Created October 15, 2021
All living things react negatively to prolonged periods of stress. That’s part of the explanation for the dramatic increase in negativity being expressed all around us and in us.
Negativity is catching. The more negativity we hear, the more likely we are to have negative thoughts and feelings, and the more likely we are to go off negatively when we least expect it, at the slightest provocation.
Defeatism is what happens when the challenges multiply and complexify and we feel daunted by the prospect of trying to solve our way out of it.
At such moments, a self-meta-programmed person who is in Observer state or Flow state, may think “It only seems daunting because you choose to make it seem daunting in your mind,” and feels an instant sense of relief, and starts to chunk the problems into manageable pieces as a start to solving them in priority order.
You’ll know when you’re getting into these higher states when you all of a sudden realize you are getting really good advice from what you hear in your mind, and that it all sounds moderate and kind, and not negative but instead, encouraging to your creativity to enjoy solving and conquering what had seemed daunting a moment ago.
There are really two flavors to life, and on a moment-to-moment basis, we may shift from one to the other.
One flavor is unnatural, it’s a pandemic condition we have suffered for a very long time, since the beginning of recorded history. I call it Acceleritis. It’s not having enough time to answer all of the questions that occur to you. It started a long time ago, but it accelerated when we began to use written language, and accelerated again when the printing press became global, and accelerated again and again with each new wave of media technology. Marshall McLuhan defined media as the extensions of Man. All of our media of expression and communication form a network with our own minds and emotions. The media shape the way we form ourselves internally which determines how we act internally and externally.
Today the intensity of our media womb has long passed the PTSD (Post Traumatic Shock Disorder) level. The covert and overt manipulation of those media for political and perverted purposes has heightened the degree of damage each of us does to ourselves, each other, and the planet. Now we will argue over the silliest things at the drop of a hat.
The other flavor of life is natural. In our natural state, before the existence of a ubiquitous media culture, we had time to consider every question until we reached a comprehensive answer, or at least a protocol for behavior based on the best estimate of an answer. When we self-meta-program ourselves we create a feedback loop in our conscious minds where we notice how often our thoughts and feelings go off the deep end, and find ways to rise above those internal self-defeating behaviors. When fully functioning, this brings the individual into the Observer state as an equilibrium condition. Prior to that point one flashes in and out of Observer state.
This graduates in stages to spending time in the Flow state, starting in one’s passion work. A person who has reclaimed their natural state and armored against falling back into the everyday win/lose ego thinking is capable of making objective decisions with care and integrity, patiently absorbing all the relevant information, studying, meditating, contemplating, reaching solutions and carrying them out meticulously.
Today the whole world faces emergencies that add to our stress and aggravate our tendency to fly directly to negativity, do not pass go do not collect $200. Instead of cooperating to overcome the threats we waste time blaming each other and getting no closer to solutions than the day before.
The only way out is for us to go inside and move from the unnatural flavor to the natural flavor. We can’t fix the world mess from the dysfunctional condition. We have to all rise up to our better selves and get our politicians and leaders there too, and quickly. That’s what this course is all about and hopefully you are feeling more girded by the week, and practice the useful ways from post to post. That’s how we can win it, no matter how bad it looks now. We have it in us. We made the mess, we can mop it up. But not by mopping up the floor with each other: that IS the mess.
Please take 101 seconds to experience this video. It’s an attic-cleansing of the old and the beginning of a new you:
Go forth, knight, to help the world within the experience bubble you bring around you. I see many more of us getting to this point soon, not just from my writings but I also see many around me who are writing too, sharing in other words, images, and languages what I’ve been saying: it’s all in our minds, we can control our minds and spirits, because we ARE them, a shift in perspective is all it takes to break away from those still infected by Acceleritis, or what most people call The Ego. To me they are the same condition, a pandemic stress condition caused by inventing faster than we can assimilate.
The Ego is a defensive stance. We feel threatened and inadequate to fend for ourselves against the impossible odds. The real self hides and deals with the world through a persona designed to achieve the desired ends of the hidden self. But the situation becomes dysfunctional when the persona begins acting on its own desired (robotically programmed) ends. The real self becomes submerged even to itself and the body and mind of the individual is on robot pilot. That is the Ego. It arises as a defense mechanism to the Acceleritis. The Ego is not a natural condition. The natural self likes to cooperate and have everyone win.
We have to recognize chronic ego condition as a mental disorder, a sickness. It could have arisen before Acceleritis but it has thrived under the ascendancy of Acceleritis. It’s what most of us consider to be normal.
Stay in this upper state at all times and feel the inherent joy of being an experiencer, alive and creative.
Cooperate and harmonize. All of us singing a single note forever would get boring. Chords are made of dissimilar notes and aren’t chord changes beautiful?
Have a canary switch that alerts you to any arising negativity in yourself at any given moment. Realize at those times: I AM MORE THAN MY NEGATIVITY.
We all have a survival instinct, it’s natural, and a good thing. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to survive, and nothing wrong with appropriate self-defense without over-reacting. But Ego is over-reacting as Standard Operating Procedure. It’s being so self-defensive that it seems like cowardice to a person operating from natural mind.
If you catch yourself acting craven in your own mind, remind yourself of your courage and heroism. Remind yourself of your determination and your Mission in life, whatever that may be. Remind yourself that giving yourself too little credit becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
March forth with self-belief.
Love to all,
Bill