Your Alien Brother from Another Mother

Tag: purpose

  • Knowing Someone When They Refuse to be Known

    We all hide behind walls, this is especially true in the day and age of the internet. Identity and hiding behind anonymity gives an edge, much like not showing cards during a poker game, we can bluff, lie and even lead someone on. Although, the knowing that I am talking about here is different, it is when we simply refuse to show our true selves.

    It is funny that we often hide ourselves in our emotions. Emotions are for sure part of our personality, but it rarely is who we really are. Think about it, when we speak with someone in anger, what shows up is the spirit of anger. We convey things in a fiery manner and utter words that we come to regret later, but what if we come to a conclusion that anger is part of our personality. It becomes deeply ingrained that we don’t even notice it. It becomes a justification, that creates a different persona from who we are normally. Severing the connection from our higher self, the one that sees everything from a wider view.

    Conversation happens two ways, its either we keep a higher trail of thought or we devolve into the same level as the other. Like water trickling down, we fill conversations with thoughts that helps the discourse to bloom into a meaningful garden of words. It tries to link both head and heart together so we could speak freely and openly about things that satisfies our needs. It gives and it takes, so we do not feel taken advantaged of and we do not feel heavy afterwards. To be lifted up instead of being brought down.

    Though as I was thinking through this, I realized that sometimes we also need to go down to the same level in a conversation. A heated discussion can bring out deeper thoughts and concerns that normally won’t happen in a objective talk. Balancing out the fire with an arbiter and or rules can probably help us create a healthy space to speak out. However, this depends both people respect the rules and bind themselves to them.

    Overall, hiding oneself is a defense mechanism… We just need to learn how to uncover, hidden things or concerns that we have. Being direct requires trust and a certain degree of understanding, knowing who you are speaking with and being attune to certain realities can help build either a beautiful garden or a cold chat.

  • The Other World the Counter to Nihilism

    There is currently a common thought nowadays of living dead or people that are alive but are dead in some way shape or form. The idea is leads me to think of how a nihilistic person would view the world today.

    Imagine you have a dream, simple yet true and readily achievable, however for some reason, you are unable to push through with it, as if stuck in a rut as all your options slowly dwindle down. Creeping like darkness in dusk, then finally you are in the middle of that abyss with just a lamp as your source of light. Nothing left, except a lamp to comfort you since without it you will be forced to journey in pitch black nothingness with no way to trudge through towards your goal. In my head that is what nihilism is, a swallowing up of all things hoped for, with no other thing left to pursue.

    In that meaninglessness, it is easy to find our minds wandering into a spiraling despair. Finding no drive and purpose to this very existence. So now what, how does the other world give meaning to this life? We assume that the other world is true and we should go prepare for it? Ehhh, does that mean I need to save a life so that I can benefit in the next life, the classic save a little girl from dying from a speeding truck so that we could get rewarded in the next life? That could very well be the real meaning of living, how we could save up for the next life.

    So should it be a heroic act or an undying self sacrifice? I think it is more than that, its about trying to reach out, trying bring something to the table, trying to fill a role in more that one aspect. Knowing that somehow things will move accordingly and appropriately. Trying to shift purpose in order to fill in the void for another person in the hopes that it will also fill in the missing pieces in our lives and ultimately collect enough credit for the next world. It doesn’t need to be grand or extravagant, rather it should just fulfill a role that is needed in the right moment.

  • A Deciding Factor

    When looking back in the past, we can always see the frame from a wider view. How things were set in motion because of an action and what we could have done better, what things we can do to improve the current situation. This allows us to make the right decisions and help us to stay grounded since we could not fully grasp the all the possible trajectory of each person. We can only estimate things if a person has unlimited options, thus if we want to come up with a concise decision then we must limit its uses. Think in terms of Subaru if he gets limited in one path, on the next revival he chooses a different path, choice is what makes us different from animals, we can always pivot towards another path that is not hindered nor limited. Everything comes at a cost and we must never discount the source of anything because it eventually boils down to one thing anyway. So when deciding on things, we must take into consideration all the factors that are involved, people affected by our decisions, effects of our decisions across time and how it affects the environment that we are currently in. Unfortunately, we have limited scope and view of our world. We can only control what is immediately in front of us and the things within our grasp in our short lifespan, I think we should consider things that helped us get this far and which things we should retain in order to move along the right direction.

  • Reflections and Renewal

    A new world requires a recount of the old one. If we have not experienced the old then we wouldn’t know what we want with the new. A child is disciplined when we don’t confirm to what is “correct” behavior, however who was it that defined the correct behavior. Why would we act in a certain way when we don’t have rules in place for our actions. In our world today, often times it is society that dictates what is acceptable and what is not. Comparing it to the old days, we have become more liberated and less concerned with judgement. “I have done nothing wrong”, “What I do does not affect anybody” or “everyone else is doing it” are common ways of thinking nowadays. Completely disregarding past norms, since they had little no benefit anyway. Bending and breaking rules, testing the limits of our new found freedom in order to be “yourself”. Innately, nothing wrong with that right? Having individuality makes us unique and experience is the best teacher after all.

    Our standards suddenly become miles apart from what we previously had. Was is it really all for free, I mean did we not lose anything in the transition towards this “new world”? Like shifting from black and white to colored, new seems to be much better than the old. Often times it is, since I am not typing on a typewriter rather on a laptop computer. This is true for technology, but is it also true for other things? What did we lose in order to get to where we are. Is it really negligible. In all honestly, I don’t know or maybe I fail to see what I am missing. Maybe all the advancements and the know how somehow overshadow what is sacrificed, or is it that we just fail to notice it because it is too mundane and nuanced.

  • Nature Vs Nurture

    This is quite an interesting topic to think about right now. In the world of plants, there isn’t usually a need to nurture. What is the natural thing for them to have other creatures like insects pollinate for them and birds or small rodents to spread their seeds. Though in contrast when nurtured, the human would till the soil, sow the seeds, water and help maintain the land they grow in from weeds and other things that would hinder their growth.

    The same logic applies for growing a person, we plant the right seeds in their mind and heart, then we nurture them so that they would grow into the person we want them to be. On the flip side of things, we allow nature to take place and just have them learn things for themselves and nothing more, often this way creates a wild growth that could lead to an unintended direction.

    This is quite similar to tending to a house or a dungeon or even a pet. Without proper admin or knowledge, these would be neglected and not be up to standard of the owner. Then again often times the owners themselves do not know what it is they want, so we try to present them possibilities and ways to reach the desired goal. Now, we all know that depending on the person viewing the requirements, they all get to imagine a unique outcome to what the owner wants. Having all sorts of ideas can have positive or detrimental effects to the product because we either complicate things or we diverge from the original plan. Thus, sometimes it is good to come back to the owner to check if we are close to what it is that they want.

    Eliminating complex things and trying to make sense what the original goal is, helps us figure out if we really need nurture or nature to move things forward.

  • Leadership, Teams, Laws and Boundaries.

    They say that a strong team is supposedly able to function even without its leader. While all that thought is good and great, it doesn’t necessarily mean that we should just function without leadership. Humility and trust is built when we understand that the head relies on the body and the body on the head. It gives us space to wrestle while still staying within certain boundaries. Respect is a two way street which is upheld upstream and downstream. A mutual contract that holds us accountable to our actions towards each other. The constant struggle for power and ownership, striving to cover for each others weakness and flaws. We create rules and revise rules in order to cater towards the needs of a team.

    Here I present to you the infamous, “Trolley Problem” wherein you are forced to choose which people to save. Saving the leader or saving the team. This gives us perspective of reliance, monopoly and choice, what is stopping us from choosing the current one and replacing it with another. No one is irreplaceable, once we grasp this truth then we could give credit where credit is due.

  • Dreaming of a Different World

    What do you tell a child dying of cancer about this world? What do you tell that child’s parents? Do you give them the canned response of “everything happens for a reason”, or just stay silent until the grief has passed or the pain is through, should the answer be in the form of statistics or math? That the child is but a number in the passing of time? Is it right to show them dreams to numb the pain or rather what kind of truth do you show them? Surely we can tell them that soon we will have a cure for cancer but what if that child is dying tomorrow?

    Escaping from the reality of this world, a comfort of things unknown. A child-like fantasy of a world beyond this one, from Peter Pan to Beauty and the Beast, tales create in us a kind of hope that can only be in our imagination, a path forward that never be closed. Somehow, some way this imaginary world provides a direction that goes beyond the time that we have in this planet. When someone is at death’s door, some would say it is cruel to give them false hope, because this world does not work for people in that way. Maybe if given that one dose of virtual reality, it would given them supernatural strength. That little voice of positivity might just be the one thing they need to move forward and be strong for a miraculous come back.