Month: February 2024

In search of lost time

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In search of lost time

Easily one of the greatest books of all time. It follows the life of the author and his experiences throughout his life. “In search of lost time” covers the subjects of Love, homosexuality, death, old age, art, the Dreyfus case, social conventions, politics, family, friends, the war and lost time. It is such a masterpiece. If only I could write like Proust. He writes like a detailed painting. You can see the brush strokes in his words. You can see the different hues. His words are passionate and full of life like Spring. His words are so vivid, they evoke feelings and transport you to his time. He describes everything in its smallest detail. He is reflective and honest. He can make you laugh and he can make you sad. He makes you reflect about your life, your decisions, your future. He makes you see how tragic life really is. Even with all the money in the world and the most esteemed people by your side, it still doesn’t mean anything. The esteemed people in the highest positions in the world are still humans and they have a nature that is universal. They have fears, they are in a world in which they didn’t create, a world they cannot successfully navigate because there is no blueprint, they are vulnerable to sickness and death and despite their best efforts they don’t know what they are doing. Boredom is an inescapable fact of life and so they keep themselves occupied with social conventions. They attend parties and invite other celebrated individuals and talk art all day. They talk art, books, music, drama and fashion. At least that gives life meaning. It makes it bearable. I learned important social skills and emotional intelligence is important in the context of life. Social skills and Emotional intelligence is better than IQ. You can be high in IQ but if your peers and colleagues find your conduct undesirable you risk being stagnant and never moving in an upward trajectory. Social skills and Emotional skills is how you navigate your way through life. It is how you find desirable mates, it is how you increase your list of acquaintances. Acquaintances enable you to move up the social ladder. You must be able to perceive and regulate other people’s emotions. That is true intelligence because human beings are emotion creatures. The ability to regulate your impulses and act in a just manner will attract things to you, it will enable you to move up. Social skills and emotional intelligence are important because as you navigate the world you meet different people with different tastes and customs. You encounter foreign traditions, a high level of emotional intelligence will enable you to be open-minded as you won’t fall prey to your urge to exert you ego, this will enable you to communicate and project yourself with desirable effects. “In search of lost time” centers a lot around society and social conventions, it explores finding favor with people, undesirable qualities in individuals and how to be well-liked and adored. The characters in these social classes are intellectuals bred from the highest aristocratic families in the world, they are the elite. This doesn’t mean they are snobbish, although a couple of characters do exhibit this snobbery behavior but rather that they are finicky and know proper culture. They engage in stimulating and witty conversations. I have to admit I loved going to the Duchess Guermantes place. It was good and she was charming. Orianne oh, my beautiful Orianne. She was funny and witty and everyone loved being in her presence. She also didn’t just entertain anyone, you had to be of a certain pedigree, you had to be a master of your trade, you had to be cultured, you had to be interesting, you had to be special. The parties were quite exquisite and wonderful. I enjoyed being in the presence of great people and engaging with them. It was quite an experience!

“In search of lost time” also explores the subject of love and how peculiar it is. The first volume of the book covers the love affair between Charles Swann and Odette De Crecy. Swann an important man in the eyes of society falls in love with a peasant girl Odette. He loves her despite her infidelities. He is conscious of her infidelities and yet he still persists. He gives her money, he does absolutely everything for her. Odette makes him suffer through jealous streaks and unquenchable paranoia. This is what draws Swan to Odette, the suffering, it is familiar to him and he just can’t get over it. Swanns is repressed and as such his subconscious is doing all the navigating in the world. Swann loves Odette with all his heart and he figures that’s enough. Eventually, Odette will come around. This makes Swann a laughing stock in the eyes of society because evidently the peasant girl is using him for his money. Swann knows this and he accepts it since it enables him to be with Odette. This is the strange thing about love, we love what makes us suffer, we love what is familiar. Because love is a psychological phenomena, we love the repressed qualities of ourselves and project them onto another person. This is explored in the work of Carl Jung with his Amina and Animus. I am not attributing the Anima for Swanns situation but it is the most intelligeable option. Besides, consciousness is a difficult topic to explore because no one can account for it, at least work has been done on the subconscious mind. Love is difficult because it can be unconscious like most of our actions. And so the most intelligent conclusion would be to say that Swann didn’t know what he was doing neither did Odette. Swann was attracted to the suffering that Odette was inflicting on him. This says a lot about the human condition, the fact that we need suffering to feel alive, to be alive. Numerous other love affairs are covered in the book like the authors affair with Albertine, a Femme Fatale who almost leads Proust in the wrong direction. Albertine too makes Proust suffer and it is what reels him in. The book also covers the authors infatuation with the Duchess Guermantes. This infatuation locks him in a trance of behavior that he doesn’t understand. He becomes obsessed with her. He spies and gathers data about her and when she takes her walks. He ultimately falls in love with her and talks at great length about her features and fashion sense. He asks his friend to introduce him to her considering that they are family and everything blossoms from there onwards. This behavior exhibited by the author shows us that love is not logical. Love is the ego exerting itself. Love is selfish and consumes. Love possess like a demon. Love is the universal unconscious form exerting itself on life. It is pheromones in the air that accessing a unwilling host. It is a phenomenon that just happens to you. Popular culture often talks about “Love at first sight” perhaps there is scientific evidence in this notion. It would certainly explain the concept of homosexuality and the urge for young boys like the character M. De Charlus in book. Maybe Charles Darwin didn’t cover the whole scope of evolution. Surely, this is only De. Charlus’ nature. M. De. Charlus is portrayed like a zealot who engages in morally unjustified and elusive behavior, maybe the society in Prousts time is wrong. The fundamental question here is that do we choose who to love? Perhaps the idea of choice is our biggest illusion.

The book also covers our common ground, the destination we all share namely death and old age. It is a certainty that we are all going to die. That our family, friends and cherished acquaintances will all some day perish leaving nothing but a memory and even that isn’t much because they vanish and die down like smoke. Proust communicates to the reader how fragile life is, how nothing in this existence is ever guaranteed and the importance of orienting yourself to your passions. This is important because life goes where energy flows. For Proust writing brought him solace and he was able to navigate life because of this passion, it gave his life meaning in an otherwise meaningless life where we all experience boredom, suffering, old age and ultimately our demise. These ideas are also covered in Martin Scorsese classic movie “The Irishman” where death and old age follows us to its climax. This is useful because death can serve as a catalyst to show us how to live. Death inspires and teaches you how to appreciate life and live in the present. After all, the present is all we ever have, everything else is just an illusion. Urban poet Kanye West makes this point on his sophomore album “The Late Registration” on the song “Drive Slow” and he advises the listener to fully be present because you never really know what can happen tomorrow. He favors a life of meaning over expediency. In the book several of the authors close family members and acquaintances die including Aunt, grandmother, girlfriend and best friend. This serves as a reminder that nothing lasts forever. It serves as a reminder to never take life for granted. We also see Proust maturing in the eyes of society, we see him as a young man full of youthful exuberance and him maturing into an old man who is teased and made fun off by the current generation of youthfuls. We see the Duchess Guemantees lose her wit, charm and beauty because of time. We see her position replaced. We see countless marriages happen because of death and separations. We see people rise up to the top of society. We see people who had it all and lost it all. We see regrets, we see people never reaching their potential. Throughout the book humannature is put through the microscope and we observe people’s tendencies and habits. It is habits that make a person and we are judged by our actions. Words are used to deceive and don’t carry any weight. Proust teaches us that life is short. In today’s climate and world, the life expendency is 70 and we spend a third of that time sleeping. Another third of it is spent doing things like brushing our teeth, commuting to work, eating, entertainment and work. We have a third of that to ourselves, that third is less than 15 years. How do you plan on spending that? What habits can you caltivate to ensure you live a meaningful life? Is self-development important to you? Whose life are you living? Is your life worth living? These are the types of questions that Proust forces us to answer about our life. We are all going to die, the youth is going to force us into retire, we are all going to be insignificant, we are all going to be useless, we are all going to vanish and leave no trace of time. Time is an illusion anyways, time is a creation of man created as a means to dominate nature, everything is what it is. Proust teaches us to make the best of the present moment every chance we get. Proust teaches us to elevate our perspective, he teaches us that change is the only constant.

Thank you Marcel

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Sandton City

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Sandton City

I had a date with destiny. She was everything I thought I wanted. She was prosperous and promised to share her riches with me. She was gorgeous with her make-up on and towering heels. She resembled a Mac advertisement like Pearl Thusi. Damn! I was star struck, lights were flickering all about, it was like a dream and I was unconscious, locked in a trance of Gucci patterns and colors. She was glorious. I was impressed but that was not enough for her. To grant my hearts desires I had to give her my soul. To relinquish control of my core beliefs and values. She wanted my blood on the contract. It was a big test for me. Do I give in and get lost in the magic maze? Or do I stay put and believe in my process and believe that time will prove me right? I’ve been hungry all my life, starved to the bone, dreaming, contemplating about forever and her role in my life. I come from a place of broken dreams, Alex, the hood, a place where dreams die. There’s a reason it’s called Gomorrah, it’s biblical, because it can be hell. Will Sandton City save me with her designer dress and Louis Vuitton handbag? Am I willing to recede into the darkness with her? I have been broke for so long that I feel like a virgin. Do I trust her? She wants too much, I can’t. I will not bend to her rules, her conventions of passivity. She wants to dominate and make all the decisions for me. While life is a stage, I am not a puppet stringed along by a puppeteer. Unfortunately, this is not a Charlie Kaufman movie, this is my life and I am the lead, the star. Maybe if she encouraged growth and freewill. For goodness sakes I am life, a miracle; I sometimes wonder how am I conscious, who are you to want to control that? God? I wish she loved me for who I am. That’s a big frailty in the psychology of man, the tendency to want to be loved and accepted for our intrinsic qualities even though life is subjective and relative. The nerve, we truly are narcissistic creatures. Still, I thought you’d be the one to stroke my ego. It’s a tragedy that life never unfolds the way we want it to. I couldn’t take your offer I am sorry. I am better than this. I am not someone you can ground. I vibrate on a higher frequency. I am too opinionated and yes, I am a “Mr. Know it all” who thinks he knows it all. I won’t apologize for being an individual. I won’t apologize for thinking for myself. I see the world through my lens and don’t seek confirmation from anyone. Do I have a problem with authority? Yes, and I am an egotistical narcissist who has grand visions about his future. That I say with pride. And maybe I am deluded but you can’t bring me down with your domineering and condescending words. You cannot validate who I am, that’s my job. I am too dimensional. I am too great. I emit an energy that’s commanding and my presence is felt like acid to the burning flesh. I am fire, a phenomenon you can’t keep your eyes off. I am exciting like the first day of the new year, I represent great prospects. I am overwhelming like running water in a glass. I am the best. Keep your promises of grandeur, I don’t worship false prophets. I create my own destiny, play the cards that I deal and dominate the world I walk on. While it’s true that I am too hungry, I won’t just eat anything. I am too finicky like a rich housewife better yet a Duchess, a Princess in the upper echelon of the aristocratic circle and so, I never settle. I know my worth. I know where I want to be. It will only take a moment for everything to change. I want it, the winning shot, the headlines, my name in lights, the glory! I will wait for my break, it’s coming.

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The narcissist

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The narcissist

Mr. Center of attention, loud and space consumer, grounding other people’s participation like detention. Miss “its not my fault you’re so sensitive”. Like “I’m sorry, if you’re offended”. Keep your half baked apologies that are conditional like the weather. You ain’t never gonna change. You think you’re the axis and the world revolves around you. Mr. Monotonising the focus, expert manipulator stringing peoples emotions like Geppetto. You’re not the only real boy in this tale. Miss tantrums and ego trips, oblivious to how you make others feel. Flossing and bragging like you’re on MTV cribs. Mr. starting fights in the clubs and bruising ribs, spoiling the fun for everyone like a canceled trip. Mr ultrasensitive, Mr. know it all, volitile temper, everyone is always wrong and you’re the victim. The victim of circumstance, victim of ill treatment, victim of past experiences, victim of life, everyone hates you and you never asked for all of this – please, no one cares. Miss “I am prettier than her, I’d never wear that, and I only eat gourmet”. We see through your pretentious persona like transparent glass, disguised by your make-up and costumes like Kayfabe, life is not WWE or Keeping up with the Kardashians. Mr. Hogging all the spotlight like “Imma let you finish, but Beyoncé had one of the greatest videos of all time”. Miss always talking and never listens to anybody; so much for the two ears and one mouth. Mr. Maui, Demi-God of wind and sea, shape-shifting your way out of responsibility with your crooked hook; “what can I say, you’re welcome”. Miss big personality, Queen Bee, imposing your will on your workforce with an iron fist. Mr fabricator of stories that conveniently suit your narrative and expands your inflated ego. Miss control freak dictating everything like a beast. Mr. take credit for your ideas and work. Miss show off with no substance, empty as a tin can. Mr. Blame everyone else and point fingers only to disregard the 3 pointing back. Miss destroy your confidence and frame to gain advantage over your mind. Mr. & Miss deep rooted insecurities, chronic bullies, passive aggressive energy, no self-awareness, self absorbed, so whack.

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Between her thighs

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Between her thighs

She told me she loved me and at that moment I was trapped because I was only interested in what was between her thighs. I felt it was a premeditated move consciously executed to land her man. She is vindictive and this is a ploy to possess all of me like a prisoner, a slave. That is what love is all about, control over the other person. Love is strategic ploy to weaken and exploit. Love is a flanking maneuver that surprises and hurts the opposition. Love is tact to make somebody vulnerable, a blow that makes a soldier reeling and a poison that kills without medical assistance. Love is war, deadly and compromising. I resent the notion that we were made of gold and sunshine. That is not what a human being is at all because like Nietzsche once stated, even good actions are sublimated evil ones. She showed her hand too soon. It was rash, impulsive, expedient and unsedective. Still, I had to be careful because I knew where that blurt came from. It was truthful expression on her side, her shadow and it came from a fabricated reality. All of her life she has been chasing the idea of love. She loved the idea of somebody completing her. She loved the idea of somebody instinctively knowing her thoughts and how she felt. The culture of romanticism had consumed all of her being. She was impractical living in a world where she chased novelty after novelty. She had a low self-esteem and confidence. Maybe, it was because she had been hurt before. Maybe, it hurt her to the core that it dismantled her self-worth and identity. Maybe this is delicate and sensitive. It could be me, something about my childhood and how I was raised. It could be that I had a narcissistic mother who never gave me much attention and that I am scared of being abandoned and so I do it to others before they do it to me. Maybe I am a written-off vehicle, completely wrecked and damaged. Still, I had to answer or run the risk of dead air taking over. I responded “I love you squared.” It sounded vague and contained possibilities. It sounded like an illusion. It hinted at loving you more but meant nothing like that. It was an exceptional counter-attacking move, one with precision and amazing creativity. The answer had to be great too, if I had any chance of being between her thighs. See, it was a mission of mine, a dream – her thighs were like a gateway to heaven, to paradise. I felt like a jackhammer anticipating to be used. A bomb on countdown awaiting to explode, figuratively and literally in her. Her body excited my middleman and love had nothing to do with it. What I felt was merely physical. A longing to express my desires on her. She represented an object to gratify my sexual urges. Besides being an object, she meant nothing to me. I resent the fact that she would tell me that she loves me when I was trying to climb, to be the best. I am young, black, gifted and amazing and she is trying to cling on to me, to lay claim and preserve like vegetables in the refrigerator. I am not a possession, I am not a vegetable in someone’s refrigerator – I belong to the world and any woman who inquires. Am I a bad person? Sure, but she’s the hypocrite and the liar, camouflaging herself to the exterior of love when she doesn’t know my intrinsic value. How can you claim to love someone you barely know? This is just the duality of life, the realization that we mean different things to different people. The realization that we are a coin toss and fittingly, theres a third side to a coin, the side that gives the coin its duality. She is wrong for loving me so abruptly. After all, would she love me if the word “love” didn’t exist? Highly unlikely, she would have requested a signature to my death warrant. So yes, sure I am an exceptional human being. At least she knows what I want. There’s a big bullseye sign between her legs and I want to be the nail that gets hammered in repeatedly. I wish to penetrate through the curtains of life. I am interested in the energy force that propelled humanity forward in our long ancestry line. Her personality is of little relevance to me; I am only interested in what is between her thighs. Personality depends upon the environment and culture, it is not reliable to be considered as critera. I wish she could detach from her body, it would be ideal. But since that’s an impossibility, I have to be patient with her. By professing her love to me, in my hands I have her vanity and ego; I can make her do anything that I want. She is eager to impress. While I don’t consider her a serious project, I do see her as an adequate mistress, somebody there when called upon to gratify my urges. Alternatively, we could fuck just one more time then she’ll be somebody that I used to know. But why limit yourself?

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Reality (Everything is everything)

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Reality (Everything is everything)

Our brains hallucinate reality based on our senses. This is what we learn from neuroscience. It makes the best guess on the objects that are present. The neurocircuitry helps it with decisions. In making decisions, the mind checks for what is familiar, it looks at patterns, colors, the texture etc. It’s not 100% accurate, it has the capability to deceive, in fact it does this quite often. What this means is that nothing in the world is certain because our senses are not reliable. There are things we can’t see, things we can’t touch, things we can’t smell and things we can’t hear. We are limited and constrained. And even with our limited resources, nothing can be viewed from the same point because we all have different angles. The neural pathways formed in our brains required data that was enforced through repetition and experience. How we were brought up and who our parents are count immensely because they represent an area in our subconscious that it repressed. Repressions are embedded in everything we do. They define us to the core. It is who we are. Could it be that the people in our lives are illusions and that they are fabrications of the mind?

According to neuroscience, we are connected to a frequency. Like a TV connected to a satellite dish or Internet for your computer or smartphone. Our minds are receivers. We are not consciousness. We receive consciousness through a frequency. All of life is connected to a frequency, one that comes from one source. This analogy has been around for decades. Psychoanalyst Carl Jung stated that every individual has a consciousness, personal unconsciousness and collective unconscious. The first two are self-explanatory but the third “collective unconsciousness” is the consciousness that is shared by every living organism. This of course means we are a product of one source. Human beings are more similar than they would like to think. Jung continues and states that the world is made of “Archetypes”. An archetype is a typical character, an action, or a situation that seems to represent universal patterns of human nature. An archetype, also known as “universal symbol” may be a character, a theme, a symbol, or even a setting. We are all an archetype of something. All of our behaviors are predictable. The first city of AI will be built on the principles of the collective unconscious. What we will need is a supercomputer and a massive cloud storage system. All the interactions of the AI will be stored in this storage system enabling the AI’s to learn from one another in a form of deep learning. With thousands of AI’s connected to this storage system mistakes will be minimized and with time the city will be perfect and completely autonomous from self-driving cars to robot servants in our houses. Like robots we are connected to a consciousness system.

The beauty in seeing someone immersed in a craft – that means his attuned to that frequency, he is one, at peace. Artists and sports people are such beautiful creatures. But not just artists and sports people, life and professionals as a whole, people who have dedicated time to be great at something – people who are one with the frequency of the world. The beauty of life overwhelms. We don’t know where consciousness comes from but our best guess is the brain because it processes large quantities of data but we don’t have proof, amazing isn’t it? How can we be sure of life? We are basically AI machines with deep learning antennas. Human beings are programmed. Programmed by our environment, nature, culture, society, immediate families and peers. We are taught to behave, to think and to navigate reality. How different are we to AI? We have awareness, something that is far from reach for AI. We created science as a means to dominate our environment, to conquer the world, to create and be Gods. Who preceded us? Could it really be natural selection? Can science solve all of the worlds problems? Do we have freewill? It seems as though our reality is in crutches. Things are never as they appear because truth is subjective and our senses deceptive. With that said, how can we navigate our way through the world without going crazy and giving in to nihilism?

Doing what comes natural to us and connecting to our frequency. While we are not AI connected to some cloud storage system. We are connected to nature. We are nature. Leonardo Da Vinci expresses the very same sentiments with his Virtruvian Man drawing. It expresses that man is perfect. Man is the golden ratio of 1.618 that appears in all nature and deep down we know what to do and who we are because we are nature and we have a purpose. All of life is one, connect with the life frequency. To master the art of living, you have to be like water – assume formlessness. Do not force things, go with the wind and it will give you the momentum needed to attain greatness, to fulfill your destiny. Critically acclaimed musician Lauryn Hill talks about the dilemma of life on the masterpiece album “The miseducation of Lauryn Hill” on the song “Everything is everything.” The lyrics state “Everything is everything, what is meant to be will be, after winter must come spring. Change, comes eventually.” She eludes to life as a process, a coming from point A to point B, from uncharted territory to explored and as such we must live naturally and confidently because we are life, like the birds in the sky and the roses in our gardens. Understanding this will enable us to fulfill our destinies. Live like life with incremental growth to flourish. Steer away from control systems attempting to dictate your life, think independently, create order out of your life, the past is history, now we look to the future; tomorrow our seeds will grow and we will be stronger. Be optimistic because the law of attraction holds true, we attract the things we value in our lives. Everything is everything, what is meant to be will be never force things, don’t impose yourself or exert force, the universe, God, or whatever you believe in is on your side. Fundamentally, you already know what to do. You are perfect. You are nature. You are life. You are awe-inspiring and because everything is everything, death is nothing to be feared but the next step, evolution – the change of seasons. Life is a continuous process and we must shed leaves so new ones can grow and flourish and ultimately die. It is a process we all share, our eternal destination. Be authentic, be truthful and natural as life because everything is everything.

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