Waking up is often slow, and sometimes painful…
I don’t remember the exact date; it may as well have been yesterday, because that’s what it feels like. But there was a day, somewhere in that nebulous cloud we call the Past, where waking up into the world felt different. And not all at once, but little by little. Something looked different, something sounded different, something smelled or tasted different. At some delineating point, all of these differences became a compounding factor, and the world ceased to be what it had always appeared to be and became something largely unrecognizable; something that needed re-evaluation in order to make any sense out of it at all.
Do you remember the exact date when it happened? I’m not ashamed to say that I don’t. As the days have stretched into weeks and then further into months and years, I keep remembering individual moments in time where the absurd would manifest itself into what I would call everyday reality; where the abnormal would persistently encroach upon the normal, at times going even as far as to suffocate the established sense of things that had been long accepted. These single moments, by themselves, would appear to be completely disconnected; both from one another, as well as from everything as a whole. However, as time continues its march to the Future, the connections begin to reveal themselves.
So, in my mind, there is no individual point in time when everything shifted. There is no smoking gun incident, or “Aha!” moment where the veil dropped away and everything was revealed. It appears more likely that each single instantiation acted as a tiny wrecking ball swinging aimlessly through the structures of perceived reality. Each impact would barely even register to the grand structure. But each subsequent impact would weaken a specific spot, so that when the wrecking ball came around to strike that spot again, the integrity of that part of the structure would continue to diminish. Over time, with repeated impacts, the strength of that structure is reduced to pieces mainly held together by gravity and inertia. What happens, then, when one of those forces is removed? Obviously, the pieces will start tumbling down.
I think it is important to state that I do not believe that this has happened for everyone, and definitely not in exactly the same way. Indeed, it seems that there is a vast minority(if not majority) of the human population where this has not happened; and may never happen. Whether they have never been taught to peek behind the curtain, or are completely unaware that the curtain even exists, that is a debate for another time.
Regardless of the hows and the whys, I find that it is no longer possible to deny that the curtain has definitely fallen away(if the curtain itself was ever even a physical construct). In doing so, the exposure of the machinations taking place behind the curtain became, in some amount terrifyingly, evident. This is no longer the world that was presented through formal education, if it ever was. Even today, the graduating classes of both higher and lower learning are being thrust into a reality that they have never been prepared to receive. The institutions that we have been led to believe exist to protect and serve all of us collectively have been invalidated by their own over-inflated self-importance, and the “common good” has been repeatedly sacrificed in the name of whatever buzzword sounds best. In an era where it has never been easier or more comfortable for an individual human being to exist and survive, it has conversely become increasingly difficult for a human being to be an individual.
The obvious question to the interested observer would be: how did we get here? What were the forks in the road in the road where we collectively chose the path(whether willingly or not) that led us to this place? Were these our only options, or were there other choices that were ignored in favor of what was chosen? These are, in no minor way, questions that deserve answers. And those answers themselves demand a sufficient amount of transparency in order for any sense to be made of them. The trick that people seem to often succumb to, in the course of pursuing these answers, is that these answers themselves are unknowable due to the complex systems that we have allowed to govern and direct our everyday existences. At it’s core, this notion is intellectual sleight-of-hand that allows the dominant power structure to insulate and perpetuate itself. “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! Shift your gaze to this distraction instead, and be amazed by the magic performed there! Come one, come all! Step right up!”
And, in large part, it does appear to work. I take no pleasure in saying that P.T. Barnum, if he was kicking around today, would be having a veritable field day. The clamor for snake oil appears to be at an all-time high.
These questions do need to be answered; even if we are only able to answer them for ourselves, individually. But the question that has been at the top of my mind for some time now, however, is this: where are we? And this inevitably leads to what may be the more important question: where are we going?
