What do certainty, entitlement and control have in common? They are all devoid of reality, and they are the life ambitions of common people. They are the mental obssesions of an ego driven ideological life. Spiritually absent, psychologically broken.
Certainty, entitlement and control are what regular people, people not Americans, want in life. Full of fear, absent of power, they need and seek certainty, entitlement and control.
People use academics to “improve” themselves into a state at which they become sufficiently self-deluded, that they “know” stuff. That “knowledge” the feeling of it, is evidence of psychological self-delusion. Everyone’s had this. It is normal. It is natural. Americans are called to super-nature, not nature.
Knowledge isn’t power; knowledge is insanity. Knowledge is the emotion of religion. Certainty, entitlement and control. The power of God. Insane.
Reality happens while people fake walk their lives.
Ego driven ideology is the core of conflict in life. People hold on with all they’ve got, to their particular delusion of certainty, entitlement and control, their ideology. Fiction culture. They blame and war on reality for not living up to their “standards,” their certianties, entitlements and control. Ego driven ideologists, from Marxist to Islamist (and in between), these religious people expect reality to obey the standards of their ideology, attacking reality for any differences.
The difference between ideology and stories.
We read Harry Potter (or whatever story), and most of us enjoy it as a story. It isn’t ideological to us because we recognize it as a story. But the story of Harry Potter isn’t any more fantastic than any other story of words. The difference between a mere story of words, and ideology, is our investment of certainty, entitlement and control that arises from said story.
A story becomes ideology when we choose to believe the story as real (certainty), and from that belief benefits occur (entitlement), based on our choices of participation (control). All of this is pure fantasy. When the story fails reality, we feel cheated, resentful, and retaliatory. Mind you, there isn’t any certainty, entitlement or control. Never was, never will be. Only participation, the outcome of which isn’t influenced by predictions. “They must PAY!” rages the ego driven ideologist.
Note this: ego driven ideological lives are always in failure. Enough is never enough.
Another difference between ideology and stories is that stories are enjoyable, but ideologies murder. As an American I treat ALL ideologies as stories. Americans are not ideological. 🙂
Benefits of bewilderment, participation, gratitude.
If you’re having a hell of a time day by day; don’t really even want to be here, I get that. What saves me as an American is my faith in God, not my understanding of God. Any understanding of God, no matter how well intended, if invested with belief, becomes an ideology, with the trappings of certainty, entitlement and control.
Because I live spiritually, meaning to trust beyond my ability to see and understand, I’ve lost the need to know, lost my expectations, lost my insistence that things go as I command. I am a participant in the day, not its commander. There is no commander. Bewildered, active, grateful, I’m present to enjoy the day, not worry and fume that it didn’t “go my way.”
Don’t fail where it counts.
Be American. Stay American.
David Weeks, Information Developer, Tampa, Florida. God love us.