Trained Thought

Unconscious
Four million red, white, and blue-blooded kids, born the same years as I, are now passengers.

They are malleable and mostly mechanical minds, soon to be “educated;” capitulating toward the most popular station, the American Dream: where Office Space jokes are a smidge too real, seconds are cents, and lives are lived for the weekends. Destination predetermined, they are spoon fed freedom; the freedom to take others’ away.

As I probe my memories, trying to find some semblance of a conscious decision or feeling from this time, I cannot find one.

Like the author and humorist who came into the world with Halley’s Comet and accurately predicted that he would leave with it, I recognize the lack of suffering I experienced from my billion year life as unconscious matter and do not fear returning to that state.

I am reminding me of me when using a calculator. I know how to plug numbers in using a given formula and I know how to read the answer, but I am as oblivious to how the calculator derives most answers as I am aware that I don’t need to understand how it did so in order to read the output.

A calculator is more straight forward than philosophy and simpler than scripture.

While my mental calculator is entering inputs and reading outputs, unconsciously learning how to live and survive, I am incessantly coddled.

Gravity pulls smiles and delicate touches toward my eyes bursting with naïveté.

But it appears as graspable to me as the universe is now.

I am learning to be the sun. But some children are quickly learning they are more like the Earth, drifting unassumingly, but a host to complexities capable of the incredible.

My parents lovingly shielded me from an empty bottle, a foreclosure sign, a drunken uncle’s negligence, and many of the arduous experiences that proved pivotal in the lives of many great people.

Enduring and overcoming adversity is, to put it quite lightly, like dealing with a salty soccer coach, always yelling and never praising. By the end of the season, you’ve learned to almost appreciate his slobbery jowls as they blubber commands and how to accept criticism, even from the grumpiest people.

Although, he would always ask, “What does almost count for?”

The answer was, nothing.

I am intentionally being deprived of the type of experiences that made my parents who they are, people worthy of respect and admiration.

The story heard by the American humans of their socio-economic status dictated that they should give their child everything that they did not have as kids.

It murmured, “Give your kids more. Isn’t that why you’re working so hard? Isn’t that why you’re rarely home? Isn’t that why they notice you frequently miss sporting events and recitals?” It implored them to improve upon the simple life of manual labor and dinners of pork chops and applesauce at the dining room table that characterized their Midwestern homes.

Was this choice really for my benefit?

Was it a rebellion against their parents and family?

Or a rebellion against themselves?

Maybe it was just a resignation to the American dream.

Whatever is was, most American parents chose to swim in the same school. When threatened, small schooling fish, as a last-ditch defensive measure, will swarm in a tightly packed spherical formation around a common center exposing the fewest number of fish to the surrounding predators. Even though they are statistically safer in the bait ball, their response can be conspicuous. Predators have developed countermeasures and use cooperation to decimate the school from above and below the surface. Independence, to these small schooling fish, means certain death, and remaining at the very heart of the formation provides the highest chance of survival.

Obedience
Sometimes I feel nostalgic for the cultural mythology of my youth, a world in which there was nothing wrong with soda pop, in which the Super Bowl was important, in which America was bringing democracy to the world, in which the doctor could fix you, in which science was going to make life better and better…
            - Charles Eisenstein

I never thought to question the “everything is fine in the world” attitude that permeated the upper-middle class culture around me in Vanilla Valley, Colorado. I didn’t need much self-deception to believe the indoctrination of education, the media, and the normality of so many routines around me. Everything was fine according to them.

At this point in my life, a human was mostly defined as a middle-class white American who definitely played bumble bee soccer and probably lived in my neighborhood. That is the extent of my world, the furthest my consciousness is qualified to reach.

Yet I am growing conscious. The mere existence of memories and questions from this point in my life can attest to that.

I remember being conscious of two things in particular: my perceived freedom and the phrase “when I grow up.”

I am being taught by a culture profoundly accepting of procrastination.

My first freedom. I ride the bus without supervision, except from the grumbly bus driver who, despite all the disturbances and disobedience, remained amiable and maintained the best handlebar moustache I will ever have the honor of mocking. I go outside, under minimal supervision, to play with friends. This is freedom; full-blooded, cheeseburger chomping, American freedom.

But freedom is not given to children. Not without first educating them about the importance of following rules. Obedience is taught early. Compliance is rewarded and defiance and distraction punished.

I am also aware of the concept of growing up. I want to be a fireman, a herpetologist, and a professional soccer player all at the same time.

I also wanted to be a business man like my dad, but I as I grew, I learned that I didn’t. Even as a child I realized that his retail sales job was, though sporadically glamorous, mostly exhausting and lackluster. I had a notion that I could do something big, something that would let me earn the love of people, rather than just accept it because I was part of the family.

The question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” was tossed around, and still is, like a tennis ball in a game of fetch that’s gone on much too long for your liking, but you continue to throw the ball because dismissing the joy and genuine interest of your dog would be depressing.

I didn’t know how much awareness came with growing up. I never would have imagined answering the question with, “I want to have a purpose because I’d rather return to an unconscious state than live in this world full of inequality, prejudice, exploitation, and suffering without meaningful work.”

But what do I know? I’m not “grown up” yet.

Self-Conscious
For all I know now, the world is comprised of hot girls, girls, and everyone else (who were probably either trying to tell me what to do or competing with me for the attention of the girls.)

My consciousness is so clearly focused inward.

But I act like everyone else is paying attention to me even though they are just as consumed by self-consciousness.

This perspective is perilous. Indeed, it is potentially poisonous; I still deal with lasting repercussions of this outlook today. Insecurity, gossip, and competitiveness still linger in me, wounded but wound like Jack fell down the hill and right into his box ready to burst out once the handle’s been cranked just so.

These lingering characteristics are often manifested through materialism. Even though I appreciate nature, especially the fusion of serenity and intensity that comes from fishing, and the orchestral ebb and flow of conversation more than most of my peers, I have one serious weakness. Shoes. I want the freshest kicks around and I want people to know it. Nike has captured cool, and that means my heart and imagination is theirs. I characterize myself, not through my words or my actions, but through the color, style, and brand of my shoes.

In 1864 Abe Lincoln was suspicious of corporations and their influence so he wrote, “God grant that my suspicions may prove groundless” for he feared it would bring the destruction of the Republic. He would turn in his grave if he knew how much my generation idolized brands. In his eyes the Republic he died for would be gone. Consumed by consumerism.

I still believe I will grow up so my immediate actions and desires aren’t of much significance to me. I bully and I conform.

But the notion that I could be someone special is still there, though it is extraordinarily faint like the dull mumbling of your awkward genius friend ranting on about his preference for Lord of the Rings during your neighbor’s pool party.

I only glimpse it as I lace up and practice juggling alone in the backyard or get genuinely excited about a literature project.

Little did I know that this notion of growing up would enslave me, regiment my life, tell me what to do, what to think, and what to feel. It would drill us, diet us, and treat us like cattle. Charlie Chaplin said to me and other “soldiers” in The Great Dictator, “You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts!”
I am starting to daydream, longing to be let outside the walls of the institution. I am beginning to contemplate getting off the train my parents had put me on, the one with a predetermined destination, and running as far and as fast as I could.

Pseudo-conscious
Four million adolescents started ninth grade the same year as I. Four million more humans waterlogged with hormones.

I entered high school in a mild depression. However, I only call it depression now, after experiencing true depression in college. I would have called it boredom or disgust back then.

I am unable to blindly accept that what I am offered as normal is indeed normal. We are studying some historical atrocities in school and I read about modern day atrocities in the news and online. But the response from adults is obnoxious and sad.

By deflecting questions or using tautophrases like “It is what it is,” they say that genocide, starvation, human exploitation by governments and corporations, and environmental degradation are unfortunate facts of life to be regretted, or even taboo subjects to be ignored.

Disconnection is rampant. Nobody gives a shit about anyone or anything that isn’t right in front of their gluttonous facades they call faces.

I have self-guilt.

I am so lucky, so privileged, but so ashamed for not enjoying the spoils. Nonetheless, I have an energy within me that demands to be utilized, an inkling that I can be something more. I know life, for me and for others around the globe, is supposed to be more joyful, more real, more meaningful, and more beautiful.

It is wretched to think phrases like “carpe diem” have been tossed aside as cliché while sayings like “time is money” are still used as motivational tools.

Time is life.

I don’t like that everybody works for the weekend and hates Mondays. But as much as my distaste for conventional American dogma intensifies, so too, do the distractions. Driving, working, drinking, smoking, socializing, and having sex are some of the minor distractions.

Balancing time between divorced parents who let me decide at which house I’ll stay, struggling to remain optimistic and enthused, finding a purpose and meaning for my life as a whole, and discovering myself and my skills are the major distractions.

I push these major distractions away for fear of alienation, for the sake of my superficial sanity.

I’ve heard that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

I continually ignore my major distractions, hoping they will ooze out of my follicles and wash away in the shower, and focus on the minor ones.

I take a lot of showers.

I still do.

Numb
“Be smart and be safe” is the last thing my dad tells me before I am left to fend for myself in Sheldon Hall. However, “fend for myself” is a bit of an exaggeration. Yes, I had to choose my own meals and get to class without a ride, but I was far from self-reliant. We all have a good idea of who was actually picking up the tab.

But I am free. Finally.

And I take advantage of this freedom. Experimentation, truancy, and overindulging move the hands on my clock.

And after supplying the municipal court with enough dough for a year’s supply of donuts for the officers I had encountered, the year is over.

I have learned two things from two self-taught lessons: how to handle myself when shit hits the fan and how to move past it.

Two lessons I haven’t forgotten.

Attentive
Agonizing longing for purpose and meaning; I try to numb it. But the attempts only result in self-contempt. This is my purgatory. I cannot escape myself or my privilege. Using covert and overt forms of rebellion I am refusing to give my whole self to a society and to an institution that embodies the apathy I have grown to loathe. I am procrastinating, getting drunk and high, and escaping. Using travel, physical or mental, I try to leave my longing behind.

Emerson said, “The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them.” I was growing up but I didn’t see improvement. I saw regression in a way. Yes, I was an intelligent, articulate young man, but I had lost the joy and the ideas of my childhood.

I am recognizing that my attempts at escape are futile, so I fling myself into school and work.

Two jobs and twenty-one credits make James a dull boy. Two jobs and twenty-one credits make James a dull boy. Two jobs and twenty-one credits make James a dull boy. Two jobs and twenty-one credits make James a dull boy. Two jobs and twenty-one credits make James a dull boy.

You get the picture. And so did everyone around me. I won’t describe the details and distortions of my depressed mind for I think we’ve all experienced the timidity and triviality of having to keep on living.

A constant headache, a numb rage, blurs consciousness.

But now summer comes. Vitamin D replenishes and I am left alone in an emerald forest for five months. I read Emerson in a tree and Thoreau on top of the butte. I accept that all the negativity inside me is accompanied, of course, by positivity.

I still do not have meaning or purpose in my life, but I am learning where to look. The true independence of this summer is intoxicating and I am finding respect for all of the unique perspectives I have befriended.

But still, I could not find a single honest, possibly disobedient, man like the one Thoreau suggested could change society. Nor could I find the stoic that Emerson calls out for. I yearned to be self-reliant but I didn’t have self-belief. I would have to prove my worth to myself.

Conscientious
A new-found awareness has stirred my curious mind. I am infatuated with genius. I want to understand it so I can imitate it. What I am reading in the tree intrigues me, “To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius.” But everyone says that only with self-delusion can I believe that I am a genius.

So many people seemed unaware of or unconcerned with some of my most passionate beliefs. However, I do know that only with self-delusion could I keep living happily in a world I feel is meaningless. I had to strive for change or I had to go out swinging.

Through my reading I am beginning to realize that self-transformation, self-belief, and self-worth are the most powerful forces of change. I am being revitalized. All I have to do is change myself!

How hard could that be?

Awake
Pretty hard.

I tear myself to pieces after junior year. I am inventing positivity rituals because I am aware of the tendencies that hold me down like an anchor chained to my leg in enough water to cover my chin. I can see and I can breathe, but I cannot move.

So I write, “I won’t be just another college dude trained as a cockatoo, regurgitating information searching for approval; used as fuel for expansive resource removal and the brutal treatment of the truthful people living in the fruitful regions of Earth. It makes me hurt.”

Then I decide that I want to take a leap of faith.

I seek an opportunity to put my skills and my grit to the test. I leap. I start something that allows me to be a part of something bigger than myself. I start believing in myself and I start believing that people are inherently good despite my most petrifying doubts.

Remarkably, at the culmination of my education according to society, school is not my priority. School does not let me practice; I am finding ways to practice for myself even though in a few months, a flaky piece of tree flesh will tell me I am obedient and intelligent enough to be a productive component of this national machine.

My artificial intelligence struggled to let my machine side and human side inhabit the same space.

Though, to be clear, I am not here to degrade education. For I see it the same way Mandela does. But our system, based on rank and test scores and standardized results, neglects what it means to be human. It prepares people to look for a job, not to create jobs for themselves and other. I would not have thought I could relate to someone who was raised in poverty, given too-few opportunities, nor to someone who has been marginalized their whole life. But this system, on a different echelon, has opened my eyes and exposed me to different forms of oppression and marginalization.

I will turn back into a mental calculator, tired and deflated from a life devoid of meaning, if I don’t use my consciousness. As long as I question how each output is derived, I’ll be awake.

Ascension
I won’t forget where the station is but I have stepped off the train. For now. Though it’s not like I can’t hop back on. I have a fellowship, not a job, with a nonprofit, not a corporation, for only a year, not the rest of my life. But I am still pursuing a career path like the obedient American college graduate should. However, instead of the comfort and stability that the realized American dream provides, my path is riddled with uncertainty, poor pay, frustrating obstacles, and indifference from the general public.

I’d like to derail the train. But part of me bets I’ll just end up train hopping instead.

Have I chosen the path of the martyr?

I am sauntering beside the tracks because it’s the only navigation I know. But at least now I can stop, examine, backtrack, sidestep, and maneuver however I want. I can actually feel the breeze rather than watch the trees bend and imagine. The grass can scratch at my legs and I can hear it rustle. I can smell the fresh air and see the approaching smog.

But it’s invigorating. I wake up each day, not dreading going to work and not bursting out of bed, but by accepting a challenge.

Another four million humans were born last year. Destination predetermined, will they wake up or will they remain content; trusting the conductor?

Will they wonder where the calculator’s answer came from? Or will they praise the dream for making life that much easier to ignore?