Speaking as a conspiracy nut job, I can offer you some perspective on what may be your colleagues’ states of mind. Playing the conspiracy game is like falling into a near bottomless pit of information that is both frightening and irresistable. The experience is like learning that everything you’ve been taught has pieces missing, and it can become a scramble to figure out what those pieces are without much in the way of guidance. So people are sort of stumbling in the dark, and they are petrified because the information is new to them (e.g. the FEMA stuff has been around since the 80s).
It’s also as close to a religious conversion as you’ll witness, because these people literally can’t not see the things they see. Without a real change for the better in the world, there is really no way for them to jump back over the fence.
There are also a lot of false bottoms with this stuff. People think they’ve hit on some definitive information, and digging deeper reveals that it is misinformation, or it’s one part truth and one part fabrication or whatever. It’s really difficult to know what the real deal is with a lot of this stuff.
So, my point is, whether they are right or wrong, you are dealing with people who are flailing about like middle schoolers who think they know something. They might say plausible things or have a partially correct idea of what the deal is, but probably they have more bad information or are placing too much importance on marginal information.
Hopefully, that creates for you a bit of a window of compassion for what they are experiencing.
So after spending a ton of energy on this myself, the interesting thing I’ve learned is that it kind of brings you full circle to a no less equal truth—that we individually and together have a good bit of power and a direct connection to a “higher power.” So we can make a choice to pay attention to that instead of being paralyzed by fear. In my case, it’s been a difficult leap to make and there are a ton of impediments since “business as usual” seems full of too many pitfalls, but I know that personal power is available to me.
Assuming there’s all this bad shit happening and caused by bad people, there’s also a window for compassion for these people. In all liklihood they’re addicted to power or are being controlled by others through their addiction or delusion. It’s a shame, really.
Another thing to keep in mind is that times have been worse. Imagine the chaos of the civil rights era or Vietnam where young men were drafted and sent to die. That was a fearful time as well with lots of anti-government sentiment and suspicion. Imagine negotiating that time in history.
For me being enthusiastic about doing this whole life game is difficult for a number of reasons (some medical and chronic). I have a mostly negative to neutral disposition. But, when I think about it, maybe part of what it’s all about is mastering that choice between fear and compassion. So how tough can you be? What’s your capacity for keeping your heart and mind healthy in the midst of the “illness” of fear and futility.
Well, hopefully that helped a little. Good luck.
Composing members:
0
