Zen Buddhism is full of stories about practitioners staring death in the face in order to cut through their mental habits and force a direct confrontation with the fundamental matter. Monks doing zazen on a cliff’s edge to keep themselves alert, rōshis telling frustrated students to kill themselves if they cannot achieve satori by next sunrise, students taking death vows if they fail to awaken within a given period of time, etc.

In Helen Tworkov’s Zen in America for example we are told of “the monk who sat with a stick of incense in one hand and a knife in the other and vowed to kill himself if he didn’t get enlightened by the time the incense burned out. As always—at least in the stories that are passed down—he got it just in time, pushed to the breaking point by the pain of the burning stub.”

In a very real sense, I think this is kind of what humanity is collectively doing to itself right now.

I don’t recommend taking any melodramatic death vows to attain enlightenment, or any harmful or life-threatening measures at all; such things are typically just pleasing to the very egoic structures we’re trying to see beyond when you enter into them deliberately, and thus defeat the entire purpose.

Still it’s hard not to notice that so many of the awakening stories we hear from enlightened masters sharing their experience involve moments of extreme existential crisis of one sort or another. Ramana Maharshi popped when gripped by a sudden fear of death, Eckhart Tolle while contemplating suicide, Byron Katie when a cockroach crawled over her foot during a debilitating depression in a squalid halfway house. In case after case we see people pushed deep within themselves by existential crises which force them to come to a true reckoning with reality.

And now we see humanity as a collective in its own existential crisis as the ecosystem in which we evolved moves toward collapse, nuclear-armed nations move ever closer to direct confrontation, and governments get more and more authoritarian while democracy and transparency continue to erode.

We are hurtling in the direction of dystopia and armageddon, and the powerful elites in the driver’s seat have made it abundantly clear that they have no intention of swerving from this trajectory. We cannot use democracy to turn this ship away from the iceberg because the “democracy” we’ve been given is a fake child’s steering wheel given to a toddler to play with so they can pretend they’re driving. Even direct revolutionary action is completely barred from us as long as we are being successfully propagandized into consenting to the status quo by the manipulations of mainstream and social media corporations.

So what can we do? What is the one exit we have allowed ourselves?

As near as I can tell, the only door we have left open to ourselves as a species is a mass-scale awakening. A collective shift out of our unhealthy relationship with mental narrative, and into a healthy one. A relationship with mental narrative where thoughts are no longer believed and identified with but rather used as tools for surviving and thriving. Where propaganda narratives are no longer reflexively imbued with the power of belief, because the egoic structures they’re designed to plug into just aren’t there anymore.

You can’t have change without a mass-scale people’s movement. You can’t have a mass-scale people’s movement without neutering the propaganda engine designed to prevent it. You can’t neuter the propaganda engine without a mass-scale awakening from humanity’s unwholesome relationship with thought.

It’s fascinating, really. Somehow, some way, we’ve managed to trick ourselves into a situation where the only way for us to avert extinction is to realize on a mass scale the potential that sages have been pointing to for millennia. We’ve managed to perfectly troll ourselves into evolve-or-die time.

As if guided by some strange, deep wisdom, humanity has walked itself into a situation where it is holding the knife in one hand and the incense in the other, vowing to kill itself if it cannot attain collective enlightenment by the time the incense burns out.

We didn’t do it on purpose. We didn’t do it because our egos found it to be a gratifying crisis to put ourselves in. We just wound up here, by some bizarre miracle, completely out of left field. Something deep within us has put us in a position where we must necessarily rise to our full potential as a species or go the way of the dinosaur.

We are beginning to feel the burn of the incense. It will get hotter and hotter.

Will we pop? Will we wake up? I don’t know; we either will or we won’t. But for the moment I can’t help but stare in awe of humanity’s crazy wisdom for getting itself into this mess.

___________________________

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110 responses to “Humanity Has Trolled Itself Into An Awaken-Or-Die Situation”

  1. You are wonderful, I’m starting my days with your writings as a quick fix to feeling sane.

    Sharing my songs with you:
    https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYll5uKUNO78HeaE65eSGDvfn6KTbQACU

    Take care & all the best

  2. Well yes, but are you meaning with your reply that Jesus and religions based on his message are the only religion with that as a fundamental precept? In my experience with organized religions it would be difficult if not impossible to find one without that principle. Of course there is a huge difference from what they say and the actions that we see in any organized religious grouping as in my experience they tend to be more interested in protecting the organization that creating the reality I mentioned above. What is your experience?

    1. She didn’t mention Jesus. She talked about Grow or Go. Christianity doesn’t teach Grow Or Go it teaches Conform or Die. Conform or be tortured. Conform or go to hell. It teaches group think.

      1. Indeed, but let’s take that up to the next level. Like the early Greeks we need to recognize the value of that experience and have every citizens and non-citizen, with the exception of those with mental issues, to have the entheogen experience as a rite of passage in a highly supervised environment say after graduation from high school. Perhaps that would help this population to realize that there is much more to life than just the immediate satisfaction of every imaginable physical want. Our existing institutions have been corrupted, failed miserably and are largely held in contempt which is a huge part of the problem. We need a radical solution if we ever expect the kind of change that literally can make the survival of this species possible.

  3. Very interesting take on things. I can detect the on the brink moment too. I don’t think it’s got anything to do with any inate wisdom of mnankind though. It is our collective lack of wisdom which has led us here and more likely the wisdom of Allah that has arranged it so that we have an escape mhatch, but will have to awaken and open it ourselves. There are wicked men who scheme and plan but Allah is the best of planners, and this is what it means. The choice is always ours. Free agency to decide is His gift and he guards it well.

  4. I love your brilliant perspective Caitlin, and your knack for framing things in a way that puts “smelling salts” to the mind and illuminates all the dark unresolved corners.

    I keep feeling called to build an automated “peoples’ government” app that’s a sort of self-deploying, automatically-onboarding, fully-configurable-by-non-techies collective decision-making and civic-duty-training system that uses reddit-style upvoting to get consensus around the smartest ways of doing various things, because all these people protesting around the world need an alternative framework they can easily onboard to in order to start living the way they keep trying to push the government toward. Then they can just walk away from pyramidal power structures altogether into decentralized but well-organized collectives. I’m getting close to a point in my work where I can finally have the left over mental bandwidth to take time out to build it.

  5. Great article. However we need a solution, as most of us who read this, already know the huge devastation coming. Mainstream media do not seem interested, and may never will since vested interests will determine what the “news” is. Will someone like Mark Zuckerberg wake up and get what you write known? Caitlin, have you sent your articles to him, or other media with a truly huge reach? Something has got to happen, and I can’t see any other way than there to be a “Hero” in the likes of Zuckerburg. The rest of us can live our lives in the best possible way, but we do not have enough influence!

    1. See my comment Sean

  6. If anyone likes Zen stories the following are two key collections; Mumonkan/The Gateless Gate and Hekiganroku/The Blue Cliff Record.

      1. I’d forgotten about Les, thanks for the reminder. Off to catch up.

  7. There is a story of the Buddha being asked, what is sin? His response was that it is anything that is unnecessary. The Tao states that when the people live in accordance with the Way, they will have birth, life and death without knowing what lies beyond the neighboring mountain. Knowing has become not knowing. As connected now means disconnected. Necessities are mostly the superfluous.

    That the ancients needed to be taught does not bode well for our more intricate modern situation. How much more difficult is it now to see clearly? An old Chinese Chan aphorism states, Do not get lost in the ten thousand things. How much more so improbable when the modern world is fragmented into ten million, billion, or more, “things”. Advanced human effort consists of lost souls acting out their incompatible juvenile delusions on a collective and individual basis.

    If you do not anthropomorphize the intelligent universal constant then life is simply a complex mechanism allowing that constant to experience itself. Ego exists to facilitate the continuation of that experience on the macro level of maintenance and survival. The intelligent micro functions inherent in the individual pattern are known only to that limited ego intelligence through concept.

    Progress is a disease upon that creation existence. That it ends in techno slavery is only natural. Eradicating its vectors is no different than what one would do with any other rabid life threatening force. It is a system of death masquerading as a way of life. All the little sins and one big lie.

  8. I am not alone in believing that humanity as a whole will NOT all wake up; but some exceptional members of humanity will survive and thrive when psychopaths and their zombie supporters and enablers go down with the sinking Titanic. Read more of this here: http://www.wisdompage.com/2013%20Articles/Molyneaux%20essay.pdf

  9. Ms Johnstone, you will probably think ” that is typical of the U.S. ” after reading this sad article.
    ~
    Generations of countless United States of Americans have been contaminated and sickened by the first-ever atomic bomb test. The Trinity explosion on July 16, 1945, was carried out in the New Mexico desert. Three weeks later, two A-bombs were dropped on Japan, killing up to 200,000 people.
    But the number of United States of American victims caused by radiation fallout from the Trinity test is reckoned to be also imponderably high.
    The United States of American government conducted the explosion in secret, unbeknownst to the population of New Mexico. That was in spite of warnings from Manhattan Project scientists of a high risk to public health from the extreme radiation. Without a warning to the public and because of a cover-up about the event, countless United States of Americans were exposed to carcinogenic radiation.
    ~
    This relevant article can be read here:
    Nuking Itself.. How Russophobia Led the U.S. to Bomb its Own Citizens by Finian Cunningham!
    https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/10/26/nuking-itself-how-russophobia-led-us-bomb-its-own-citizens/

  10. Roundball Shaman Avatar
    Roundball Shaman

    “Humanity Has Trolled Itself Into An Awaken-Or-Die Situation”
    .
    This is actually a very good thing. A society of beings should learn how to evolve past a selfish, jealous, egoistic, predatory default way of thinking and being or it should just fade away of its own accord and internal rot. Being selfish and predatory does nothing to promote goodness and positivity in the Universe.
    .
    “We are hurtling in the direction of dystopia and armageddon, and the powerful elites in the driver’s seat have made it abundantly clear that they have no intention of swerving from this trajectory.”
    .
    These self-deluded-appointed elites also have another trajectory. That is, their personal appointment with Karma and facing up to their endless spiritual crimes. That day is coming for each and every one of them. And you don’t have to be a fly on the wall to know what the Big K shall confront them with. Makes one smile right down to your core.
    .
    “We are beginning to feel the burn of the incense. It will get hotter and hotter.”
    .
    And those self-deluded-appointed elites will find themselves getting hotter and hotter and hotter and…
    .
    “But for the moment I can’t help but stare in awe of humanity’s crazy wisdom for getting itself into this mess.”
    .
    It wasn’t humanity’s wisdom that brought things to this point. It is the sacred spirit and intelligence of the Ground of Being, the Divine Matrix that we all live within and are a part of. That’s where all wisdom lies. It bore us, it holds our answers, it generates life itself. We are but pinpoints of consciousness out of an endless eternal matrix of possibilities.

    1. You Shaman you.
      .
      I like it.
      .
      For what it means (probably not much) I like everything you say on this post.
      .
      It is like a bit of refreshing collective thinking about what is best for all of us and I’m all about that because if we can’t think together then we are done for….forever.
      .
      No doubt there is a matrix of possibility, but this is a matrix that can be solved easily. So you know the solution don’t you? If possible, lets discuss it later. I have some ideas and the beauty of any idea is that once it is out there, then it is out there. It can’t be owned.
      .
      The possibilities are boundless, so why let one’s imagination go into a pit of despair is what I think? Doesn’t mean there are not rabbit holes in your future, but if you have been way deep down there and survived, then you must know that you can do it again. Lets do it again is what I think and I think we have only just begun to realize what this grand blue and green planet we live upon can support.
      .
      I’ve got no problem with being pushed to the edge cause I’ve been there and I’ve learned. Any day your learn something is a good day for that – it is a good day to be alive.
      .
      Peace
      BK

    2. A thousand points of light so. to speak. Hmmm, sound familiar.

      1. For context about this unique period, here are some disgusting investor people talking about, oh, millions, billions, of houseless, foodless, or global deaths by starvation, & the #GreatReset, #BuildBackBetter, the #NewNormal. Was it EVER about climate-(is that even real?), Covid? (real?). Or has it always been about the long, years known collapsing quadrillion+ of the global economy/debt? If you can stomach these ppl, just listen to those playing at the edges of finance, & realize there are way bigger, way worse people who brought us here, to this point, & who want to manage/control the outcome, get theirs first; it may help understand things. I happen to have no issue with China (or anyone). I’m afraid they’re captives, too. These videos are nothing more than chatter, but it’s insiders. Who decides what’s next? A bankers dictatorship? A global govt? And of nations? It isn’t the US govt, or it’s citizens, smart, decent, trapped, just like you; no, not one country-I don’t think it ever was. It has always been a global, Intl., cosmopolitan, Davos Man (Samuel Huntington’s description) type, a club, a cabal, a school of thought, Darwinians, Malthusians, not a nation, those wth no loyaty to anything, no soul, no heart, a group we call the 1%.

        https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K75LmNv4Kms

        https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XRmuFY0B1KE

  11. I wish that I had Cait’s hope for us collectively, but I look at history and see something else. As Thomas Jefferson realized, when life becomes intolerable for a society that society erupts into revolution, and does not change to a different, saner, outlook on life but rather expresses its disappointment in anger and violence. This rarely, if ever, produces a better society than the one which caused the trouble. Yet, like Jefferson, I think that it is inevitable unless we get a government which cares more for the average person. Such a government does not seem realistic in our oligarchy. The rich will not give up control unless and until they are destroyed, and what may follow that destruction is scary to contemplate.

    1. Mike M. – with all due respect. It is not scary to me. It just makes sense.
      :
      At the end of the day, or the beginning, a rich man takes a shit just like the rest of us.
      .
      ha, ha.
      .
      BK

    2. Wealth is never destroyed. It is simply handed off to someone else.

      1. “Wealth is never destroyed. It is simply handed off to someone else.”
        `
        Here Khatika denies the reality of war.
        War destroys infrastructure, libraries and museums, the real wealth of ordinary citizens.
        `
        Yet again Khatika “authoritatively” launches a stupidityMissile into Caitlin’s forum.

    3. Dang pesky historical facts

    4. terence callachan Avatar
      terence callachan

      Food shortages will be the catalyst for global uprising.Food shortages happen all over the world every day of every year but don’t affect large enough numbers of people to light the touch paper of discontent.

      Covid19 is going to kill many many more people.
      As the percentage of the global population infected rises it will reach a point where so many will have died so many will be sick or disabled and disruption to business will be so severe that too many people will not be working for economies to keep the ball rolling.
      There will be a slowdown in transportation of goods
      Shelves will empty
      Prices will rise
      Governments will refuse to pay furlough
      People won’t pay their bills
      More businesses will cease to operate
      In desperation those who have nothing will attack those who have
      The police the armed forces will not be sufficient to control the breakdown
      The ball will stop rolling
      ONLY money can control these circumstances

      Reluctant governments had better pay up
      Give every single person a regular monthly allowance sufficient to enable them to pay their bills and buy essentials
      It’s the only way to keep economic activity as we know it from collapsing completely

      1. Part right. This will all occur because of govt shutdown in response to the plandemic to usher in the great reset. Covid is contrived based on testing results not deaths but people will no more believe this than that 9/11 was a CIA, Saudi operation to purposely destabilize Iraq and thd rest of the Middle East. Or believe Pearl Harbor was instigated and allowed by the US to usher us into a world war.

  12. I do hope humanity makes it through the planetization crisis and succeeds in forming a stable integrated global civilisation. However I do not expect humanity will succeed because of a general Awakening in the manner of enlightenment. I dont see any signs of that in the society around me or online.
    The normal condition of non-conscious immersion in mind and mental narrative which Caitlin understands and describes so well can only be overcome by an individual. There is no ‘we’ that can do it. One of the best things any one of us can do to help humanity past the test is to awaken ourselves from our own addiction to non-conscious immersion in mind. I believe that the more individuals can awaken themselves the better chance humanity will have.
    Will humanity make it? I hope so but it is far from a done deal. Humanity can fail and it will be Atlantis all over again.

    1. Can you or anybody else elaborate and expound upon:
      :
      non-conscious immersion in mind
      :
      Seems like an attempt to say others can’t think as well as you can, but hell I don’t know, so that is why I’m asking. Also, any extra info you could provide on Atlantis would be appreciated.
      .
      BK

      1. I think Caitlin describes it well in her articles.
        Anyone who has tried their hand at meditation will also eventually notice it in their own lives. That is they will notice how non-consciously immersed we can all be in our mental chatter. Mental narratives which are telling us what everything is & means.

    2. The answer is not all encompassing global civilization but many smaller compartmentalized local governments taking care of the local population with true representstion at a local level.

      1. I dont mean a One World Government.

  13. Humanity, or homo sapiens if you prefer, have been in tougher times. Consider the last Ice Age. So, something tells me humanity will survive this “Time of Transition” that is upon us (at least in my mind). The only question is what form this survival will be, and whether homo sapiens will eventually go the way of the Neanderthals……and get subsumed into something better able to survive.
    ~
    As Kropotkin clearly discussed in his fine work “Mutual Aid – 1902, ISBN: 1522093419”, the species that perform mutual aid amongst the individuals are the ones best able to survive. The big cat predators may be awesome, but they are the actually the most vulnerable if you can appreciate this perspective that was in contrast to how Darwin was interpreted.
    ~
    If “success” is judged as presence and numbers across the globe, there is no denying homo sapiens have been successful collectively up to this moment in time, but this very success could be our undoing as only “nature” knows. Most of us here I suppose sense the storms coming. Can you feel it in your bones?
    ~
    Personally, I’m all for collective insight, knowledge, sharing, and learning, but I won’t give up my liberty for this, because we are all individuals with our own minds. So, there is a balance between collective benefits and individual liberty. That is what I think.
    ~
    As always, achieving balance is an ongoing effort. Each individual has their strengths and weaknesses, but if we work together it is amazing what we can accomplish. History suggest this, but it also suggest there is another side to it all that could be our demise if anybody has more power than any one individual should ever have.
    .
    BK

    1. That is why tribes form. Survival and power in numbers. When society collapases tribes will emerge once again.

    2. Agree, we need to find that illusive pulse of life and if we are just a herd that all acts in unison, then there will be no one that strays just a little off the path to rediscover that illusive pulse of life.

      That means that though we want to work together in concert, we also need to play our own fiddle once in awhile to stay in tune.

      1. Mr. T.M.
        .
        Thank-you so much for what you say.
        .
        One thing that makes me sad – just being honest here – is that I will never see in my lifetime the amazing herds of american bison that once roamed the grasslands living life naturally. None of us here will ever see that like it once was, but maybe, it can be again for those who are around in the future.
        +
        Metaphorically, the “buffalo” from the plains speak mean so much in my mind and that coupled with the fact that I was born in Buffalo, NY is why their image means so much to me. To think that there is a $50 gold coin of a creature that many did their best to destroy outright is irony of the highest order. But, the Buffalo survived thanks to the goodwill of a few.
        ~
        Peace from me and my family to you and your family.

      2. Hopefully we don’t all go the way of the American Bison, but it can happen to us as well.

    3. Kropotkin.
      You probably know then Ken, that Tolstoy called him ‘The White Buddha’
      Very appropriate, that.

  14. We, We, We, humanity, the article keeps referring to, assuming there is an ‘us’, as if ‘we’ are a ‘mono-corpus’ entity.
    It’s like all the time hearing, we (America) are the richest nation on the planet!
    However, when the notion is challenged, people come up with all types of rationalizations for it to be so: We have the highest GDP on earth, is one.
    The problem with this position is, most folks, even those who know better, don’t see that this does not actually compute with the facts of the entire population on the ground.
    When are all of us economic ‘have-nots’ ever going to be able to have that necessary universal epiphany that gurus highly recommend?

  15. It’s a pretty blinding illusion to think that a significant fraction of eight billion insouciant Joe Sixpacks is any wiser than the bunch of sociopathic puppeteers who create the alternative reality we live and die in. Public space in perpetual low or high level conflict certainly doesn’t support that view. Enlightenment is only, has always been and will always be reserved to a happy few who’ve managed to transcend fear by taming their demanding preservation instinct into desireless serenity. Ain’t nuffin’ we can do about it. It’s human nature.
    My favorite story by Eckart Tolle is that of a pupil who asks his Zen master as they are resting on the grass how one enters Zen. After a long silence, the master replies: “Can you hear the mountain stream over there?” The pupil listens carefully and replies: “Yes Master” – “Enter Zen from there” says the master. There’s a long silence again and the disciple asks: “Master, what would you have answered if I’d said I couldn’t hear the mountain stream?” – “Enter Zen from there”, replies the master. If worse gets to the worst, I suppose this recipe will also be valid during and after a nuclear holocaust – and even after death :o)

    1. Very wise post. Serenity is only possible by first ejecting fear. Was funny too. Thanks for posting it.

  16. I would like to interpret this as I see it. Please tell me where I am wrong.

    “So what can we do? What is the one exit we have allowed ourselves?
    “As near as I can tell, the only door we have left open to ourselves as a species is a mass-scale awakening.” True, in part. True in the sense it must be a fundamental shift within the human mind, but how? False in attempting to place our hopes of survival on the amplification of some trait we posses. This also applies to “awakening” which is where Caitlin always goes astray. Why do I say this? One because it leaves it as a choice of goodwill. Goodwill is not the preeminent condition. Survival is. No one lives forever, hence the self is interjected, “live” while you can. Two, “awakening” always takes on a ‘social’ dimension and if you have seen them come and go as one poster pointed out below. This dimension really ( notice here how really and reality start with the same letters) adds nothing. It is more a detriment.

    Next, “A collective shift out of our unhealthy relationship with mental narrative, and into a healthy one.” The key word here is “narrative”. What is narrative, it is a story. Think little kids at bedtime. Narrative evokes our imagination, our idealism, our needs unconscious psychological needs. It is a mental diversion. A diversion from what though? It is a mental diversion from reality.
    Next, “A relationship with mental narrative where thoughts are no longer believed and identified with but rather used as tools for surviving and thriving.” This really is the key, it is “thoughts” as “tools for surviving”, but how? We are thinking beings that is just a given, that is what we do. What we need to do it make better “thoughts”. What do I mean by this? I mean we need to improve the process so the conclusions we form are more robust and grounded in ‘reality’. Conclusions form our beliefs and that is where we go astray.
    Now let me introduce two words;
    Logic – the system or principles of reasoning applicable to any branch of knowledge or study.
    Fallacy – any of various types of erroneous reasoning that render arguments logically unsound.
    Why are these words important? See Caitlin’s quote above, “thoughts are no longer believed and identified with” This is so important because it implies we just ‘believe’ in ‘thoughts’ and that is in actuality what we do. There are many ‘reasons’ for this that have very, very little to do with ‘reason’. Identified with would indicate a sociological aspect and this also is very, very significant and also has virtually nothing to do with ‘reason’.
    So really this is the key, or at least I ‘believe’ so. What though about the “Collective” that Caitlin mentions? As, “I think this is kind of what humanity is collectively doing to itself right now.” and “And now we see humanity as a collective in its own existential crisis as the ecosystem in which we evolved” The point is we are a ‘collective’ and really we just ‘evolved’ to this point. So how do we the ‘Collective’ ‘Evolve’ further?
    We do what what comes naturally, what we do already, we do what we do to ‘Survive’, we “Think”. We just do it ‘Collectively’ and we do it better by identifying the ‘Logic’ and the ‘Fallacies’ within the logic.
    When we do this the, “propaganda narratives are no longer reflexively imbued with the power of belief,” Propaganda is a weak logic full of fallacies it really is. It is inferior and inferior products do not survive. Also “the egoic structures they’re designed to plug into just aren’t there anymore.” The way I envision a “Collective Intelligence” because that is what I refer to it as, I envision it as an anonymous collaborative attempting to refine the process of human thought for the benefit of all. This is not a stage for individual ‘ego’. Individual ego is just not important. This applies to the leaders ego and the followers ego.
    Lastly, “You can’t have change without a mass-scale people’s movement. You can’t have a mass-scale people’s movement without neutering the propaganda engine designed to prevent it.” So true as we just did at least on paper I ‘believe’ because I as an individual reasoned it as so. Please tell me my errors, (fallacies). Caitlin said, “You can’t neuter the propaganda engine without a mass-scale awakening from humanity’s unwholesome relationship with thought.” Our unwholesome relationship is simply our acceptance of thought ‘processes’ that are flawed or fallacious. We need a better ‘process’. We need to put all our energies into understanding the validation and mechanisms of human thought, not human “Consciousness” that comes next, but human thought processes. We need to include all of human thought in the formation of our ‘conclusions’, because we all bring a different perspective. It must be a “Collective Intelligence”.

    This is what I ‘believe’ I also believe that when errors ‘fallacies’ in human thought and logic arise we tend to react socially and that is our downfall. Yet until the advent of modern technology computers, internet, we really had no alternative. Society was our connection so to speak.

    https://medium.com/@whmilk/save-the-world-collective-vs-individual-intelligence-69e1353ea9b5

  17. Ummm ‘DEMO(N)CRACY? not a coincidence? People die on a regular statistical basis, get used to it, but mainly NOT from Covid19. If at all. The death stats are QUITE NORMAL in the UK, viz there is no ‘pandemic’. But you have to read the stats. The government stats are quite clear on it.
    This life has been, and I wrote the song to commemorate it in 2010 ‘THE INTELLIGENCE TEST.’ Looks like many/most are failing it.
    The Pacific Ocean actually kicked me out at Point Leo, Victoria in Jan 1977 when I was being carried out to sea by a strong riptide, and passed out, to find myself on the beach at the waterline with NO EXPLANATION.
    ‘This is the moment you have worried about.
    You have sat the exams and the results are coming out.
    This is when you find out if you’re cursed or blest…..
    when you answered the questions were you drunk or possessed?’
    WILL YOU PASS THE INTELLIGENCE TEST? For the rest of the lyrics go to

    1. Very creative I like it a lot.

  18. “crisis is a pre-requisite for personal growth” – William Meader.

    1. if you read stories from Holocaust survivors, they all say: “the more oppressive a situation, the stronger a person becomes”. as Jane Hirshfield says “in order to gain anything, we must first lose everything”. People like Trump, who have been spoon-fed their entire lives, will never awaken. only real people, living real lives.

      1. They became stronger because the weaker ones died out. The strong survive. Modern society has allowed the weak, both in mind, body and spirit to proliferate. A culling is overdue.

        1. is is better to let people assume you’re an idiot than to open your mouth & remove all doubt.

          1. Ignore history to your demise.

  19. Thanks. It takes talent and skill to paint oneself into a corner.

    1. Why would anyone want to go into a corner except maybe to sulk and be a baby about it. So please expound upon your conflicting statement if you don’t mind.
      .
      Of course, I expect no reply, but maybe there will be one and I look forward to that if it occurs.

      1. It takes no talent and skill to be a magistrate judging others in the fucked up country of England best I can tell. Corners are tricky and if you find yourself in one it is best to hope that your friends (if you have any) will help you out. As for the magistrate in England overseeing the case of Julian Assange, seems to me her family has some connections with some very unseemly things stemming out of South Africa and I hope she gets what she deserves. Her and her family.
        .
        But I will withhold judgement on this until January I suppose when this madam comes down with her decision regarding an individual held in the Belmarsh prison for the crime of……….telling the truth. Crime of the century I suppose that is.
        .
        Talk about fucked up shit. That is what needs to end and the sooner the better.

  20. Caitlin, this is one of your best essays ever. Existentially deep and true.

    One point — I don’t see it as crazy wisdom that got us into this mess, but i agree with your article’s implicit assumption that it will take our crazy wisdom to get us out of it.

    1. Jesus, Buddha,, mohammed have all tried already. Their success was limited at best. Mostly it just gets warped and comperomised by all but a few.

      1. Look at it this way, if not for those great ones, life would have failed long ago. It could be that it is we that have a limited understanding of the extent of their success.

        1. Fully agree. They are the only reason we made it this far.

          1. But some of us could get it right this time if we followed the instructions of the world’s greatest Liberator, Yeshua. He is the only Liberator who is capable of leading His followers out of this corrupt, violent, greedy, polluting and often depressing civilization which now indoctrinates, exploits and oppresses nearly everyone including Christians.

    2. All of our religions are the reason we are in this mess in the first place. Religion was always connected with State and State always benefited from religion. Look at religions as a pacifier to keep the majority of the people from rising up against their oppressors; the few rebels who break ranks are easily dispatched.

      1. So the early tribes were compromised by the shaman who consulted the spirits. Who run the tribe, the chief the medicine man or the war chief. Who run the middle age societies, the kings or the church. I think you will find then and now it was a group effort. Just like today except the shaman is quickly being marginalized by chief and war chief.

      2. When Jesus was teaching and healing the common people/peasants of the Roman Empire, only the rich counted, only the “official citizens,” not the untold millions of slaves and peons. Indeed, to feel sorry for the teeming rabble of the empire was utterly unthinkable to the elites. A suffering slave or peon deserved only laughter or mockery, if he or she were paid any attention at all by the rich and powerful, because they were the only people that mattered, the only people considered fully people, in the ancient Roman world. So how ironic it is that so many on today’s left fail to recognize and acknowledge that their cherished value system, its compassion for the marginal and vulnerable, its condemnation of exploitation and oppression, stems from the origins (as opposed to the checkered histories) of the religions they now despise. Without the Jewish prophets and Jesus, or without the great sages of Indian, Chinese, and other Eastern traditions, or without the late Stoic philosophers who shared much the same theology and value system, there could never have been a Marx, nor a Timothy Michel, nor any other secular humanist. All of them, whether they know it or not, stand on the shoulders of RELIGIOUS giants. Hell, even the courageously and brutally honest Thomas Paine, that formidable enemy of orthodox Christianity, began his “Age of Reason” with a clear statement of his deistic religious faith, upon which his early and admirable advocacy of human rights was expressly grounded.

        https://churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles/human-dignity-was-a-rarity-before-christianity/

        1. No problem. They will simply rewrite history. Most of the left are ignorant book burners who have no idea of truth nor any desire to seek it. The right are more logical and less ignorant but just as ruthless in different ways. Politicians are not intelligent people, just manipulative and ruthless similar to criminals. Pablo Escobar have much more in common with career politicians such as Joe Biden and Donald Trump than anyone wants to admit.

      3. That was true then, not so true now. The Principalities in High Places want to destroy all religions probably because so many of the followers of them try to live up to the higher standards that their religion stands for. Christianity is at the top of their list for destruction. Probably a one world religion of sorts would be the replacement if there is the take down.

  21. We’re living in a chaotic society that’s in its terminal decline , because if our society was in convulsions because it’s in the process of transitioning to something radically new and genuinely better, there would be at least some kind of organized grass-roots opposition to the entrenched power of old, collapsing order. Today, however, we are forbidden from even uttering the name of the oppressor. And every popular protest movement that does arise – Extinction Rebellion, BLM, Trump, Antifa, Alt-right, Brexit, etc. – has been infiltrated and co-opted by agents of the existing order, because “the best way to control the opposition is to lead it ourselves.” (Lenin) So long as the discourse of the solidarity of the oppressed is shaped by the sensitivities of the oppressor – who also funds the movement of the oppressed, we’re pretty much doomed…

    1. Read the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. Tells us all we need to know about our current societal collapse.

  22. Avoiding Hopelessness

    It’s starting to feel like at the end of the book 1984, where it turns out that there is no escape, that all those who seemed to be in opposition to big brother were actually fake and Winston Smith, the protagonist is subsumed. Big Brother, or our favorite spy agency that exists with no oversight and has access to everything which I will avoid mentioning since we know they use algorithms to pick up anything that might threaten them seem to be orchestrating the manipulation that is leading humanity into an inescapable pit. We can only stand by as witnesses, as each gate closes and like cows, we come closer to the slaughter house. 

    Historically, humanity has not had the wisdom to self organize such that the lives of all those living could be joyful and fulfilling as opposed to an unendurable struggle, which is more or less the case for more and more of the multitudes. And since the necessary limits that keep us in homeostasis have been completely ignored, we have sullied the ecosystem that sustains us, to the point of no return quite possibly.

    In our small pueblo, occasionally one encounters some poor foreigner who has lost their inner compass and wanders helplessly about without the ability to maintain themselves. They have no money, hence, no shelter, rags for clothes, and no food. They have exceeded their limits and their only hope is compassion from others. The system here has no agency to provide for them, The only solution is to engage the embassy of their country to transport them there where hopefully, they will receive the humane attention they need. Humanity now is like this and there is no agency to send all of us to.

    The least insane among us need to rally and gain control of the situation, to restore the limits that have been ignored and broken. This becomes problematic since those who consider themselves sane are often people dominated by their egos and we end up with the blind leading the blind and the hopelessness of the situation deepens.

    For me, the only hope lies in activism which to be valid, needs effective strategies. We may have one, that is, uniting like minded individuals, organizations, and networks under one giant network for the purpose of collaboration and organizing. For this strategy to be effective, the network must be gigantic, that is, millions to billions of members. This we are creating and will be launched nov. 30.

    1. Nice post until the last paragraph. Those who place their trust in this world are doomed to be disappointed. Go ahead. Organize, fight, join the battle. The world enjoys crushing transient dreamers. If you succeed, the power and greed of the world will transform you into something unrecognizable. You are not fighting the oppressors but railing against human nature itself.

  23. Simply put what we are doing is not working. We are embracing the change called death and rejecting life on a mass as well as individual level. Can this be reversed? From the stand point that it is conceivable then yes but only if the mass consciousness and vision of this species can be awakened to the reality that we are creators. It is time to wake up and finally understand the difference between what is truly negative, ultimately self centered “I” ness, and the positive concern and care for others above ourselves on all levels then use that knowledge in creating, changing this reality into the vibrant love centered existence that any sane entity longs to see. It is just a choice.

    1. Jesus called it love for your brother.

      1. Well yes, but are you meaning with your reply that Jesus and religions based on his message are the only religion with that as a fundamental precept? In my experience with organized religions it would be difficult if not impossible to find one without that principle. Of course there is a huge difference from what they say and the actions that we see in any organized religious grouping as in my experience they tend to be more interested in protecting the organization that creating the reality I mentioned above. What is your experience?

  24. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to ensure the continuing evolution of mankind. Nothing induces evolution in any population so much as stress, except perhaps for viruses. Is there any bottom to the rabbit hole? No pain, no gain. If you truly wish to ascend stop thinking like a mortal. That said, we grow tired of such love and are increasingly tired of all the lies and in need of rest and beauty.

  25. Yes, I have said exactly the same thing, but I like the way you say it better. At the same time, I need to remind myself and everyone that almost everything that is happening, and is allowed to happen could be linked to our favorite secret agency that for the sake of algarithms, I will not mention. And we all are constantly forgetting this, it seems. The same is true with the corruptnature of all gov’ts. This tends to be ignored and overlooked. If you recall the book 1984, what seems to be happening has the hopeless quality that sneaks in at the end of the book, when it is clear that no one can escape. Since now it is clear how the trojan horse strategy that is used over and over works so effectively to manipulate the public.

    We hope to launch nov. 30 a platform that will make collaboration and organizing on a huge scale, feasible and easy. The database can hold millions to billions of like minded individuals, organizations, and networks. This is an attempt to unify the millions of “woke” people and orgs. to be a force for good. We have been working on this since March and have now, a huge international team working on this.

    We wish to collaborate with anyone else doing something similar and to manage in a horizontal manner, such that all members will be equally empowered and none will be subsumed.

    We also hope to hit the ground running with 1000 orgs. already committed. Any help we can get will be greatly appreciated. mofwoofoo@gmail.com. Utopiacornucopia.org, the umbrella name for the network is currently under reconstruction.

    1. 1984 was nice and seems to be trendier today but I think “The Trial” by Franz Kafka to be much more appropriate to where society is heading.

  26. Watch any of the African safari video clips on the internet showing prey animals being chased, caught, macerated by razor sharp teeth and finally eaten alive in large chunks by their predator, be it a big cat, some kind of wild dog or something from the wolverine or weasel families. The instinct for survival is absolutely imperative in the prey as the animal futilely tries to escape, obviously in great pain and with ebbing facilities until it ultimately loses consciousness or enters some state of shock or natural anaesthesia that causes the creature to stop struggling even as it watches its own body being devoured.
    .
    I’m sure it’s the same with human individuals facing a death by some terrible disease, traumatic accident or aggressive physical attack from one of our fellow human beings. It can play out in excruciatingly slow motion or in an Augenblick. So, the suffering may be prolonged or mercifully short but the transition from existence to non-existence is (one can only guess) probably qualitatively the same.
    .
    The sequence of instincts is hard wired into the DNA of any living entity that ever achieves self consciousness. It will struggle, no matter how futilely, to retain its personal awareness until damage to the brain or nervous system is so extensive that bodily control is lost (you’ll recognise the accompanying sense of futility if you’ve ever suffered some form of paralysis whatever the cause) or conscious awareness in the brain itself fades from anoxia or neural depolarisation (if you’ve ever undergone general anaesthesia you’ll know this can happen instantaneously, shocking in retrospect upon reawakening, or gradually, like slipping into an acid trip before the lights wink out).
    .
    No person would ever agree to undergo such a procedure if he i) wasn’t assured by a massive collection of extant medical data that the loss of sentience is reversible or ii) could simply no longer tolerate the level of pain being suffered. Pain, visceral or psychic seems to be key to a person’s willingly accepting death over continued existence. That most prisoners seem to docilely cooperate in their own executions I don’t think is an exception to this, as their mental balance in the moment is certainly stressed to the limit and burdened with forced notions of honor, self worth and similar considerations. What was it Ben Johnson supposedly said on the matter? “Nothing clears the mind like knowing one is to be hanged in the morning.”
    .
    Humans have been documented to individually and in large groups (think concentration camps) endure almost unimaginable pain before succumbing to despair and finally death. I think you can extrapolate the response to whole societies and countries faced with existential threats. As long as there is “hope,” as we characterize the feeling or experience, people will try to maintain life.
    .
    I suppose there may be other motives that work to the same end as well, e.g., as long as we have a chance to retaliate against a genocidal attack, we want to persist long enough to launch the second strike missiles even if it means the end of our species. I’ve long pondered the sense of destroying ALL of humanity just because our half might be eliminated in a first strike. I’ve also remained dismayed that the US seems to be the one nuclear power that refuses to rule out the first use of nuclear weapons.

    1. A remnant will survive in their bunkers with years of food. They are called politicians. I heard they even had room for regular people (serfs) to do the work for them.

      1. Can you imagine emerging from your bunker only to be surrounded by politicians (i.e., lawyers) with no peons to kick around? The Horror!

  27. You can’t have change without a mass-scale people’s movement. You can’t have a mass-scale people’s movement without neutering the propaganda engine designed to prevent it.

    How 2 do it? The machine is strong.

    1. Indeed, it has been developing its psychological methods for quite some time, and has gotten quite good at it. How else to explain that while most people distrust governments, and the politicians they are composed of, they will turn around and accept the psyop that’s inflicted by them as if it were undeniable truth. We all know that politicians are simply the best liars among us, yet we believe them. Which is why I reached the conclusion that anarchy would be an improvement.

  28. Listen

    Listen and you will hear
    The roar of raging weather
    The sigh of dying species
    The cackle of burning forests
    The groan of sinking coasts

    Like an animal frozen in fear
    As it’s death bears down
    It will leap too late and too short

    Like an animal caught in a mudhole
    As it sinks and struggles
    Every movement taking it closer to drowning.

    Like a bird blown out to sea
    Already too far, too tired
    It’s last wingbeat doomed to the waves.

    Is there an antidote to despair ?

    You will do violence
    But still be killed
    You will negotiate
    But still loose everything
    You will pray
    But not be saved

    You will make long journeys
    And find nowhere to go
    You will kill yourself
    And no one will know

    And when the last woman
    Sings a lament to no one
    for her lost child
    It will be the most marvellous sound in the universe

    Listen

  29. It seems that in humanity’s development of science and technology our level of knowledge has far outstripped our development of the wisdom necessary to deal rationally with the reality that our rapidly growing knowledge is presenting us with.

    I agree that either humanity wakes up soon to the potentially destructive reality that our exponentially increasing knowledge is confronting us with or we are finished as a species.

    1. I sense that many, many more than anyone realizes, are waking up right now and will continue to wake up as the post-pandemic depression sets in. It used to be, until just months ago, that it was easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. No longer.

  30. Western Liberty R.I.P.
    “We are witnessing in every Western country a rapid transformation of what were formerly free countries into police states. Governments violate their constitutions….”
    https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2020/10/25/western-liberty-r-i-p/

  31. Yes Ms Johnstone, is does seem like we are heading toward our doom very quickly. Events are not in our control; we do not have the launch codes in our possession. We are mere peons in the chaste economic system; our voices are never heard or paid any attention to. Without fallout shelters we will die. We can not escape to another planet, so we will die here when the shit hits the fan. Our species is quite dysfunctional, irrational, and insanity rules the day.

    1. If we and our fellow humans were sane we’d spend most of our available time trying to accomplish tasks and goals beneficial to our fellow beings following the same instincts we use to care for our children. If everyone acted altruistically we should all be raised up, thrive and find fulfillment. The opponent would be pain, suffering, want and death rather than each other. The enlightened amongst our number repeatedly tell us this, but most refuse to listen or act on this only advice that stands to reason. Living by the dictum of “the greatest good for the greatest number” would be as gratifying for the givers as for the takers and no one would have to incur the guilt of the daily human culls presently inflicted, in one form or another, across this planet.

  32. Since 1970, I have escaped the mainstream living in Northern coastal California. At a comfortable distance, I’ve watched world events unfold. The vast lies behind bourgeois culture have been newly made naked, making the search for cultural meaning an ideological death trap. The lies told about who rules and what the public dumb shows carried on by the lower priests of capitalism really mean, is another form of entertainment having as its function the reigniting of anti authoritarian and neurotic fears that the rapist is about to return. Mass media is full of cop shows and 100000 swat raids are visited on the people every year. Mr. Kennedy is an eloquent man. I am astounded by his clarity. Every day class war explodes in every city in the USA. Every day, items that cost a penny to make, are sold for a dollar. Capitalist murder is by stealth, like the nerve gas based pesticides that coat our food. It isn’t like the people’s struggles have just started. They have been a daily experience in my 79 years. It is remarkable how strangers in different places can reach the same conclusions independent of each other.

  33. Caitlin, I do not deride your thoughts but sense some contradictions. You say mankind has fallen under the sway of experts who are not experts at all. This is the opposite of enlightenment which I agree. Enlightenment is throwing off these so called experts and using our mind to reach proper conclusions. When you do this you are ridiculed like the little girl in your 9/11 story. Such ridicule even occurs on this very blog when it goes against the accepted norm. So how does mankind reach enlightenment without near extinction. Prophets and such other truth tellers have been killed or imprisoned throughout history. We are headed to catacysm and not enlightenment. Prepare now.

  34. On a more practical note, it is said 90% of the people die in the first 90 days of a cstaclysm. Prepare now to survive those first 90 days. Then enlightenment may come a little easier to you at the end of those first 90 days.

  35. Caitlin, here is your first test. Sit in a full lotus position for 4 hours without moving a muscle. It you succeed there is a good chance you will become enlightened.

  36. You can always meditate on death. Its the one of highest forms of meditation in the Buddhist traditions. No incense, knife or cliff face required. Just a quiet space and imagine you have only a short time left on this existence. What would you do, how do you feel. After some time at this the realization of the reality that you are actually very near to being non existent should evoke some meaningful change.

    1. Non existent?
      Is that possible?

    2. Even better, quit worrying about becoming the great enlightened one and begin paying attention to everyone else and all the life around us.

    3. As is so often said, we are all just one heart beat away from death at all times. It could happen to you, dear reader, before you get to the end of this sentence.

      1. That is so true, and it only exemplifies the idea that it isn’t anyone of us that is important, but rather life itself, the life of this planet. The great “I” needs to realize that “I” is just a blade of grass that helps keep the entire lawn healthy and green; if “I” isn’t doing that, then there is no further reason for it to exist. Try telling that to a great “I” like Elon MUsk.

  37. The Mass Movement will come Caitlin!
    Just take a look at the severe riots going on in Italy this very moment, it is happening, all around the world, more and more people are standing up to the Tyranny!
    Australians too are catching on quickly! It is only just BEGINNING, wait until our Superannuation disappears, wait until home prices crash 50-75%, and a home worth less than then they borrowed!, and if that doesn’t do it, a world famine in the middle of war will!
    https://summit.news/2020/10/23/sweden-refuses-to-impose-new-lockdown-measures-saying-people-have-suffered-enough/
    https://thehighwire.com/videos/the-frontline-doctor-who-went-viral/
    https://wolfstreet.com/2020/07/14/it-starts-mortgage-delinquencies-suddenly-soar-at-record-pace/
    https://www.newstarget.com/2020-10-21-biden-endorses-transgender-activism-for-children.html
    https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/markets-by-sector/agriculture/food-shortages-to-reduce-population-brought-to-by-the-covid-triumvirate/
    https://thedailycoin.org/2020/10/13/agricultural-terror-new-zealand-blocks-farmworkers-leaves-crops-to-rot-video/

    1. Famine is coming but like all unpleasant subjects it is ignored. That is because after generations of plentiful food people simply cannot believe it will happen. I truly truly feel sorry for nations on limited food now. Hundreds of millions will starve. The west will know hunger for the first time in over a hundred years. China and India will have food fiots as well. No one is talking about it. Not even on this blog. The concept is too hard to accept.

  38. The Pain was Excruciating… it happened 18 or so years ago, when a friend said there were explosives “inside” the World Trade Center. Been wide awake ever since.

  39. https://www.johndayblog.com/2020/10/kennedy-for-president.html
    Those who understand that this ‘reset’ is not a reset but rather a whole new proposal on the entire organization of society, but being done through oligarchical methods and without the sort of mandate required in a society governed by laws and not men, are – as we have said – reluctant to admit that a great change is indeed necessary.
    Rather, we must understand that the underlying catastrophic economic mechanisms which are forcing this great change exist independently of the coronavirus, and exist independently of the particular changes which the oligarchs promoting their version of a ‘reset’ (read: new proposals) would like to see.
    You see, the people and the oligarchs are locked into a single system together. In the long-term, it seems as if the oligarchs are looking for solutions to change that fact, and effect a final solution that grants them an entirely break-away civilization. But at this moment, that is not the case. Yet this system cannot carry forward as it has been, and the Coronavirus presents a reason at once both mysterious in its timing and also profound in its implications, to push forward a new proposal.
    We believe that technology is quickly arriving at a point where the vast majority of human beings will be considered redundant. If the technocracy wants to create a walled civilization, and leave the rest of humanity to manage their own lives along some agrarian, mediaeval mode of production, there may indeed be benefits to those who live along agrarian lines. But based in what we know about psychopathy, and the tendency of that among those who govern, such an amicable solution is likely not in the cards.
    That is why the anti-lockdown protests are so critically important to endorse. This is precisely because the lockdown measures are used to ban mass public demonstrations, a critical part of pushing public policy in the direction of the interests of the general public. A whole part of the left has been compromised, and rolled out to fight imaginary fascists, by which they mean anyone with conventional social views which predate May of 1968. All the while the actual plutocrats unleash a new system of oligarchical control which, for most, has not been hitherto contemplated except by relatively obscure political scientists, futurists, and science fiction authors.
    https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/10/18/whose-great-reset-fight-for-our-future-technocracy-vs-republic/

    ​Robert F. Kennedy Jr, International Message for Freedom and Hope. Watch the first 20 seconds, please, and get a nice mug of good coffee, because you will have decided to watch the rest. .
    This is the time to speak freely, no matter what, and to gather against totalitarianism.​
    This is what that first essay is about. I realized it in 20 seconds.
    This is the most important speech I have heard in decades. Thanks Cat.

  40. Unfortunately, we are still hunter-gathers with hunter-gather brains, everything you say is exactly right. I really don’t know how you obtained your level of wisdom but I am impressed. Right now, it is even worse that you say it is because in the midst of this mayhem, the population of the United States, especially, has been gaslighted by the clowns running the three ring circus. The rich ones who can work from home are hiding in their privileged spaces afraid of a virus that is killing at the rate of the flu. The poor ones, work for minimum wage, can’t afford housing and have to bring stuff to the lucky ones. Everybody is forced too wear a dirty nappy on their face to protect them from a virus that is 5,000 times smaller than the holes in the diaper. Since these people think they have something significant to fear from Covid and they also believe a dirty nappy will protect them from the grim reaper, they won’t understand they are supporting the worst war crime industry in history. I suppose we can always hope.

    1. Ancient Nomadic Hunter/gatherers before the “advent of agriculture ”
      Probably was a better deal.
      At least for the planet

  41. 369onerealitytwominds Avatar
    369onerealitytwominds

    It’s called 5 dried grams in silent darkness. Every politician and criminal going through the system needs to be dosed with entheogens.
    Life implies death.

    1. Like the early Greeks this needs to be part of a ritual of passage for everyone, with the exception of those with mental problems, say immediately after high school in a regulated, controlled and supervised environment. Then, of course, those who wished to repeat have that right also. We need a radical solution to everyone to awaken to our inner possibilities as well as our outer potential. What we are doing now is a utter failure and leading rapidly to the destruction of life on this planet.

  42. “Life and death are at war within us. As soon as we are born, we begin at the same time to live and die. Even though we may not be even slightly aware of it, this battle of life and death goes on in us inexorably and without mercy. If by chance we become fully conscious of it, not only in our flesh and in our emotions but above all in our spirit, we find ourselves involved in a terrible wrestling, an agonia not of questions and answers, but of being and nothingness, spirit and void. In this most terrible of all wars, fought on the brink of infinite despair, we come gradually to realize that life is more than the reward for him who correctly guesses a secret and spiritual “answer” to which he smilingly remains committed. This is more than a matter of “finding peace of mind,” or “settling religious problems.

    Indeed, for the man who enters into the black depths of the agonia, religious problems become an unthinkable luxury. He has no time for such indulgences. He is fighting for his life. His being itself is a foundering ship, ready with each breath to plunge into nothingness and yet inexplicably remaining afloat on the void. Questions that have answers seem, at such a time, to be a cruel mockery of the helpless mind. Existence itself becomes an absurd question, like a Zen koan: and to find an answer to such aquestion is to be irrevocably lost. An absurd question can have only an absurd answer.

    Religions do not, in fact, simply supply answers to questions. Or at least they do not confine themselves to this until they become degenerate. Salvation is more than the answer to a question. To emerge alive from a disaster is not just the answer to the question, “Shall I escape?” Everything hangs on the final issue, in the battle of life and death. Nothing is assured beforehand. Nothing is definitely certain. The issue is left to our own choice. But that is what constitutes the dark terror of the agonia: we cannot be sure of our own choice. Are we strong enough to continue choosing life when to live means to go on and on with this absurd battle of entity and nonentity in our own inmost self?” Thomas Merton (The New Man 1999)

    1. Thomas Merton is on of my favorite authors.

    2. Hello my friend!
      It is not so much a battle of life and death that is most important, but the battle of discernment, the battle for truth, walking the middle path, and with it the discipline of not wondering to the left or to the right of that path, in everything we seek, in everything we do, in everything we write, to everything we say.
      Many people visit the beautiful Great Barrier Reef every year, and the majority by far don mask and snorkel for the day, and couple hundred bucks, they go home and feel happy they have seen the reef, though others, are not satisfied, they have a far greater need, they don the tanks and weights, and go right to the bottom, and view the reef in its entirety, they see the full breath and depth of the reef, the different corals, the brighter colors and greater shapes, other types of fish.
      Some people choose to live and seek truth, but most are too busy with family, work, other commitments, and by far they are the majority, and it is these people that will be slow to get up off their knees and stand up, not just for themselves, but for liberty for freedom, currently being STOLEN from you, from me, from our children and their children!
      We WILL come together. But not yet! When it happens, you will feel it, and we will be joined as brother & sister, with righteousness & goodness, with love and sincerity. A new world WILL be born!

      1. AHHH. But what is the truth. Everyone serms to have their own definition and there is the quandry.

  43. here’s a wake up call:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCl_oA7pFa0&feature=emb_logo

    Let the feast begin: we get to eat each other. how fine. Sister Canada gets first hit of the kool-aid.

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