In this article, I argue that what is easily adopted by the masses—whether it be an ideology, a consumable, or a lifestyle (all of which I will collectively refer to as cultural artifacts)—is inherently short-sighted, divisive, and unhealthy. The problem with easily adopted cultural artifacts is that they are cognitively subversive, hijacking our incessant and primitive desires to be socially accepted, even when it goes against our own interests and the betterment of those around us. The solution I pose to this problem is the active, consistent, and unrelenting upholding of free thought and free speech founded on love, and the dissolution of authoritarian censorship.
Groupthink, Social Media, Propaganda
(Surah Fatir 35:18)
وَلَا تَزِرُ وَازِرَةٌۭ وِزْرَ أُخْرَىٰ ۚ وَإِن تَدْعُ مُثْقَلَةٌ إِلَىٰ حِمْلِهَا لَا يُحْمَلْ مِنْهُ شَىْءٌۭ وَلَوْ كَانَ ذَا قُرْبَىٰٓ ۗ إِنَّمَا تُنذِرُ ٱلَّذِينَ يَخْشَوْنَ رَبَّهُم بِٱلْغَيْبِ وَأَقَامُوا۟ ٱلصَّلَوٰةَ ۚ وَمَن تَزَكَّىٰ فَإِنَّمَا يَتَزَكَّىٰ لِنَفْسِهِۦ ۚ وَإِلَى ٱللَّهِ ٱلْمَصِيرُ
No soul burdened with sin will bear the burden of another. And if a sin-burdened soul cries for help with its burden, none of it will be carried—even by a close relative. You ˹O Prophet˺ can only warn those who stand in awe of their Lord without seeing Him and establish prayer. Whoever purifies themselves, they only do so for their own good. And to Allah is the final return.
We act differently depending on the environments we are in because different environments incentivize and punish certain behaviors. Environments can change in an infinite number of ways, and one of those ways is what that environment looks like socially.
When alone, we are more comfortable thinking and behaving in ways that we genuinely believe in because there are no social repercussions. As soon as you involve someone else, the other person's opinions are taken into consideration. We put our social masks on. When put into a group, we become less true to ourselves and begin to compromise for the group's desires. The larger the group becomes, the less of our genuine individuality shines through the fog of the increasingly unidentifiable "group."
The American Psychological Association defines groupthink as "a strong concurrence-seeking tendency that interferes with effective group decision making. Symptoms include apparent unanimity, illusions of invulnerability and moral correctness, biased perceptions of the outgroup, interpersonal pressure, self-censorship, and non-optimal decision-making strategies."
Cultural artifacts that we are totally comfortable with using alone suddenly become forbidden in the pursuit of conformity. We stop using certain words, we dress a certain way, we don't move as comfortably, we yield on our opinions or passionately take up opinions that aren't even ours, and so on. Now, this isn't to say that these behaviors are necessarily bad. We are social beings. We cannot live alone. From being breastfed as a newborn to being gently laid down in our last days, we are all inherently dependent on other humans for our survival and happiness. The issue arises when we dismiss the truth in favor of the group's desires, as this leads to a multitude of problems, both for our Self and for society at large.
Clara at Corporation Incorporated
Imagine Clara, a young professional just starting her career at a local corporate office. Excited to impress her coworkers and make a name for herself, she arrives a few minutes early to a meeting, her laptop already open and ready to present her ideas on maximizing shareholder value. As the first one in, she has her spreadsheets and slide decks prepared, eager to share her brilliant insights.
Alex, the team’s Executive Director, walks in on time as usual. "Hey Clara, how's it going?" he greets.
"Oh, just your standard Tuesday, you know how it is!" Clara replies, feeling a mix of nerves and anticipation.
"I sure do!" Alex responds with a smile, settling into the head seat at the meeting table. "So about that project on maximizing shareholder value, I think I have it all figured out." He plugs in the HDMI cable to his laptop, displaying his work on the big screen. Clicking through various tabs, he exclaims, "I’m so excited to share this with the team!"
As he sets up, Clara can’t help but compare her own calculations and PivotTables to Alex's presentation. Doubts begin to creep in as everything looks different from her own work. By the time Alex is ready to present, the other four team members have arrived. He kicks off the meeting, showcasing his calculations, but Clara notices significant flaws in the market sizing assumptions.
"Surely Jason the math nerd will catch these errors," Clara thinks, glancing at Jason, who is focused with his fingers interlocked and elbows resting on the table. "Good, he'll definitely call it out."
Alex, energized and locked in, announces, "And that brings me to the PowerPoint we’ll present to the CEO." He pauses, taking a deep breath before turning to the team. "Before I dive into that, does anyone have questions, comments, or concerns about what I just shared?"
The team exchanges glances, and Jason leans back in his chair, arms folded. "Yes, I actually do." The team leans in, eager to hear his thoughts.
Clara thinks, "Okay, here it is. I’ll support Jason if needed. But I can’t be wrong—Alex's market size is 8 billion people in Arkansas alone, and he believes the average willingness to pay for a chocolate bar is $400."
Jason scans the Excel tables, then states, "This is all very good mathematics. The shareholder value will surely increase this way."
"What!?" Clara blurts out, her surprise drawing everyone's attention.
"Is there a problem, Clara?" Alex inquires.
Clara's mind races. "What should I say? Am I actually wrong? If Jason thinks it’s fine, maybe it is. Let me double-check my numbers... Yes, the population of Arkansas is definitely not 8 billion. I just got this job; I don’t want to sound foolish. Perhaps a new study supports the $400 chocolate? There’s no way I’m the only one who sees this discrepancy."
The team waits in silence. Heart pounding and blood rushing to her head, Clara instinctively laughs nervously, "No, not at all! Looks good to me!"
"Good to hear!" Alex resumes, eagerly showcasing his PowerPoint slides.
Two months later, Clara lost her job, as Corporation Incorporated went through with Alex's plan and went bankrupt soon after. Jason had a forged Business Analytics degree from Harvard. Alex earned his position through smuggling white powder to the higher ups. The other team members were grateful to have a job in the first place. Clara was right, the population of Arkansas was, in fact, less than 8 billion.
Social Media (And Its Consequences)
It isn't often that the everyday person has the opportunity to influence the masses with their words. Usually, laypeople have influence over themselves, their friends, their families, and their interest groups—and that's about it. With social media, we have the potential to reach millions. When millions of people are involved, social dynamics and incentive structures change in fascinating ways. Looking at popular online figures and the now nebulous term "social media influencers," we see this play out as parasocial relationships and idolization.
A parasocial relationship is one where, through consistent exposure to and consumption of a popular figure's content, the audience feels a personal connection to them. The audience knows the popular figure's favorite foods, hobbies, taste in music, political beliefs, relationship with their family, romantic life, and many other intimate areas of their life. On the other side, the popular figure does not even know that audience member exists.
Idolization has existed long before the advent of social media, but social media has made it easier for massive numbers of people to band together in reverence to a popular figure. Portions of the population now identify with artists, such as the Swifties, known for their intense loyalty toward Taylor Swift, who, as of writing this, ranks #1 on the highest-grossing tours of all time, generating more than $1 billion in just over a year. Whether it is the Kardashians, MrBeast, Andrew Tate, BTS, or Elon Musk, social media has allowed the masses to idolize people who, albeit successful in their own regards, are at the end of the day just people.
None of this is news for millennials, Gen Z, and the up-and-coming Gen Alpha, but it sets the stage for the rest of this article. The existence of these supermassive idols begs the question: what makes them so popular? Why are they easily adopted by the masses? My argument is that it is because they have been marketed in a way that most people can get behind, that their social identities lack nuance, and that they have been reduced to caricatures that are easy to understand. Just like other cultural artifacts, people can become reduced to one-dimensional statements, lackluster means of expression, and questionable authority figures.
Public figures are often vehemently followed by those seeking easy answers to life’s difficult questions. Men struggling with love desperately cling to Andrew Tate's misogyny. Women searching for meaning cheer on the Kardashians' perceived meaninglessness. The financially unfortunate live vicariously through MrBeast's indifference to money. The techno-utopian savors every bit of Elon Musk's vision of the future and glorifies all that he does. And so on.
The reaction of the masses to what these public figures say and do is not in the control of the public figures themselves. However, they should be aware of what they say and how it might be taken up by literally millions of people. For example, when Donald Trump makes a bigoted statement (as he tends to do), it enables his obsessed followers to act in bigoted ways. When Joe Biden not only fails to condemn the atrocities happening in Palestine but goes one step further to support the Israeli actions, a large portion of the U.S. population adopts his opinions without a second thought. Public figures have access to the masses, and the cultural artifacts that are usually taken up are the simplest ones (read: furthest from the truth).
Propaganda (AKA the Propagation of Terribly Simple Ideas)
It is easy to think of propaganda as something that only exists in the WWII section of a history textbook. We often look back and ask how people could be so easily swayed into adopting extremely ignorant ideas, yet so many of us fall into the same destructive thought patterns as previous generations. Propaganda is a powerful tool to control the hearts of the masses by bypassing our cognitive functions. It is inherently reductionist, simplifying complex interactions between people, cultures, politics, and history into mere symbols and caricatures. Whether it portrays Israelis as pigs or bringers of justice, Palestinians as terrorists or freedom fighters, Americans as greedy gun lovers or voices of peace, Russians as cold-hearted tyrants or symbols of equality, or Chinese as mind-controlled slaves or leaders of industry, people, full of complexity, are reduced to either evil or good.
Our brains prefer simplicity, and we often choose ideological reductions that suit our worldviews, identities, and ethics. This isn't the case for everyone, though. International policy experts and disciplined historians are often capable of distancing themselves from their interpretations of political events. They understand politics as a means of gaining power to ultimately serve a nation's interests. Just as we can view individuals as having interests without blaming them for pursuing those interests, international policy experts and historians deeply comprehend that interactions between nations are interactions between interests.
Politicians—the figures we see in the news like Modi, Trump, Trudeau, Netanyahu, Sunak (no longer), and Imran Khan—are human manifestations of the masses' interests. They are appointed to serve the interests of their people and do not simply appear out of thin air. Even in the case of tyrants, they can only exist if enough people allow them to. Tyrants thrive when individuals are willing to trade their morals for material gain. This is what we know as corruption. If a nation is willing to trade freedom for wealth, truth for falsehood, and trust for power, they will cultivate leaders who embody these traits.
The cultural artifacts that an individual chooses—those chosen by their family, community, state, and nation—determine the leaders they appoint and the side of history they align with. What you choose to believe, the ideologies you adopt, the food you consume, and the life you lead literally shape the course of history.
Will you choose to believe that the world is simply good versus evil? Will you opt for the ideology that is easiest to express? Will you consume the food that is most readily available? Will you live a life that is comfortably non-confrontational?
Or will you humbly accept the complexity of the world? Will you admit that you don't have all the answers but still strive to pursue the truth to the best of your ability? Will you move away from the crowd and seek nuance, even in the face of ostracization? Will you choose to invest your time in cooking whole foods that Mother Nature has designed for you? Will you live a life filled with hardship for the betterment of humanity?
The choice is yours.
Diffusion of Information & Memes
Surah Al-An'am (6:116)
وَإِن تُطِعْ أَكْثَرَ مَن فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ يُضِلُّوكَ عَن سَبِيلِ ٱللَّهِ ۚ إِن يَتَّبِعُونَ إِلَّا ٱلظَّنَّ وَإِنْ هُمْ إِلَّا يَخْرُصُونَ
˹O Prophet!˺ If you were to obey most of those on earth, they would lead you away from Allah’s Way. They follow nothing but assumptions and do nothing but lie.
Cultural artifacts are spread throughout societies in multiple ways. Whether through word of mouth, media, or observation, cultural artifacts occupy space in the landscape of information. Like any piece of information, understanding a cultural artifact requires time and energy. The deeper the desired level of understanding, the more time and energy needed. The highly influential Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) illustrates this effectively.
The ELM theorizes that there are two primary ways people process information, depending on their level of motivation (the desire to process the information) and ability (the capability for critical evaluation). The level of thought that the recipient applies to the information is referred to as the level of elaboration.
Central Route (High Elaboration): The central route is used when the message recipient has both the motivation and the ability to think critically about the message and its topic. When people process information centrally, their cognitive responses, or elaborations, are much more relevant to the content. In contrast, when processing peripherally, the individual may rely on heuristics and other rules of thumb to interpret the message.
Peripheral Route (Low Elaboration): The peripheral route is employed when the message recipient has little or no interest in the subject and/or lacks the ability to process the message thoroughly. At the low end of the elaboration continuum, recipients do not examine the information as deeply. With the peripheral route, they are more likely to rely on general impressions (e.g., "this feels right/good"), initial parts of the message, their own mood, and positive or negative cues in the persuasion context. Because people are "cognitive misers," seeking to reduce mental effort, they often use the peripheral route and rely on heuristics (mental shortcuts) when processing information.
Not only does the receiver's level of elaboration matter in the proliferation of a cultural artifact, but the artifact's complexity also plays a role. As part of the Diffusion of Innovations theory, one of the factors determining the success of a society's adoption of an innovation (or idea, or cultural artifact) is its complexity. The easier it is to learn or grasp, the faster it diffuses. Just like with physical objects, the larger an idea is (its size) and the more complex it is (its density), the harder it is to move around.
I Love Me A Good Ol' Dinner of Brainrot!
For those boomers out there, "brainrot" is a super cool term that all the cool and hip kids are using. Brainrot is the process of allegedly rotting your brain through the consumption of content geared towards cheap and quick dopamine rushes, which are at times so obvious that their delectable nature is almost insulting to our egos. Think of brainrot content as the fast food of social media. We know it's bad for us, but we consume it anyway because it is so accessible, and dangerously addicting.
Brainrot is often in shortform videos and images on social media platforms such as Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts, which have all exploded in popularity in recent years. Most people would classify this content as in the form of memes. Now, the term "meme" didn't start from 9GAG as some of my Gen Zers may be shocked to hear. The term actually originates from the prehistoric times, all the way back in 1976, coined by Richard Dawkins.
A meme is defined as (thanks Wikipedia):
"an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme. A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols, or practices, that can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena with a mimicked theme."
In other words, on the most primitive end of the complexity spectrum, Internet memes are the transportation system of cheap and unhealthy cultural artifacts, spreading across the land through our handheld gizmos. On the other side of this complexity spectrum is what our ancient forefathers from 2 decades ago would call "long form media". This includes books (idk, look it up), movies, podcasts, documentaries, etc. Long form media is often able to tackle larger, more complex ideas, because more time and energy, more elaboration, more resources, have been put into breaking them down.
What I advocate for is to do away with brainrot and simplicity, and seek out long form media and complexity. Let's busy ourselves with deeper thought, tackle larger ideas that may be a struggle to grasp, and cultivate disdain towards short catchphrases and dopamine grabs that leech our attention with no benefit other than to give Zuckerberg more advertisement revenue. Let's choose our cultural artifacts based on their truthfulness, and not on their expediency, through central processing and careful elaboration. Our time in this life is limited, so let's become harbingers of Truth, to seek out knowledge and dispel ignorance. We don't have the time nor energy to learn everything, so all we can do is try our best.
Emotions, Hiding Among the Crowd, Feeding the Ego
Suraha Al-Baqarah (2:6-2:15)
إِنَّ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا سَوَآءٌ عَلَيْهِمْ ءَأَنذَرْتَهُمْ لَمْ تُنذِرْهُمْ لَا يُؤْمِنُونَ (٦) خَتَمَ اللَّهُ عَلَىٰ قُلُوبِهِمْ وَعَلَىٰ سَمْعِهِمْ وَعَلَىٰ أَبْصَارِهِمْ غِشَاوَةٌ وَلَهُمْ عَذَابٌ عَظِيمٌ (٧) وَمِنَ النَّاسِ مَن يَقُولُ آمَنَّا بِاللَّهِ وَبِالْيَوْمِ الْآخِرِ وَمَا هُم بِمُؤْمِنِينَ (٨) يُخَادِعُونَ اللَّهَ وَالَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَمَا يَخْدَعُونَ إِلَّا أَنفُسَهُمْ وَمَا يَشْعُرُونَ (٩) فِي قُلُوبِهِم مَّرَضٌ فَزَادَهُمُ اللَّهُ مَرَضًا وَلَهُمْ عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌ بِمَا كَانُوا يَكْذِبُونَ (١٠) وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ لَا تُفْسِدُوا فِي الْأَرْضِ قَالُوا إِنَّمَا نَحْنُ مُصْلِحُونَ (١١) أَلَا إِنَّهُمْ هُمُ الْمُفْسِدُونَ وَلَٰكِن لَّا يَشْعُرُونَ (١٢) وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ آمِنُوا كَمَا آمَنَ النَّاسُ قَالُوا أَنُؤْمِنُ كَمَا آمَنَ السُّفَهَاءُ أَلَا إِنَّهُمْ هُمُ السُّفَهَاءُ وَلَٰكِن لَا يَعْلَمُونَ (١٣) وَإِذَا لَقُوا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا قَالُوا آمَنَّا وَإِذَا خَلَوْا إِلَىٰ شَيَاطِينِهِمْ قَالُوا إِنَّا مَعَكُمْ إِنَّمَا نَحْنُ مُسْتَهْزِئُونَ (١٤) اللَّهُ يَسْتَهْزِئُ بِهِمْ وَيَمُدُّهُمْ فِي طُغْيَانِهِمْ يَعْمَهُونَ (١٥)
"Indeed, it is the same whether you warn them or not—they will never believe. (6) Allah has sealed their hearts and their hearing, and their sight is covered. They will suffer a tremendous punishment. (7) And there are some who say, 'We believe in Allah and the Last Day,' yet they are not believers. (8) They seek to deceive Allah and the believers, yet they only deceive themselves, but they fail to perceive it. (9) There is a sickness in their hearts, and Allah only lets their sickness increase. They will suffer a painful punishment for their lies. (10) When they are told, 'Do not spread corruption in the land,' they reply, 'We are only peacemakers!' (11) Indeed, it is they who are the corruptors, but they fail to perceive it. (12) And when they are told, 'Believe as others have believed,' they reply, 'Will we believe as the fools believe?' Indeed, it is they who are the fools, but they do not know. (13) When they meet the believers they say, 'We believe.' But when alone with their evil associates they say, 'We are definitely with you; we were only mocking.' (14) Allah will throw their mockery back at them, leaving them to continue wandering blindly in their defiance. (15)"
Let me tie together what I have laid out so far. The type of media, people, and places we put most of our time into will determine what cultural artifacts are most accessible to us. If we do not select our environments and choose our cultural artifacts carefully, we are susceptible to being controlled by the masses, or worse, tyrants.
Why is it so easy for us to outsource our ideas and beliefs to the masses in the first place? It's because it is often difficult to turn inward towards our true self. The true self, the core of who we really are, is behind many walls and fortifications that we've built up throughout our lives to "protect" ourselves from emotions that we often aren't properly equipped to process and work through. Emotionally immature parents (who most likely had emotionally immature parents) don't provide us with tools to deal with negative emotions such as fear, guilt, shame, anxiety, and depression, but instead command us to simply not feel those emotions. Emotions cannot not be felt, so instead of expressing them, releasing ourselves from emotional tension, we push them down, deep enough to not be seen. What ends up happening is that we internalize these emotions, and over time, we push down so much to our core that our true self has no space to breathe.
At a certain point, there is no more room for emotion to be pushed down. We have cluttered our soul with all those negative emotions we were never allowed to share, filling our hearts to the brim with hatred and resentment. Our true self is deafened, its voice lost beneath years of unexamined baggage. Most of us continue on living, some of us don't. Those who do continue on living, they live, but just in the physical sense. Their bodies move, their hearts pump blood, their lungs breathe, but they are soulless. The soulless person does not yearn for anything, does not desire anything, has no faith in themselves nor others, and so, becomes someone who yields to any small force. A puppet to be played with and thrown around for the enjoyment and gain of others.
Cultural, religious, political, and social forces drag and shove the soulless person here and there with no real direction or purpose. The soulless person will get lost in trends, moving where the masses move, with no bearing on themselves. They are content, at least superficially, to blend in with the crowd because sticking out would subject themselves to close examination. An unexamined soul is fragile, hurt, and scared, and doesn't trust the world to examine it, so it looks for places to hide. The soulless person conforms to social expectations, to professional trajectories, to familial obligations, to financial structures, to pop culture and media, and to the painful mediocrity of the norm.
Throughout the day, these people, scarred by their painful memories and experiences, walk around society guarded in heavy armor, lugging their bodies exhaustedly to wherever the crowd takes them next. When they get home, tired from all the meaningless, purposeless effort, they throw their armor around in fits of anger, frustration, and despair. They feel entitled to a reward for their struggles, and they are so desperate to get that reward now, so they often indulge in self-destructive, cheap cultural artifacts that provide the brain with a short burst of good feelings. Like a child (of which their true self most likely still is), they demand pacification in the forms of:
Consuming decadent, highly processed foods, supplying a mixture of sugar and salts instantly into the blood stream.
Consuming brainrot, self-validating news and media, and feel-good sitcoms.
Gossiping about others, projecting their insecurities onto others.
Physical abuse, inflicting pain upon others to gain a temporary sense of control.
Emotional abuse, externalizing their problems to others inside of taking responsibility.
Drowning out the pain with alcohol and drugs, turning off their ability to think and feel.
Excessive and compulsive sexual behavior in an attempt to mask the pain.
Self-harm, to at least feel something.
Each day is fed to the ravenous, unsatiable ego. Each day becoming more ignorant of the Self. Each day becoming more lifeless than the next. Each day devoid of love.
Love, Self-Reflection, Free Thought
Surah Fussilat (41:53)
سَنُرِيهِمْ آيَاتِنَا فِي الْآفَاقِ وَفِي أَنفُسِهِمْ حَتَّى يَتَبَيَّنَ لَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الْحَقُّ
"We will show them Our signs in the universe and within themselves until it becomes clear to them that this [revelation] is the truth."
What is Love? Baby Don't Hurt Me...
Love is not a feeling, but an act. Love is giving someone a hug even when you are angry with them. Love is listening to someone talk about their problems even when you have many of your own. Love is cooking someone a meal even when you are exhausted. Love is sacrificing your own money to help someone in need. Love is charity even when you have very little to give.
Love is an act of faith, removing the barricades that imprison your soul, exposing it to the unfathomable complexity of the universe. Love is the rebellion against fear, it is the willingness to embrace the unknown. It is difficult to love something that you don't understand, for what parts of the unknown can you love? Your love is only as deep and sincere as your knowing of what you love. If you do not know yourself, you cannot love yourself. In order to love yourself, you must know yourself.
Love is letting your true self be examined, being concerned for its safety, yet having hope that it will make it out in tact. But before you expose your true self to the chaotic world, you need to nurture it in safety, building up its strength and resilience. First, connect with your true self by yourself. Then, with trusted loved ones. Then, with colleagues. Then, with strangers. Know that your true self is known only by God, who has created you with love so that you may love yourself and in turn love God. Love is the cosmic force of creation, nothing would be without love.
The difficulty with love is that it does not happen by chance. Love is intentional. In order for us to be capable of loving and receiving love, we need to lay out the necessary groundwork for our soul. Children, if not raised to manage their emotions appropriately, will remain children in adult bodies. Children, inherently ignorant, are incapable of giving love, and are therefore unable to love themselves. Children naturally seek love from external sources, usually adults who are (supposedly) capable of giving love such as parents, teachers, and mentors. If these authority figures don't teach children how to love themselves, these dependent children remain dependent throughout their lives until they learn how to free themselves from their desire for external validation.
Self-Reflection Is Difficult
This is where the difficulty lies: coming to terms with the possibility that you were not loved as a child. You may have received what seemed to be love, but you could never make that distinction, as what you perceived as love was all that you knew in childhood.
Think of the overprotective mother who stifles a child's desire to explore the world, keeping them indoors and away from society out of fear of judgment. When the child cries in frustration, yearning to frolic in the yard, the mother, full of anxiety, exclaims, "I do this because I love you! I don't want you to get hurt!" Thus, the child learns that to love is to anxiously protect oneself from a dangerous world. Consider the father who is never satisfied with his child's achievements, who can never show interest or approval due to his own inability to love. When the child, incessantly trying to win their father's approval, burns out and breaks down, it reflects their own perceived incompetence. "This is what is best for you! Life isn't easy!" Consequently, the child learns that to love is to continuously push oneself to exhaustion in pursuit of others' approval.
The process of unlearning these false notions of love and exposing the truth—that love isn't the norm—is often disorienting. Our hopeful child selves desperately cling to the illusion that we were loved in ways that were genuinely loving, but that we simply aren't grateful enough to recognize it. The guilt of seeing our parents as fallible, just human beings (who may have never received their own love), is uncomfortable to sit with. The harsh truth that we cannot change those who do not want to be changed, or worse, love those who do not want to be loved, perpetually stabs at the heart and mind. Those of us who cannot bear to face these uncomfortable truths cower away from the realities of the universe and, hence, away from the realities of their souls, never knowing what life truly is and shutting away any possibility of real love.
Below is an excerpt from the book Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, a somewhat painful yet refreshingly clinical reflection on our relationships with parents, which goes into the freedom of having your own genuine thoughts and feelings without guilt:
"If your childhood thoughts and feelings made your parents uncomfortable, you would have quickly learned to suppress these inner experiences. Knowing your true emotions and thoughts probably felt dangerous if it threatened to distance you from the people you depended on. You learned that your goodness or badness lay not only in your behavior, but in your mind as well. In this way, you may have learned the absurd idea that you can be a bad person for having certain thoughts and feelings, and you may still hold that belief.
However, you need access to all your inner experiences, without feeling guilty or ashamed of them. Plus, you’ll have more energy when you let your thoughts and feelings flow naturally, without worrying about what they mean about you. A thought or feeling means nothing more than that you’re having a thought or feeling. Regaining the freedom to simply let your thoughts and feelings come and go without condemnation is a profound relief.
The fact is, having a thought or feeling isn’t initially under your control. You don’t plan to think or feel things; you just do. Think of it this way: Your thoughts and feelings are an organic part of nature expressing itself through you. Nature isn’t going to be dishonest about how you feel, and you don’t have a choice about what thoughts nature brings up in you. Accepting the truth of your feelings and thoughts doesn’t make you a bad person. It makes you a whole person, and mature enough to know your own mind."
Those of us who courageously, painstakingly, and patiently chip away at the fortifications we've built are slowly uncovering the truth of the universe and ourselves. Honesty is the first step to reality. When we can muster the courage to speak honestly about ourselves, we can act from a place of knowing—a place that is capable of love. Then, we can speak honestly about ourselves in relation to the world.
Humility, the self-awareness of ignorance, and curiosity, the desire to rid ourselves of ignorance, are the second steps to reality. When we can admit that the world is more complex than we can ever fathom and that we are not all-knowing beings, we can act from a place of learning—a place that allows for the continuous exploration of love. Once we sufficiently know ourselves and the world, we become capable of both providing love and receiving it. However, this is an ongoing journey, as both we and the world are constantly changing.
Free Thought and the Pursuit of Truth
There is nothing more freeing than aligning yourself with the truth. Although it requires constant recalibration and careful examination of both yourself and the world, it allows us to think and act freely, away from the mania of the masses. We are able to stand firm against the forces that be and observe the world with greater objectivity—not so that we can "control" our lives, but so we can make more informed decisions from a place of calmness and faith. We can see trends for what they are and choose cultural artifacts that help sustain our peace. We can build strong mental and emotional foundations, away from the crowd, so we aren't swept away in its stampede when it inevitably moves toward us.
Instead of parroting others' ideas, beliefs, and perspectives—hiding among the crowd while risking nothing—we should incentivize and cultivate free thought and its expression. Free, independent thought is the creation of cultural artifacts and, like any other form of creation, requires love. Free thought requires us to listen to ourselves, trust that we are coming from a place of love, and respect our minds enough to take them seriously. It involves the constant reminder that our existence is not only valid but welcomed. It is a rebellion against the notion that others know what is best for us, let alone have our best interests in mind.
Free thought is often terrifying, as it means going against the current of the masses. It is like walking through a crowd of people who are all going the opposite way. It is difficult to move, hard to find your own air to breathe, and you may get swept away, but in the end, you will find peace. Because we all experience life a little differently, we each have our own unique set of experiences and timelines that (ideally) manifest as our individuality. The universe has manifested itself in me, and who am I to question that creation? God has chosen for me to live with the soul I have, so why should I undermine His love for the sake of others?
Each one of us is special in that there is no one like us. There is no other person that is me; I am the only me. It is obvious—there cannot be two of me at the same time. Even if I were to be cloned and given the same exact experiences up until now, in the very next instant of existence, that clone would no longer be me. It is obvious, yet we live as if we are supposed to be the average of the masses. We look toward where everyone else is going and quickly join the crowd, hoping that we will be protected. The crowd will not protect you. As soon as you are no longer aligned with the crowd, or if you have interests that differ from it, you are exiled, hunted, or, in modern terms, canceled.
Expression and Fighting Censorship
"Uh, I think that all the silence is worse than all the violence
Fear is such a weak emotion, that's why I despise it
We scared of almost everything, afraid to even tell the truth
So scared of what you think of me, I'm scared of even telling you"
Lupe Fiasco, "Words I Never Said"
Once we can love ourselves, engage in cultural artifacts that are truthful, move away from the masses, give ourself the grace of free thought, we are one step closer to being able to unapologetically express the truth of our souls, and hence, the truth of the universe. However, most people don't like the truth, because it forces them to confront themselves, to confront death. The masses are comfortable in their delusion and ignorance, and have no plans on removing themselves from that comfort. So when the truth is spoken, they raise their pitchforks in a blind rage, choosing to attack what forces them to feel mortal. In addition, those who benefit from the mob, those with worldly influence and power, see it as a threat to their authority.
"You dare move out of line! Get back in there like the good Samaritan that you are! Don't cause any problems for me, you hear!" The tyrant is powerless without the submission of the masses. It should be clear why censorship is a vital strategy for the success of dictatorships and fascist states. Tyrants can take many forms, but they all use fear as a way to control people for their own interests. Be especially careful of regimes that aim to control your behavior through strict intolerance founded on religious dogma, as they can make you lose faith completely and dissociate from essential spirituality.
Fighting against oppressive regimes and standing firm against tyrants is no easy task. It may be the ultimate form of faith: to fight against worldly ignorance in the name of freedom, often facing punishment through physical and emotional torture. Yet not rebelling, staying complacent, may be worse than death. Staying quiet, moving with the crowd, and allowing the truth of the universe to be silenced is its own form of torture. It is a torture of the spirit, that inexplicable energy that binds us to the cosmos and to God. The torture of the spirit, the eternal punishment, is Hell—the ultimate destination for those who fear something more than He who has created fear. Our bodies and minds are important aspects of our existence, but they are temporary, worldly things. Our spirits, the life energy that allows for sentience, like all energy, never cease to exist.
I advocate for the unrelenting expression and acceptance of the truth. The truth is already known by God; the truth is known by the Truth. So what are we hiding it from? Let's support one another in being honest and truthful, even when it may jeopardize our worldly affairs. Continue to dismantle the ego in yourself and others. Cultivate love within yourself, even when it is unbearably painful to do so. Choose cultural artifacts that provide you with peace and stability. Avoid those simple, unhealthy pleasures, and don't get caught up in the whirlwinds of the emotional masses. Find places and platforms that cherish your honesty, and move away from those that censor the truth.
In relation to the earlier parts of this article, be skeptical of easily adopted cultural artifacts. Don't take up ideas and beliefs that are simple to adopt. If the masses suddenly embrace an idea or follow a trend, observe from afar. The less nuance there is, the less truthful it is. The epitome of nuance is your own individual truth in all its infinite complexity. Take your time, use central route processing, and consume media that invites critical thought and self-reflection. Don't let these cultural artifacts die, and don't let anyone take them away from you.
If you can't find truthful cultural artifacts around you and in the places you live (which is often a consequence of colonialism and cultural imperialism), create your own. Be the initiating force for truth and love.
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