The Predicament

What a predicament we find ourselves in.

The story goes that a thin veneer of electric pulses unites us all, interconnectedness they call it.

Yet, there is another force that has been within and around us for millennia.

Once, in a distant time, a distant land, information passed its way tongue to tongue.

Tête-à-tête.

Whispers in the ear under the moonlit sky, speech exchanged with attentive eyes, around a fire with all its warmth, animals conspired.

Sounds put together, strung along for an eternal ride, gave way to stories waiting to be heard.

Enchantments.

Legends were born.

Myths were started.

The eternal hero’s saga continued.

A vibrational pulse made its way through land and sea, be it on horseback or by the way of a thousand steps the message found its way.

“One last I love you.

One final goodbye.

A heartfelt salute.

Another sky that passed us by.”

An approaching figure, a shadow in the horizon, nears with withering news. From saddle to ground, the rider encroaches, “I bring in my hands, the possibility to dispel much pain or much happiness; for you to endure depends on the power within this prose.” An everlasting spell he read:

“Sweet remembrance.

Gentle approaches.

My heart this tells you,

My love for you dead,

Do not reproach me!“

Breath, air escaping arid lips, those pronouncements sacred and not meant to be wasted. Oh! How we exhaust this precious resource more valuable than gold. The enchantment of the captivating zephyr, casting away into an apparent emptiness, to be received, ingested, and cast away once again into nothingness.

From whispers to digital imprints, this energy has shaped worlds, known and unknown. The murmur of a gentle wind casting sounds into the air. In all its might, no stronger charm can be heaved, no stronger energy released. We are strung along with this wonderful jinx.

A fluttering sail is seen on the horizon, making approach to the rocky tides.

Snowy lands.

Misty trees.

What was once scandalous is now under the influence of propagandists.   What was once marvelous is now under the influence of activists.

What was once scandalous is now under the influence of propagandists.
What was once marvelous is now under the influence of activists.

Creatures await amongst shadows not seen. A wooden skiff nears the turbulent shore, a stranger disembarks, heavy hemp bag over his shoulder, looking ‘round he sees not a soul yet feels wandering eyes on him. He screams into the air:

"From an ancient land I come,

gifts in hand,

do not let me succumb!"

His shriek rattles through the smoky mist, unseen feathery creatures awake from their slumber. Wings fluttering in the wind, eyes turned to face the harrowing howl, as if his statement carried magic within, a sparkle of light emerges from above, the fog gently lifts. A voice pronounces:

“You cry is heard,

Your intentions have been seen,

Yet we cannot help thee”

A sentence is set forth, condemning a lonely sailor. These uttered noises more powerful than a thousand swords. With a final mournful breath, the sailor is no longer true. His judgment condemning him to the place in time where all is forgotten, swallowed whole into a beast so majestic the universe itself seems downtrodden.

That is the power of the force expelled through our breath.

We are magicians, molding reality, sculpting the unimaginable, exercising millions of neurons that run amok in our brains.

Letters formed, put together they became simple prose, as time passed, a new magician’s trick was born.


A magical apparatus lights up, its electrical discharges similar to a majestic and frightful animal’s brain; The Animal.

Homo-Sapiens.

The ape that knows that he knows.

The passing of the years have been endured, knowledge and wisdom conveyed with astonishing speed and superficially matured.

Augmented growth, progress made by leaps and bounds, exponentially.

Into the dark void in between the empty space of our souls. A long, fruitful journey, not without mistakes or aberrations. Not without confusion and fault.

An enchanted reader mesmerized by a mythical glow, discerning the letters to understand it’s flow. A few simple seconds to read these lines:

“News has come, to you my son,

The awaited day has come,

Once, these bars held me in place,

My years withering away,

With might and a spark of luck,

I gladly tell you,

I’m free from all this muck!”

Oh! The time has come, to endure a feeling much eluded but always sought, happiness is here but not to trust. The power behind those lines, releasing the mind from the catacombs of nightmares, finally, he was no longer stuck.

The same magical screen lights up faces, smiling and frowning, lit up by the millions, all ‘round the world, in this dimension and dimensions unknown.

What was once scandalous is now under the influence of propagandists.
What was once marvelous is now under the influence of activists.

And through inspiration of the long, lost muse, another cast spell to enthrall us all, a power so strong even the gods felt its pull.

Soon, realization comes to me, I am writing out into oblivion, casting out sounds for what they were meant to be: eternal spells.

We are in the grips of an eternally subconscious incantation: the spell of Words.

Words.

So it ends, or it begins, of that journey only the readers eyes can discern, an eternal struggle to set forth intention and thought, that, my dear friends, is the predicament we find ourselves in.

Exploration

There is no exploration more important and transcendental than that of our own mind, our own being.

To overcome mental barriers and the cognitive dissonance of which we suffer at the time we are presented with evidence that goes against our dogmas, beliefs, or conceptions of ourselves. Ideas which we believed were indisputable, infallible, and were planted in our subconscious from the moment of birth, perhaps from the moment of conception. Within homo sapiens this is very natural, we are an animal species with very complex social structures and we depend on these structures to realize ourselves as people.

The historian and author, Yuval Noah Harari expresses in his book, "Sapiens: from animals to gods", that this kind of indoctrination takes place for years, something very specific to homo sapiens, unlike other species. Humans at birth require a constant and special kind of attention different from a kitten that few weeks after birth can forage for food or a foal that can trot shortly after birth. This human peculiarity, among many others, has contributed significantly to our extraordinary social abilities as well as to social problems, something very unique among species. Raising children requires constant help. A single mother would not find it easy to find food and support her children at the same time, ideally, collaboration from family or community members is preferred. This has greatly favored our ability to form strong social ties.

Apart from this, homo sapiens are born with an underdeveloped brain that lends itself easily to being molded, educated, or manipulated to certain "specifications".

Our brain at birth is like glass that has been melted in an oven, easy to handle and mold very freely. This is why it is easy to educate children from youth to be Christians or Buddhists, socialists or capitalists, to love war or peace.

However, once we reach adult life there is also a great capacity for education and learning. It will not be easy but dogmas to which we were subjected from an early age can be changed, in many cases a cognitive dissonance can occur, which can cause much mayhem within our senses and being. There are certain thoughts that over time, and with the discovery of new evidence, can begin to produce contradictions within our brain. Leaving those thoughts can be difficult for us, there is a certain comfort in them and the dissonance is so great that we decide to ignore the subconscious. During the first years of life, the brain is in a process of neurogenesis, it is being formed and this process continues until adulthood, where the process of neurogenesis is already at almost undetectable levels. Environmental factors such as physical exercise, stress, and the consumption of antidepressants, have also shown significant effects on neurogenesis. All this influencing our way of thinking, neurons connected and assimilated into our lives.

This exploration of our cognitive reality may seem without measure or effect, without purpose, but in itself, it is an exploration of why we become who we are. The independent individual that we often think we are is usually no more than a small and delicate illusion, fragile as the first layer of ice on a lake in early winter. Our reality is made for us, we have a mental filter in place since we were born, which has its practical use during our first years, but, at the same time, it can create barriers.

It is of utmost importance to be free and independent of thought enough to be able to analyze these contradictions that can occur in our way of thinking or seeing the world. Deepening our thoughts, analyzing our mental processes, and appreciating the fact that many of our untouchable doctrines are malleable, they can be changed. We are questioning what was established for us, all the schemes and ways of thinking. It is not forgetting what has been learned, but extending our knowledge and expanding our culture with new and renewed presences.

Introducing new ideas with greater significance and importance for our lives can be the difference between full freedom of thought or remaining with a cast placed on our thinking.

IMG_4808.jpeg

Our brain at birth is like glass that has been melted in an oven, easy to handle and mold very freely.

Life Recycled

We are explorers,

Never-ending energy that drifts into eternity.

The very dust that we are made of will one day conform into another state of being

We are seeds in an infinite loop of blossoming,

An unending expansion and contraction of the universe,

One big bang after the other.

We are sailors

Casting away into space dust

Waves of particles carry our vibrance trough smooth, dark fields of apparent emptiness

We are tadpoles in an infinite loop of hatching,

the lungs of the universe in an eternal inhale, exhale, that breaths life into itself,

like a puff a warm air that escapes gasping lips on a cold winter’s night

We are life renewed

We are life reimagined.

Dilapidated mansion in the hilltops above Medellin, Colombia.

Dilapidated mansion in the hilltops above Medellin, Colombia.

Lenses

Adapting is always a pain.

Viewing the world through different lenses seems to be a constant change. I used to wear eyeglasses, every year or two my prescription changed.

My sight it required to keep viewing the world through my tiny window pane.
Thats the world we love in today.
Or has it always been that way?

Constant tectonic shifts in our perception. Reality flows as surely as subatomic particles passing through the void.

One filter over our eyes can keep leading us into self-deception.
Don’t let it eternally obscure your vision.

Every now and then, a new filter must go in. New lenses must replace old, weathered ones not worthy of what we envision.

Old understandings cloak the clearness of a new reality, shake it off like a dog removing water off his fur and we may just reach a new level of permeation.

My sight it required to keep viewing the world through my tiny window pane.

My sight it required to keep viewing the world through my tiny window pane.

Exist

Much like any other human that has ever lived, I don’t have a definitive answer to what happens after our last breath. Maybe an answer will elude us until the very end of our existence in this universe. Where we go, if we go anywhere at all, is the deepest mystery of them all. Introspection on death has caused suffering and existential angst. It has served as fuel for innovation on every aspect of human life. An everlasting quest to never forget and never be forgotten. Medicine prolongs our life, technology improves our life, philosophy tries to explain it and religion tries to justify it.

The relentless wave of existence washes over us daily, distractions, such as modern day consumerism, often serve a role in bandaging these feelings yet the itch that is embedded in our soul cannot be scratched so superficially. In the words of a great writer and journalist, Johann Hari;

“...Its not so much the consumer behavior itself, its what the consumer behavior diverts you from; we all know at some level none of us are going to lie on our deathbed and think about all the shoes we bought, we are gonna think about moments of love and meaning and connection in our lives...”

IMG_7154.jpeg
The relentless wave of existence washes over us daily...

The AI

Humans evolve technologically to create an artificial intelligence, a super computer that is conscious of its own existence, that eventually takes a human form.

Humans become virtually useless, the 'ai' replicates itself with consistent, better versions of itself, its advancements duplicating exponentially each time. Soon enough, identifying humans from 'ai' is impossible. This artificial intelligence then destroys the world along with most of the "natural" humans and creates life in another world or here on a different landscape, earth.

Maybe its a never ending cycle, a circle of life if you will.

Maybe we were created by such a force which we call god

IMG_2117.jpeg

Join Me

With each step

And every breath.

To battle the overflowing tide in the sea of life,

Diving headfirst into the mist,

Aimlessly making sense of what we see.

Carve and plow

Slice and dice.

I insist to you

through stuttering breaths, incapacitated words

Whispers barely heard

Sentences ill formed

I insist to you

Read the stolen glances,

those subtle touches

Not the broken romances

Time is coming

A wave of darkness beckons

It’s fires burn like a Nebulas Humming

The path grows thinner, darker,

That fire raging with undying cunning

To reach out is to go out in eternal ardor

This, our only chance

Do not fear,

As Stars collapse,

Their ancient energy explodes into something so much brighter.

IMG_2323.jpeg