Home Blog Page 282

Breaking Down Belief Systems and Finding Your True Self

Nikki Sapp
-
7
Breaking Down Belief Systems and Finding Your True Self

“Start living as if you don’t know how to live. Nobody is there to teach you, no guidelines exist. No books exist which say how to do this, how to do that. You are just left alone on an island. Everything is available. Intelligence is within you, instinct is within you, intellect is within you, now start moving.” ~ Osho

Whether we realize it or not our entire identity is formed from the relationships we have with the world around us.

In fact, our perception that we even exist at all is dependent upon these relationships to people, places and things, in order to survive. For example, in relation to a tree I am a human, in relation to that man I am a daughter, in relation to that child I am a mom, in relation to that lady I am a friend, in relation to this dog I am its owner etc…

Our whole existence comes from who or what we are in relation to the things around us. With each one of these relationships comes a different personality.

We have the personality when we are with our family, we have the personality we are with our pet, we have our friend personality, we have our work personality, and we even have the personality of the voice in our head that is commentating on everything.

Going even further down the rabbit hole, within each one of these personalities we have preconceived notions about the way we should behave, the way others should behave and the way life in general should go.

The friend personality has its beliefs of what it means to be a friend, the employee personality behaves in accordance with its ideas about what it means to be an employee, the spouse personality has its own set of rules and regulations on what it means to be a spouse, and so on and so forth.

With all these different ideas, belief systems, and relationships that make up who we are, or at least who we think we are, how do we find out who we REALLY are?

How do we go about breaking down relationships into labels down to personalities down to belief systems all the way down to our lowest common denominator?

“As long as you have certain desires about how it ought to be, you can’t see how it is.” ~ Ram Dass

Before we can break ourselves down to this level we must first ask ourselves, “What IS our lowest common denominator?”

The lowest common denominator is us at our first level, our most authentic self. It is the part of us that has not one concept or preconceived anything about anything.

It has no thoughts, beliefs, ideas or judgments of how we should behave, or of how others should behave because it exists prior to all labels and concepts of what is “right”, “wrong”, “acceptable” or “unacceptable.”

It can never be upset or offended because it has no prior idea of how things should happen or how people should act. It is our pure consciousness. It is the awareness that literally is the observer of all the different personalities that show up in our day to day existence. Our lowest common denominator experiences life as it is in the present moment.

When we become in touch with our lowest common denominator we experience life as it is. We experience people and relationships as they are without getting caught up in the labels in our head of what we believe someone should be acting like.

One would dare to say, it is only when we get in touch with our lowest common denominator that we are actually truly living, because when we are not in touch with this pure awareness we are still operating from our thoughts about a situation instead of the situation itself.

To always be in our thoughts is to constantly be judging which means we are not present. The less we are truly present and living in the moment, the less we are experiencing life in its most authentic form. So now that we know WHAT it is, the question still remains, how do we find and connect with this part of ourselves?

“When there is silence one finds the anchor of the universe within oneself” ~ Lao Tzu

c3f7e4b13e064e60df40e868f5e081b8In order to break down all our beliefs about life and people and become completely anchored in our field of pure awareness, we must turn our attention inward.

Once we become focused on what is going on inside of us, we are then able to confront every judgment, criticism, belief and idea head on.

It is only in this confrontation of ourselves that we are able to realize that every single one of our judgments of good/bad, right/wrong, acceptable/unacceptable is based on prior programming, which stems from how we were raised, or where we grew up or what books we read etc…

However, our lowest common denominator exists PRIOR to this programming. So whenever we find ourselves placing judgment on others or on the world we can be assured that we are not operating from lowest common denominator.

We must literally always point the finger back at ourselves anytime we find ourselves becoming frustrated, angry, offended because these emotions are always indicative that there is a preconceived belief of the way things SHOULD be, that is being triggered.

Once we become willing to confront these beliefs we are able to connect with a stream of inner stillness and silence that allows our authentic self to emerge.

Operating from our lowest common denominator won’t always be easy, and will definitely take practice at first, especially for those of us who have become very attached to all of their ideas of who they think they are or should be.

But when we are brave enough to confront ourselves and question every single belief down to the point that the false self cannot come up with even one more lie to try and make us believe in its validity, we are on the path to our authentic self.

Our authentic self gets to experience the present moment in its purest form, it gets to experience people and situations in their most raw and genuine way, the way they truly are before our thoughts step in with all their judgments and commentary on a situation.

When we start living this way we see the world through brand new eyes, through the eyes of a person who has no prior knowledge or judgment on anything, which means we start to live through our feelings and instincts and consequently the world becomes new and exciting all over again.

Images

Inner voice
Heng Sinith / AP via The Guardian)

4 Ways Not Being Irrational Can Make You a Better Person

Gary Z McGee
-
4
4 Ways Not Being Irrational Can Make You a Better Person

“All the problems of the world could be settled if people were only willing to think. The trouble is that people very often resort to all sorts of devices in order not to think, because thinking is such hard work.” ~ Thomas J. Watson

This article could list a helluva lot more than just four ways to be aware of irrationality –scarcity error, hindsight bias, outcome bias, groupthink- to name a few. But for the sake of limited space and your precious time, we’ll stick to these four for now.

By heeding the following perhaps you’ll be able to recognize your own cognitive errors sooner and you may even be able to change course before any permanent damage can be done in the future.

447615699_pink_elephant1_xlarge

They can stretch your comfort zone, heighten your awareness, and potentially even make you a better person. But before we get to the four ways, I want you to NOT imagine a pink elephant. Got it? Good, you may now proceed.

1) Take things into consideration rather than believe in them

“There is no polite way to suggest to someone that they have devoted their life to a folly.” ~ Daniel Dennett

“History,” writes Steven Novella, “is strewn with ideas that were intuitive and made sense at the time, but were also hopelessly wrong.”

Indeed: Flat-earthers, heliocentric believers, Jewish zombie cults, witch hunters, people who supported slavery; these were/are all symptoms of a self-aware species stuck in its adolescence, trying vainly to evolve past its infancy. The finite game of belief is a dangerous game.

It purports that we place all our eggs into a single basket, while ignoring all the other infinite baskets. This leads to fundamentalism, authoritarianism, oppression, dogmatic myopia, blind patriotism, tyranny and, worst of all, rampant ignorance toward what is healthy for human beings to thrive as an interdependent being in an interconnected cosmos.

In short, it prevents spirituality from flourishing. A far superior strategy for dealing with the quagmire of Truth is to simply take things into consideration using probability as our guide. Belief cripples thought, ties it up into tautological knots, and then leaves it starving in the middle of the Desert of Just Desserts.

Considering an idea rather than believing in it, on the other hand, mends thought, frees it from circular bondage, and saves it from the dearth of the desert. Skeptically considering the universe, rather than superficially pigeonholing it into a prepackaged truncated belief structure, liberates the soul by freeing us up to engage with the cosmos in an authentic and interdependent way.

And suddenly we are going from mine to ours, from insecure animal to fallible god, from finite player to infinite player, from small-picture thinking to big-picture thinking, from ego-centric thought to eco-centric thought, and beyond.

The diamond in the rough is that the more we can embrace the cosmos in this way, the more likely we are to have empathy, and thus the more likely we are to becoming more compassionate people.

2) Underestimate your knowledge rather than overestimate it

“Knowledge rests not upon truth alone, but upon error also.” ~ Carl Jung

1185231_658448717509476_1460384035_n

Embrace your ignorance, or it will embarrass you. Realize that you are a fabulously fallible creature, first and foremost. The evolution that’s dangling from your back pocket like a monkey’s tail is riddled with error after error: carnal, cognitive and cosmic.

We are a fumbling, stumbling, clumsy ape that imagines it’s a flying, confident, graceful god. We all know that we’re prone to mistakes and imperfect, but we tend to ignore these facts and put forth an irrational confidence.

For example most of us irrationally believe that we’re excellent drivers, when in reality most of us are not even decent drivers. This is called the overconfidence effect: a cognitive bias in which someone believes subjectively that their judgments are better or more reliable than it objectively is.

The shocking thing is that experts actually suffer more from the overconfidence effect than lay people do. This is because experts are more certain with their knowledge than the layperson. Perhaps even this article is an aspect of my own overconfidence effect. *mind blown*

So knowing that we don’t know as much as we think we know is the first step toward attaining real knowledge. Acknowledging that we know less than we think we do, gets us closer to actually knowing something. This is because we then free ourselves up to learn more.

Even masters who have already mastered their art probably believe they know more than they actually know, and so the master who can admit this to himself is better able to truly engage beginner’s mind and continues to learn and perfect his mastery, with the understanding that his mastery will never be perfect.

3) Understand that if a billion people say something irrational, it is still irrational

“Public apathy is more powerful than public opinion. There’s more of it.” ~ Dr. Jim Boren

Peer pressure can warp common sense, and it usually does. This is why propaganda is so effective. A billion people saying the world is flat is just as irrational as one person saying the world is flat. It’s just more dangerous.

Similarly, if the majority of the people blindly believe in something irrational, it doesn’t make them correct. It just makes them irrational sheep.

If a thousand Pastafarians stormed the beaches declaring that the Flying Spaghetti Monster was coming to turn water into rum and hats into colanders, and we should all pay homage or boil for an eternity in a pot of hell, it doesn’t make their view any more rational than if one only one “crazy” person was preaching the same.

be rational

How is it possible that such irrational thinking can still plague our “evolved” species? Solomon Asch’s experiments on conformity have revealed the true nature of our herd-instinct. Sadly his research shows that people will often completely ignore concrete evidence in favor of conforming to popular opinion. Like climate change being man-made, for example.

But don’t feel bad if you’ve been taken by this particularly nasty cognitive bias, we all have. It turns out that it is actually an evolutionary survival strategy that is deeply rooted inside us all.

Imagine you’re out on a hunt with your fellow hunter-gatherer friends and suddenly everybody screams and runs away. Are you to stand there scratching your head wondering what their running from? Of course not, you’re going to run because you could be dead before you’re able to figure anything out.

So you see it was an evolutionary advantage. But as it stands today, this survival strategy is mostly just psychological baggage that we must take great care to guard against. In today’s day and age we can afford to be that guy who stays behind to figure it out, because we’re not in immediate danger. Indeed, we actually flourish even more by being that guy.

We guard against the herd-instinct by being skeptical and by questioning things to the nth degree while using the key to open-mindedness.

4) Understand that Control is a stubbornly persistent illusion

“The mediocre soul is incapable of transmigrations –the most supreme form of sport.” ~ Jose Ortega y Gasset

Focus more on what you can control and worry less about what you cannot, because even what you can control is in some way, big or small, out of control (see #1). This doesn’t mean that you have zero control.

This just means that you have considerably less control than you think you do. It would behoove you to simply roll with this fact. There’s a healthy helping of humble pie at the end of the truth that slaps you.

This doesn’t get you off the hook for thinking or acting irrationally, mind you. Not in the least. Rather, it gets you off the pedestal that doesn’t even exist in the first place. It puts the cart back behind the horse where it belongs, so that we can allow the journey into the unknown to continue.

What the world needs right now isn’t a bunch of people who think they can walk on water. What the world needs right now is more people who are adept at swimming. This requires a sense of humility sharpened by the philosopher’s stone of skepticism.

At the end of the day, life is a giant ocean of small and large chaotic fluctuations that create the illusion of order. There’s nothing wrong with taking advantage of this order, mind you.

It’s as much a tool that leverages us in an ever-changing reality as a hammer is a tool for hammering nails. But just because you have a hammer doesn’t mean that everything is a nail. It is our responsibility as rational beings to think rationally in an otherwise irrational world.

The most profound way we can take control of our lives is to realize that it is mostly out of our control and that people are mostly irrational. Indeed, enjoying the ride, I mean genuinely allowing the journey be the thing, is the ability to live and thrive in the tension between being both circumspect and adaptable, between being both skeptical and able to go with the flow.

We cope with adversity by embracing adversity, thereby transforming it into a sacred privilege that launches us into self-actualization and onto the path toward enlightenment.

5 Monkeys

Image source

Pink elephant
Dennett quote
Intelligence
Real and irrational numbers
Spiral ground

Myths of Voodoo, Spirits and Black Magic

Garima Roy
-
1
Myths of Voodoo, Spirits and Black Magic
myths of voodoo
Representation of “Voodoo Spirits” at the cultural Voodoo fest by Nigerians. Do they look scary to you?

What do you think about Voodoo or Vodun as it is more accurately known? Many think of Voodoo as a cult that deals in black magic exclusively to cause evil – pinned dolls, curses, evil spirits, sorcerers etc. Lot of information portrayed in movies, TV shows, books in popular culture about Voodoo is inaccurate and sensationalised which has created series of fable tales in people’s mind.

Voodoo isn’t a morbid practice intended to hurt or control others, in fact it isn’t the same everywhere. Voodoo also spelled as vodun, vodoun or vudun is a traditional religion as old as 10,000 years that originated in coastal West Africa. The propagation of Voodoo as a religion or practice across the world is an interesting story, which also speaks volumes about the negative image associated with Voodoo, but before throwing light on that, let’s look into the core beliefs of Voodoo as a religion and culture.

Voodoo in Benin

Voodoo originates in Benin, West Africa where millions of people consider it to be the way of life. Followers of Voodoo believe in existence of a supreme force and “Voodoo” here stands for the ‘Great Spirit’. They believe that a good spirit is way more powerful than a bad spirit and so they seek guidance of the good spirit to live their lives. The phenomenon of calling the spirits for guidance and blessing is what they call “White or Good magic”.

It’s fascinating to know that even though they believe in animal sacrifice done to awaken the spirits, they still worship animals. Like the Python (snake) is considered holy and is worshiped in Benin. It’s believed that anyone who kills a python will eventually have a tragic death. Voodoo in Benin, is also about worshiping the elements of nature and the annual dance and culture festival promote peace and harmony.

Birth of Voodoo | National Geographic

The music involves rhythmic sounding loud drumbeats and the dance is largely an expression of one’s spiritual connection with the divine. Voodoo followers believe in energy and spirit and practically live their lives with good intention. These people are not involved in any kind of malpractices as perceived by the world at large and causing pain through Voodoo is against their morals.

While some practitioners certainly engage in the darker side of Voodoo, the religion itself is not dark. Instead, Voodoo is more like a neutral force running through the universe. Voodoo can be used for good or evil, depending on the heart, mind, and objective of the person corralling the Voodoo force.

7224713
Voodoo Dance Ceremony

African Slave Trade in Haiti

slave-sale
An image representing African Slave Trade, the event is recorded as one of the most brutal events in history.

It is true that Voodoo is a religion in Haiti. However, there is an ugly history behind the enslavement of Voodoo followers from Benin to Haiti and rest of the places in America. From 16th to 19th century Benin was one of the major targets of the slave traders and people of Benin were brutally transported to America through a painful process. This phenomenon is known as Atlantic Slave Trade or transatlantic slave trade.

slave_routes

Voodoo in Haiti

Haitian Voodoo | National Geographic
5.webp.CROP.original-original
A Haitian Voodoo follower calling a spirit

People enslaved were significantly high in number and even though they were made to take rounds around a tree several times to forget their lives by traders, they managed to carry their culture to different places. They managed to root and propagate their cultural practices, and today Voodoo is one of the majorly followed religion of Haiti. The practices and rituals went through tremendous changes with time, but their core beliefs remain the same, that is to worship the good spirit and spread goodness.

Haitians believe in one powerful spirit and call it “Bondieu” and further divide Bondieu into three types of spirits; Loa are spirits which guide the universe, in addition to Loa, there are spirits that are not well understood and even somewhat mysterious; these spirits are sometimes referred to as the “twins,” because they represent the contradictory forces in nature, such as good and evil, happiness and sadness, health and illness and lastly are the spirits of the ancestors.

Haitians worship all these spirits in good faith hoping that it would do well to them. Haitian Voodoo is based on the idea of healing and exploring one’s connection with oneself, others and God.

Those who practice Voodoo believe that there is a visible and an invisible world, and that these worlds are intertwined. Death is a transition to the invisible world, so our predecessors are still with us in spirit. They watch over and inspire us.

Voodoo in New Orleans

Due to Atlantic slave trade and Haitian Revolution, Voodoo practitioners rooted in New Orleans underwent series of transformation. Over time, American culture became fascinated by this mysterious tradition and began to depict it in movies and books as sensationalized horror.

The film White Zombie (1932) changed the image of Voodoo worldwide as it brought the concept of pinned dolls which wasn’t traced in the original vodun religion. A series of movies created a mythology that we have taken as truth, portraying the concept of Voodoo as devil-worship, evil witchcraft and black magic. Tourists in New Orleans were attracted to the concept of dark energy and locals found a great business idea in that attraction.

They started amusing people with stories of Black magic and New Orleans soon had a market selling pinned dolls. It’s been said that Voodoo is essentially to spread goodness in mankind but at times people try to engage with dark energy.

However, Voodoo followers believe in the theory that whatever you do, will be done to you. Therefore, playing physically with energy and spirits to harm people is looked down upon by Voodoo practitioners.

Here is an interesting video showing similarities between different spiritual systems and Voodoo.

Voodoo: Cult or Religion?

Article Sources

National Geographic News 

Image Sources

Voodoo dance ceremony

Slave trade in Africa

Voodoo in Haiti

Much Ado about Moving: The Movables, the Immovables, and the Movers:

Gary Z McGee
-
1
Much Ado about Moving: The Movables, the Immovables, and the Movers:

“All mankind is divided into three classes: those that are immovable, those that are moveable, and those who move.” ~ Benjamin Franklin

This exceptional quote by Benjamin Franklin strikes at the heart of the human condition. In one simple sentence he blends a wide range of human experiences: ignorance, pride, and passion, to name a few.

While we should be cautious about overgeneralizing, quotes like these can still be helpful as they give us something we can hang our intellectual hat on. It provides us with three symbols, or archetypes, to imaginatively and creatively explore. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do in this article.

Understand: We all contain aspects of each of these three. Look at it like a three-way yin-yang. Nobody can definitely say they are 100% a mover, a movable, or an immovable.

We all fall along a fluctuating probability spectrum between all three, weaving in and out of each of them over the course of our lives, depending upon the experiences we’ve had and the education we’ve learned, unlearned, and relearned along the way.

So without further ado: much ado about moving.

The Movables

“Beginning is easy -Continuing is hard.” ~ Japanese Proverb

if-you-expect-the-world-to-be-fair-with-you-because-you-are-fairThe Movable archetype is immature and impressionable, a fledgling beginner of the new. It’s that part of us that is susceptible to power and authority. It tends to seek the easy way out of things, usually as a tagalong to someone or something stronger. Movables are naïve and experience ordinary ignorance.

Their comfort zones are mere pinpoints but exceptionally malleable. Their mental paradigms are null. But their ego is empty, and so there is always hope with the movables. There is always a chance that they can be directed toward the good and the healthy.

The hope lies within their innocence and flexibility and the fact that they are free to be molded into something great. Their vulnerability is a boon, but they are double-edged swords that can cut both ways, depending upon the moral compass of the one(s) who eventually “move” them.

Like Voltaire cryptically stated, “Religion began when the first conman met the first fool.”

We would do well to tap into this aspect of ourselves when attempting something new, or when we need fresh eyes to see the world with. For example: even an established Mover would be wise to adopt a movable disposition after exiting an existential cocoon, or after experiencing a dark night of the soul.

Beginner’s mind comes to mind, or the concept of the New-layman mentioned in Surpassing Mentors and Escaping the Master’s Shadow. But all things in moderation, to include being credulous.

3851246951b30cf255a647fc09031bd5The Immovables

“He is a hard man who is only just, and a sad one who is only wise.” ~ Voltaire

The Immovable archetype is rigid and static, an inert monolith that’s averse to change. It’s that part of us that wants everything to stay the same, to remain safe and secure. It tends to stay firmly planted like a mighty oak.

Inflexible and unyielding, it fears change and anything that drifts away from its opinion of the “norm.” People who have been crippled and overwhelmed by this archetype are status quo-junkies par excellence, people who have “placed all their eggs into just one basket.”

Their comfort zones are tiny and unbreakable, and thus averse to stretching. They are stuck in their ways and refuse to budge an inch in the way they view things, even if a healthier way presents itself. Because of this they tend to be dogmatic about their beliefs, using terms like “faith” and “patriotism” to placate themselves and the innocent masses.

From devout disciple to master-stuck-in-his-own-mastery, and everyone stuck in between, the immovable is anyone who has given up the search for Truth; who believes he has already found the truth, despite the world and the ever-greater truth of the great mystery that is our cosmos.

But this archetype is a part of us all, loyal, trustworthy, and steadfast. We would do well to tap into it when committing to goals, or seeking to plant roots, or in cultivating life-long friendships.

Immovables may not want to move, but there can be great strength in standing firm upon certain things, like having the guts to be stern when others are overly lax, or being harsh when others are being too lenient, or even having the audacity to stick to your guns while committing acts of civil disobedience.

But all things in moderation, to include being strict with our principles.

The Movers

“If I am unable to make the gods above relent, I shall move hell.” ~ Virgil

YinYangYongOpt

The Mover archetype is proactive and hands-on, a fierce contender that always takes the initiative. It’s that part of us that gets shit done, that takes the bull by the horns and wrestles it to the ground. It stays on the move, ever-adaptable, never staying anywhere for too long, lest it lead to stagnation. People who adopt the mover archetype are focused and clear with their objectives.

Movers are free, no matter what rules surround them. They are dedicated to moving the world, lest the world move them. Movers are a force of nature, fully realizing that they alone are responsible for everything they do.

They easily move the movables and even sometimes have the power to move the immovables, if given enough time. Their strength is their tenacity to stay adaptable to change and to capitalize on opportunities.

But just as there are three sides to – shall we call it The Moving Trifecta? There are three sides to the Mover. One side is immoral, another side is moral, and the third side is amoral.

The moral side is healthy & sustainable, the immoral side is unhealthy & unsustainable, while the amoral side does what needs to be done for the greater good, in the moment, be it healthy or unhealthy, sustainable or not (though they are responsible for the consequences).

Movers can be immoral and preach hate and intolerance, they can be moral and push for love and tolerance, or they can be amoral and do both somehow, playfully using all sides against each other, or even mocking it all with high laughter.

The amoral mover’s way of taking the world seriously is to disrupt it sincerely and then give it a new form. Like a trickster. Where the moral mover is high on his powers of light, and the immoral mover is high on his powers of darkness, the amoral mover sweeps in with his powers of truth and blurs it all into perspective, an enchanting middle-gray.

Indeed, one could argue that the most moving mover is the amoral one. But all things in moderation, to include… moderation?

At the end of the day, we all have aspects of each of these archetypes. We can probably all agree that we’d rather be more mover-like than either movable-like or immovable-like, but sometimes things don’t work out.

Sometimes fate tosses a monkey wrench into our machinery. The good news is that we have from this moment (right now) until the day we die to make a difference, to dig down deep and find the capacity to change.

So let’s honor Old Ben Franklin and take this moment to find the courage to move, and then keep moving. Move despite the rigid immovables and the moveable suckers. The world needs more people who can move.

Image Source:

Benjamin Franklin
Naive lion
Anchor tree
Three-way yin yang

Breaking the Chain of Obedience

Gary Z McGee
-
1
Breaking the Chain of Obedience

“The man who can face vilification and disgrace, who can stand up against the popular current, even against his friends and his country when he knows he is right, who can defy those in authority over him, who can take punishment and prison and remain steadfast—that is a man of courage. But do you need much courage just to obey orders, to do as you are told and to fall in line with thousands of others to the tune of general approval and the Star Spangled Banner?” ~ Alexander Berkman

The chain of obedience has always existed. For instance, people have always been told, “because I said so,” or “because it’s the law,” or “it’s just the way it is.” These simple words contain remarkably many themes of false and bad reasoning.

Paraphrasing David Deutsche, the author of The beginning of infinity: “First, it is a perfect example of bad explanation: it could be used to “explain” anything a so called authority can put a law on.

Second, it is about who declared such-and-such in the past, not necessarily what reality portrays (which is the opposite of truth-seeking). Third, it reinterprets a rescue from true explanation as a request for justification, which is the justified-true-belief fallacy. Fourth, it confuses the nonexistent authority from ideas with human authority. And, fifth, it claims by this means to be outside the jurisdiction of normal criticism.”

It is not, nor has it ever been, outside the jurisdiction of normal criticism.

Soldiers-Painting-Peace-by-BanksyAlas, we have devolved into what Alexis de Tocqueville feared —“democratic despotism.” We’ve been conditioned to think that this is okay. It is not okay. And once we’ve woken up to our conditioning, we have nobody else to blame but ourselves. There is no true authority to turn to. The only authority that can make a difference is you.

Do not look to the plutocratic mandarins for assistance, or expect anything but vaudevillian smoke and mirrors from the billion-dollar corporate circus that’s rampaging across the globe like a retarded elephant on steroids flinging Monsanto seeds with nuclear weapons strapped to its back.

The local killers want us distracted by foreign killers so they can rob us blind, and so that we can slip further and further into slavery. You must become your own authority.

Like the hip-hop artist Immortal Technique said, “The purpose of life is a life with a purpose, so I’d rather die for a cause than live a life that is worthless. I don’t need the circus or a day of national observance, I need you to think for you and stop being a servant.”

It’s time to wake up. This is your life, and its value is being sucked dry every second you waste allowing the atrocities committed by the ruthless chain of obedience to continue.

Like Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

Well, these things matter. It’s time to end the blind march of the living dead and to begin instead the wide-awake journey of being truly alive. It’s time to end the rank and file of ignorance and to begin the courage and honor of awareness. This means questioning the status quo and the people who blindly uphold it.

This means holding the power-that-be accountable for their actions. This is our call to adventure. Mother Nature is screaming at us using a language older than words. It echoes in our bones. It resonates in our souls. We can all feel it.

Some of us are confused by it, and are suffering from cognitive dissonance, but she is still there singing her harsh Truth. And it is high time we listened. It’s time we made some noise. It is time her voice became our voice. It is time to replace “their unhealthy unsustainable way” with “our healthy sustainable way.”

“The secret of freedom lies in educating people,” wrote Maximilien Robespierre, “whereas the secret in tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.”

So ask yourself: am I an agent of liberty, intent upon freeing and empowering people; or an agent of tyranny, intent upon keeping people suppressed and ignorant. If it’s the latter, by all means keep the chain of obedience intact and live out yourunexceptionally ordinary life. But if it’s the former, by all means break the chain of obedience and educate people.

support-our-troops Wake up and smell the collateral damage. Question the so-called authority of your chain of command. Think for yourself. Question your orders, whether they seem immoral or not.

 

Like Einstein said, “Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth.”

Don’t have unthinking respect for authority. Have thoughtful vigilance toward authority instead. Be a thorn in the side of all immoral movers, be they the president or a peasant – People first, rank second. Be the bee buzzing in the ear of all xenophobic peddlers peddling war, be they democratic or republican.

The war machine begins and ends with you either blindly obeying the vicious chain of obedience or having the courage to disobey when you feel the actions of the chain of obedience are immoral. It won’t be easy. Hell, it will probably be the hardest thing you will ever do, and you may have to face “vilification and disgrace” because of it, but sometimes that’s the price you have to pay for being a moral agent in an immoral world. That’s the price you pay for courage. That’s the price you pay for liberty.

Civilians, a message to you: extract from your veins the culturally prescribed IV drip (TV drip) that has been pumping close-minded diatribes and pithy platitudes into your system for the better part of your life. Wake up and smell the propaganda. Question all platforms of presumed power (especially police and military). Question all media. Be circumspect against political disinformation, especially if it’s coming from the vampiric two-headed monster known as bipartisanship.

Remain vigilant against the saturation of information. Don’t believe anything you hear and only half of what you see. Take it all into consideration, but then use probability to assess validity. Use the secret of open-mindedness and question reality tothe nth degree.

Don’t seek rigid one-right-way answers. Seek instead for skeptical truth that is adaptable. By doing so, you will discover that people are far more alike than you originally assumed. You may even be able to find your soul tribe along the way.

At the end of the day, if you still feel like it’s all for naught and that you cannot possibly make a difference, consider the words of Thomas Edison, “When you have exhausted all possibilities, remember this: You haven’t.”

The problem isn’t the chain of command. The problem is the chain of obedience.

The Chain of Obedience

Image source:

Soldiers painting peace by Banksy
Be a warrior not a worrier
Support our troops

1...281282283...348Page 282 of 348