"I’m struggling now because, sadly, I feel I have to relinquish that sense of possibility for this civilization as a whole."

~ Daniel Pinchbeck

Read the full article here:

My Identity Crisis

I wonder

Daniel Pinchbeck

if you are familiar with, and how you felt about, the following brief article years ago from

Douglas Rushkoff

:

In a World Run by Algorithms, Weirdness Is Our Best Weapon

How anomalous behavior defeats the systems of social control

From the Article:

Transcending the game altogether means becoming a spoilsport — someone who refuses to acknowledge the playing field, the rules of engagement, or the value of winning. (Why win, anyway, if it’s only going to end the game?) In certain non-Western cultures, the spoilsport is the shaman, who lives apart from the tribe in order to see the larger patterns and connections. In a world where a person’s success is measured by career achievements, the spoilsport is the one willing to sacrifice commercial reward for social good. In a middle school where social media likes are the metric of popularity, the spoilsport is the kid who deletes the app or chooses not to own a phone at all. The spoilsport takes actions that make no sense within the logic of the game.

Such anomalous behavior challenges convention, breaks the conspiracy of conformity, and stumps the algorithms. A.I.s and other enforcers of social control can’t follow what they can’t categorize. Weirdness is power, dissolving false binaries and celebrating the full spectrum of possibility. Eccentricity opens the gray area where mutations develop and innovations are born.

We can assert our uniquely human sides through things like humor and pranks, music and magic — none of which can be appreciated or even understood by machines or markets. Comedy demands that we identify with someone else and recognize our plight in theirs. Music communicates through aesthetics, while art challenges our sense of self and our relationship to the outer world. Stage magic confounds our logical sensibilities, contrasting the way things appear with the way we know they should be, while spiritual magick explores the seemingly impossible relationship between our will and the workings of the universe.

Forget possibilty

Daniel Pinchbeck

and step into the Preposterous with me. I have a magickal screenplay, let’s get together in person and film… bring Marianne Williamson and Jane Fonda with you.

There’s hope where there is faith, you cannot straddle the fence any more… otherwise yes, give up.