My Escape from the Matrix...

For most practical purposes I have given up on society in total. I completely dropped out from MSM's continuous drooling blather. Before, when I was servicing the machine for money, I didn't have television at home but I had it at work. When not on a call, and not navigating the continuous stream of bureaucratically generated bull shit, I would often find myself in a recliner in front of an idiot box. I was too emotionally tired to do anything about the brainwashing while at work. The pull of easy entertainment that required no thought on my part was overwhelming during those society induced comas of mine. Now there is zero programming in my life. My internet time has clocked in at about 10 minutes a day since I resigned...sometimes less or not at all, but a fair estimate would be about a 10 minute per day average. I've realized that I simply do not care about the insanity any longer. While it is my problem, as it is yours, I've liberated myself from any guilt associated with not doing "something" about the world. And I mean something in the protesting/activists with faith in the political smoke screen sense of something. I consider trying to inform zombies and drooling creitins about the near post petroleum future to be akin to pissing and shitting in a toilet of potable water...it's just stupid. 

 

I haven't been reading or writing at all. While I was working I would read one or two books a week on top of studying Druidry. I haven't read a thing and yet somehow I have become more spiritual. How is that? Following your bliss comes with many positive side effects. My bliss is to act in accordance with my best analysis concerning what is true about the world. My entire life has been about finding the truth, and now it seems that a part of that search has finally ended...dissolved into my own bliss.  I no longer have any dead lines, meetings, or mandatory training. I don't have to sign admissions of guilt for doing nothing wrong. My purpose has become a practice of good stewardship for all life. That is to say that the majority of my "responsibilities" are about raising and husbanding young life. I am here for my son everyday. I am actively watching his mind, body, and spirit evolve. That is my primary purpose in life now. Just to be present for him as a loving and guiding father. I'm also raising seedlings in a cold frame that I built out of salvaged and scavenged materials (although it appears there will be no need for such technology seeing as how it was in the mid 80's today...there is often snow on the ground about this time around here). I will soon be raising "biddies" as well (baby chicks).

I have found that I have a proclivity towards scavenging. I've always despised the idea of waste, and now I work towards salvaging as much resources as possible from America's waste stream. The cold frame I mentioned was built with wood siding that I saved from a demo job on my house (the one that I walked away from) and glass shelving from an old refrigerator. The first composter that I built was made from salvaged shelves and the one I'm building now is being made from box spring wood (if you've never completely demolished a box spring you should try it some time...and I'm talking about one that was made 30 years ago back when quality was a large percentage of making consumer trappings).

There is still a lot of irony that is unfolding in my new living situation which all revolves around the 67 year old aunt-in-law growing up when she did and where she did. The variety of irony I'm talking about here can be summed up nicely by a quick anecdote. The other day I came into the house from constructing things out of scavenged wood and it was 74 degrees in the house. It was 70 degrees outside. I said to her "it's too hot in here," as I felt the temperature of my sons skin who had been in the house playing. "I'll turn on the air conditioning" was the reply I got. I said, "no, just open the windows up," to which she replied that it was not summer yet and she doesn't open her windows until summer. She's paying the utilities and it's her house, so what was I to say. I just mourned the stupidity quietly to myself as I made my way back out to my constructing sanctuary (I spend a healthy portion of my time in the two car garage next to the house that I claimed upon the first day here...I didn't want my wife getting any ideas this time, and I strongly considered pissing on the walls to make my claim). As I walked back to my cave the massive heating and air unit kicked on. I could go on with many such anecdotes but I believe this one will suffice.

 

However, I have managed to abolish paper towels from the house, I've enacted a program for saving organic matter formally known as "waste" generated in the kitchen, and I've slapped a PUR filter onto the kitchen sink so that we could stop drinking chlorine, fluoride, lead (from the aging infrastructure) and god knows what other not good for life chemicals that have found their way into the municipal water supply. I've still not got around to setting up a recycling program and every time I haul the trash off to the dump I feel a strong tinge of guilt...but priorities. I'll get around to it as soon as I can...soon I'll probably resolve to just going through the trash and sorting it myself. There are more pressing concerns like acquiring more stones for the beds, setting up my 500 gallon cistern for rain water harvesting, tending to my seedlings, making soil as quickly as possible to put in said beds, constructing a chicken coop, and all of this amidst taking care of my son and aunt-in-law as well as all of the other tasks that come with living in a ticky tacky box. The family in-law-member that was responsible for keeping up the house for my aunt-in-law, best I can tell was a jack leg, and so I've been having to go through and un-screw all of her jack leg work. 

 Today I cut the 2 acres with a push mower and enjoyed every minute of the work. I viewed it as harvesting biomass to alchemically transform it into soil for my beds. My heart sunk when I realized that I had once again found myself gardening on top of rock hard red clay. I'm sure it's possible to amend clay, but it's not worth the effort as Steve Solomen himself has warned against. I'm here to tell you that if you have red clay, don't bother with it...grow on top and let the soil critters do the work for you.

So the big picture looks like this. I've had to do some adjusting to get used to not bringing home the money for my family. My wife has been doing that with her camera and innate proclivity towards hustling needful things. I'll be making money eventually, but I'm on natures time now, and she can't be rushed. Eventually my practice of permaculture will pay off and I'll be able to ferment my way into money. William Hunter Duncan said in the comment section of my last blog that the fermentors will be like a national treasure in the future...I think he's right. I find the alchemy in fermentation to be amazing, rewarding, and very desired by people. I've not once witnessed somebody who likes kraut eat my kraut and not have their minds blown. The only problem I have is that I haven't been able to keep up with the demand for it because I've been so busy making my way in the matrix while not being a part of it. To be fair, I still acquire money from the Matrix through my wife's use of it, but the world requires money from us. It's a sad fact, however Wendy (my wife) loves taking pictures and doing what she does for money.  She's following her bliss as well, it just so happens that a side effect of that for her is making money. 

 

I was asked to say something about how my family is adjusting to the new arrangements. I can say that my son, my wife, my aunt-in-law, and I are all much happier than before we moved. Resigning from the Matrix was the best thing I have ever done and I have not regretted one moment of it. I've had doubts about it throughout this process, but no regrets. Most of my doubts revolved around money, and the fact that I'm no longer making any of it. The things that I can now provide for my family are priceless. What kind of price tag can you affix to being able to be a father for your child every single day? I suffered from constipation working as an EMT for many reasons and I now have bowel movements three to four times a day. My body is telling me that I have done the right thing. Being home I'm able to cook every meal with all whole foods every day. I have no deadlines and no schedule. I would advise anybody who has the ability to acquire a living situation without needing to work for the man to do so now. Give up some of your cherished autonomy and start learning how to live with family...now.

The end result, or the take away from my experience with the resignation and move, is that it's all been a product of following my bliss. Everybody should follow their bliss relentlessly all of the time. In one of my favorite movies, "Waking Life," a dream character says, "it's bad enough that you sell your waking life for...for minimum wage...but no...they get your dreams for free."  Stop selling your dreams and start living them. Let go of the fear that has been programmed into you and trust that the universe is divine, and so are you. You are Jesus and the Buddha, and they both said as much. What I have done is shed that programming. Sometimes society forces those of us who are sane to walk away. That's the literal place I was in. My choice was to walk away or go insane servicing the myth of the machine and progress. I now service my own dreams, and in so doing I service the dreams of my family and of the post petroleum humans that will make it to the ectotechnic future. Stop delaying, stop buying into the brain washing that they pump into you intravenously, let go of the programmed fear and follow your bliss...or stay miserable servicing the death of everything within the machine. This is real, and it needs to start happening now, while things still resemble "normal." 

 

I'll be posting pictures of what I'm doing soon...I plan on taking the pictures later on in the day when the light is right.