I was at the Wits Theatre for the launch of The Kyle Shepherd trio album. Unbelievable launch, musical intelligence, no wasted touch on the instrument. Every touch has a purpose. How you touch, how you grab, the duration, what you don’t do, all that has a purpose, it emits pitch and frequency. Don’t rush, play to your hearts content. Feel, communicate, speak your mind with music. Jazz music, feel the tempo, listen to the pulse, improvise, embody the glorious music. Music made for the Gods.Thank you for the invite Bridget. Always wanted to come to Wits so my first love, Performance arts led the way. The Wits Theatre is beautiful, absolutely gorgeous.
One of my favorite movies titled “Soul” by Pixar explores Jazz music, purpose and the flow state. The movie describes life as something you improvise, making up things along the way, breaking rules to rewrite your own – Jazzing. Joe Gardner is a substitute music teacher of a high school when one day gets the opportunity of a lifetime to audition to play for the Dorethea Williams band – his dream job. Excited he goes to the audition and does extremely well. While playing the piano, we see his fingers taking control of him, it is automatic like stepping up a gear. Completely on free-flow, we see him close his eyes and let his fingers and the music do all the talking, we see the room disappear and it’s just him and the piano, the end-result is that he plays the most mezmarising solo of all time, leading to Dorethea to give him the job on the spot.
The movie describes the “Flow state” as a space between the physical and the spiritual realm. This is because when you are in flow, you are in your own world, a world where you dictate everything, time disappears and nothing matters except for the task you are engaged with. When you are in flow, you are possessed by a creative demon that takes over everything. When you are in flow state, God reigns. That’s exactly what happened with the show. The musicians where in their own world, a world where music reigns. They were totally in sync and they didn’t even have to look at each other, pitch, tone, rhythm, fingers and sound spoke. They even closed their eyes, the music was beating from within. To touch, feel, emphatize, understand the keys of the piano, caress slowly and stike forcebly when the moment demands, to string the double-bass with intention to induce a trance and create a rhythm, to beat on the drums like a celebration of the devils death. The album is pure euphoria, beautiful and timeless like how real art should be, reminded me of Charles Mingus “Devil Blues”, “Devil Woman” but without the organs and horns, it had a strong classical influence like Ludovico Einaudi and Yiruma.
Kyle Shepherd is on Piano, Shane Cooper on Bass and Jonno Sweeman on drums – they are the definition of mastery. They have been playing together since 2008, touring the world together and it shows. They have chemistry, they compliment each other and they have a mental telepathy. They were Jazzing, improvising, in complete flow, having the time of their lives. They love what they do, the music was unbelievable, it was beautiful. Congratulations Kyle Shepherd and the whole team and a deserved standing ovation.
Man, I will never forget how Toy Story 3 made me feel, that is a classic movie, the score and musical arrangements were spot on, the animation guys, angles, cameras, shading departments, voice artists, writers, developers and everyone involved, well done for the magnificent job. Yea, “Toy Story 3” felt like it. Good job guys we had three outstanding installments, curtain call but not the guys at Pixar, they went for a 4th one and promised future installments with an epic finale! Yea, change is good. Woody just isn’t that toy anymore. I loved the 4th one, I was never disappointed, not once, I was constantly doing something, laughing, listening, being engaged with the program that I even cried, that Gaby Gaby act is deep, Gaby Gaby is not like Lotso or Stingy Pete, she just wants it to happen, she wants to be a toy that can be loved and played with like Woody once. Woody is a good guy and finally relents his voicebox to Gaby Gaby, his had his chance, bless another, we love the wisdom Shrieff Woody, and Buzz Lighter “listen to your inner voice” is the best thing ever! It has a bit of Nietzsche, children need some Nietzsche early on in their lives, give them some Karate kid to emulate, give them pride, instill confidence in their spirit, just do your best, love your kid. My first story movie was “Toy Story 2”, in 2000, I had it on cassette or VCR, whatever you call it, it was the most amazing thing ever, I liked Toy Story 2, I was in love. Toy Story 2 helped me have empathy with my toys. I always practiced caution, care and respect. I was never rough with my toys. I liked action figures, I had this cool Ninja figure with a red attire and Gohan super saisan 2 when he beat Cell, that was a big toy for me, very cool flexible, limbs and hands could imitate life, yellow hair and navy attire. A lot of my friends wanted it when I was young and so I made the executive decision to not play with my favorite toys when I was with other people. They would be envious and want to steal it away from me. No, it was not worth the risk, it was just for me eyes. “Toy Story 2” is the movie that started everything for me and then I saw “Toy Story” and it was the same for me but now, “Toy Story” was now my “Toy Story 2”
The first thing I am going to do when I get to heaven is get Ray Charles information. I need to see him perform. That would make my whole existence. He was a creative genius, one of the best and greatest talents the world has ever seen. He was amazing! Then I am going to a Amy Winehouse concert – the same day! I want to be in pure music bliss. I want to have a lot of fun, I want to dance, sing along to the lyrics and laugh with like minded individuals. Man I swear heaven is going to be so much fun! The next day I am keeping the momentum going. I want to see Louis Armstrong and wait for it John Coltrane, he will finish my second day in heaven but if I still have time I will head over to a Miles Davis concert, man what I would do to hear “Kind of Blues” live. So John, when you done with your set please be so kind to assist Miles. I’d continue my third day with Charles Mingus! Charles you and your team just have to perform “Devil Woman” and “Devil Blues”, I am bitterly disappointed that Colombia did a greatest hits and omitted those two bangers! Charles, if you can commit to playing those two songs, then I will give you the whole of Day 3. And on Day 4, hi there “Delfonics” and “Al Green”, you know I wouldn’t miss you guys. Besides, your music is going to help me get heaven pussy. Of course I will be there, in a flash! I think I will be settled by Day 5 so I will go to a Nina Simone concert and later Roberta Flack. Roberta baby, you just gotta sing “Killing Me Softly With His Song” for me. DAMN! Heaven would be a place that I would never want to leave. There are religions that promise 7 virgins for the deceased. Imagine that! 7 virgins, all for you. Isn’t that perfect? Isn’t that the end of suffering? That is excellent marketing by God and his angels. Still, it’s not appealing to me. How are the virgins? Are they opinionated virgins who think they have rights? Are they feminist virgins? You know what? No feminists in heaven! Yall can go to hell! Heaven is not a place for feminists. Heaven is a place for good women who are obedient. That’s all a man wants when his dead, 7 obedient virgin women, who will not talk too much and ask too many questions but rather serve as sex objects and suck this dick. That’s it, that’s all we want from heaven. Can you promise that God? I don’t think I’d want 7 virgin women even in heaven. It’s too much administration and work. Will they give it up easy or do I have to work for it? Knowing women they won’t give it up easily without a challenge or getting something in return. But maybe the ruler of heaven is Old Testament God. That would be so dope, if it is Old Testament God, I am confident we will be getting our promised pussy without a strain or any delay on our side. Old Testament God is a good open-minded guy. He ruled the Bible with fear and an iron fist, I am confident in his ability to keep women in line. A man doesn’t need 7 virgin women playing hard to get. There’s also the pressure and stress of satisfying 7 virgin women. Honestly, I don’t want that kind of stress when I am dead. It’s not worth it, I am dead and in heaven, I’d rather let loose. Heaven for me would be smoking Chronic the whole day. I’d rather not have a penis too. I definitely don’t want a vagina. No sexual orientations in my heaven. Just weed, music and maybe Gordons gin. But if God insists, I will have both a penis and a vagina. I think we can negotiate on boobs, they are not neccessary. I think God will side on me with this one. It’s so typical of Pixar making me ruminate about the second life. What if there is a second layer to life like on the movie “Coco”? What if life continues after death for the absolute last time before we get to heaven or hell? What if you get to relive all the decisions you made during your first life? What if Karma finally catches up with you on this second life? Damn! I enjoyed watching Pixars ideas on “Coco”. It was such a refreshing movie, filled with imagination, awesome storytelling techniques and emotive scenes. It’s such a classic! I expect the same thing with “Soul”. It is going to be a classic, I can feel it. Hoping for the Pygmalion effect with this one. I can’t wait.
The Screenslaver interrupts this program for an important announcement. Don’t bother watching the rest. Elastigirl doesn’t save the day; she only postpones her defeat. And while she postpones her defeat, you eat chips and watch her invert problems that you are too lazy to deal with. Superheroes are part of a brainless desire to replace true experience with simulation. You don’t talk, you watch talk shows. You don’t play games, you watch game shows. Travel, relationships, risk; every meaningful experience must be packaged and delivered to you to watch at a distance so that you can remain ever-sheltered, ever-passive, ever-ravenous consumers who can’t free themselves to rise from their couches, break a sweat, never anticipate new life. You want superheroes to protect you, and make yourselves ever more powerless in the process. Well, you tell yourselves you’re being “looked after”. That you’re inches from being served and your rights are being upheld. So that the system can keep stealing from you, smiling at you all the while. Go ahead, send your supers to stop me. Grab your snacks, watch your screens, and see what happens. You are no longer in control. I am.
I think Pixar are trying to kill me. Before I delve into the main subject of this text. What was with “Toy Story 4” guys? What the hell was that? What sorcery was that? I mean I have been a “Toy Story” fan for literally my whole life and they have never made me cry. Sure the storylines are emotional as in the one exhibited on the third installment but I never cried, almost did but I didn’t. You guys assaulted me on the 4th installment. What a tear jerker. The emotion regulation techniques used in the movie are outstanding. The toys exhibited sensitivity and empathy they could regulate each others emotions. Everything is just so emotive, the film score just moves you, it is so powerful yet subtle and familiar. The movie just goes straight to your heart. I am fascinated by emotions. It’s like something hijacked my rational faculties. I had no control over my emotions, it just happened – what an experience! It wasn’t the first time you guys made me leak, you did it with “Ratatouille” too. You guys are truly something else. It’s amazing how you can create an experience like that. When my emotions get out of control like that it makes me think of how amazing the Universe is, how amazing life is. We are the Universe experiencing itself, all of life and nature is one – we all come from the same source. When you guys made me tear up with “Toy Story 4” I was one with the storyline, one with the experience you created, one with your mastery, one with your artistic expression and at that moment everything was perfect. I felt one with the Universe and hence there was nothing I could do. I was under your spell. What amazing art you guys created. I felt my facial expressions change, I felt my eyebrows going lower, I felt them coming closer, I felt the downward pull of my mouth, I felt my facial muscles contract and with that tears came out from my eyes. I felt my face wrinkle like a raisin. I did not do that consciously, it just happened, I was overwhelmed. It makes me think; emotions are not concealable, it is impossible to hide them, they always have a way of leaking out. The avenues of these leakages are found in body language, voice and facial expressions. It’s impossible to hide what you are truly feeling because it is an unconscious phenomena, it is the Universe communicating. Our emotions are spontaneous things that happen to us and we experience them. This means emotions are depended on socioeconomic factors like the environment, culture, family, friends and other external stimuli. This makes sense because the emotion fear is triggered by the amygdala – the flight or fight organ. Wow! It seems as though existence is a program. We don’t know what consciousness is or where it comes from and we can’t control our emotions. Because of this fact I don’t think we can fully understand our emotions, they are complicated. What a predicament. What a revelation! But I digress, thank you guys for the beautiful movie, I loved it! It was thoroughly entertaining, it was hilarious, it had imagination, the animation was brilliant, it was moving and heartfelt, it was emotive, it was beautiful. It was interesting to see; children begin to regulate emotions in the first few years of life. They find a favorite toy, blanket or stuffed animal that they use to self-soothe and regulate their emotions. We saw that with Bonnie and Forkkie, it gave me nostalgic memories, I couldn’t help but to reminisce. I am happy Gabby Gabbys dreams came true. What a noble thing to do, thanks Woody. I am excited at the prospect of a 5th installment. I hope I watch the 5th installment on the big screen with popcorn and a large coke. I watched “Toy Story 4” a year later and it was well worth the wait. To the Universe, thank you to the spirit of Steve Jobs. Thank you to John Lasseter and every creative who has ever made a contribution to Pixar. One day, I want to own stock in Pixar; I want a slice of heaven. You guys make my soul dance, you make me happy and you keep me young. Being childlike is a quality I never want to lose and you guys are aligned with that mission. I love everything that you guys do and I will be a fan until I die.
My goodness where do I start? I think women are great. When I think of women power comes to mind. I think they are better than men. Maybe “better” is unfair and unjustified but give me a moment I haven’t concluded my statements as of yet. I just think they are a sophisticated species. Everything about them; their built, their ability to multi-task and the chaos they bring to the world. It’s wonderful chaos, progressive chaos, muchly needed chaos that brings about growth and prosperity in the world. They are the underlying motivation behind man’s action – the perfect courtier, the puppet master, Gods’ wife! That would explain why Adam and Eve ate from the tree of life. God made man to be conscientious and orderly, to obey his instructions. And he did a great job. Man by nature is conscientious and orderly. Adam alone would have never eaten from the tree of life. Even if you substitute Adam to a Steve Jobs – a creative individual who is open minded and thinks outside the box – he would have found a pear tree or a lemon tree to pick fruit from. The dynamic changed when Eve was introduced to the picture. God never anticipated to be defied in that manner. He didn’t understand what was happening, he was confused. He was disappointed in Adam and didn’t understand Eve. Not that humanity blames God – no one understands women, women don’t even understand women. Maybe Gods mother understands. The true creator of everything – nature, the universe, life.
She has certainly given women remarkable powers. I mean to be the gatekeepers of life – wow! The remarkable ability of multitasking; women can cook, do the laundry, help children with their homework, clean the house while listening to music, save the world from monsters and fly at the same time. It’s not an exaggerated statement – their ability to multi-task is unbelievable! Men by contrast can’t multi-task. We can’t kill 2 birds with one stone – that’s a term concocted by women and they most likely killed 2 birds with one stone. When men are doing something as menial as boiling an egg – the door is closed, there is no interruptions, the TV is off, the data option on our phone is off, it’s us with the egg and the stove. Once the activity of the egg is completed, life can carry on. We can’t do two things at once and maybe that’s a good thing because it enables us to focus and do the task very well. This is depicted in the PIXAR Animated Movie “The Incredibles 2”, where Elastigirl is totally incredible! The character “Elastigirl” personifies what it is like to be a women. Even her catch-phrase “I’m flexible”. She can be a parachute, she can be a sling-shot, she can be boat, she can stretch to far places, she can fly, she’s a mom who has 3 children and a husband, she’s hands-on and she saves the world from “The Screenslaver” – Oh, she absolutely saves the world on “The Incredibles 2”, there’s a scene where she’s chasing a runaway train on her bike and the scene is so intense, she’s communicating via radio with Evelyn and they are brainstorming ideas on how to stop this train, it’s trilling and nervy and she might not get to the train resulting in the death of many civilians – at the heat of all that she receives a call from his second born child Dash who wants to know where his shoes are, she answers the phone call, helps Dash locate his shoes and then gets back to chasing the train. She eventually gets to the train, stops it and saves lives – she’s incredible excuse the pun! The best superhero EVER! Mr. Incredibles’ power on the other hand is strength – just strength, it is a specialized and focused superpower. He tries to operate in a domain other than his designated field when he took on the mantle of taking care of the children and he dismally failed because it required a lot of multi-tasking. Not that we blame Mr. Incredible, taking care of a baby with multiple superpowers, helping your son with Maths homework and regulating your daughter’s feelings who is in adolescence handling boy problems is a tough task.
Women do a lot of things better and at once – while we men do one thing exceptionally well. I don’t know which is better. I love how they control the power dynamics too. They enjoy real power! They are subtle and indirect in their methods. They often position themselves as nurturers, comforters someone who will listen to your problems and help. Someone with patience and devoid of judging prowess. Angelic guardian angels who assist in times of distress. “Mother Theresa” – someone who gives more than takes. They have this wonderful ability of regulating emotions and making you feel good when you were in a torrid place psychologically. They do it with a hug that is emphatic, a hug that makes you feel that everything will be alright. A hug can make you open up more, to reveal yourself up more, to free yourself of the mental chains, it can strip away your power, and it can make you vulnerable. Women have so much data on the people close to them. Data that can destroy lives. Data that can make you an outlaw. Data that can cripple. It’s remarkable power! They deploy effective strategies. In a lot of instances their statures or physical built helps them get into a position of power. Their statures can act as object of desire or frail entities that are powerless in a man’s’ world (The Gandhi approach). Either way, it is effective. On the Etv Telenovela “Scandal”, Kgomotso Christopher plays the role of “Yvonne Thebe” an ambitious, seductive young lady who often uses men to get to the top. She plays on their repressed desires by promising to be the best they have ever had. She uses her body as an object of desire and usually compliments it by wearing dresses that are solid in terms of color, bold and seductive – colors like red, yellow and black. She is able to disarm powerful men and make them do whatever she wants. She’s the paramount of power! Another tactic that is effectively used is that of submissiveness. Like Gandhi, they know and understand their strengths and weaknesses. They use their weakly statures to progress their agendas, they lose the physical game to win the psychological game. They dominate while seeming weak – they are able to feed the man’s ego and indirectly make him do whatever that she likes.
There is something also awesome about the female reproductive organ. Something that could only be created by Mothernature. It reinforces the theory that they are indeed nurturers. I find the male reproductive organ interesting too. It’s like they co-exist. Like one is useless without the other one – isn’t that amazing! Basically it’s a hole that invites the male reproductive organ in. It’s accommodative. It’s warm. You just want to stay inside all day – maybe that’s why we in the womb for 9 months. There is an exercise called the Kegel exercise and basically what it does is to strengthen your PC floor muscles. After pregnancy, women use it to tighten the vagina area – it is not just for pregnant women, any woman can use that exercise to tighten. Once the PC muscles are developed, the vagina grips the penis tightly enhancing the sensations felt by the duo. You are inside and it’s affirmed, it is spiritual, it feels like heaven, it is amazing! The science of it all. The female opens or stretches her legs and the man goes in. Do you understand that process fundamentally? It states that man is destined to be woman’s bitch. It states that woman is in control. Woman is top of the hierarchy. Woman is the most powerful! And because life begins between the legs of woman – it is fundamentally correct. I think that’s one part, one story but a lot of hypothesis can be concluded on that. The world wouldn’t know what to do without women. However, it is equally true that the world wouldn’t know what to do without man. For man represents order and convention and women well like I stated at the beginning chaos. We need both order and chaos.
I think that man has noted the remarkable power that woman possessed. Work has been introduced to nullify that power with the emergence of AI (Artificial Intelligence) I really think it’s humanity last invention, the destruction of family structure, nihilism, the centralization of the world, the love of all things expedient and the disconnect from nature. It has crippled Mothernature’s will – she’s no her last legs, her days are numbered. Man has broken her. The natural order doesn’t exist anymore. Everyone is confused and history is not enough because it has been altered by conquers. Human interactions are at a minimal and all emotion is bottled up. Women have abandoned their posts to make their mark on a fabricated virtual reality. As a result of that, power has been redistributed to man and his destructive ways. All animals are equal – how could we fall for that? Life has become a series of George Orwell’s books – first it was Animal Farm with Feminism and Gay rights and now 1984 with Facebook and Google. How were we so distracted? Mothernature will never forgive us for this! Throughout history humans have made bold statements about the generation they belong to, and it has always been met with the same sentiments, the argument has always been the same – they always outlined reasons why their generation is best and why the current generation is rotten to the core. People who always state this are people who are clinging on to the past and won’t accept the present. Its justified and a phenomena that has happened ever since. A generation is 20-22 years and within a given time; 4 generations live to form a Zeitgeist – the Zeitgeist is the believe or customs of a specific time, the last 2 generations are stuck in their ways and content with the information that they have attained during the course of their lives. Then there is a generation that is struggling to adopt to new customs and beliefs prevalent in the current world – some are rigid and refuse to be swayed around by new customs but most are struggling. Then there is this new generation, fresh, new and hungry to make their mark on the world. They introduce new things and more innovative things to the world – they see the world in their eyes. Throughout history Mothernature has been consistent in providing this data. However, for the first time in history all generations are in unison about the future of coming generations. It’s a tone of concern and uncertainty. This tone comes from the depression in the west, the lack of self-identity, nihilism, expediency and the act of falling into novelty after novelty all of which has no meaning and direction in the realm of life and self-actualization. All this is due to increase exponentially and we just don’t have an answer on how we are going to solve this.
The world is marching towards uncharted territory, territory that is fabricated and created by a few men – men with enormous resources and power. Men who are excluding Mothernature out of the equation and creating a new type of life. Was this the direction of becoming? Was it on Mothernatures watch? Did she anticipate this or it’s been God’s plan all along? Man put Mothernature out of a job and retired God’s mother. Does God have a chance or is he dead like Nietzsche hypothesized? I take back my prior statement of the first paragraph, I think woman is great but man has no competition – yet! For man controls reality, controls perceptions, forms tastes, starts ventures, gives life to objects and although single-minded his execution is unmatched and unrivalled!
“Every twenty-nine years the planet returns to the same point in the sky that it occupied at the moment of our birth.” That is a Paulo Coelho quote, bestselling author who is known for producing works like “The Alchemist”. By “the planet”, he refers to Saturn and he states that at the moment we are born we have twenty-nine years of unlimited potential, in that time we can choose to become who and what we want to be. After the twenty-nine year cycle the world closes and we become our dominant actions and thoughts. He states that the second cycle comes when we are 56 years old and at that time we can reinvent ourselves again and become what we desire. Paulo Coelho states that after those 29 years in which Saturn has returned to the same point in the sky that it occupied at the moment of our birth, life becomes automated and passive. Life becomes the product of those twenty-nine years. It is a beautiful analogy, one that makes me take an interest in astronomy. Neuroscience seems to agree with this notion and our culture is articulate in expressing this phenomena. We see this on movies like “The Incredible 2”; Jack-Jack is a superhero baby who has unlimited powers. Edna, the artist who creates the heroes super-suits calls him “pure unlimited potential”. This of course is a metaphor because when babies are born, they are born with the capability of becoming anything they want. Babies are infinite. Babies are pure and their eyes are clean, yet to be indoctrinated by any external forces. Babies come from the world of Gods, completely untainted by the idea of mortality or fabrications of humanity. The statement that you can become whatever you like holds true for babies because they are yet to explore their maps. That is the idea for the character of Jack-Jack in the Incredibles franchise. We see a complete contrast of this idea when we pay attention to his father “Mr. Incredible”. Unlike Jack-Jack, Mr. Incredible is specialized. He has one superpower which is strength and he has made it into a skill to fight bad guys. Mr. Incredible knows his limitations and his strengths. Something that cannot hold true for Jack-Jack as he can do anything – including teleporting to an alternate dimension. There are neuroscience reasons for this phenomena, when we are young our neuro-links are liked to a lot of stuff in our minds. As we get older some of these things in our minds dissipate so we can specialize in certain tasks that are conducive and promote our way of life. This is the direction we must take to become competent adults in the world. We have to narrow down and specialize. This means getting a job and becoming responsible. This means instilling order in a chaotic world.
Specializing is the biggest thing that we do in life. Specializing means ignoring all the noise and listening to the music. It means concentrating on the things that give your life value. Specializing means being in sync with yourself. Specializing means intense focus on yourself. This is the reason why elite soccer stars like Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo play only football and nothing else. It also explains their troubles with the taxes and the law. Being an adult means letting go of all the things that could be to sustain what is. Hence, the Saturn analogy is a perfect one. After 29, you are the mass decisions of your life. After 29, your ways are set in stone and you have earned your strips. Donald Glover talks about this on his “Weirdo” comedy special when he states “If you’re a conservative when you’re 30, you’re going to be conservative for the rest of your life.” Pretty much by the time we turn 30, we are who we’ll be for the rest of our lives. We see an example of this from Billionaire Shawn Cater aka Jay –Z who upon getting his break in 1996 when he was 26 years old, never stopped working. He was relentless vigor. From 1996 to 2001, he released an album every year. Every album that he released was certified Platinum. First and foremost, he saw himself as a business, a brand and at age 31 in 2001 – he was already a great businessman and because the rules of Saturn are true, he became a Billionaire in less than 20 years. It’s fair to say that at age 29, in 1999 Jay –Z was already set in his ways. Everything after 1999 was automatic – he was an astute businessman for the rest of his life. On his critically acclaimed album “The Blueprint” on the track “Never Change”, he talks about consistency and being the same all his life. He hook of the song states: “I’m still fuckin’ with crime ’cause crime pays, I never change! Out hustlin’, same clothes for days, I never change! I’ll never change, I’m too stuck in my ways, I never change!” The rules of Saturn made his destiny concreate and for the rest of his life all he has to do is to show up. He has a chance to change when he turns 56 in 6 years’ time when the second cycle of Saturn will commence but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
The journey of Saturn starts when you are a little child and gains momentum when you are in your late-teens approaching twenties. This is because at that age, you need to be able to screen out the things that don’t matter to you and concentrate on the things that do. It is a very difficult thing to do and you can find yourself getting lost in a maze of peer-pressure and self-destructive behavior. It is also a time where the majority of people look outward instead of inward. It is a time when we are indoctrinated into society’s ideals and conventions. At this age, you are vulnerable because you lack an identity and society is more than willing to assign one to you. It is at this point where people are indoctrinated into mass thinking and lose synchrony with Saturn. Some find their way after exploring and unite with Saturn while others go completely off-track. The ones who return find their purpose and live fulfilling lives. They live with true freedom and value the experiences of life. 2 Pac talks about this phenomena on the awesome Kendrick Lamar album “To Pimp a Butterfly” on the track “Mortal Man” when he states: In this country, a black man only have like 5 years we can exhibit maximum strength. And that’s right now while you a teenager, while you still strong. While you still wanna lift weights, while you still wanna shoot back. ‘Cause once you turn 30 it’s like, they take the heart and soul out of a man.” MJ DeMarco continues with this idea on his bestselling business book “The Millionaire Fastlane” when he states: “When you are under 25 you have maximum horsepower and your choices discharge an incredible amount of horsepower. A simple choice I made more than 20 years ago is still felt today. That’s a lot of torque! If you reflect on your choices, you make them in an instant, yet their consequences transcend a lifetime, especially ones made in early in life.”
It seems as though the notion of being young forever is a myth, one that has to be shuttered. A life in your twenties chasing novelty after novelty has dire consequences. It has existentialist consequences for it strips away the identity of the person. It restricts potential and drowns in an ocean of mediocrity. A life in your twenties chasing novelty causes depression in your 30’s and depression at your 30’s is forever. Depression at your 30’s sets up nihilism and an unfulfilled life for all of your days. The problem of 30 is that we are supposed to have certain elements in our lives in order and under control, the problem arises when we don’t. It is a debilitating and paralyzing realization. One that questions your worth and purpose. One that fuels suicidal thoughts. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. The most important thing in life is self-awareness. If you have that, you can live the life of the hero – that is to turn unexplored territory into explored territory. The new things that you are doing in your life will make your legs lighter and new code will be generated in your neural circuitry causing pathways to be formed. With newly established pathways, you can push yourself and challenge yourself. You can demolish the preconceived notions that you had about yourself and create a new persona that the new constructed mind will be able coincide with. You can call upon Saturn to give you another change – your second cycle can commence immediately after the first one has elapsed! You can redeem yourself like a hero! Yes, a hero! But do I think that it’s possible to redeem yourself? Sadly, it was just banter and I don’t. Adopting the life of the hero after 29 is highly unrealistic.
In 2015 PIXAR released a movie titled “Inside Out”. The movie explores what goes inside a little girls head. It is staged inside the limbic system – the part in your brain that processes feelings and emotions. It personalized the 5 main emotions that everybody has namely; Joy, Anger, Disgust, Fear and Sadness. Joy is golden, spirited, motivated, overzealous, unsuppressed and delightful. Sadness is blue, soppy, depressed, overwhelming and deflated. Fear is purple, nervy, unsettled, worrisome, unfulfilled and insecure. Disgust is green, finicky, stylish, assured and confident. Anger is red, unreasonable, self-serving, tantrum throwing and unstable. The movie explores emotion regulation, the purpose of emotions and their functions, impulse, imagination, the amygdala (the fight or flight organ) the subconscious mind and the importance of sleep. It is an amazing movie – my all-time favorite without a doubt. It garnered universal acclaimed from critics all around the world who praised the movie for its impeccable story-telling, originality, imagination, research into neuroscience and the voice artists. It is acknowledged as one of the greatest amination movies of all time. The movie follows Riley an 11 year old girl whose world suddenly turns upside down when she has to move into unexplored territory, a new environment – the big city. Everything is so new to Riley and her emotions are all over the place. In her previous life she used to live in the countryside where there was space, a big yard, a conservative neighborhood where everyone knew and assisted one another. Hockey was her passion and she was in a team that was doing pretty well. She had a best friend that she loved wholeheartedly – her life was perfect! However her present was met with a lot of uncertainty. She now lived in house that was crammed and sandwiched into two other houses that had no space. The environment was clustered, loud and busy. The emotion Anger is elated when Riley’s family enter the city for the first to a loud and busy environment stating “These are my type of people.”! Now Riley has no friends or a hockey team – she has to start all over again. It is worth noting that Riley’s most dominating emotion before the big move to the city has been Joy.
The emotions Joy, Anger, Disgust, Sadness and Fear are stationed in the mind’s headquarters (Limbic System) and they influence Riley’s actions via a control panel. All the memories of the day are stored each night to long-term memory. These long-term memories create her 5 “core memories” and they are represented as islands because they form her personality. These 5 islands stand alone because they represent who Riley is to the core. In the context of the mind, the islands represent the hippocampus which is responsible for memory in the human brain. The memories that are moved to long-term memory each night represent habits and the basal ganglia which is the element in the brain that helps with habits. Now, that Riley has to form new habits, her islands are in danger of being dismantled. Which is what happens as the story continues. The first island to go is “Friendship Island” – now that she is in a new environment, she has no friends and thus affecting her overall personality – she is left weak and vulnerable. Hockey Island is the next island that crumbles. Lacking a self-campus and self-identity, an idea comes from Anger that she should run away and go back to Minnesota to start new core memories – I mean that’s where she grew up and life was perfect before mom and dad decided to move! She steals money from her mom’s purse and heads to the bus station. It is interesting to note, the idea comes from Anger and by trait Anger is passionate, self-serving and in the moment. Anger’s idea was fueled by the Amygdala. The Amygdala has the tendency to hijack and bypass the neocortex which is the thinking brain. Riley knew what she was doing was wrong hence when she stole the money she was in stealth mode, aloof, making sure that her mother doesn’t see her. The Amygdala by trait acts! Hence it’s called the fight or flight organ. Tears are usually triggered by the amygdala, it is a very sophisticated organ. The Amygdala can house memories and response repertoires that we enact without quite realizing why because the shortcut from the Thalamus to the Amygdala completely bypasses the neocortex. When this decision was made, Anger didn’t think about the repercussions because he is so shortsighted, he was impulsive and the Amygdala fueled and gave life to this idea – resulting in Riley’s reaction.
This action nearly results in the destruction of “Family Island” luckily Sadness comes in to save the day. For the duration of the movie, Joy makes it her duty to keep Sadness off the control panel as her and the other emotions don’t understand Sadness purpose in Riley’s life. Towards the end of the movie all that changes as she gives Sadness the podium. The change of heart comes from her journey with Sadness when both of them were sucked out of Headquarters. On their journey back to headquarters Joy, sees Sadness’ value as she regulated and helped the friends who were helping the two emotions – it was special. When Riley was on the bus awaiting for it to depart, she was emotionless and turning black inside. All the other emotions couldn’t do anything to save the situation. Sadness stepped up to the control panel and Riley snapped up and stopped the bus as it was leaving requesting to get off. She got home to the sight of her worried parents and started telling them what had happened (Sadness was still on the control panel). Riley was honest, she told her parents that she missed Minnesota, that she missed her friends and her previous life, she communicated all this in tears. Her parents listened with emphatic eyes and embraced her with a big hug – they further communicated that they too missed Minnesota and their old lives. Something that affirmed Riley’s sentiments and made her feel better. Both parents embraced Riley, it was a warm moment, it was a beautiful family hug. Sadness called Joy to the panel and they joined to create a new, cemented “family core memory”. The reason sadness is so important in life is because, it forces you to slow down, it forces you to contemplate about things, it helps you focus, it helps you organize or reorganize life and it enables you to keep moving forward. Sadness is the hero in any story.
This intelligent movie communicates the importance of emotion regulation and intelligence and why it might be better than IQ. A test was conducted on 4 year olds to test impulse control and delay gratification. The tests were conducted on the children of Stanford graduates which implies that the children were from good families. It was a simple test; an examiner would leave one marshmellow on the table instructing the kid that if he could wait until he comes back that he would have two marshmellows – but if he can’t wait, then he can have that one. He would then exit the room to see what the kid would do. A grueling and brutal test for any 4 year old I assure you! Some kids distracted themselves by closing their eyes, tried to sleep, sang loudly or avoidance – they simply looked the other way and acted as if it didn’t exist. For their reward, the examiner would come in 10-15 minutes later and give them two marshmellows. While other kids simple couldn’t wait and just ate that one marshmellow. This test is interesting because it provides insights to the kid’s character and the trajectory that the child will probably take through life. 14 years later the kids were tracked down again to see the progress in their lives. The emotional and social difference between the grab-the-marshmallow preschoolers and their gratification-delaying peers was dramatic. Those who had resisted temptation at four were now, as adolescents, more socially competent: personally effective, self-assertive, and better able to cope with the frustrations of life. They were less likely to go to pieces, freeze, or regress under stress, or become rattled and disorganized when pressured; they embraced challenges and pursued them instead of giving up even in the face of difficulties; they were self-reliant and confident, trustworthy and dependable; and they took initiative and plunged into projects. And, more than a decade later, they were still able to delay gratification in pursuit of their goals. The third or so who grabbed for the marshmallow, however, tended to have fewer of these qualities, and shared instead a relatively more troubled psychological portrait. In adolescence they were more likely to be seen as shying away from social contacts; to be stubborn and indecisive; to be easily upset by frustrations; to think of themselves as “bad” or unworthy; to regress or become immobilized by stress; to be mistrustful and resentful about not “getting enough”; to be prone to jealousy and envy; to overreact to irritations with a sharp temper, so provoking arguments and fights. And, after all those years, they still were unable to put off gratification.
Belo Horizonte hosted the semi-finals between host nation Brazil and Germany. Heading into the match it was tipped at 50/50 and the Brazilians were relying on the support of their fans to tip the result their way. Brazil hadn’t lost in Belo Horizonte in over 39 years. Brazil had notable names missing through suspension or injury like their leader Thiago Silva who was suspended courtesy of a second yellow he incurred in the quarter-finals and of course their best player – the sensational Neymar Jr. who incurred a tournament ending injury. However, the stadium would be filled with more than 50 thousand Brazilians – what could go wrong? For the match they instilled David Luis as the captain and he was going to lead them to the finals! The two teams came out to mark the commencement of the game but before that they had to sing their respective national anthems. The Brazilian players sang loudly and passionately as if to compensate for the loss of their two biggest stars – the stadium was a buzz and vibrating and some of the players even cried because of the ecstasy. By contrast the Germans were businesslike, they looked focused and motivated and never exerted or strained their vocal chords for the anthem. The game commenced, the stadium was loud, all in support of the home nation Brazil. The fans expected a good game. The pressure was on and emotions where all over the place. Brazil were nervy with the ball. David Luis as the captain was too enthusiastic as he vacated his spot in the heart of defense to assist with the offensive play. Marcelo playing on the Left side of defense was too industrious. Maicon was passed his peak. Luis Gustavo and Fernaldihno didn’t complement each other. All this meant was for Germany to keep shape and stay calm – Brazil were too out of control. 29 minutes later the scoreline was 5-0 in favor of the Germans. Even before half-time, the game had already been decided. With the final already secured, the German coach omitted his best defender at Half-time so he can rest. The game finished 7-1, the heaviest score-line in a World Cup semi-final match – Brazil were humiliated!
The ability to regulate one’s emotion is a priceless asset. An asset the Brazilian team didn’t have. Maybe, the Brazilian women’s team would have done better. This is because women are better “Emotion managers”. They use their prefrontal cortex efficiently. This starts off when they are young girls playing and interacting with one another. On the playground, girls prefer to play in small groups. This helps with engagement and an overall serenity in the group. Boys on the other hand prefer big groups and numbers, this is because boys are more competitive. By trait, boys are threatened by anything that might challenge their independence, while girls are more threatened by a rupture in their relationships. So when a boy gets hurt during play, he does the honorable thing and moves aside so that play can continue as opposed to girls – girls tend to discontinue play to attend to the person who got hurt. I doubt the women’s team would have been beaten 7-1. They should have stayed together on the pitch where it matters most. The men’s team lost mentality and emotionally before the game even commenced. They played football with the Amygdala – they played with feelings and emotions! And because Germany where playing football with the Neocortex (the thinking brain), they saw the frailties and instability of the Brazil team. Watching Brazil play in that match was like watching “The Wolf of Wall Street”, with David Luis as Jordon Belfort – impulsive, idiotic and expedient! Emotional illiteracy is dangerous!
Conforming has its advantages for example if you are starting an online community, you have to understand the ecosystem and adapt to make it your own. You have to understand what works and what doesn’t to create a framework and structure for your newly formed community. When you have a structure and framework you can slowly add what’s different about you. Being different from the get go is not wise because you can get shunned and ignored, that’s not good for creating a self-sustaining brand. Different doesn’t necessarily mean good. You have to conform to a certain point because to conform entails to be emphatic and empathy makes you relateble and likeable. To conform is to understand and to be compassionate because you can mirror people’s mannerisms, tastes and conducts.
A perfect example of conforming to be different is with the Apple 2. When it was released it was just like a lot of computers in a lot of ways. It could run on any operating system, it could be modified to the users tastes and had multiple USB ports. Steve Jobs later changed everything about the Apple 2 with later products to reflect what Apple stood for, to be different, to have a rebellious spirit and to have taste. Apple needed to stand out from the rest of the market and set the benchmark. He closed off everything so Apple could run on its own operating system and reduced the multiple USB ports to just two ports for the modem and printer. The decision to close off Apple was the difference maker and is the reason Apple is the most valuable company in the world. Apple of course is vertically integrated today owning and controlling everything from operating systems to distribution. But they had to conform first. Not conforming makes you different and can provide an edge to inspire innovation that can make you successful, however it’s not always guaranteed. You need to be flexible enough to know how to fit in and then go out.
Warren Buffet is a perfect example of this. He lives far away from Wall Street to avoid the noise and clutter. He doesn’t follow the news. He is sheltered in Omaha. However when it suits him and his business interests, he can be attuned in and make decisions everyone else can’t see because of his different perspective. As opposed to news and loud untrustworthy bulletins, he has trusted sources from within Wall Street, that gives him the advantage. You conform to understand and then make your own way.
antakalipa 