The Conundrum Of Minimalism

One of the biggest hurdles I’ve come across in my (very slow) journey towards minimalism is the fact that minimalism isn’t just about things.

Let’s say I have a huge collection of CD’s, DVD’s, books, and such. I’ve written before about the pros and cons of physical media. The pros are, if you have a physical copy of something, it can’t be deleted from the cloud. The cons are, it can still be ruined, and you still have to store it somewhere.

So how does all that fit into minimalism? Continue reading “The Conundrum Of Minimalism”

Decline Of The Digital Age

Confession: I’m a dork. A nerd. A geek. A bona-fide weirdo.

I’m also past 50. The last five decades have been quite the journey for me. I watched the digital age come and go. It’s rise to, and fall from, prominence.

“But the digital age isn’t dead!” you decry, nostrils flaring in contempt. “You’re even posting this on a digital platform!”

I’m not talking about the mere existence of digital media. As you can see, it’s still here.

No- I’m talking about the waning dominance of digital media as a place of wonder and growth. You know what Instagram reels catch people’s attention the most? The ones that show someone making something- some kind of physical art. The digital media itself is just a communication tool showing the actual, physical art. There’s no wonder in the digital aspect of it at all.

Once upon a time, I would play with computers (like the Commodore 64, or the Tandy TRS-80 CoCo 2) and teach myself to program sprites in BASIC because, well, just because I could. The technology was new, and you didn’t really know what it could and couldn’t do. It was exploring an unexplored space. But today, all of that wonder is gone. Everywhere you look, there are unending expanses of procedurally generated landscapes, where everything is just a little bit different, but nothing is really new.

Fortunately, the human mind isn’t bound by digital limitations. When you are a true creative, the means of producing ideas will not be limited by the equipment you use.

You can write a novel on a typewriter or on a computer (or a physical word processor) and the novel will be either good or bad. You can record a song on a computer or a tape 4-track, and the song will still either be catchy or it won’t. You can paint a picture with an ipad or paint and canvas, and it will be interesting or it won’t.

But there’s no value in “digital” as anything but a tool now. There’s no fascination in it by itself. Computers are unable to produce ideas on their own, despite what the AI investors want you to believe.

My commission to you, from one human being to another, is to regularly come up with ideas and try to bring them to fruition. As an additional challence, I want you to do it without computers, just to prove to yourself that it’s not the computer that comes up with ideas. It’s *you.*

I’m not talking about finished products- I’m talking about ideas. A sketchpad, a notebook, a pocket minicassette recorder- something to just get the ideas down. You can always go back and finish them later.

If you practice doing this, you will find that your creativity will likely increase because your brain is no longer trapped inside a digital prison.

Learn to break free of the mental limitations you put on yourself, and the machines that represent those limitations.

Move past the Digital Age, and embrace the creativity of raw, analog humanity.

Slowing Down: The Ruthless Elimination Of Hurry

I’ve finally gotten to the point where I’m tired of being mentally stimulated all the time. Seriously- I’m getting sick of it.

The problem I have is that, as a geek, I’m constantly interested in and drawn to the internet and social media. Technology in general fascinates me, but not in the way you might think.

My brain is what modern psychologists call “ADHD.” You can name it whatever you want, but in the end, it just means that it’s extremely difficult for me to focus on things that are important if they don’t provide dopamine or stimulation.

And so far, the best thing I’ve found to deal with it is- get this- being bored.

hate being bored. When I was a kid, I would throw temper tantrums about being bored. I didn’t want to play the same game again. I didn’t want to go to the same classes every day. I didn’t want to do anything that wasn’t impulsive or adventurous.

Fast-forward: I’m now 50. My life has become one boring activity after another, over and over and over, until I die. Continue reading “Slowing Down: The Ruthless Elimination Of Hurry”

Is The Doompill Real?

Triangulum Galaxy

“Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
– Dylan Thomas

You may have heard of the words “redpilled” or “bluepilled,” references from the 1999 film The Matrix. The two different pills represented Truth and Ignorance, respectively.

The whole idea of “-pilled” became a thing, and we saw the emergence of words like “blackpilled” and “doompilled” which represent Nihilism and fatalism. They embody the ideas that “nothing we do matters, because the world’s outcome has already been determined.” This itself stems from the idea of Determinism- that everything that happens has already been predetermined.

Does anything really matter?

Does it really matter if we try to fix anything? Does it even matter that we exist at all?

Of course it matters, because we’re not just sentient blobs of dust shambling around on a rock. We are God’s creation, even with all our flaws and imperfections imposed on us by the Dark World. At our core, the very fact that we are sentient is amazing. And to know that we were created this way by an unseen, omnipotent God makes it even more incredible.

And to think that the incredible omnipotent God cares about us, and wants to know us is simply unbelievable.

But it’s 100% true.

 

ADHD and Spirituality, Part 3

You may remember the piece I wrote a while back about ADHD and Faith. Or maybe the one about Spirituality and Mental Disorders.

Have you ever wanted to be able to do something, but weren’t able to mentally do it? Have you ever wondered “If ADHD, or depression is a mental disorder, how does that affect my ability to ‘take every thought captive to be obedient in Christ’?”

How can I “take every thought captive” when my frontal cortex is dysfunctional? Some people will ask “Do you believe God wants you to be focused?” Well, I would hope so… but I also believe God doesn’t want people to die from cancer. And yet it still happens.

“People don’t choose to get sick!” you might say, and you’re right. But I didn’t choose to have ADHD either. I mean, it’s all I’ve ever known, but at no point did anyone ask me if that’s what I wanted.

Furthermore, what I believe about God’s character doesn’t seem to affect my ADHD in any way, as far as I know.  But does my mental “disability” affect my spiritual walk? And if so, how can I know? How can I tell if I’m just spiritually apathetic, or if it’s just my brain refusing to work the way I want it to?

Is there any hope for Christians with ADHD? Continue reading “ADHD and Spirituality, Part 3”

Who’s In Control?

Over the last three years, I’ve come to realize that we’re not in control of much of anything.

“I’m in control of my own destiny!” you exclaim defiantly. “I only do what I want to do!”

But that’s only partially true. One could argue that nobody can force you to do anything, but that’s not true either. They can make your life miserable to the point where you’ll do anything to make it stop. (Side note: this is called torture.)

I’m not talking about Free Will or The Matrix- I’m talking about autonomy.

How much of what we do is “allowed” and how much of it is “free?” If you’re in control of your own actions, but have to change or limit what you do under threat of force, are you really free? Continue reading “Who’s In Control?”

Optimism, Pessimism, Indifference, and Realism

Over the last few years, I’ve witnessed a massive exodus from liberal-controlled social media platforms. These digital refugees have but one singular, but inexcusable common crime: Their perception of reality is still functional.

Indeed, it is true- entire empires of news media have been erected, based on misinformation and lies. Mental illnesses cause people to pretend they are opposite genders, or even a different species of animal, and they are encouraged and applauded as “brave.” The very basic foundation of science and reasoning has become popular opinion, not objective facts. Religion has been twisted into a disgusting caricature of itself, becoming a faint ghost of its former self- impotent to save anyone from anything.

The situation we are in is appalling. But there is much confusion amongst the masses: should we be excited, or outraged, or indifferent? What does the future hold? What is actually important? Continue reading “Optimism, Pessimism, Indifference, and Realism”

The Zen and Creativity of Lego

Believe it or not, this post isn’t going to be about Lego bricks.

I rewind back 35 years and remember building with Lego. The interesting and creative thing about Lego bricks is that they were just basic shapes, but you could assemble them in any way you wanted- sometimes in ways they weren’t intended. But the only limit to what you could build is how many bricks you had, and your imagination.

Today, there are every kind of Lego kit, with all kinds of special pieces, decals, and instructions. You don’t need any creativity to buy a Harry Potter or Star Wars Lego kit and assemble it. It just requires following instructions, and patience.

In the modern “Creative World” there are tons of people cranking out content, but there are precious few people that understand how building blocks of creativity work.

Let me explain:

Music, as we know it today, is made up of building blocks. There are certain fundamental parts to a song that you can assemble different ways, but in the end, they’re what makes something a song. Things like tempo, time signature, instrumentation, key, melody, lyrics, and such are uniquely identifiable parts of a song, but don’t make a song by themselves.

Writing is much the same way. If you’re writing a fiction story, say a sci-fi novel, there are certain things it’s going to have in it. Dialogue, main characters, secondary characters, plot, setting, and so forth. You can change out any of these elements and it becomes a different story- but it’s still recognizable as a story.

If you examine any one of these building blocks by itself, it doesn’t make up a complete work. But they’re necessary to make the whole. Continue reading “The Zen and Creativity of Lego”

Passion or Practicality?

As a Creative, the phrase “Follow your passion!” is both really good, and really horrible advice. Most of the things we’re passionate about are not money-making ideas, because most creatives aren’t passionate about money- we care about art, music, literature, and improving people’s lives in aesthetic ways. This severely limits what we have the resources to do.

The flip side to this, “just give people what they want” and “if it makes money, it’s good” are components of what’s called Pragmatism. Record companies are notorious for this, as are large publishing houses. They make vapid pop music, because vapid pop music is what sells. “If it makes money, how bad could it be?”

Well, if you’re the artist trying to make their vision become reality, it could be disastrous. Continue reading “Passion or Practicality?”