MyStrangeMind.com is Evolving

After several years of relatively small changes to this site, I’ve decided to switch things up a bit. The most noticeable change is the new skin on the site. Alot has changed with WordPress, the content management system I use to run this site; so I decided I’d start evolving the site on a more up-to-date theme framework. I’m going to work on some more graphics, logos and other customizations as time progresses too.

I’ve been tinkering around and becoming more familiar with what is happening in the free / open source (FLOSS) community lately; in the process I’ve learned about some great software that I’m now utilizing on this and other domains that I run.

Friendika – decentralised, open source, secure, private, modular, extensible, and federated.

Friendika is a social networking platform which allows you to have a Facebook-like experience, without being tied to services like Facebook, or having your friends necessarily on the same server. In fact, you can connect to friends on other Friendika servers, or just about any other server that implements Ostatus, DFRN or any future protocols that the Friendika community developers can write a bridge for.

One of the neat things about this project, is it is evolving very quickly and the developers are very responsive to suggestions; quick to implement new features and improve the features the software already offers. Another neat thing about Friendika, is the fact that I’m now one of the regular contributers! So if you start using it and see an area that can be improved, you can always talk with me and I’ll see if I can come up with a solution for whatever you might need.

New Pubic Friendika Server Launched: OpenMindSpace.org

I now operate a public Friendika server on openmindspace.org, where you can connect to me on my new profile or anyone else on a friendika compatable system. Anyone who wishes is welcome to sign-up and start using it!

Status.net – decentralized open source microblogging platform

Status.net is another form of decentralized social software. Their software is a microblogging platform similar to Twitter, which allows you to share small blips with anyone else on a Status.net compatible system.

This is a project which is really taking off and may one day help the microbloggers to communicate in a more decentralized fashion, with people able to better cluster together in small groups.

New Status.net Server Launched status.mystrangemind.com

I’ve decided to join the federated microblogging revolution with my own Status.net install. You’re welcome to connect to me there from any Status.net compatible server so we can better share information and stay in touch. You may also notice that I have the microblog feed syndicated on the sidebar of this site; that way you can see what is going on easier.

I’m currently running the status.mystrangemind.com server in “single user mode” meaning it is not possible for others to sign up; but if there is enough interest in it, I’ll be happy to open it up to the public. If you want to get on an already established public status.net server, check out this list of status.net servers. One of the neat things about smaller more decentralized servers, is you can choose your server based upon the kinds of people on the server.

New Technical Blog: chriscase.cc

Something I’ve been angling towards, as I learn more about building websites, is the idea of specialized content. When I first started mystrangemind.com, it covered a wide array of topics and it still does is to some extent. Recently, I’ve started writing more technical posts about programming, software, linux, databases, etc.

I decided beforehand that these kinds of posts just wouldn’t fit in well here; since many of the people who would go to a site like this aren’t interested in programming and the like. That is why I started another blog at chriscase.cc.

This new website functions as a more technically oriented professional site for me, where I can focus solely on topics such as programming, open source software, databases, and other computer-related topics. It also functions as a sort of resume for me, so people interested in working with me on freelance or open source projects can see how I think, the way I code and what kinds of projects I’ve worked on in the past.

Part of my intent is to document things that I’ve done or had to figure out; both for my future reference and for the benefit of others who may be researching how to do things. I’ve already found it useful myself on many occasions, I like being able to go to the site and just search for the topic and some detailed information instead of having to research and rediscover everything again on articles that may come and go on other people’s websites.

Vision for the Future

Like most webmasters, I’d really love to see my sites get more hits and have more participation from others of like mind. It would be great if more people used Friendika and contributed to the enrichment of that community of ideas too. Together, we can explore the kinds of topics discussed here and have a great time in the process.

I am going to keep working diligently, to not only add useful functionality to the sites; but also to regularly contribute high-quality content. With perseverance and a little good fortune, even more interesting people will come visit and contribute their ideas, creating a synergy which will add to the community as a whole.

Reflections on the Comforting Hum of the Celestial Wheel

Several years back, I can recall being in a state of abject boredom.  At the time, I was in school and working nights and weekends at the downtown Hilton. I was taking 15-17 credit hours and working 30-40 hours per week; so basically I had very little life outside of those two things.

It was a life lived in limbo; a life lived working almost constantly for the future promise it would bring, not so much for the present; so I tended to think.

The hours I spent there at the hotel became easier as time went on, as I learned how to deal with the situations I had to deal with in that line of work; eventually everything took very little thought or effort, even in school. Previously I would have appreciated skating along in an low-effort kind of existence; but it didn’t work very well for me. The truth of this became clearer with each passing cycle.

I started noticing all of the patterns of behavior everywhere: in the guests, in the revolving door of co-workers, in the conventions; it all became so lifeless and predictable.

At school I’d notice the same things too: all of the robotic students attending their classes, most of them not caring about really learning anything; but merely looking to pass the next test, so they could get that piece of paper; not truly being in the present moment.

They’d study to pass tests, then forget, copy each other’s homework assignments, copy each other’s project assignments; not caring about a truly enlightening experience. If you asked real questions in class, then they’d look at you with contempt, wishing only to regurgitate the required material, so they can get back to their mindless routine. It seemed to be without much in the way of substance.

Most of the teachers, though not all, were reading off of yellowed notes; their lesson had long since lost their passion. The students in their classes rarely took an interest and there never was any incentive, in their understanding at least, to try anything new or innovative. How sad it all was.

Seldom was a meaningful contact made which didn’t involve some sort of hollow self interest, drudgery or was rigidly structured by some sort of societal convention.

Everything in that world was part of one silly game after another, which everyone unknowingly played; the results of which amounted to little more than superficial ego-based pursuits; seeking attachment, attainment, recognition, etc.

It seemed as if everyone was setting up the rest of their lives, without the slightest clue who they are or where they were going. They “wanted” all of these things: a degree, a spouse, kids, a house, a career; but they could never really say why they wanted these things. It’s just the way it had always been done.

To me, it was like living in a land of automata, where nothing and no-one had much of a conscious. Any attempt to interject something different was either frowned upon or ignored altogether. Only the comforting hum of the celestial wheel gave me solace during those bittersweet periods of reflection which occur from time to time.

I began the realization that I wasn’t challenging myself enough, despite the challenge of moving through all of the daily drudgery. So I sought to dig deeper, to be more of an explorer in my own mind and in the world around me.

In the process of all of this, I feel as if I became more enlightened and it set me out on the path to uncover greater mysteries, as well as to meet the people who would carry me towards greater intrigues. It also taught me that there is no shortage of mysteries to explore. In our minds, in the universe around us and in the minds of others; there are countless treasures which none have unearthed.

At whatever stage you are at, there are always challenges which can make you a better, more aware, more principled, individual. If there’s anything I’ve learned, it is that there is always a new horizon to pursue.

In life and in death, the celestial wheel will continue eternally; bringing about new opportunities which we can take, or pass over.  How we meet the opportunities brought about by the wheel, will determine the true product of our lives.  We are not here to gain money, gain influence, achieve acceptance by others, or any of the other illusions.  What we are left with, after everything turns to dust and blows away, is either being a better, more conscious, more enlightened individual; or being the same or worse than when we entered this cycle.  Each rotation of the wheel, each lifetime, is an opportunity to move up or down on the sliding scale of enlightenment.

The Power of Principles, Intent and Awareness: a Healing Story

You can sail the ocean blue
You can fly up on the clouds
You can search the world for gold

You can seek a life of fame
You can toil at a job
You can hear a higher call

In our hearts,
In our minds,
In our short and fragile time,
We must all decide just what it means to be alive

You can look into my eyes
You can wish upon a star
You can walk a thousand miles

You can paint a moonless sky
You can scale a rocky wall
You can feed a starving child

In our hearts,
In our minds,
In our short and fragile time,
We must all decide just what it means to be alive

You can drink ’till you’re no more
You can dig an early grave
You can fight a losing war

You can build a better world
You can find someone to love
You can hope there is a cure

—Din Fiv – Infinite Paths

Some of the most important qualities we need, to prosper in our lives include: a positive attitude about our selves, and understanding of the underlying principles that govern things and the proper actions to learn and eventually adhere to those principles. Those who do not seek these qualities inevitably end up sabotaging themselves and quite possibly, those around them.

In order to accomplish anything of significance in this world, it takes a great deal of strength, courage and dedication to principle. If we do not gain confidence in our abilities, then we will not be confident in the principles we learn and our adherence to them will be shaky and inconsistent.

I know from my own life experiences, that success or failure at any endeavor comes from a genuine, unapologetic, understanding of the underlying principles which govern whatever aspects of our reality we seek to master. We must tirelessly study and understand these underlying principles, because everything operates on principles; not opinions, authority, emotions or theories.

Furthermore, once we have studied and gained an intellectual understanding of the underlying principles, we must then learn how to put those principles into practice; this is not something that happens overnight per se. If we are impatient and impractical, expecting everything to resolve itself immediately, simply because that is what we desire, we will give up and fall short of our goals.

Emerging From the Brink of Oblivion

In my own life and the life of my family, an opportunity presented itself to learn these lessons, in one of the most difficult ways I know of. We had the misfortune of a birth that did not go very well. This set off a cascade of events which provided us with a new challenge and opportunity; to nurse our child back to health.

At virtually every step along the way, many individuals around us tried to cast blame and shame, saying that if only we’d have done this or that, it would have turned out differently. They tried to find every fault they could in our situation and that of our child.

It is very easy to look back at things and feel like the expert, after-all hindsight is 20/20; but we know for certain that we did things in the best way that we knew how. We are always taking the lessons learned from this experience and applying them to the future.

We feel no shame for the past, because the past is far behind us now and there is no sense in dwelling on the things we can no-longer change. Only the present can be changed and having the power to change the present is all we needed anyways.

Dogen Zen-ji said, “Time goes from present to past.” This is absurd, but in our practice sometimes it is true. Instead of time progressing from past to present, it goes backwards from present to past. Yoshitsune was a famous warrior who lived in midieval Japan. Because of the situation of the country at the time, he was sent to the northern provinces, where he was killed. Before he left he bade farewell to his wife, and soon after she wrote in a poem, “Just as you unreel the thread from a spool, I want the past to become present.” When she said this, actually she made past time present. In her mind the past became alive and was the present. So as Dogen said, “Time goes from present to past.” This is not true in our logical mind, but it is in the actual experience of making past time present. There we have poetry, and there we have human life.

When we experience this kind of truth it means we have found the true meaning of time. Time constantly goes from past to present and from present to future. This is true, but it is also true that time goes from future to present and from present to past. A Zen master once said, “To go Eastward one mile is to go Westward one mile.” This is vital freedom. We should acquire this kind of perfect freedom.

—Zen Mind: The Beginner’s Mind: Control

Of course, the easy thing to have done in this situation, would have been to give up, point fingers, feel sorry for our selves, blame others. I’ll admit, there was a fair amount of this going on at first. However, once the reality of the situation settled into our hearts and minds; we knew that there was only one acceptable course of action. We had to gain an understanding of what we needed to do and implement that understanding to the best of our abilities.

We decided to dedicate ourselves to understanding the principles of healing and wellness. This is something you never fully understand; but you can gain a more principled understanding, only if you have the intent to unapologetically strive for it. We sought out and continue to seek out, alternative forms of treatment, diets, therapies, tools and techniques.

We decided not to trust the supposed authority of doctors; but only our own understanding of the principles as we learned them along the way. This has allowed us to comb the available sources of opportunities and find what works best for our unique situation. As time progresses, we continue to refine this understanding and with it our actions.

At this point, I’m happy to say that we have gone from a seemingly hopeless state of affairs, to a much better situation. We are really starting to see both our own potential and that of our child. All of us want badly to see ourselves succeed at what we are doing, we know what to do, or at least how to figure it out with trial and error, we have confidence in what we are doing and we are doing it!

With each passing week we see more life, coordination, awareness and intrigue in our child. As this continues to happen, we continue to build up confidence and understanding; because we are seeing our understanding of healing principles in action.

When a crisis befalls us, it is imperative that we see that crisis as a challenge and an opportunity: to grow, to change, to better understand the principles which govern the world around us. Anything short of this will not work out in the long-run; because if we see our self as defeated, then there is no helping the situation either from outside or from within.

every thought you have creates its own reality…
It’s like every choice or decision you make…
the thing you choose not to do…
fractions off and becomes its own reality…
and just goes on from there forever…

everything is in one big ball of fluctuating matter…
a constant state of change…
the underlying order is chaos…

—Din Fiv: Through The Looking Glass (Original Quotes from the Movie Slacker)

Huge Repository of Independent Documentary Videos

I’ve been a big documentary watcher for the past several years; but it has been a awhile since I compiled together most of the documentaries, which have made an impression on me over the years. That’s just what I did today!

I’ve embedded a semantically organized repository of documentaries and discussions, containing independent, non-conventional perspectives on a wide array of topics; generally focused on alternative historical perspectives.

The documentaries are organized semantically into Pearl Trees; to make them easy to maintain, navigate and organize. This repository will be maintained and added to on a regular basis, to ensure that there is always fresh, working content and the latest indie documentaries which become available online.

Why So Passive Aggressive, When It Comes to Real Change?

“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”

-Albert Einstein

I’ve always been somewhat vocal about my views on just about anything important to me.  The way I see it, if you believe something is important and you have something to say about it; you may as well get it out there; else you’re just committing intellectual suicide.

I don’t worry much anymore about what others think of me for being who I am; because being who I am is much more important than what they think of me.  In fact, if I had spent much of my efforts in recent years worrying what other people think, trying to be popular, it’s likely I wouldn’t have accomplished much of anything at all aside from being a selfish, intellectually lazy, ego-centric, attention-whore; which is generally what the really popular people are, though they’ll never admit it.

As you may imagine, this means I’m often not the most favored person; but the people who really do appreciate me for who I am, form a lasting mutual bond that is virtually impenetrable.  Because there still are some people out there who appreciate intellectual honesty and despise the kind of mundane conformity that has gripped so many in it’s clutches.

One thing I notice about most people I come across these days, is they don’t really have much, in the way of their own unique viewpoints.  If you happen to have a unique viewpoint, they really don’t want to hear it.  They’ll either pretend they are listening and have absolutely nothing to say about it, or they will flat out ignore you once they realize that you have a viewpoint that they don’t agree with.  It seems to me as if they’re so afraid to have a real discussion about something, where there might be differences of opinion and the possibility that their own views may become vulnerable; that they’d rather steer clear of it altogether.

That’s the way most of the places/groups one can go to, in order to socialize have become.  You’re expected to just sit down, play the game and not say anything too controversial or “out of the box.”  If you do, then many people will start to isolate you and ignore you. If that’s the way so-called communication is supposed to place, then who the hell needs it!

If the new definition of communication is to have watered down conversations in which everyone focuses on the same old same old talking points and nothing new is ventured into; then it isn’t really communication at all.  We may as well just go to our coffee houses, sip on caffeine and make beeping noises at one another.

It’s just frustrating to have so many people in this world, yet so few who really want to try new ways of seeing things and doing things.  Is it any wonder why the years keep on passing, the problems keep mounting and not much of anything seems to get done about it.

What I’d love to see, is for more of us to be willing to really engage one another in discussions of things that really have the potential to bring about grass-roots changes in the world.  If someone has an opinion that is different than yours, discuss it in great detail so you can at least understand it; don’t just slam the door on them.

When you slam the door to communication, because you don’t want to have an uncomfortable discussion; then you’re just missing another opportunity to create meaningful change.  We can’t really afford to do that anymore, can we?  Let’s stop this bullshitting and time wasting, so we can get down to business; because I for one am not going to just sit around twiddling my thumbs while the world comes crashing down from all sides.

A World of Escapists

A recurring thought, in my stream of consciousness as of late, centers on the all encompassing desire, virtually every human being has; to engage in various forms of escapism. I’ve noticed this at various times in my life and kind of swept it under the rug; but this idea is becoming apparent once again.

Realizing this has got me somewhat depressed and I just have to get this written down; in writing this, I hope to figure out more about this phenomena and my relationship to it. I’d really like to know what we are trying to get away from, what we are hoping to find and if there are any lessons we can learn from these observations.

Maybe it’s a good thing that we are trying to escape, maybe not, maybe I’m totally off base and we, as humans, can’t do anything but escape. I’m not saying that I know anything for sure; I just want to explore something that is, in my mind at least, begging to be explored.

The sad thing about these kinds of thoughts, is the fact that it is very difficult to discuss these thoughts with anyone else. Most people don’t really give a damn what I have to say about anything like this; they either change the subject, ignore me or try to act like having a seemingly “negative” observation about something means that I’m not focusing on what I need to.

That may well be; but it doesn’t change the fact that I am extremely curious about this. I want to know why so little is said about it and why so many engage in this vacuous practice that basically consumes most of people’s lives.

Absurdities in Everyday Life

Why is it that people would rather spend the better part of their free time, frittering away, and/or watching a fictional, or highly controlled, reality via a television screen; when there is a huge glut of unaddressed dilemmas which threaten our long-term survival as individuals and quite possibly as a species.

Why is it, that in many social situations, individuals choose to smoke and drink, often (but not always) in order to escape their daily lives; even if it means that they may not remember the experience, or worse, may even harm their bodies in the process.

Why is it that, when we become activists, who want to see “change” in the world, we often focus our efforts on issues, which we stand little to no chance of having any effect on; while there are other issues which we can have a major impact on, right under our noses, that we simply ignore as if they don’t exist.

Prime examples of this, are the attention given to relatively small scale man made ecological disasters. These disasters get most of the press and activist attention, while most of the damage wrought by man takes place routinely and meticulously planned, in broad daylight, with the massive system of government subsidized, corporatized, monoculture agriculture.

All of this large scale farming is happening, while hundreds of millions of individuals are living atop perfectly productive land on their 1/4 – 1/3 acre lots; usually growing nothing but worthless grass on it.

Since we aren’t using the land that we are on, and we still must eat, we visit the restaurants and supermarkets and spend most of our monies on highly processed, additive laced, genetically modified, franken-food.

What Are We Running Away From

It is starting to become clear to me, that we tend to shy away from self examination and especially the examination of our own personal contribution to our personal survival. Society has given us so many tools to escape this responsibility, namely money; that in just a few decades, we have largely lost the skills which helped build great nations of free self sufficient individuals.

Not only has society given us tools to escape our responsibilities; but it has also given us plenty of red herrings; so that we are less likely to discover a method of curing the underlying cause. We become polarized into phony political, religious and economic paradigms; which only serve to divide us and pit us against each other.

Instead of cooperating amongst ourselves, forming real communities, creating genuine, robust, bottom up, solution-oriented, changes; we expect someone else to take on what is ultimately our own responsibility. We have a solemn responsibility, as individuals, to take decisive action in our daily lives.

What Can We Do?

The most important thing we can do, is to first identify what we really need, to survive and flourish as integrated individuals; while doing so, we need to also determine what we don’t need.

Once this is sorted out as best we can, we need to determine what we can do to get what we need, what impediments if any are stopping us from meeting those needs. Then we need to organize a plan, for how we are going to meet our needs on a continuous basis.

We have to regularly re-evaluate our lives, so that we are eliminating unneeded processes and focusing more energy on those which are necessary; else we will live lives which are not as meaningful as they could be.

Let’s Get Started

As most of us realize, deep down inside; we are facing some serious problems, on so many levels. Many of the problems are already effecting us, while there are many which will only affect us years down the road.

We can’t keep delaying the solutions until tomorrow. If something is not going to be done today; it is probably not going to happen tomorrow either. The desire to escape is addictive and infective. The more we engage in escapism, the more we are likely to do so in the future.

Conversely, the more we engage in decisive individual actions, the more we are likely to do so in the future; especially as we begin to see the effects of our efforts. Each day is like a sliding scale; we either make some progress towards our goals, or we move away from those goals.

We know for certain that if we choose to ignore our responsibilities, they will not simply go away. We can’t just pretend that they aren’t there and they go away; because they are real concrete problems; they will remain with us until we each address them as individuals.

Once enough of us address these problems as individuals, we will undoubtedly see more synergy in our communities. Once successfully kindled, this synergy will have a momentum all its own; which will help to continue the process.

All of this is up to us. If we aren’t willing to do it, then who will.

The People’s Republic of California

Rioting in LA because of a stupid ball game. Cali is so full of jerk offs, bums and commies. Perhaps those words are interchangeable.

It’s no wonder that:

• The Cali government is hopelessly bankrupt. Yet they continue to raise people’s tax in order to fund the government’s fruitless excess.
• People are living in homes they borrowed 500k to 1 million dollars for, which are worth a fraction of the cost anywhere else in the country. Of course, they got adjustable rate interest only loans for many of these homes. They’ll just walk away scott free and drag their community down in the process. They don’t care, they don’t have to face the consequences and that’s all that matters.
• They have a huge socialist tax & spend state which they can’t afford, yet when they try to cut it back to more reasonable levels, the leftists come out into the streets to protest. A state which is soon to fail and be bailed out with an old favorite tool, other people’s money.
• They pump water hundreds of miles, at great expense, so they can grow oranges in the desert.

I tell ya, I was in my rental car earlier today (in San Diego) just in a parking space looking at a map, and some lady came up behind and started honking her damn horn, trying to pressure me to leave the spot. She even had cars piling up behind her waiting for her to get her ass out of the way.

To top it all off, I saw a bum crapping on the sidewalk of a busy street. This must just be the last place one can stumble to, before they fall completely into the Pacific Ocean!

They need to just shut this asylum down and figure out how to produce something or provide something of value. Some really deep thoughts into realistic solutions that aren’t pie in the sky BS are going to be necessary if they are to pull things together around here.

The Genius Of The Crowd

by Charles Bukowski

there is enough treachery, hatred violence absurdity in the average
human being to supply any given army on any given day

and the best at murder are those who preach against it
and the best at hate are those who preach love
and the best at war finally are those who preach peace

those who preach god, need god
those who preach peace do not have peace
those who preach peace do not have love

beware the preachers
beware the knowers
beware those who are always reading books
beware those who either detest poverty
or are proud of it
beware those quick to praise
for they need praise in return
beware those who are quick to censor
they are afraid of what they do not know
beware those who seek constant crowds for
they are nothing alone
beware the average man the average woman
beware their love, their love is average
seeks average

but there is genius in their hatred
there is enough genius in their hatred to kill you
to kill anybody
not wanting solitude
not understanding solitude
they will attempt to destroy anything
that differs from their own
not being able to create art
they will not understand art
they will consider their failure as creators
only as a failure of the world
not being able to love fully
they will believe your love incomplete
and then they will hate you
and their hatred will be perfect

like a shining diamond
like a knife
like a mountain
like a tiger
like hemlock

their finest art

The Tao of Principle

Principle is originally there; just call it to mind and it is there of itself. Desire is originally not there; if you can just see through it, it disappears of itself. Stopping desire and keeping to principle are basically not two things; to the extent that you have stopped desire, to that extent you keep to principle. Nothing benefits people more than principle, yet those who keep to principle are few. Nothing harms people more than desire, yet those who indulge desires are many.

When people have desires, it is like trees having insects; consumed within unknown, before long they collapse. Those who think desire is fun do not realize desire is like fire; if you do not put it out, you will burn yourself. Your spirit will suffer from irritation, alcohol and sex will wear out your vital energy, producing illness and ulcers, so you cry out in pain day and night. Buddhists who say you suffer from your sins after death do not realize you already suffer while still alive.

–Thomas Cleary

What the Matrix Can Teach us About Life and Rules

Morpheus in this conversation with Neo (‘the One’) in the first Matrix movie:

‘I’ve seen an agent punch through a concrete wall. Men have emptied entire clips at them and hit nothing but air. Yet their strength and their speed are still based in a world that is built on rules. Because of that, they will never be as strong or as fast as you can be.’

‘What are you trying to tell me, that I can dodge bullets?’

‘No, Neo. I’m trying to tell you that when you’re ready, you won’t have to.’

Many years ago, I entered this movie without a clue of what to expect. Incidentally, I find that these kinds of unexpected surprises, are often the best kinds of transformative experiences. The mind has no time to prepare any expectations for the experience. Instead the mind is just hit with the new reality and must quickly transform itself in response; there is no time to filter or deflect the experience.

The Matrix exceeded my wildest expectations and instilled a newfound curiosity towards the very nature of our experiential reality. At first there was a stream of thought to the effect that, maybe we are literally plugged into a mechanical device which simulates our reality. This further brought about thoughts such as, “What in fact is reality anyways?”

If our conscious reality is simply impulses arriving via the nervous system, then the reality is quite literally a projection in our own minds and is therefore holographic in it’s very nature. This essentially means there is not a solid, tangible, world out there, as our rational minds often like to think. Instead, we have this biological operating system which constructs these rule sets, which govern our impression of reality, in order to function more effectively (by it’s own definition, of course) in our environment.

What I am getting at here is the fact that our minds have a basic rule-set by which they operate, in order to survive in the current environment. This rule-set is generally set-up for the basic survival of our biological envelopes (bodies). However, by no-means are these foundational rules concrete; they are simply the consensus that we have, as a collective, chosen to instill via the socialization process.

When I imply that the rules are not concrete, I mean there may be a different, perhaps more succinct, set of rules; which will at some point, allow us an even deeper connection with the world around us. We have to be willing to look at the current set of rules in a critical light, in order to enable our selves to do this. Clearly there is an inherent resistance to this, which seems to be a product of the Ego not wanting to let go.

If we, on an individual level, can genuinely undock from this control grid, as many have done in the Matrix; then I foresee many of the limitations which now impede our day-to-day lives falling by the wayside.

If such a movement were to come to fruition, perhaps the people who made this conscious decision to undock from the control grid and redesign reality, will again build great societies, where they and their descendants can better self-actualize. A society where novelty is in great abundance, where individuals are no longer a drain on resources; but instead a priceless asset which compounds novelty as they reflect it from their own unique perspective in order to generate a richness of experience which most of us can only dream of in today’s world.