Exit the cage
Exit the cage
On escaping bullshit by listening to our senses
The last time I witnessed someone completely loose their composure, it was because they were admitting to me and to themselves, that everything they allocated their precious attention to in life—was bullshit.
Why are there people living in cages to which they hold the key?
Who is building the cages?
I don’t know the answer to either of these questions. I can only speak to what I’m witnessing.
The person I reference above has more courage than most people. This is because they were capable of admitting an ugly truth so they could then take steps to move past it.
I see this same ugly truth concealed in others. I see it in the look of worry behind people’s eyes that resembles the same look you might expect in a prey animal cornered by its predator.
But they themselves are both the predator and the prey.
I hear it in the nervous uncertainty of people’s speech. The cadence of a person who speaks with conviction rings ten tones deeper to the soul of their fellow human being than the cadence of a person who’s every phrase ends in a tonal inflection that says, ‘If you tell me I’m wrong with enough authority, I’ll believe you.’
This is dangerous.
This is what makes some nihilistic philosophers ask questions like whether humanity should be trusted with its own freedom.
The optimistic take is that the majority of humanity will take the key, and open up their own cage.
The cages I see most often hold titles like, ‘[Broad Category X] Manger’ or ‘[Broad Category Y] Representative’. But really, what I’m referring to anything that David Graeber would call a ‘Bullshit Job’.
There are other cages as well that get more complicated to define. Maybe the easiest way to put it would be that:
A cage is anything that prevents you from chasing the truth in the world that you are most uniquely enabled to uncover.
I hear the counter argument; “Chasing truth doesn’t pay the bills.”
Maybe that’s always the case, at least at the start. And if it is, then the problem of failing to chase the truth you are uniquely suited to uncover over the long run stems from making compromises. A compromise is a concession with a potential future in favor of a stable trajectory.
We compromise living out our personal legends in favor of bullshit stability due to reason.
Kant knew better than anyone the limits of pure reason:
“All our knowledge begins with the senses, proceeds then to the understanding, and ends with reason.”
We are mammals that built empires off of our senses long before reason. As we grew and developed to know reason, we lost sight of starting from our senses.
…but not entirely.
These same senses are what is calling out to those drowning in bullshit to wake up. It is what prompted a friend of mine to break down because they could sense that they weren’t in the right place. Let them guide you to a better outcome also.
I wrote this because it is a truth I sense I am uniquely enabled to uncover.
Godspeed.
-Benjamin Anderson
Send me signal on Urbit: ~padlyn-sogrum