Perhaps the most frustrating thing about the last 3 years is “the actors” have simply stopped even trying to make things look real. False rage, tweets written by interns based on public opinion polls on messaging and then, the pinnacle last week …. This.
Really? First soup on paintings and now Greta pulls an AOC and pretends to get arrested? Seriously, WTF.
And yet, “the masses” (whoever they are) continue to believe what they are told about all of it: that the vaccine is 93% safe and effective, the energy transition is going great and diversity and inclusion officers at colleges are really making a difference.
To me, perhaps the most striking example of this has been the #TwitterFiles that definitively show the Government through the FBI and even offices of members of congress demanding content be censored, taken down and their users banned (no doubt this is what happened to me on LinkedIn). The collective reaction thus far? A sigh, an “oh well we knew that” and a return to business as usual. It’s the matrix and it’s hard not to want to take the blue pill and go back to sports and the lady in the red dress.
I honestly don’t know how it ends and perhaps the frustration has been the driver of why I write less and produce less content. In 2018, I felt like I was drawing attention to real issues that weren’t fully understood and that I was “helping.” Now? It feels like everything sees things for exactly what they are but there is nothing we can do to address and fix it. The billion dollar question long term is who will be the uniting force that bridges the gap, addresses the deficit, foreign policy, the debt and infrastructure and “saves society” from itself. But we need to get there sooner than later because every day that goes by feels like there is less and less if the world we knew in 2019.
In the meantime, I blocked the President on Twitter (the tweets drove me insane) and I’m doing a better job of blocking out the negativity.
I had a wonderful trip to Omaha with Andrew’s hockey team and head to Dallas this weekend for a huge tournament with him before States and Nationals in February and March.
Ben has lost 20 lbs, picked up the clubs again after a mandated (by me) 6 week break and to my surprise, at hot yoga showed me he is far more physically fit and determined than I thought.
Little old me has peeled off almost 30 workouts, is down 23 lbs, and I actually got to a drop shot the other day that even surprised me (more than it surprised my opponent). The winery fell through but I’m evaluating a land deal with a different brand expanding into a different state, my friend’s Bourbon company that I helped with a small bridge loan with is starting to really take off and NAPE is the first week of February and I’m excited to see many faces at the Four Seasons lounge.
Until next time, be safe, be good, and have a great day.
Love and hugs,
DRW
Congrats - outside the echo chambers you can finally hear yourself think! Short of showing up at your house and moving your mouth for you, no one "makes" us do anything. Sure, they can rig the system, pervert incentives to mess with the game, spread BS. But if we don't pay attention is it really working? The new AI may be our salvation since we'll know that the rest of the marketing crap we see is generated by computers now. Funny how the techies are so excited about something that's going to put a lot them out of work, although they don't seem to think so. More and more things will be kept off the internet to keep them away from the robots, and that will be a good thing. People will have to go old school and talk FTF. Like at NAPE.
"In 2018, I felt like I was drawing attention to real issues that weren’t fully understood and that I was “helping.” Now? It feels like everything [I think you meant to say 'everyone' here] sees things for exactly what they are but there is nothing we can do to address and fix it."
You WERE drawing attention to real issues that needed additional understanding. You WERE helping.
I set up my Substack account, largely on your recommendation, and I hit it hard for a couple of weeks, looking at how I could get the message out about my "12-Steps to Save Western Civilization". FYI, Step 1 is "Restore our ability to communicate", and Step 2 is "Reclaim the language". My point was that if we can't do those two things first, the remaining 10-steps don't matter.
As I dug deeper to gather up supporting material for what I was writing and what I was proposing, I quickly found that things are much worse than I originally thought. That the wheels that were set in motion decades ago were now moving so fast that there is no turning back - that the train is going to crash, no matter what we do to try to prevent it.
At around that time, I wrote an explanation on my Substack explaining why I wouldn't continue writing about the 12-steps, but would possibly highlight articles by others. It was also around that time that I came across an article on The Burning Platform titled "'Say Nothing' Phase of this Fourth Turning". It was this article that supported my decision to hold off on writing on topics that would face opposition and deplete my energy - especially considering that the people that need to hear the message aren't yet ready to hear the message. I haven't stopped the research, or stopped connecting the dots, or thinking about articles I will write on certain topics when the time is right, or share with people when we talk offline.
The Fourth Turning that Straus and Howe describe is here. The players are easily identifiable, sides have been chosen, and all that's left is to let it play out until the masses reach such a level of discomfort that they are ready to listen.
Keep on doing your research, keep on identifying the problems with hard solutions, and keep on gathering your thoughts and ideas on how to fix things, and be ready to talk about it when the time comes.