The Perils of Fortune telling

      These past few days have been a bit heavy, so I think I'm going to talk about something phenomenally stupid I believe. 

    Throughout history, humans have had many approaches to telling the future, from using string to heating bones over a fire. Despite my doubts as to its merits, I occasionally dabble in fortune telling myself. My personal rule, though, is that I have to try and use the least effective method to predict the future that I can. So I usually just role dice or draw five cards from a deck and make a prediction based on that. 

    In my opinion the most effective method of predicting the future is using the weather report. I'm not just referring to it predicting rain or sun. I have this hypothesis that the weather is partially affected by the mood of people in the area, so if it's hotter then normal people are angry and if it's cold and wet then people are sad. I realize that the weather affects peoples moods, but my brain has noticed that the weather sometimes gets warm when major events happen, and as brains often do, it has become convinced that this always happens. 

  Do you ever try and predict the future? What method do you use?

Thoughts

    I'm not used to talking about my feelings. The only time I've gotten a chance was at therapists office, and even then they usually just say, "That's nice and all, but let's focus on getting you better now, 'kay." 

    That's why my blog tends to be a bit disorganized. I'm not really writing for a professional audience, I'm writing for people who, like me, feel that no one in the world could possibly care about or understand them. I know a lot of people say that if people don't like you, then you need to work on yourself, but if you've never thought of yourself as someone who could be liked, it can feel a bit futile. 

    I know people hate the internet, but I owe everything to it. It's where I first learned that I'm not alone in the world, where I found other people like me. It helped me realize that even if I'm strange and different, I'm not alone in the world. 

    I don't see it talked about a lot, if at all, but the right to be yourself is perhaps the greatest luxury you can have. People are expected to downplay if not conceal their true selves for the benefit of those around them. I don't care who defends this, all I see are people miserable about having to hide the truth from their friends and loved ones for fear they'll be rejected. And last week we saw where that philosophy can lead a society. 

    The whole reason I'm a blogger is that there's a lot about society, not just in America but in general, that doesn't make sense or feel right to me. Like the idea that everyone has to work. If you look at the numbers, it's clear that that isn't true, and acting like it is true means that a lot of people starve for no good reason. Then there's the way we elevate science but punish art, even though both are important for the growth of society. Or that we talk about bullying in such a way that everyone is discouraged from talking about their opinions. 

    We're working on it, I know. But at the bottom is this idea that the way to fix society is to fix the way people behave. That ignores the way society influences everyone. People behave the way society expects them to behave, or according to their own moral codes if no one is around. Again, we're becoming more aware of that, but the amount of people I see who assume that society is only as good or bad as the people living in it is frustrating. 

    I don't really know if I have much to say, I just have a lot of random thoughts that have been rolling around in my head for years now. I also want to have a place where I can just say what I feel about life, which can pretty much be summed up as "It sucks, but I still think it'll get better." With a whole lot of philosophy about the Universe shoved in there. I also want to talk about why I think the world is the way it is in a venue where I know no one will take me seriously. I do want to have an impact on the world, but the last thing I want is to destroy it completely. 

Thoughts of a Dreamer

   I'll start by stating the obvious; these are dark and horrible times. They've been dark and horrible for at least six years at this point, if not earlier. These are the kind of times where people either cry out in despair or search desperately for a solution. This post will be mostly the former. 

    I've made it clear at this point that I don't want to go back. Not to 2015, 2012, 2006 or 1995. I miss the way things were, and like everyone else I'm mourning what could have been, but I don't want to go back to a world where I honestly wasn't happy. Nobody was. We were just going through the motions praying that, tomorrow, things would be just a little bit better. Naturally they got a whole lot worse, but going back wouldn't change anything. The horrors of today were set in motion by the choices of the people of yesterday. You don't need to learn history to know that. 

    I don't know if things will get better. I know a lot of people say that things will get better at some point, but will we even be alive to see it? 

    What I miss most, though, is the feeling of certainty I had before the pandemic. The feeling that no matter how bad things were, when I wake up tomorrow the world will still be there, more or less the same way it is today. Now I know that that isn't true. Now every time I walk past a place I used to love, all I can do is ask how long it will be there, before it's demolished or destroyed in an earthquake. 

   Because I know I'm not the only person who feels the way I do, that going back, no matter how far, would be a huge mistake. 

The Sky and the Sun

 Sun is shining
Outside of my window,
The promise of a new day,
The hope of a better tomorrow.
The sun is shining,
How can it be so peaceful
When it's all gone so wrong?

All around me are walls of glass,
Trapping me,
Suffocating me,
Keeping in the warmth
From the sunlight outside.
Those outside the walls say that it is pleasant
And warm.

Those outside the walls
Keep us trapped,
Say that but for the enclosure
We would devour them,
Desperate for sustenance.
Those outside the walls
Don't trust us not to hurt them.

And why should they?
They see the stones
We have in our hands,
The rocks that will bring about 
Their demise.

Those of you who say
That we aren't prisoners,
Do you honestly think
That the walls were put here
For our benefit?
Do you honestly think 
That those outside the walls
Hear our cries,
Or that they would care if they could?

Do you not see
That they built these walls
So that only they would have access
To the sky and the sun? 

The Heat of Anger

    I'm writing this post the same day that I wrote Saturday's post. I just finished Monday's poem, and I decided that I don't want to have to worry about writing one post tomorrow. According to my phone, today's supposed to be hot, at least relative to the weather we normally get around here, and I expect we'll still be dealing with the fall out from yesterday. 

    I'm angry right now, but also really sad. Back when I was young, when I thought that America was the greatest country in the world, I wondered how someone could like living in one of those poor countries in Asia or Africa, the countries that only ever showed up on the news when they did something wrong. Now that I live in one of those countries, I realize that you can love a country even when you know it's not a good country, and that it probably never was. And it hurts, so much, because how can someone like you change things? You can yell and scream all you want, call the right people, picket outside of town hall, organize movements, all that and more I've seen people try, and it hasn't worked. 

   I'm glad that so many are speaking out about this, but I keep seeing people say, "Voting is more important than ever now." And I have to ask, is it? Voting Biden into office didn't fix things. Voting Obama into office didn't prevent this. Donald Trump didn't have a majority vote, yet he still won the 2016 election. So now we just vote more? Haven't we been told that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results?

    Maybe we are just insane. You'd have to be to see American and still think your country can be saved. 

Satan's Inner Circle

 Disclaimer: I'm not an expert on anything. I only have an AS degree from my local college. Do not come to me for expert advice, though if you need assurance that you're not the only person who feels angry today, the day that the Supreme court overturned Roe v. Wade for no good reason, I'm more than happy to provide it. 

   I lost faith in America a while ago. Not democracy, not my fellow citizens, America specifically. I don't believe in the concept our Founding Fathers put forth so many centuries ago, because I've seen firsthand just how much they aren't working in this day and age. Maybe it would work if we weren't people of the twenty-first century, but we are, and for us the old rules aren't useful anymore. 

  There's so much going through my mind right now. Old words from when I was small, new thoughts from when I became an adult, but beneath all of those things is a question I'm completely unable to answer. Why? Why do our leaders insist on building a system none of their followers is capable of believing in? If they'd come from afar to conquer us, that would be one thing, but they grew up in the same glass house we did, they wouldn't be in power now if they hadn't. Yet they rule as though they were foreign kings who hold us at their mercy. Do they think we aren't capable of destroying them? That we won't turn our backs on them if the don't give us what we need to live? Why do they insist on trying to take our power? No one in America is here because they were willing to give into a system they felt was unjust. They came because they wanted control over their own lives, control they felt they didn't have back home. I suppose it's poetic. We were the country you came to when life back home got dicey, now we're the country you run from because it's impossible to be who you are. 

    I keep thinking about glass houses. I see people angry over this, furious that not even the least partisan body in government is save from the evils of Fascism. And I don't know what to do. Voting won't fix this. Not enough people believe in our government now. Violence would make everything worse, but I suspect it's the only thing that'll scare those in charge enough for them to listen to us. If it were up to me, we'd all wake up tomorrow and say, "Enough. I'm done believing in a system that refuses to believe in me. I'm not going to do anything to keep this system going. I'm going to sit in bed, play with my kids, do whatever it takes to keep me happy. I won't be a part of a broken world." I know that won't work, that it's just a fantasy, but it's the only solution I have that's even remotely peaceful, and it still requires people to be willing to beg, barter, or steal if that's what it takes. 

    I wonder how much longer we have before our glass house is destroyed. 

The Illusion of Power

     Am I the only person who has an Illusion of power? Something she does that she pretends impacts the world in a meaningful way, even though there's absolutely no evidence that it does? Given how many people believe in conspiracy theories these days, I expect the answer is almost certainly yes. I know a lot of people are  annoyed by the fact that others will do things that don't change the world in obvious ways, but if growing up in the twenty-first century taught me anything, it's that even the obvious things don't work all the time and not everyone who wants to do them can for whatever reason. As someone with severe Anxiety issues, I can understand the appeal of something that allows you to feel powerful without putting yourself in a situation you're uncomfortable in. 

   Sort of related, but am I the only person who gets annoyed at people who say that making art or talking about a problem isn't an effective way of solving it? Specifically in the case of random people online, at least, I do think that talking and posting about these issues is important, especially if you're not sure that your right. I've been a writer for my entire life, and one thing I've learned is that consuming bad art is just as important as consuming good art. The most important skill you can learn as a creator is how to screw up, because that will tell you what you need to know to do it right the next time. And art, of any sort, matters to people. Why do you think people got so upset about NFTs? It's not because they thought it was a scam, it's because they viewed it as an affront to something important to them, mostly because it was something they'd always believed in, and now it was being reduced to something to only care about because you wanted to make money. 

     Honestly, as despicable as NFTs are, I feel that we, as a society, can learn a lot from them. Specifically, I think we can learn about the importance that the unreal has for people, especially those who can't or don't want to participate in society. The big failing of NFTs is that they got everything they were trying to do wrong. The only thing that kept them alive was pure unquestioning belief, and that's the hardest form of belief to maintain. More importantly, if you're trying to keep an illusion alive, it's the worst kind of belief to have. In order for an illusion to last, it needs to be malleable, and in order for an illusion to be malleable, people need to be able and willing to question it's merits, offer changes, and be sure that those changes can be implemented. 

   I wonder, would we be better off if we came up with an illusion of power that people could actually believe in? I don't want to live in a world where my voice will never be heard.  I don't think anyone does. I think that if we did live in a world where we couldn't be sure we mattered, that world would fall apart, because no one would believe in it's existence. 

Little Stories

So much time spent writing
My own little stories.
How much time must I spend
Making sure I followed the rules?  

Charcter count

 Did you do it right?
Better double check to be sure
Or else it won't count

     I've lived my entire life in day dreams. I know that's not normal, but it's the only life I know, and it's what my reality is built around. I honestly find it strange that most people just don't daydream all that often. Doesn't it get boring?

A Dreamer's Curse

 If you wish
To dream of better days,
Than be warned.
For your future may not be as rosy
As you want it to be.

To dream of the world you want
Is to influence the world.
And to influence the world
You in turn open yourself up to its influence.
You cannot change the world without being changed yourself.
Accept this,
Or let go of the power you wield. 

Do not become a dreamer
If you wish to save your world.
Your world was doomed
The moment you took your power
For yourself.
If you wish to save the world
Then don't dream of a better world
Or pray for tomorrow.
Do what you must to keep your world as it is
For all eternity.
Do not hope for change,
For change will bring an end 
To the world you love. 

Musings

    I envy the narcissists of the world. They never question their self worth, no matter how many people tell them they're awful. I'm trying to believe that I'm a good person, but honestly I just don't think that I am. I realize that it isn't fair to judge yourself based on others, there are plenty of articles that say just that, but when all around you are people who can do so much more than you can with no effort at all, it's hard not to think, "What's wrong with me?"

    I envy normal people. They don't constantly ask themselves, "What am I doing wrong?" Every time their in a room with other people. I have trouble ordering coffee at Starbucks, let alone talking to other people. 

   I'll be honest, I just wanted to get that off of my chest. I know I should go to therapy, but I've never found therapy to be very helpful. They say that in order for therapy to work, you have to want to change. Change how, exactly? Work harder, do more, try to ignore the voice that says "You're worthless, and everyone knows it but you?" 

    I just wish I knew, with absolute certainty, that if I wanted to I could find a place among people. I don't like other people very much, but the human part of me wants so badly to meet someone like me. Someone who loves to learn about anything, but not enough to actually be good at anything, who thinks reality is overrated but feels that learning science is the best way to understand the world, who can't find a box they fit in no matter how hard they look. I want to live in a world where I know that if I chose to be myself, I'll still be OK, no matter what anyone else thinks.  

My Internal Melody

Every day I dance
To a beat no one else can hear.
In my head I'm endlessly twirling
But in reality I'm stuck in place.

Reality

     I don't think that humans will ever be able to see, much less comprehend, the reality of our Universe. It's much too big for us to do that. Because of this, we will never be able to know if we really see the objective truth. What well believe today will be proven bunk in a hundred years time. 

    Whenever I see people spouting views I know to be wrong, I just remind myself that in another world I would believe the same things. Humans aren't immune to being shaped by their world after all. I hold many views that I know can't possibly be true, but they fit the world I live in too neatly to get rid of. 

   I have to wonder, in a world where none of us can know the truth, can any of us claim to be sane? 

   Most of know that things like books, most movies, paintings and so on aren't real, yet we get angry when they don't convince us that they are real. Clearly I'm not the only one who believes in what I know isn't real. So why, then, are we obsessed with trying to find reality? Why don't we search for the truth about the world we actually live in? 

My Worries

    I wish we, as a society, were more willing to talk about religion. We talk about the big ones all the time, but what we don't talk about is the issue I, and a lot of other people, have. The issue of there not being a religion that gives me what I want from a religion, nothing that's really meaningful to me at least. 

    It's why I've come up with my own religion, sort of. It's mostly me trying to find a way to work science into religious thought. I don't care what Stephen Hawking said, there's still a place for Gods of any gender in todays world. But I still only have a template. And I'm more than a little worried that people reading this will think that I'm just trying to start a cult. I honestly wouldn't blame them. I've often heard that religions equal cult plus time, and that might be true, but I would much rather just skip the cult phase. I don't want a religion that only exists because people believe in it unquestioningly. What makes our Universe strong is that even if not all of us believe in it's existence, and in this day and age that's a distinct possibility, then it's still exists as a real place. We don't succumb to the Infinite just because a few people decide the Universe can't possibly be real. 

    What a lot of people forget is that what made religions so much stronger in the middle ages and earlier was that you could believe in science and God at the same time. I'm not an expert, but I strongly suspect that scientific advancement, coupled with organized religion's lackluster response to our current crises, is what's killing belief in most religious institutions. I don't think this is a time for some new Jesus to gather people together and show them a new God, I think that it's time for people to learn how to make our own Gods, using everything we've learned in the past three-hundred years. We've had decades of people learning how to create worlds in fantasy, surely someone can figure out a fantasy we would all be willing to live in. 

    I've been trying to write more in my notebooks, mostly because it feels wrong to keep buying them when I don't use them. Mostly I just write in stream of consciousness, but sometimes I come up with poetry ideas or fiction. 

   I keep trying to imagine what the world's going to look like in a few years. I'll be honest, I can't picture it all that well. I just don't think it'll look all that much like our world does right now. I could be wrong, but I think things are about to change very drastically, in ways we couldn't possibly imagine right now. I could just be thinking that as a way of coping with the stress of existing right now, but I'd like to think that in fifteen years time, today will be only a distant, unhappy memory. 

A Plea for Reality

 The sun will rise tomorrow,
Two plus two is four,
Let me soul stretch across eternity,
Let my heart go on forever.

My world is bound by physics,
What goes up must come down,
My mind is a vessel of thoughts and dreams,
Ideas to plant in the ground.

Don't look too closely
At the world within your soul,
Or else you'll see the truth
That'll keep you from being whole.

My world is only real
So long as I believe it exists.
But the longer I have to examine
The more I feel I'm on a precipice.

So let my soul stretch beyond
The moment of here and now,
Let my heart hold onto this moment,
Lest my world be gone tomorrow. 

    Tomorrow's poem is another one of my personal favorites. This one is the one I quote to myself whenever I feel like life is getting out of control. Maybe it can help you. 

The Universe

    I don't know how many people will see yesterday's post, and I expect that most who read it felt that I was completely insane. That's a good thing. If people start to believe that the Infinite is real, reality might fall apart, and I don't want to be around when that happens. 

     That being said, if you're like me and worried about what could happen if we stop believing in reality, remember that there's a vast Universe filled with living and non-living entities to help share the burden of keeping our world together. So long as they believe in our world and work to keep it together, we'll be okay. Just like how a society can withstand a few people not believing in it's core tenets, but when the majority lose faith in the narrative that holds a society together, that society is doomed. 

   When I feel like my world is falling apart, I remember the laws of physics, laws that everything in our Universe, no matter how large or small it is, obeys. Even in our divided world, they are something that we can all agree on, because we see it everyday. Our world is bound by physics, what goes up must come down. 

The Infinite

     On Monday a couple of weeks ago, I posted a poem called "The Infinite". It was sort of an outline of my religious beliefs (if you can call something that only you believe a religion). I figured I'd explain it a bit more in depth here. Don't worry if this sounds crazy, since none of this is real. It's just a way of looking at the world that I feel makes sense. 

    To start off, there's a well known argument among philosophical types that posits that we're all living in a simulation. Basically, an advanced civilization could create a simulation that's functionally indistinguishable from reality, and then the people in that reality could do the same thing, and so on and so forth, on and on for all eternity. Since everyone living in each successive simulation would have no idea that they were living in a simulation, it's possible that we're living in a simulation ourselves and just don't know it. 

     I'm not going to argue for or against it. Plenty of people have done both, and I do highly suggest you look it up if you're looking to doubt everything you see for the rest of your life. But reading that theory I got to thinking, if we are living in a simulation, what does the real world look like? Is it filled with people? Weird alien creatures? Are we living in a sentient carbon cloud?

      What if there was nothing at all? 

      I've been a dreamer for as long as I can remember. I daydream all day, everyday. As someone who spends most of her time in a world that she knows isn't real, I'm more aware than most that the line between the real and the unreal is a lot thinner than most people think. 

     But thinking about it, it makes sense to me that not only is our world not as "real" as we might think it is, but that reality itself might be something of a myth. Think about money. It's not real, but because we all use it to buy and sell things everyday, we think of it as real. Value works the same way. Think of the internet. It's not a real, physical thing, but because we all believe in it and, importantly, agree on the rules that it has to follow, it's become real in the eyes of most people on earth. Look at society. There are no laws of physics governing society, just laws that we all agree our real and work to uphold. You could argue that the only reason we have morality is to keep society real. 

     What if our Universe worked the same way?

      What if the reason our laws of physics worked is because of the efforts of everything in the Universe, from dark energy to galaxies, keeping those laws real? What if the thing holding our Universe together is an agreement that the basic laws must be followed, no matter what? 

     I have no proof of this. I don't think that you even can prove this. All I know is that humans and animals, creatures we all agree to have consciousness, grew out of one celled organisms, who in turn grew out of simple chemicals who were just moving where the metaphorical wind took them. When did consciousness develop? There are people who argue that even inanimate objects have some consciousness, so could it have grown out of the ground down rocks that became our ancestors? 

    Importantly, I think that we all know this, at least a little bit, but most of our daily lives are spent trying to make sure we know as little about it as possible. The stars, the planets, our societies, all of it is built to keep us from forgetting that our world isn't real, and that at any point, it could stop being real forever. 

   I don't know. Most of it isn't really scientific. But I can't stop seeing it everywhere I go. Everywhere I look I see people who seem to be questioning reality. More importantly, I see people fighting against the idea that what they see, what they believe might not be real. I honestly think what makes our universe what it is comes from being built on top of a place that isn't, and never will be, real. A place where nothing matters, because everything that could happen has already happened, and is happening all at once. A place where nothing has meaning, for if it's done it will be undone in an instant. A place where physics, time, chaos, everything we know, doesn't exist, and those who exist within it are constantly trying to forget just how lost they are. 

    There are many names for this place. Some call it the void, some call it darkness, others call it emptiness. But those names don't sit well with me. It's not empty, because everything that is, was, and will be exists within it, and everything that happens is happening simultaneously. For me, there is only one name that can contain a place so vast that not even our Universe can comprehend it. 

     The Infinite. 

     

What Gives me Hope

     Times are dark. There's no denying that fact. It's almost impossible to avoid reminders that the world we once knew has come to an end. Is it any wonder so many have fallen to despair?

     I confess, I'm one of those people. I don't believe our old lives are coming back, nor do I think they should. When I was in the past I was happy, because I'd never known any other way of living, and while I knew our world was flawed, I thought that it could still be fixed. But then it fell apart, and when looking at what had come before, I was struck by how sad and lonely I really was. What kept me going in the old world was the promise that things would someday get better, what killed that world was the realization that the promise would never be kept. 

     I don't hope that things will go back to the way they used to be, and I'm deeply dismayed by all the people I see hoping that the old times will return. I understand the impulse. However horrible life was, it was familiar. You knew what to expect, and while it was difficult, if you followed the rules, you could survive. Nobody knows what will come next. We could be in for a utopia, or an even worse dystopia, and no one knows what we'll get. 

    What I do hope for is a world that exists at all. Reality isn't just made out of human thoughts and wishes, or even the wishes of those who live on earth. Reality is made out of the wants, needs, and plans of everything in the Universe, no matter how small, or far away from us, it is. Our universe isn't perfect, not even close. I don't think it was ever made to be perfect. It was made to be a universe that could be changed, a universe where, at any moment, the wants and desires of those who live in it could change it into something almost entirely different from what it started out as. 

     Everything in our Universe is acting according to its own beliefs, how it feels the world is and how it feels the world ought to be. That's what all of us are doing as well. All of us believe in a world, a world we can shape as we please, a world that will be shaped by others to be what they want as well. This is a world where everyone's voices, no matter how quietly they talk, need to be heard. 

    When I think about that, I remember that we are simply the next step in the long path the Universe has taken. We are not inevitable, but we are more able than anything that came before us to shape our world into whatever we want it to be. No matter how much people have tried, they can't make us stay silent. No matter how lost we feel, we will keep believing in a world that belongs to us. 

    When I think of that, I remember why I have hope.  

Joy

 My heart is leaping,
Blood rushes through my body,
All problems seem to disappear.

What could possibly be better
Than being good at something you love? 

One of my goals

     I don't want to become a famous writer. I want everyone to read "A Glass House". I want it to be talked about in every blog on the internet, especially the stupidly pretentious ones. I want to be known as the woman who wrote one really great poem, and that poem made her so entitled that she never managed to top it. Because I honestly don't know that I ever will. I won't pretend that creativity is magical in any way, but if somebody told me that poem had been sent to me by supernatural means, I would accept that instantly. I don't view that poem as just a poem. I view it as the message I was meant to give humanity. 

Disagreement

 A war fought with words,
Both sides fight for victory,
Both sides agree
The worst thing that could happen
Is that things remain as they are.

They both wish to live in the same house,
They don’t agree on where the walls should be placed.

Both sides may have merit,
But both sides won't win this war.

My Windowsill

 Full of Tchotchkes
Memories of who I was
And my future self

Spring

 Flowers open up
Revealing life's big secret
All begins somewhere

A Better Person

 Tomorrow I'll be a better person.
I'll love my family a little more,
I'll hate my enemies a little less.
Tomorrow I'll be a better person,
But for today I just want to be me. 

Friendship

 Friendship:
I'm friends with many people
Of all shapes and sizes.
We hang out on weekends
And talk about our lives. 

Normalcy.
Closeness
Oh, how I've missed this. 

    At the start of every new year you hear people hoping that it's going to be a great year, or at least better than the last year. I don't often hear people expressing hope that the next month will be better than the previous one. 

    As of today, May 2022 is over, and with it a month where our government saw fit to remind us in every way it could that it doesn't care about us at all. If I were normal, this would be the point where I hope our government decides to turn things around, but instead I'm just hoping that this is the month that the American people say "Okay, enough, if you won't take care of me, I'm going to live my life without your help."