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After Joe Biden bowed out of the upcoming election an article came to my attention that quoted Biden saying:
“The great thing about America is here, kings and dictators do not rule, the people do.”
“WHAT?!” I thought. Maybe when the US was first founded, but certainly not now.
I decided to run a poll on Instagram to see how people felt about Biden’s claim. Here is what that poll looked like and what the results were…
These numbers are clear… very few believe what Biden said.
To break this down…
We have about 320,000 followers on Instagram. But since we haven’t used IG much in the last few years, we only got a few hundred responses to the poll.
I still feel these results point to something important even though our followers are likely people who already think outside the box.
There is a large portion of the population that does not at all believe that the foundations of US democracy are intact. And to be honest, they are right.
“Democracy” in the US is more of an illusion.. a trope.. an outdated way of describing how the country functions. Truthfully, this is likely the same in other free countries as well.
Modern “democracy” essentially invites citizens to vote every four years under the illusion that societal choices are theirs, when in reality they are driven by those with the most money and power who got both by taking advantage of faulty system incentives.
Yet the sitting president of the US (and leaders of other countries) still talks about democracy as if it’s the bedrock of our society.
It’s a bizarre time to be alive lol.
We’re living in the Twilight Zone.. where we are watching a world so ridiculous, so plastic, so backward.. all while being pressured to take it very seriously.
When I watch the millions of dollars spent on election events, the suits, the nice decor, the security etc.. you see incredible amounts of energy going into something that’s an illusion, something a growing mass doesn’t even believe in but it happens anyway… like on default. Moving through the motions. 🤖
We’re told to engage in the body politic on one hand… yet we see the truth of the body politic and wonder.. what am I really doing?
It’s a paradoxical place to be and brings up some tough current decisions.
For example, it appears that voting for RFK Jr would be a fairly different direction from the status quo… and I do believe this to be true. But it’s all happening in a game or system that feels incredibly awkward to be part of.
THESE are the times we are in. It’s supposed to be paradoxical.
We have to laugh sometimes, engage sometimes, scratch our heads sometimes, not know sometimes, and just get really friggen comfortable with uncertainty.
The old consciousness, the old world and paradigm is dying and yet our neighbors still deeply believe in it…
All the while a new consciousness, a new world and paradigm is birthing and yet it’s not present in front of us much… but you can feel it…
Feeling it makes the existing world look and feel bizarre. But we don’t have to throw stones at it… we simply need to embrace the space we’re in.
Here’s where this can be important…
I see people get tripped up on trying to make ALL OR NOTHING decisions about what they SHOULD do or decide on in our existing moment…
The truth is no one knows, and part of this is just keeping it light and having fun with it. The other part is looking at things from different perspectives.
Here is where some framing I’ve discussed around thinking and decision making comes in handy…
It’s not a perfect visual but it gets the idea across…
Before we break it down, as a general rule of thumb, the bigger and more impactful the decision, the more time we should spend considering its complex effects.
Looking at that crude graph, we see short term solutions on the left. These are things we can do now and will make some impact, but they can be things in our current system or out.
On the right, we have long term solutions. Really, this is where humanity has to start orienting a little more. With long term decisions/solutions we can make them in system or out system.
Voting MAY be a decent short term thing so long as you don’t get lost thinking it’s THE solution and truly vote for someone you ACTUALLY believe in…
Trading services, buying from a neighbour, or purchasing outside of government overreach and taxation (parallel) can be immediate out system options.
Sometimes changing purchasing habits is a good in system way to contribute to long term results down the road.
Exploring and discussing new societal models is very out system and long term, but energy still needs to go there for those that are inspired.
In the end, I offer this simply as a way to explore the various ways we might think about impact or our decisions.
Of course, just being a high quality human being with an open mind and heart is huge too!
We only have so much time and energy in a day, and we only have so much power to affect things, being able to connect our actions to progress in our minds and being can help us find joy and peace in the present moment.
I trust that to some this way of orienting to things will bring some value, and if anyone wants to dive a little deeper into discussion around this you can check out an older podcast episode I did called Interconnection & A Pathway to Change.
