New Illusions

[Ron Tocknell]

We are now facing a monumental challenge ahead of us. It isn’t a mountain or an ocean or even space travel. It is our own mindset.

At present, we are in a situation in which some reap huge rewards for relatively little input while others are bent in hard labour each and every waking hour in return for barely enough to feed their families.

This must be addressed.

The only predators we now have to face are our own species. The disempowered are exploited by the powerful. Each nation poses a potential threat to other nations who, in turn, are seen as a potential threat to them. Vast amounts of our resources are committed to the production of weapons and the maintenance of military power. We have become our own enemies.

This must be addressed.

Our progress and technological advancement is currently based on a monetary system, which can only operate by ensuring that the majority are enslaved by debt.

This must be addressed.

The exploitation of the Earth’s finite resources is taking us ever closer to irreparable damage to the environment on which we all depend.

This must be addressed.

We are caught up in a twilight world of avarice and acquisition dominated by stuff and objects we are hypnotised into believing we need.

This must be addressed.

That sounds like an awful lot of addressing; and it would be if we tried to address each element individually. However, each element is governed by one overall mindset:

It is the mindset that says: “I’m gonna screw you before you get a chance to screw me!”

It is the mindset that regards everyone as an enemy unless proven otherwise.

It is the mindset that says: I am the sum total of my stuff.

It is the mindset of an obsession with power and control.

That is what we have to address; this mindset that focuses on illusions.

It is an illusion that money is anything but a symbolic representation of an imagined unit of value. When money is released from the bank, it isn’t taken from anywhere. It is generated when the figures are entered into the computer. It then becomes a debt owed to the bank… with interest. Yet that money never existed in the first place because it is an illusion.

Our development and progress owes much to our capacity to imagine. When we work out complex mathematical calculations, we do so by converting the elements into imaginary symbols and then we imagine how they would interact with each other. Because this exercise of the imagination can lead us to a conclusion that can have a predictable impact on reality, we tend to think of mathematics as ‘reality’. It is not. It is an illusion we have learned to utilise.

A drawing of a buffalo is not a buffalo. It can be recognised as a buffalo by all who see it but it still is not a buffalo. It is an exercise of the imagination and the fact that the lines seem to suggest something we recognise as a buffalo is an illusion.

We utilise illusions all the time. We judge distance by the illusion that distant objects appear smaller than near objects. We judge time by the illusion that time is actually in motion, moving in measurable linear increments.

Much of what we accept as solid reality is simply illusion that we have learned to utilise. Concepts of wealth, poverty, power and so on are all illusions. This capacity for ‘imagineering’ (using imagination to bring about actual consequences) has been a vital element in our evolution to the beings we are.

Illusions are neither good nor bad; they simply are (or, to be more accurate: they simply are not). This capacity for illusion has enabled us to manifest a reality that otherwise would not be possible. There is no reason to believe that such a capacity would not continue to enable us to manifest impossible realities.

There is, however, an almost universally held view that our progress has somehow gone wrong. This, I feel, is largely due to the fact that many of the old illusions are no longer conducive to the overall concept of true progress.

The role of a leader in society is not simply to have power over others but to oversee and maintain the infrastructure and behavioural policies necessary to make a society work for the benefit of all. The fact that most leaders in our history have been, at least to some extent, despotic, megalomanic tyrants who were drawn to power by the prospect of personal gain and ego has clearly had an impact on our history. However, it has not prevented the progress towards better societies that improve the lives of the majority within them.

Until now.

The concept of power over others has now reached dangerous proportions. The damage caused by the illusion that a tiny few can hold absolute power over the masses is no longer ‘collateral damage’ along the path of improvement. It has become a threat to the course of progress itself.

We need new illusions. We need new tools for our future imagineering.

Whether it is a democracy or a dictatorship, power over others exists only by consent. It is not the illusion of one’s own power that makes it a reality; it is the consent of the masses to buy into that illusion that turns what would otherwise be delusions of grandeur into a position of actual power. Actual power is not in the head that wears the crown but in the hands that place the crown upon it.

Power only works if we buy into the illusion.

Money, as a material object has little value. Coins could be made into useful items but the intrinsic value is no more than the usefulness of the substance from which they are made. Paper money, despite being in higher denominations, has even less intrinsic value. It isn’t edible, it doesn’t burn too well and it’s not even absorbent enough to use as toilet paper.

Let’s imagine you have a large, plastic bag containing $100,000 and the freedom to do whatever you want with it. In the illusory world of society, that would enable you to equip yourself with lots of advantages and, when it was spent, the plastic bag would go in the trash.

Now let’s imagine that you are stranded on a desert island when a plastic bag containing $100,000 is washed ashore. The plastic bag becomes the object of desire, as there is nothing in nature that replicates its properties. It can hold water; it can keep food fresh; it can keep things dry. The 100,000 rectangles of useless paper becomes the trash.

Money only works if we buy into the illusion.

We must now devise the illusions that we are prepared to buy into and reject the illusions that are leading us away from our path of perpetual improvement.

[Deborah J. Boyd]

Please join me at peace2027.ning.com and bring this video with you please. Love & Peace, Deborah

Peace Portal said:

You are so correct, and dead on target (dead as in debt/Debtor/Civilly Dead); what is needed is an information age economic model. Our explanation of one is at www.freedigitaluniverse.com, please take a look and let me know what you think. Here's a short video on the economic model that treats all users as Soules, and their currency is unencumbered.