Image: "Actual situation, Truth", WrittenChinese.com
I seem to have dried up. I have nothing to say (for now). Usually there is no shortage of events, mostly global in nature and occasionally local to myself, which jump out from the background of meaninglesss chatter that we refer to as 'news' and on which I have been drawn to comment in the past. Frequently and regularly. Over the past months and years I have found a voice for my thoughts on media like where you are reading this now. I still see those things. They are still important. They still need to be aired and discussed. There are still errors of judgement being made in high places, by people who are often unworthy of the trust that has been placed in them by others, or who have manipulated themselves into such positions by some unfair means. Decisions that affect the lives of so many people. Decisions being made so arbitrarily or even purposefully for selfish or nefarious reasons without regard to suffering they may cause or general harm they may do at every touch-point they make within the wider world.
But none of that, none of those things, seem to matter any more.
I have watched the world, the world of man that is, in its setting within the broader sphere of life in which it exists, for many years. You might even say for a lifetime. I have seen how things change over time. I have witnessed a progression of events unfold. While some may have done the same thing and perhaps describe what they have viewed as 'the ascent of man' or 'man's technological progression from stone age to the age of high technology', some of the words I would use to describe that progress might be 'deterioration', 'complexity', 'lost meaning', 'brinkmanship', 'greed', 'road to nowhere', 'suppression of individuality' and 'elevation of ego', among a great many others.
This year, the world of mankind seems to have completely lost its way. We appear to be at a confluence point for various streams of influence - good, bad, or downright evil - all converging at roughly the same time into what is becoming a maelstrom of... of what? Unstoppable, inexhaustible, all pervading problems, mostly of our own making, that we may be incapable of preventing from depositing us into whatever it is that awaits us in its furious paroxism through which we must endure like so much flotsam and jetsam before the gods of chance non-selectively eject some of us from the grinding, convoluted mess into the quieter eddies of downstream rivulets of a life of struggle towards some renewed hope, along with the equally non-selective and impartial rejection of the rest of us to some other less desirable fate?
Using another metaphor, all the wheels are in motion, driving the machinery of our future. We, while many have not yet grasped the truth of this, are utterly helpless to prevent or steer to best advantage where that machinery will take us. We are still grappling with one issue that has majorly disrupted the lives of many of us, having forgotten all the previous dilemmas which confronted us earlier in the year or during recent years. Nor have we given, in our general expectation that it is just a matter of time before we are back on track towards 'normalcy', any consideration to all the other problems that are increasingly impinging on our capability to maintain any form of 'normal'. We are blinded by our own expectations.
Those expectations will prevent us from taking what right now is the greatest opportunity we will ever have to adjust as best we might the view we have of our position in the world and adapting the lives we now live to more successfully live within that world. Not that that would prevent the calamitous events now in progress or on the horizon. We can't escape any of that now. It's all a bit too late for that. The world we see, as the second half of 2020 unfolds and rolls on to the next year in line, will never resemble the world we knew up to the beginning of this year.
Nothing, or nothing much, will ever be the same again. That means big changes are about to occur. Disruptive changes. A tearing down of institutions, both solid and intellectual, will begin to occur. As an example, only the foolish or indifferent would board an aircraft again, or 'take a cruise' on an ocean liner. Here are a few other things that only the foolish or indifferent might do:
- Join a crowd for sports, cinema/theatre, political rally or protest
- Enlist in the military/police
- Become a politician or be employed in other meaningless roles
- Buy a house/car/truck/boat/aircraft
- Be further away from your place of shelter than you can walk in a single day
- Not have adequate food/water supplies on hand for at least a few days
- Get sick or undertake tasks that carry a health risk
- Be confined to a penal institution
- ...
- ...
- ...
So, for those and other reasons, I have dried up. I have nothing to say (for now). I am not someone who will participate in toppling statues, painting protest signs, or burning police stations. Those things I have covered in 'other meaningless roles' or 'join a crowd'. The people who engage in such, while very necessary to aid in speedily bringing an end to the current diabolical system, mostly I think are missing the point by focusing on what will in any case pass away in time. The totally corrupt system we have now cannot possibly last. Greater forces are coming into play, and will prevail over any of the flimsy structures, physical or seminal, that we have built in our headlong pursuit of progress. I do not need to concern myself with those things. My eye is on what may follow, should I be so fortunate as to be able to witness it.
Author
Bernard ("Bernie") Edwards blogs at NotSomethingElse and lives "as simply as I can, working towards having as few dependencies on the industrial system as possible" in Australia.
Bravo! We highly recommend Bernie's blog. ~ Ed.
