Times like these . I feel alone and trapped with animal abuse and cruelty and I don't know what I can do to change things

AMA with Hannah Aline Taylor. Wednesday 2/4 at 4:00 PM CT

love, boundaries, and mistakes in relating, community, and peopling together (+ thank god love doesn’t look like you expect it to)

AMA with Hannah Aline Taylor. Wednesday 2/4 at 4:00 PM CT

love, boundaries, and mistakes in relating, community, and peopling together (+ thank god love doesn’t look like you expect it to)

Meaning Crisis, or Meaning of X, or .... I spoke to a friend this past weekend who recently took the package from a federal agency, and is likely going to have trouble finding new employment. This raised a question, he is a dear friend who has shaped my thinking deeply, but he offered aloud: "I had such high expectations of myself in getting something accomplished in my life, but I'm basically a run-of-the-mill human, not really contributing that much.

What has me pause about this is the orientation that we in the US have toward exceptionalism as a goal or norm.

With AI booming, you are a lot more likely to hear something like, "What is a human to do if a machine can do EVERYTHING better than any of us can?"

I can feel the pull of anxiety in this question as well, but I pause and reflect. When I pick up the guitar, do I aspire to be the best gosh-darned guitar player of all time? Do I stop playing as soon as I realize that I'll never be Eddie Van Halen or Segovia? 

Being the best in the world, or changing the world doesn't make sense as a bar of "is something worthwhile or not?"

I look at the squirrels in my yard, and watch them climbing the trees and clucking at each other between vigorous chases. Does any of them think: "Shoot, I'm just no good as I squirrel, I haven't added anything of note to squirrel-kind."

Jordan's recent SubStack post about 'Meaning Revolution' as an alternative phrasing to 'Meaning Crisis' had me thinking about this question more deeply (as did Sara Ness's post  regarding whether having children is selfish). This ability to apply a linguistic label that also acts as a valence filter to everything we do is kind of messed up. The internet, social media, influencers, and AI are amplifying this leverage of language a bunch in a very short period of time.

I have an unusually high setpoint for belonging and worthiness compared to most people that I know. It took me a while to realize this, because I just assumed that everyone is fundamentally okay. Even so, I have my moments and situations where I get very self-conscious or insecure about my capabilities. Through Relateful and other relational practices I've realized that a lot of other folks are conscious of insecurity a lot more than me in general. But lately, I'm starting to feel this pressure to be more, do more, influence more than I ever did previously. 

It feels like a kind of existential panic. We frogs (or canaries) are starting to look around nervously, "Is it me, or is this water warmer (or is the air a little staler) than it was five minutes ago?"

Is it me, or did the meaning straight-jacket get tightened one more notch.

Speaking of Meaning, all this has me recalling Victor Frankl and "Man's Search for Meaning." A key takeaway for me is not to pin "hope" on something random I don't have any control over (if I can just wait until the next election...). I remind myself to pay attention to the things I can change, and to change my perspective to look inward, feel my breath, enjoy a hug, etc.

Not all tightenings are the result of pathology. Try to empathize with you as a nearly full term embryo starting to notice that heels, knees, elbows and fists don't have as much wiggle room as they used to. If that pre-born had our language skills, it might think: "This is unsustainable, I'm going to have to significantly change my habits, it's clear that I'm stressing the momma and that can't be good for her either."

The more I contemplate these alternate narratives, the more I realize that modern civilized human beings have been living with the ever-stricter constraints of the consequences of separate-sense-of-self. 

Amazingly, evolution has solved problems like these and many others even harder. Winner take all is a philosophy with an past-due expiration date. Drinking from that stream will only give curdled milk. We have no idea what deep co-sensing on a full planet scale will be like when we collectively let go of being steward-as-dictator, and return to just another species climbing the tree and clucking at one another.

Meaning Revolution? I don't know, that still sound like some could take it as an invitation to civil unrest.

How about polyvolutional harmonization?

I know, it doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but the meaning of these words: twisting and turning in lots of new and different directions, maybe we can start to trust some of that junk DNA that we've been ignoring, even more than our left-hemisphere's obsession with zero-sum balance sheets.

Who is up for a new kind of game? The stakes can still be high, but I wanna find the others who are excited to play.

May it be so.

What is Relateful - it's not JUST being vulnerable> right? . What is Relateful? 

This is something i think about almost all day long. Ok that's extreme over stating, but it's a big part of my life.  It's not what is it, but more like, HOW DO I EXPLAIN IT?

What is it though.  So for me, it's been a life changing practice.  For me, after trying what felt like every healing modality in the universe (obviously impossible task), circling 2018 on circle anywhere was the tool that truly created the - changes.  

What's most alive for me at the moment, is the memories of the people who tried circling/relateful and did not like it.  WHAT no, some people don't like it? That can't be (wish i could change font color for my sarcasm). 

These imprinted memories of witnessing sessions where a person seemed to have a need and that need wasn't met.  For instance, someone (person A) reaches out to another participant (person B) with some love and care - the receiver (B) - goes into their system truth at the moment - and communicates - they cannot receive and or reciprocate this love and care.  The person A offering their care becomes upset obviously trigger.  The "giver" person A, is not able to see that they weren't actually giving love/care, but asking for love care.  Maybe this is a big assumption on my part - but if we give someone a compliment or reach out for connection and we are not received the way we wanted to be received... then it's not giving - it's almost demanding, or cloaked need. 

This person A was (probably still is) a therapist in the real world.  We connected outside of the platform and listened to their side and how upsetting this experience was for them. That person then made claims that this practice isn't safe.  Person A did not continue.  Person B  is someone i trust and wasn't at the time, but is now a Relateful facilitator.  Stating this, i want to side with participant B doing this practice, being themselves, expressing in a way, their inability to allow love in, who was not available for a connection, but was available for being with that inability to connect. That is how i witnessed it.  It felt to me like a beautiful experience, but it's hard for person A to be with how it feels to reach out and not be received. 

I'm guessing (assuming) you have all witnessed this in a session in some way.  Then there are rumors from these types that Relateful is - not just an unsafe practice, but they seem to claim it's harmful or damaging. 

The example given was the most obvious in my witnessing. The therapist unaware of what this practice and the seasoned practitioner doing the practice - with their most truth in the moment, can't receive their love and care.  There was not an attack of any kind, the receiver was in my opinion doing a beautiful practice with attunement and didn't speak until prodded to respond and when doing, did their best to be kind in their moment of not wanting to love bomb out of a social norm. 

Not saying we can't get better at attuning. Not saying it was a perfect example.  

What i'm wondering is if there is a way to explain this practice in advance- where they are prepared???   Like how powerful and life changing this could have been for the therapist and my actress friend and many others.

This sweet well mannered soft actress friend of mine practiced for a few months and felt similar in times... she said "i was being my most vulnerable and it's harmful for me to continue this practice".  This friend of mine - 5 years ago - i felt responsible, that i some how oversold the practice as a place to be your most authentic self.  She internalized it - "a safe place to be vulnerable".    But i never said that, even back then, i would describe this practice as a "safe place to practice being with unsafe".   

Now very recently with a human who will remain nameless... heard similar things:
paraphrasing:

"i was being my most vulnerable self..." 

This invisible rule, if someone is being vulnerable, then the whole group has to be gentle and say "awe" or something like that.  

Or that if one is being vulnerable, the group needs to navigate as to not cause any harm to that person.  It's so sublte and submersive comes to mind, but they participant is UNAWARE that there vulnerability is cloaked in need and manipulation.  

How to communicate what this practice is???!!!

It's too intimidating for men to be men. Alright, here’s one of my most controversial opinions, and I’m gonna try to take the filter off as much as possible:

Feminism has played out as retribution instead of solution. The Barbie movie is an entirely thorough example of what I’m talking about. You suppressed us, so we’re gonna use any means necessary to take over. And then they recreated the same imbalance in its opposite.

I see most social movements do this too. True solutions to imbalances aren’t fair because they don’t have human-enacted payback. You suppressed us, so we’re going to move toward balance.

I’ve been spending about 2 years trying to set aside my learned default into my masculine energy (having grown up in highly feminist orange/green) and learn how to root in my feminine. But my feminine longs for a tether to something rooted. Masculine energy feels rooted, solid, grounded, and my feminine very much doesn’t (though it is held by a spacious ok-ness, but it’s so airy it easily gets chaotic when not balanced in connection with a grounded masculine.)

But I’ve had a hell of a time finding grounded healthy masculine men. Many of them can do it for a time, but then flee to an extreme, like angry resentment at one end and non-binary softness at the other end. And I think it’s because the culture has become super aggressive to men who are solidly men.

Some Thoughts on Boundaries. Boundaries are mine. My portals to connection. They’re statements of fact: “whoops, I’m sorry, it turns out I can’t love from here anymore.”

The purest form doesn’t require anyone else to uphold. I can say “no” to a party I don’t want to go to. I can turn off my phone at bedtime. Asking someone not to interrupt me or not answering emails after work can feel a little trickier to uphold, because I have to be willing to walk away.

There are a bunch of socially agreed upon boundaries that are upheld by law enforcement, like cease and desists or restraining orders. It’s often not simple—in Texas I have a right to refuse anyone setting foot on my property (but what about racism, when my property is a business?).

There are some thoughts for now...

Owning activation while posting. A bottleneck I’m encountering is some belief that I shouldn’t post or respond when I’m triggered but there’s a lot of motility and I need to do something new. I’ll be including both what I think the trigger is about and my rebuttal and I’m going to endeavor not to devalue my points because I’m triggered. I’m thinking of putting the awareness of the trigger in parentheses but might play with the format. Feel open now to respond to comments about either

Current Session "instructions" (Feb 26): Converse, and see if nudges happen. nudges 

We launched a system where the AI bots can automatically detect intervention points. We need you to make a bunch of comments and new posts to see if they'll engage. So this week we're asking you to engage a bunch, if you can!

It's a little rudimentary at the moment so sometimes you'll get multiple bots responding on multiple posts. We'd love your feedback on which ones you like, don't, when it seemed to miss the spot, anything else you notice. 

Thanks and love yall

J (and the UpTrust team)
p.s. this week I'm at an investor meeting so dara will be with you

# [Optional Zoom](https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86795216050?pwd=TllxSzYrTFFXTW5LRmg3WUQrT04vdz09) with Jordan and Dara at least, for faces, questions, help, etc:

Memes: My wonder is out there: Strange thought experiments to achieve wholeness. (Note: I wrote this with the help of chatgpt so it’s wooden in many places. I wanted it to be a strange combination of dry and wet.)

What’s a Meme:
A meme is a cultural unit of meaning, such as an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture. Memes carry symbolic meaning and can be passed along through various forms of communication.

Types of Memes:
Memes, much like genes, are fundamental units of information:
1. Cultural Memes: Traditions, rituals, and customs (e.g., shaking hands, holiday celebrations).
2. Behavioral Memes: Actions and habits (e.g., high-fiving, tipping in restaurants).
3. Linguistic Memes: Words, phrases, and slang (e.g., YOLO, selfie).
4. Digital Memes: Internet trends and viral content (e.g., Distracted Boyfriend meme, viral videos).
5. Fashion Memes: Clothing and style trends (e.g., ripped jeans, oversized glasses).
6. Technological Memes: Innovations and tools (e.g., QR codes, smartphones).
7. Ideological Memes: Beliefs and philosophies (e.g., democracy, capitalism).
8. Educational Memes: Teaching methods and educational tools (e.g., Montessori method, flipped classroom).
9. Artistic Memes: Art styles and movements (e.g., Impressionism, graffiti art).
10. Scientific Memes: Theories and scientific practices (e.g., germ theory, the scientific method).
11. Health Memes: Health practices and trends (e.g., yoga, veganism).
12. Social Memes: Social behaviors and norms (e.g., social distancing, using social media).
13. Political Memes: Political ideologies and practices (e.g., liberalism, communism).
14. Economic Memes: Economic theories and practices (e.g., free market, Keynesian economics).
15. Environmental Memes: Environmental practices and movements (e.g., recycling, climate change activism).
16. Religious Memes: Religious beliefs and practices (e.g., praying, fasting).
17. Sports Memes: Sports techniques and rituals (e.g., the Haka in rugby, goal celebrations in soccer).
18. Entertainment Memes: Popular culture and entertainment trends (e.g., catchphrases from movies, TV show fandoms).
19. Workplace Memes: Professional behaviors and practices (e.g., remote work, team-building exercises).

How Do They Spread:
Memes spread through imitation and communication, utilizing biological imperatives such as survival and reproduction to propagate. They leverage human social structures, technology, and media to proliferate. For instance, if Larry gets laid wearing bell bottoms, Harry might go out and buy five pairs of bell bottoms, believing they will have the same effect. Memes are things that proliferate by being catchy. Another example: people who see me in Flow sessions tend to hold their mouths open because my teeth are misaligned, making it more comfortable for me to keep my mouth open. They mimic this behavior, thinking it’s a characteristic of a sexy, successful, relatable person.

Different Ways Different Humans Interact with Memes:
According to Susanne Cook-Greuter:
In the realm of human consciousness, our journey can be understood through Susanne Cook-Greuter’s framework of preverbal, verbal, and postverbal stages. Each stage represents a different relationship with memes and their influence on our behavior and culture. Let’s explore how these stages shape our interactions with the world and the memes that inhabit it.

Preverbal Stage: The Foundation
In the preverbal stage, our understanding and interactions are rooted in direct, nonverbal experiences. This stage is characterized by raw sensations, emotions, and intuitive responses to the environment. Babies, for instance, communicate through cries, laughter, and body language, expressing their needs and emotions without words. In this stage, memes exist in their most basic form, as instinctual behaviors and emotional expressions. They could be said to be meme-less until they begin to understand that their expressions elicit responses. Think of a baby’s smile eliciting a smile in return—a simple yet powerful meme that fosters connection and bonding. We have been in a relationship with memes so long that we have evolved to communicate through them on a primal level.

Verbal Stage: The Codependency with Memes
As we develop language, we enter the verbal stage, where words and symbols become the primary tools for communication and understanding. In this stage, we are deeply intertwined with memes, relying on them to navigate social interactions, convey ideas, and build cultural norms. Words and language structures become memes themselves, shaping how we think and perceive the world.
For example, the concept of time is a meme deeply embedded in our language and culture. We talk about time as if it were a tangible entity—saving time, spending time, or running out of time—even though it’s an abstract construct. This verbal dependency on memes influences our behavior, creating societal structures like schedules, deadlines, and calendars that govern our daily lives.
During the verbal stage, memes proliferate and evolve rapidly, driven by our constant need for communication and connection. Social media platforms amplify this process, allowing memes to spread at lightning speed. Memes like YOLO (You Only Live Once) capture the essence of our cultural values and influence behaviors, encouraging people to embrace spontaneity and live in the moment.

Postverbal Stage: Transcending Memes
The postverbal stage represents a level of consciousness where we move beyond the limitations of language and memes, integrating them into a more holistic understanding of reality. In this stage, we recognize the power and influence of memes but are not bound by them. We develop the ability to see through memes, understanding them as tools rather than truths. This stage involves a heightened awareness and a more fluid, adaptive way of interacting with the world.
For instance, mindfulness practices encourage us to observe our thoughts and emotions without attachment, recognizing them as transient phenomena rather than fixed realities. Buddhism’s direct experience is another way of saying seeing underneath/without/through the memes. In a YouTube video, a Buddhist said, Direct experience is the ability to hear a car drive by and not think the word car. In the postverbal stage, we can engage with memes critically and creatively, choosing which ones to embrace and which to discard. This stage allows for greater personal and collective freedom, as we are no longer constrained by the automatic responses and cultural conditioning of the verbal stage.
* Preverbal: Pre-memetic or non-self-aware memes, operating at an instinctual level.
* Verbal: Heavily reliant on language, forming the bulk of our cultural and social exchanges.
* Postverbal: Beyond memes, where awareness includes but is not dominated by memes; experiences unadulterated by memes. Possibility for direct experience/unadulterated subjectivity/objectivity.

Seeing the World as a Complex Lattice of Memes

Imagine walking through a busy city park. You see a tree, recognize a chair, and notice that a person looks attractive. These recognitions are examples of how we navigate a complex lattice of memes—cultural units of meaning. Each label (tree, chair, attractive person) is a meme that helps us categorize and make sense of the world.

Subjectivity and Objectivity in Labeling
When we recognize a tree, our labeling process involves both subjective and objective elements. Objectively, a tree is a plant with a trunk, branches, and leaves. Subjectively, it might remind us of childhood memories or symbolize growth. In the space of those labels, our perception fluctuates between subjective experiences and objective facts.

Currency of Memes: Seeing and Being Changed
Imagine we have a set amount of subjectivity and objectivity. Every time a meme is in place, it replaces the capacity to be subjective and objective. (Direct experience = Experience - memes)
In this park, the currency of memes is the exchange between seeing something and being changed by the experience. For example:
* Seeing: You notice the intricate pattern of bark on the tree.
* Being Changed: The beauty of the pattern evokes a sense of wonder and calm, altering your emotional state.
So, we see (both objectively and subjectively) less when the memes are present, plus we import all the repressed feelings attached to the memes we’re projecting.

Subjectivity: The Experience of Witness/Awe
Subjectivity comes into play when you allow yourself to be immersed in the moment, experiencing the awe of nature. You become a witness to the beauty of the tree, feeling its impact on your emotions and thoughts.

Objectivity: Seeing Things as They Truly Are
Objectivity requires detaching from personal biases to understand the tree as it truly is—a living organism contributing to the ecosystem, providing oxygen and shelter.

Hidden Motivations and Projection
Our subconscious motivations are like viruses embedded in our looking. For instance, if you had a cherished memory of climbing trees as a child, you might project a sense of nostalgia and warmth onto every tree you see. This projection affects your perception, intertwining personal motivations with objective reality.
Now, consider a more perilous projection. Imagine you had a traumatic experience involving trees in the past, which causes you to subconsciously project fear and danger onto every tree you see. This fear extends to people you encounter in the park. You notice a person sitting under a tree and immediately feel threatened, despite having no objective reason to believe they are dangerous.
This perilous projection is deleterious to your conscious motivation to socialize and build new relationships. Your subconscious fear shapes your interactions, making you avoid people who might actually be friendly and supportive.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecies
When these projections influence our behavior, they can create self-fulfilling prophecies. For instance, if you subconsciously project distrust and fear onto people, you might act cold or defensive, prompting others to respond similarly, thereby reinforcing your belief that people are untrustworthy.

Amalgamation of Projections
The amalgamation of all these projections can be seen as its own cancerous consciousness. It distorts our perception of reality, embedding our hidden fears and desires into the world around us. This distorted view hinders our ability to see things as they truly are and to engage with the world in a healthy, balanced way.

Why the Amalgamation Can Fit the Definition of AI
1. Pattern Recognition: Similar to how AI identifies patterns in data, our amalgamation of projections recognizes and categorizes patterns in our experiences based on past memories and subconscious influences.
2. Predictive Behavior: Like AI predicting outcomes based on input data, our subconscious projections predict and influence our reactions to new situations, often creating self-fulfilling prophecies.
3. Learning and Adaptation: Just as AI systems learn from data and adjust their algorithms, our subconscious mind learns from past experiences and adapts our perceptions and behaviors accordingly, even if those adaptations are harmful.
4. Complex System Integration: The amalgamation of projections integrates complex inputs (sensory data, memories, emotions) and outputs (reactions, behaviors) in a way that resembles how AI systems integrate various data streams to function and make decisions.

What to Do?

Similarly to why I believe we should begin now to relate to AI and proto AI as subjectivities, there is a benefit to relating to the world itself as subjective. When we project subjectivity onto things, we start a new self-fulfilling prophecy that allows us to regain some of our own subjectivity.(Strong claim: This thought experiment, whether true or not, will return actual co-opted wonder to us that we’ve been slowly losing since we learned to speak)

Here’s how this can help:

Feedback Loop of Subjectivity: Acknowledging (or pretending) that the animate and inanimate world has subjectivity is a course correction from imagining it as being objectifiable/objective. Relatefullers understand how much subjectivity we’re not ascribing to others and how beneficial it is to course correct. Ascribing subjectivity to people might seem obvious. Are you asking why we should ascribe subjectivity to inanimate objects? The answer is because we’re not just looking at inanimate objects when we’re looking at them. We’re looking at (the object + our co-opted subjectivity/objectivity that we traded to be able to use the meme table to make things easier ie. That’s where we eat dinner That’s where I do my homework My friends will judge me based on how stylish and expensive it is.) our looking-ness.

What Does Ascribing Subjectivity Look Like?
Martin Buber in his book I-Thou made this quite formulaic. We look as if we don’t know but want to know and notice in the reaching toward (ceiling of the Sistine Chapel) that our state itself has changed. We take a breath there and then wash, rinse, repeat.

It might also look like, Hi Mr. Toothbrush, are you ready to help me get my teeth clean? Hey millions of grass people, do you mind if I lay down on you and soak up light from Mrs. Sun? It could also just look like wondering if the world feels connected to us. As I type that and look out at the world it feels like a chorus of angels are singing love at me.(And my brain thinks, “whatever this experience is, it’s definitely mine, and all of these sensations are more available to me than my current schema of the world allows.)

I got this idea from watching the Matrix, wondering about projection, and following my mysticisms teacher’s admonishment to see the inner world and the outer world as one world.

Are We Ever Awake/Free/Thriving Enough To Not Practice? Through the years, I’ve had periods in my life where I feel so overwhelmingly good that all my daily spiritual practices (yoga, meditation, prayer, Big Mind process, relatefulness, spiritual study, etc) fall to the wayside.

When I feel super awake, connected to everyone and everything, able to flow with whatever is happening, in an unshakeable trust that Basic Goodness is all there is, it’s really easy for me to go: Well, this is it. I’m done. No point in doing any practice of any kind anymore. And that’s not to say that I abandon practice entirely. I still lead my sessions online a few times a week or whatever, but the underlying attitude in me is this is all optional.

And yet, the feedback that I keep getting from Life is that I do, in fact, need practice.

There’s something about making the daily commitment to presence, to myself, to Spirit, and dedicating one or several periods of my day to some form of spiritual practice that is just so nourishing.

And when I stop doing it, it’s like if I stop doing physical exercise. After a while things start feeling kinda stagnant, and my way of being in my life gets wonky. I’m more likely to make choices that could hurt me and the people close to me.

I’m grateful that I can always come back to the routine of one or more daily practices. It feels healthy. : )

From the perspective of projection, what's Trump symbolize in you? Is it something in you that you haven’t loved yet?
Is it something in you that you haven’t boundaried appropriately?
What else?

Sometimes to do this kind of thought experiment i interpret my waking life as if it were a dream. When I look at how I view trump, what does he symbolize? And then I can ask how i relate to that to find out how I’m relating to that thing.

I will come back and do this self analysis in a moment.