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Life is the strangest damn thing.
It’s so mind-boggling that anything exists at all, right? And on top of that, somehow we are all the main characters of our own story. This means we have the opportunity to make the most of it, make it beautiful, and make it happen together.
I’m convinced the future belongs to those who feel the most alive.
But how?
There’s a perceived emptiness with an uncomfortable amount of people in our culture today.
So many seem to lack enthusiasm for life. They seem disconnected and in need of fulfillment in their day-to-day lives. You don’t want to fall into this trap of lacking personal agency and shrugging individual responsibility.
There’s an infinite number of reasons one can become empty in this way, but it only takes one counter reason to bounce back.
The bounce back takes you way further anyway.
I want to illuminate the path for these people and flip on their light.
I want to shake them into seeing that their life is being drenched in possibilities and opportunities. It drives me crazy to see life go to waste when so much can be done about it. Apathy and complacency are evil tricksters that make matters worse. They create a self-fulfilling prophecy.
And as much as I want to help others in this way, it’s critical to keep an eye on my own situation and measure my degree of fulfillment versus emptiness.
Awareness can catch the issue before things go off the rails.
We just need encouragement - that’s all.
Sincere reminders that we are actively authoring the story of our lives.
And anytime someone starts to play the blame game and engage in disempowering thoughts, steer them back into the truth, the truth that they hold the power. Power of mind. Power of belief. Power of choice. Power of attitude.
These can be intact and not unconsciously diluted and diminished.
We need the bravery to tell people “Get it together!” When they need it and the ears to hear it when it’s said to us too.
To the wise ones, the imagination is more than a silly painting-like canvas off to the side of our mind that helps with ideas.
No, to the wise ones, it’s a gateway to the vast realm of the unconscious mind. And you might ask, what’s so important about the unconscious mind? The unconscious mind is where everything is recorded. All sensation, all memory, all thought, all emotion, all experience, and so much more is stored there. Engaging with it is vital because if you don’t, it will 100% spill over into your conscious life.
Carl Jung, the mystic psychiatrist who put the unconscious on the map, said: “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will rule your life and you will call it Fate.”
That ought to have you shaking in your tube socks.
Luckily, the imagination offers us the opportunity to dialogue with the unconscious proactively. It gives us the chance to work things out on the front end before it becomes a big issue later.
Since the unconscious has a major influence over our perceptions and behaviors, it’s important to properly value the imagination and it’s podium seat in our toolkit of sense-making.
The imagination is one of the greatest aspects of being a human. It’s where we can explore ideas freely, visualize scenarios that don’t exist yet, and create possibilities beyond the known world. It’s why people like Albert Einstein said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."
This is just scratching the surface of what’s possible in the imagination.
The imagination is the user interface for the unconscious. (Dreams work similarly but aren’t accessible under conscious control.)
All that shows up in the imagination has to come from somewhere, right? It can’t just arise from thin air. It comes from the unconscious.
And once you start to pay close attention to this fact, you start to unlock deeper insights about yourself and the hidden aspects of your psyche. The imagination allows the unconscious the speak in a language made of symbols, metaphors, and imagery.
And through it, we can make use of the rich resources that lie within our unconscious mind and utilize its wisdom & creative potential.
Culture plays a crucial role in shaping and influencing the trajectory of our collective development as a society & species.
Similar to the imagination/unconscious relationship, culture acts as an epigenetic user interface for our collective evolution. Culture encompasses the shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that define our society. All of which have the power to modify & influence our genetic expression.
Without letting up, it impacts how we perceive the world, interact with one another, and transmit knowledge from one generation to the next.
Culture determines the possibilities and constraints within which we as individuals operate and guides our choices and actions.
Through our cultural practices, rituals, and traditions, knowledge and wisdom are transmitted across generations, shaping the collective memory and identity of our society. And just as a user interface can determine the ease of use, accessibility, and functionalities of a system, our culture influences the opportunities, challenges, and pathways available for our collective progress and development.
Thinking of culture as an epigenetic user interface, allows us to acknowledge its profound influence and highlight the dynamic relationship between culture and human development.
Of course, it’s beyond anyone’s direct control, but it helps to keep it mind when you feel the ripples and waves of change.
On the bright side, the power of the imagination lets us take full advantage of our individual situation.
The more people do that, the more spirit and soulfulness we can bring into the world. And the more people there are wide awake with hearts on fire, the more wholesome our culture’s approach becomes. This alters our collective family tree for the better.
And sure, you may think it’ll never work. And that could be true.
But the world works in mysterious ways and we’ll never know unless give it a whirl.
