or a promise of hope. Somewhere right now, someone fights for their life, and hangs on against all odds because what you have in your possession is something worth fighting for. For as much harm as we have done, we have seen crops grow in the wasteland. We have witnesses moments of peace in nations of perpetual war. We have tasted victory after moments of epic failure. We have heard the ringing laughter from the soul of a terminally ill child. Therein lies the spark.

The solution to any problem lies in fostering that spark in yourself. By taking the time to focus on it, you begin to train yourself to spot it more readily around you. Soon you will see it every where, hiding in plain sight, waiting to be coaxed out of the dimmest places in your life. As it builds strength it will feed the sparks of those around you, igniting a passion for joy that drives all things. After all, happiness is a skill, and like any skill must be practiced.

Even a single flame ignited burns away some fraction of the most pervasive darkness. There is no star in all of creation that could hope to burn brighter than the unification of our infinite number of sparks. All of those tiny lights, when encouraged, nourished, and aimed in concert, compose a blinding spotlight capable of illuminating all of creation.

Despite whatever seeks to hinder you today, you have the knowledge that you can overcome. It isn't going to happen because you change something in the past. You won't succeed because of the grand plan you are waiting to implement, just as soon as the time is right. There are things about your story that cannot be changed. There will be unforeseen obstacles that come crashing into your path. Just acknowledge that things happen the way they happen because that is the only could have possibly have happened. Accept the new reality, and continue forging on. Victory comes when you engage every moment by acknowledging the situation for what it is, standing up, ignoring apathy, embracing the challenge you face, and acting boldly as if you are the hero of a story that is currently being told.