Maybe we should stop playing God?

Have you ever watched a 2003 TV serial called “The Second Coming”? Well, I haven’t but there is great little speech in there from Christopher Ecclestone’s character. This speech was sampled by Orbital for their track, You Lot, and that’s where I heard it first:

“You…are becoming Gods. There’s a new master of creation, and it’s you. You’ve unravelled DNA. You’re five years away from building your own people and at the same time, you’re cultivating bacteria strong enough to kill every living thing! Do you think you’re ready for that much power? You lot? YOU lot? You cheeky bastards! You’re running around science like kids with guns, creating a new world while the world you’ve got is stinking. Go on…hands up…hands up anyone who thinks you’ve got it right. Yeah…there’s always one – I can see you. If you want the position of God then take the responsibility.”

…

“You stupid, stupid people! I’ve seen what you’ve done! It’s finally happened. Heaven is empty…and hell is bursting at the seams!”

[Note: I’ve omitted the middle section of the speech as it doesn’t really have much bearing on what I’m going to be talking about. This isn’t me using selective quoting to erase part of what was said. You can listen to the full speech HERE]

First of all, I’m an Atheist and a believer in science rather than religion. Even so, what is been said here in the above speech is thought-provoking no matter what you believe in.

Whether you believe that God created the universe or that it was formed from The Big Bang, we should all be able to see that mankind has been making itself into the next Creator. We slice atoms apart and discover the secret building blocks of life. We clone living creatures in labs. We cure all kinds of terminal diseases and prolong life where perhaps life should have been lost.

You may look upon these feats of the human race in either a positive or a negative light. But there’s no denying that we’ve done some pretty bad shit too.

Using all of our knowledge and resources to find new ways to either kill each other more effectively or increase material gain…rather than improving our planet. Playing about with deadly bacteria and viruses in labs, cultivating nasty shit that could be freed (whether accidentally or purposely) at any moment to lay waste to our race. Working on making ourselves obsolete by programming increasingly automonous AI. Turning the people against one another through the power of the media in order to generate ad revenue and push selfish agendas that only benefit specific groups of humans.

I suppose much of it started off with noble intentions: seeking to understand the world around us and how it works so that we might gain knowledge and an understanding. So that we might chase worthy causes such as saving lives or understanding the knock-on effects of our various actions.

But knowledge is power and – as Uncle Ben famously reminded Peter Parker – with great power, must come great responsibility.

Unfortunately, there are a great many of us on this planet who aren’t interested in taking any damn responsibility – at all. Do you think that those who commissioned the Manhattan Project thought ahead and tried to envision how a world stocked with nuclear weapons would look? Do you think any of those people are interested in taking responsibility for the way we live now with atomic energy being wielded so freely? Granted, if the Americans hadn’t created the atomic bomb first then somebody else would have. The Nazi’s were apparently close to a break-through if I’ve read correctly. American, German, British, Asian…it doesn’t matter. What matters is that somebody did it or somebody would have done it at some point.

Knowledge was pursued and knowledge was gained. Power was gained and a Pandora’s Box was opened, never to be re-sealed again. And so we discovered a new way to kill each other en masse.

To reference that speech again, perhaps we are cheeky bastards. We’ve got access to a near-complete toolbox that allows us to forget about how or why we were created, and just become creators ourselves. We think we know what we’re doing. We think it’s a great idea to do X and see what happens to Y. Fuck knows what is happening in top-secret labs the world over. I think I’d rather not know as it might be the sort of stuff that could keep you awake at night.

We’ve gotten a bit cocky and sure of ourselves, haven’t we?

The truth is, there’s so much that we still DON’T understand and so perhaps it isn’t such a fantastic idea to be experimenting with the building blocks of life. Even more importantly, the planet around us really does stink in many ways and I can’t help but wonder whether it would wiser to fix existing problems rather than creating new ones.

Now some of you might be wondering if I’m saying that we should just halt all advances in science and research. That’s not what I’m saying. As a race, we do need to move forwards and continuously improve. The alternative is to slob out and become slaves to mindless entertainment and convenience – as if we’ve done enough and should just call it a day. Right now, there is research underway that will save lives for example. Long may it continue.

But…

“if you want the position of God then take the responsibility.”

And this is our problem because we can’t even take responsibility for our everyday mundane lives, let alone major events that will impact the billions of people living on Earth. Young men unwittingly father children and won’t take responsibility for being too lazy or too selfish to have used a condom. People would rather take companies and other people to court rather than take responsibility for something that was REALLY their fault. A mistake is made in a workplace and everybody says, “wasn’t me.”

So how can we expect a scientist to take responsibility for developing an unstoppable flesh-eating bacteria? How can the billionaires and world leaders be trusted to put the latest break-throughs in technology to use rather than utilising it for financial profit or as a symbol of power? How can we, as a race, be trusted with the keys of creation?

We play at being God and think we know it all but we don’t. I just hope that we don’t find this out the hard way. Not that we’d likely learn from such a mistake anyway.

Soil of the Soul

A few weeks ago, I was trawling the internet and reading various blogs and website articles on the subject of personal direction. Something that has been gnawing at me for some time now is my lack of direction in life and every so often, I find myself trying to seek the answers or at least some pointers to how I can get my arse fired up and motivated to do something more fulfilling than the dreadful 9-5 (or – in my case – 7-5) grind as a servant of The System.

It was while seeking enlightenment (spoiler alert: I’m still me, for better or for worse) that I came across an analogy that did at least strike a bit of a chord with me. This analogy compared the human soul to fertile soil and reminded the reader that we could all plant seeds in our soil, nurture said seeds and watch them grow into mighty trees. The main problem for a lot of us is that the soil has been tainted and the seeds left unwatered and unfertilised thanks to invading external forces that have seen fit to turn our plot of soil into a rubbish dump.

I quite liked this analogy and thought about it some more. I saw my own patch of fertile soil enclosed within a field. Seeds labelled “Direction”, “Passion”, “Happiness” and “Purpose” were planted but I didn’t get chance to water or feed them. Y’see, the field has a gate and just as I was skipping toward my patch of sown soil – watering can in my hand – there came a loud crunching noise. It was the sound of a dump truck reversing right through the gate! The bastards! Before I could verbally assault the driver of the truck with a multitude of PG-18-rated words, he tipped the bed and unloaded his cargo of garbage all over my patch. I was too aghast to act but I caught the registration of the truck as it sped away, leaving a cloud of diesel fumes behind. It was a private plate that read “LIFE”.

rubbish-dump-1

We all plant seeds in the soil of our soul. Some seeds take longer than others to germinate, break the surface and bear fruit but we do plant them subconsciously, most often as children when we aren’t even aware that we’re doing it.

Or so I have been reading anyway.

You have to take any advice or points of view that you read on the internet with a pinch of salt of course; especially when it comes to the optimum way to live your life and be happy/successful. Everybody has their own philosopy or tried-and-tested ‘secret’ that worked for them but we are all different and what works for Bob won’t necessarily work for Dave. I personally believe that it is perhaps better to listen to different ideas and solutions then draw your own conclusions based on everything you have read.

However, one recurring self-help tactic that is supposed to help the individual work out what they want to do with their life, is to go back to the past and reconnect with your inner child. You know, that previous version of you that enjoyed doing certain things or making use of talents/skills without realising that they might take you somewhere. Before the fly-tipping began and you turned an unwitting blind eye to the dumping of truckloads of garbage on your precious – now poisoned – patch of soil.

Before the superficiality, materialism and greed of society poisoned our minds.

Before you graduated childhood and were inducted properly into The System, encouraged to accept a status quo and pour all of your energy into unfulfilling jobs in order to service unavoidable debt and keep a roof above your head.

Before you were trapped in that 9-5 cycle with those wonderful dreams shelved as you play the part of just another cog in the machine – a machine that works for the rich and powerful and runs on the blood of the working class.

Shit got a bit dark and gloomy there but it really is how our human society functions. Breaking out of this cage and finding a way to live happily – without being sucked dry by others who don’t have your interests at heart – is the ultimate quest in my mind. It’s not an easy quest by any means and there are a lot of boxes to be checked as you are pushing forwards but is there a more rewarding journey to embark upon?

I’ve been trying to reconnect with my inner child and cast my mind back to past. What I remembered was that I was crazy about drawing, writing and being creative in general. I would spend hours doing this sort of thing, improving my skills and simply enjoying what I was doing without feeling the pressure to turn it into a career or money. Somewhere along the way, I ran out of steam and stopped. Society, people and working a physically-demanding job left me tired and more likely to turn to mindless entertainment in my spare time rather than enjoying the arts and continuing to improve my crafts.

One of the last things I drew was this picture of the character, Blaze Fielding, from the videogame, Streets of Rage 2. That was in 2015 (according to the date on the back). I’m not proclaiming myself to be a good artist or anything like that but comparing this picture to what I was doing a few years prior shows dramatic improvement. It’s also a stark reminder of where I could be at today had I kept at it. As it is, the cubby-hole in my desk is a stack of outdated portfolios and half-finished pictures living in plastic wallets, awaiting completion.

I’m not going to blame society or other people for my lack of work. After all, it was me who allowed this to happen and it was me who chose to numb my tired brain with the likes of videogames and Youtube and lock my creativity away in a cupboard. That said, external influences and the necessities that come with living in the way that society expects you to live have had a part to play. Of course, it is my responsibility to push back and not allow external factors to affect me.

It is my responsibility to fit a stronger lock to the gate that the dump truck forced open before tipping its load all over my patch of soil (no dirty innuendos intended…). Heck, I should be investing in 24/7 security and watchtowers.

But what is done is done and now the clean-up must begin. It’s past time that I hired a skip and put in the work to clear out all of the dumped rubbish that hides that soil and the seeds that are buried deep, awaiting their oppurtunity to sprout.

And with that, I will spare you any more long-winded analogies.

Book Talk: The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A F*ck (Mark Manson, 2016)

tsa-1 I’m somebody who isn’t really that happy with their life and so – this admission out of the way – I’ve read a lot of self-help material and watched countless motivation and self-improvement videos on Youtube. Thing is, a good chunk of this stuff is, as it turns out, complete bullshit that doesn’t sink in at all. Even worse, a lot of it could be detrimental to our quests to improve. All of this advice that instructs you to be forcibly positive and happy 24/7 for example…it’s actually the opposite of what you should be doing.

Well, according to Mark Manson, author of The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A Fuck that is. Avoiding the negativity in your life and plastering over it with forced affirmations and fake-it-until-you-make-it positivity is no good. Refusing to acknowledge problems means that you will never solve them and if you furiously focus on positives then all you are really doing is reinforcing the existence of the negatives. This is just a taste of the kind of insight this book offers.

In reality, Mark Manson’s advice is all stuff that we should already be aware of but we seem to have lost our way. Taking personal responsibility for everything in your life, the importance of being able to say “no” and how to decript the (potentially shitty) values that you are living by are just some of the over-arching themes that make up this book of real talk. It’s eye-opening stuff that seems so obvious and simple yet our consumer-driven culture obsessed with the ego, financial wealth and materialism has warped our sense of reality over time.

I’m not saying “buy this book and your life will be fixed” but all I CAN say is that this is the first self-improvement book that I burned through at a great pace then read again immediately. And you know what? I think I might even read it a third time. There are many lessons and pointers that you can take from the book and implement in your own life straight away but The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A Fuck has resonated with me so much that I feel like ramming it into my mind.

I’ve learned that I probably complain too much and that I also blame others and past events for my problems. I’ve learned that I need to take personal responsibility for 100% of my life. I’ve taken away new ways of thinking and looking at life.

As I said, all seemingly obvious stuff but until reading this book, I wasn’t fully aware of how much I was doing wrong in life. I’m not here to make such cliched statements as “It changed my life” but I do feel as if I have been given a kick up the arse and a bit of a jump-start. I cannot say the same for 99% of other books or videos that I have tried.

The book is very easy to read too as it comes across as more casual and direct-talking versus other alternatives which can sometimes be a bit too stuffy and loaded with psychology-speak. I would even go as far as to say that it is an enjoyable read in general regardless of whether or not you are looking to get anything out of the experience. If you are like me though and want to improve yourself and figure out where you might be going wrong then I would heartily recommend putting the other stuff on hold and giving The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A Fuck a shot.

Take Some Responsibility

Taking personal responsibility: it’s a normal act that appears to have become a black art; a taboo even. We live in a toxic blame culture where everything is always somebody else’s fault and some people believe it is acceptable to sue a coffee vendor because they weren’t warned that their beverage would be…y’know, hot. Insert a Captain Picard facepalm meme here if you feel like it because it certainly fits.

It’s about time that we – as a society – learnt to hold our hands up, admit when we fucked something up and take some responsibility. Take responsibility for the state of your life. Take responsibility for your feelings. Take responsibility for your errors. Take responsibility for that sprog you brought into the world after choosing to play a game of Hide The Penis.

At this point, some of you may be dying to ask, “but why should I take responsibility for shit that wasn’t my fault?”. Recently I have been reading Mark Manson’s excellent book, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck, and he makes some fantastic points about taking responsibility. What leapt out at me the most was learning to differentiate between “Responsibility” and “Fault” and realising that you must still take responsibility in some way even if a negative or unplanned event wasn’t your fault.

Events beyond your control may have caused set-backs, pain or heartache in your life but you are still ultimately responsible for responding and processing the resulting feelings while pushing on with your life. Somebody may have wronged you in some way but even if was their fault, you are responsible for how you let it affect your life going forward and whether or not you decide to dwell on negativity and anger. For a more obvious example, it may be the fault of Durex that a rubber was faulty and you accidentally became a father but you better believe that you were responsible the moment you decided to explore the interior of your lady-friend’s knickers.

That last example concerns a pretty big life-changing event and I used it because it’s actually the smaller, seemingly less significant events that people have greater trouble accepting responsibility for. The problem is that blaming somebody/something else is simply the easy way out and it feels good to absolve ourselves of fault…for a short time at least. Blaming others is a quick and easy high but one of the keys to long-term life satisfaction is learning to take responsibility for feelings, situations and events even if somebody or something else was originally at fault. Remember: you must separate “Responsibility” and “Fault”.

And as much as I may be coming across as preachy as fuck here, I’ve been just as guilty as everybody else when it comes to hurling the blame around and running from responsibility. That’s why I have been taking the advice from Mark Manson’s book onboard and trying harder to take greater responsibility for my life. For example, if somebody pisses me off then I have been accepting that it’s my responsibility not to allow that person/event to keep me down and make me feel like shit for any longer than necessary.

It’s my responsibility to go out and find more money rather than moaning about not having enough to do activity X or afford product Y. It’s my responsibility to learn from mistakes and not repeat them. It’s my responsibility to stop eating junk food and chain-drinking energy drinks if I know I’m going to feel like death later on. If I want greater success with women and dating then it’s my responsibility to up my game. I can decide to NOT do any of these things but then I don’t have the right to moan about the consequences down the line. The only person I will be accountable to is myself and no matter what bravado and bullshit I decide to project, I will KNOW the real deal and that’s what counts.

Sure, there have been external factors at work throughout my life thus far that have set me back or contributed to things not turning out the way I would have preferred (I could write a list of the damn things) but that’s where I need to separate the Fault from the responsibility to myself. Of course, there are also those times when a poor decision, mistake or collossal fuck-up HAS been my fault but the end result is the same regardless of whether the bad shit is internal or external in origin. It’s my life and I have to take responsibility.

It is difficult, I will grant that. We have been raised in a blame culture where protecting one’s ego and image trumps admitting to your shortcomings and taking responsibility for doing better next time or making amends where necessary. Switch on the TV and you will see politicians and people in authority blaming others for shit that has gone wrong. Look around you in your own life and you will see countless people jumping to blame others or announce their complete exemption from any responsibility-taking when some seriously smelly shit hits the turbo-charged fan. It’s no wonder that several generations have lost their way in this sense.

Bottom line: take fucking responsibility for your life and everything within.