CHOOSE YOUR REALITY
This week Google decided to send out the press release on quite possibly one of their more controversial products ever to be presented: Google Glass, a battery operated computer processor complete with a tiny computer screen that sits on your face in the form of eyewear. Oh, where do we even start with this one? My own personal processor was a whirl. Oddly enough, as a kid, I really enjoyed those state run multiple choice tests, so this is what went through my mind as I processed this strange new possibility as a part of my reality. Here are the possible realities I projected for Google’s new product:
A) The best invention ever, taking man one step closer to telepathy and complete interconnectedness?
B) The worst invention ever, putting an electromagnetic wave omitter right next to our brains leading to mass brain cancer epidemic?
C) Still the worst invention ever, putting an electromagnetic wave receiver right next to our brains turning us into psudo-human-cyborgs that can be manipulated into a further buying frenzy through marketing frequencies that influence our unconscious desires?
D) Yet another stupid marketing ploy to turn something uncool into a desirable cool item by making a reality-style competition out of it, but lacking the give away at the end, thus turning it into only a competition for dumb, marketing-dupable rich people?
E) Or the dorkiest invention ever, this will be considered about as cool as those bluetooth ear thingies that have the power to make even someone who is considered cool, rich, and beautiful instantly transform into a big, silly-looking tool?
Choose one. According to the Times, which controls a fair portion of the collective consciousness, the answer is E). Lucky for Google, the NY Times only gave them a design challenge in return rather then even mentioning the possibility or science of A, B, or C. Personally, I was so ready to go for answer A), but considering Google’s new product is promoted as another “cool toy”, answer D) ended up beating A) out in my present belief system. I suppose I could rearrange my beliefs systems to get to A) but until Google proves that their motives behind releasing this device into society has a greater purpose to serve humanity than providing us with another class dividing toy, well, I don’t see it as all that important.
So what is the game? It’s the game of Choose Your Reality. How does it work? Well, there are many ways to play, but generally speaking, I recognize four styles of playing.
Style 1) The Sleeper: we let others choose what happens in our reality by agreeing with or accepting as fact whatever we see around us, read in the news, hear in the media, etc. Believing life to be something that happens to us:
“Right now computer glasses sound dorky, but if they design them to look cool, I’d get one if I could afford it.”-Jane Doe, Still Hates Her Job.
Style 2) The Polarizer: we jump between heaven and hell from moment to moment, and never quite feel like we actually have a handle unless we do something to zenify ourselves with pure choices. Believing life is something we can overcome if we try really, really hard to overcome the dark side:
“This is either the cure for humanity or the end of it, but I won’t have anything to do with it. I’ve got to go meditate, this is disturbing my peace.” -Summer Rayne Sunshine, Avid Meditator.
Style 3) The Shape Shifter: we try a taste of all percievable realities before choosing which reality to dive into and experience. We change our position from moment to moment until we agree with one of the present options, shifting from one paradoxical reality to the next, and quite possibly confusing everyone around us while doing so:
“I’d volunteer, but only if they give it to me for free… Wait a minute, I hate competitions… However, I do love strange, new realities and this is about as strange and new as it can get. I could make this work for me, but only if the powers that be choose to make it work for me. Otherwise, it’s decidedly not working for me, therefore I’m decidedly not supporting this becoming a thing in society, although it probably will eventually become a thing for some of society, the way the iPhone has. But I won’t get one because only villains and cyborgs wear computers on their faces, the good guys are usually, generally, mostly natural. Except for Luke Skywalker, who had a robot arm and turned even his machine father back to the good side. In which case, it doesn’t really matter one way or another.” -Jack Sparrow, Weirdo Pirate.
Style 4) The Parallel Universe Jumper: we imagine all the possible realities to experience and then choose which one we prefer to experience. Believing life is a game, one where the rules and circumstances change from moment to moment, where we have the power to choose, to some degree, how we will experience whatever comes next (Or at least, have the discernment to choose how we do not wish to experience something next):
“In your reality those glasses are dangerous. In her reality those glasses are the future. In his reality those glasses are going to make someone very rich. In their reality those glasses are super dorky. In my reality, this object exists as a tool for humanity’s next step.”-Miranda Smith, generally out there, no one can quite place her.
All are true, though totally different. Get it? The truth about reality is that we’re all experiencing different ones. The people who believe this is a dangerous invention maybe currently or soon will be reading studies that prove how electromagnetic fields are manipulating our desires and causing brain cancer, while, the folks who think it would be fun to be the coolest geeks in school will get themselves a pair of Google Glasses as soon as they hit the store selves, unconcerned by electromagnetic waves, as they spend 95% of their waking hours within 12″ of a computer anyway. Each of us will prefer our own vision of reality and in most cases, most of us will prefer that others don’t try to convince us that our reality is not real.
There’s no point in trying to discount anyone else’s reality, they’re just as real as our own. We’re all living in our own private parallel universes, which when we meet, sort of intersect in a strange kind of fun house style hall of mirrors.
We can see the same objects and events, but in the mirror I’m looking in, they’re tall and wobbly, while the mirror you maybe looking in shows them stretched and short or upside down. The only way we could be seeing things the same is if we decide to agree to look through the same looking glass, which is kind of the way the collective consciousness works. But, even then, the perspective is still slightly different from person to person (unless of course you’re remote viewing into another person’s body, which is just a little bit creepy, though generally harmless as few people will simultaneously agree to allow someone else to psychically possess them, and even then, most likely you’d still be missing something in the periphery. By the way, this is why the idea of internet information gleaning doesn’t scare me. You want to know what I look at and comment on via the internet? Big deal).
There is yet another style of playing that I failed to mention. Let’s call this Style 0: the Quantum Leaper.
The Quantum Leaper style is the most abstract and difficult to describe, since this playing style generally does not allow us any ability to communicate in human language what it is that we are experiencing in our present, ever shifting, reality. In this style one is so expanded in our perceivable reality, that when we look at a concept such as Google Glass, at first we might see something like this in our minds eye:
A cat wearing Google Glasses
Then the kitty might start to look something like this:
Fractal Rainbows
And eventually, it might organize itself into something that looks like this:
Exploding Star
And then we might get so distracted by how cool the exploding star was that we forget all about the whole question of Google Glasses and go on about our merry, strange, and wonderful day.
Perhaps playing with Quantum Leaper style is really the most fun way play. I mean, come on, psychedelic cats in glasses and exploding stars? Now that’s my idea of fun!
Let’s play.
THE TRANSFORMATIVE STATE 