We Are Trailblazers

I was doing research for another article I want to write to post here, and I fell down a rabbit hole and it won’t be ready for a while. In the mean time I was reminded that what we call a “Normal Life” right now is something that has never existed before.

Human beings instantly being able to talk to each other, anywhere on the planet? Sharing ideas, supporting each other, flinging insults… the whole thing! This has never been done before. There is no way to know if we are doing it right or wrong. I don’t think you CAN do it right or wrong, and then I remember the insults thing. Yeah there is a lot we can do better.

I just wanted to take the time to just remind myself and anyone who reads this, that we are in uncharted territory. The results of what we do now will have lots of unintended consequences. This isn’t to scare myself or anyone else into stagnation, no it is to validate the gravity of that fact. To cut myself a little slack when I feel daunted getting up in the morning and not knowing if I as a person am up to navigating the ENTIRE UNIVERSE AT MY INSTANT FINGERTIPS. It is daunting and the reality is that what I do in that shared digital space has consequences that unlike the physical reality, they do not decay with time.

Our brains and instincts are set up to help us navigate a mammalian animal life. That life exists in a physical realm where change is unavoidable and absolutely necessary, stagnation is death and decay, (which is also change). We cannot escape it, but there is a comfort in that also. We can accept our note in the song our place in the cycle of things.

As we trailblaze into this new universe we created for ourselves, everything we do is visible and stays. It is a strange new relationship with responsibility, a call to be more genuine. A gentle reminder that what we create ends up having a life of its own outside any expectations of what it would be. This will be good and bad, but mostly it will just be.

So it’s ok to be daunted by the enormity of the face of everything at once, and we are all doing it the best we can. None of us have ever done it before, we can’t look to history to see what its impacts will be. We have to watch them unfold even though we won’t have perspective to see the real patterns. We are in the thick of it right now, way too close to what’s happening to see anything at all.

So I choose, every day to try to be clearer and kind. If I’m going to send ripples out into this new universe, I don’t want them to be ones that I’m ashamed of. I want to create places I want to come back and visit. When I remember this time of my life (Its the internet none of this is going anywhere). I may look back and think I was pretentious and naive, but hopefully also kind. That’s the trail I want to blaze.

We Get the Golden Rule Wrong

“Do unto others as you would have them do onto you.”

That was the golden rule as it was taught to me. I thought it was the real definitive way to know how to treat other people. I would literally treat other people the way I wanted them to treat me, basically teach them how to treat me by treating them the same way.

There is just one problem with that. Other people aren’t me. They are their own whole other person, with thoughts, needs, feelings, history, culture and the list goes on and on. How I want to be treated has no bearing on how other people want to be treated. By living the golden rule literally, I mostly became annoying.

Really the take away from how we treat other people is how we think it is acceptable to act. What I mean when I say that is if you are a disher of harsh criticism, it sets the scene for others to think that harsh criticism is how you interact with the world so criticizing you harshly is acceptable. This may or may not be the criticizer’s preference, but now it is out there anyway.

So instead of the simplistic golden rule, I think of it this way: Treat others the way THEY want to be treated, AND behave the way I want others to behave around me. I like being treated with respect. I know that every person feels respected in different ways. I try to follow their lead and listen when they tell me I’m off.

No

I trap myself in impossible situations. Stupidly complex.

From my point of view. 

I know it’s myopic.

From the outside it’s easy, it’s simple.

Just get up.

Just say hello.

Just send it. 

Just make it. 

Just do it. 

Just smile. 

I don’t expect anyone to understand. I may have barriers. 

Invisible like a mime. Self imposed pretentious. Superfluous.

Just get up. 

Just try.

Just walk away.

Just ask for help.

And when I listen, I really try

when even I can’t explain.

Tell me how to help.

Do what I say.

***Crickets***

I retreat. The cure is worse than the disease.

Explaining myself, justifying my space.

Why are you hurting?

Why can’t you just stop.

Why?

Just stop it.

Stop.

Retreat. Back to my cave with the echos and voices.

Angry ghosts repeat their shadow lessons.

Worthless

Hopeless

Helpless

Forgotten

Invisible

Insubstantial

Nothing

Nothing

No

If I make it until morning. I feel the scraping pain of armor construction.

Of building the prison I keep myself in.

I limit my pain to me. 

I don’t want your pity.

I will drown in your worry.

I refuse to do your emotional labor.

If I decide to say no to the sun. 

That’s my choice.

If this is my path I will not force you or even ask you to be my witness.

I’ll wait.

My prison, my armor, my pain, they are not your responsibility. 

Fuck you and your interest. 

Fuck all interest without investment. 

When I stop building, fixing, maintaining

If/when it all falls apart. 

I will have do one to blame but myself.

Don’t worry. 

You’re in the clear.

Thought Experiments: Schrodinger’s Cat

If you are unfamiliar with this famous thought experiment the short version is, there is a box with a cat inside, also in the box there is a radioactive substance that has a 50/50 chance of decaying in the next hour killing the cat. In an hour’s time before the box is opened and the result can be determined the cat exists in both an alive state and also a dead state simultaneously. Before I did my research for this article, I thought that this was being used to explain quantum mechanics of possibility states, the way it is used colloquially, as in something will exist in multiple states of being until observed.

The details of it were much more interesting so I leave this here. In essence Schrodinger was using a deliberately absurd example to show how quantum physics didn’t directly translate to how we observe and interact with our everyday environment. He was basically poking fun at another scientist with Einstein.

What I find fascinating and useful (why I wanted to write about it in the first place) was how it can be a metaphor for worry or dealing with the unknown in general. I will mash up that idea of the unknown existing in all it’s possibilities until informed of the results. Our thoughts exist in a state closer to quantum particles than physical objects. This does not mean I think thoughts ARE quantum particles, though.

My first example of this kind of extrapolation is Schrodinger’s Stars. If you know very much about astronomy then you probably know two things, one the universe is very big, and two the speed of light is constant, it never changes. Knowing both of those things, when you look up at the stars from Earth, they are very, very far away, hundreds or thousands of light years away. That means you are not seeing the stars as they are at this moment, you are seeing how they were when the light was produced, hundreds or thousands of years ago. You are looking at a history of the universe that is just reaching us now. That star you are seeing may have gone out since then, it may not even exist anymore. So I say they are Schrodinger’s Stars visible now so effectively still there and shining while also existing in their current state that is yet unobservable to us. Both are real but only one is known to us so we default to that.

The same can apply to anything unknown, test results of any kind, phone calls while your battery is dead, other people’s feelings if you don’t get a chance to talk to them. I also think about secrets and lies this way sometimes. There is the reality of the situation then there is the information you have access to. You are affected by what you can observe and if you are denied relevant information your reality about a situation will not match the evidence of the situation. I think of situations where I suspect I have been lied to or that there is more to a story than I know, in Schrodinger terms. I mean, I accept the evidence I have but also hold in possibility the reality that something else might actually be happening. Schrodinger’s Affair for example. You can’t always prove if someone is lying to you but you can leave room for a truth you can’t prove. Your reality becomes the supposition of the possibilities.