The World Is F*cked—What's Your Solution? Part 2

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.” -commonly attributed to Leo Tolstoy

As Part 1 of this article explored, material solutions to humanity’s many problems are everywhere. They include ways to undermine government overreach and decentralize authority, build new, voluntary infrastructure outside the State, and opt out of the current paradigm while creating a new one.

While these solutions are essential for creating a new and better world, I believe they will ultimately fall short unless more humans venture inward. There must be a conscious evolution in body, heart, and spirit. The following suggestions for solutions cover what we can accomplish by caring for and connecting more deeply with ourselves—and how this can change the outer world.

You own your body–act like it

The government claims authority over people’s bodies in many ways: demanding a cut of the fruits of your labor, issuing commands you are expected to obey under threat of force, imposing medical mandates, or requiring military service registration (and in the worst of times, outright conscription), to name a few. The underlying implication is clear: the government claims ownership over you and everyone else.

Recognizing that you own your body—not some external authority—is an act of both philosophical and strategic defiance. Caring for your health is a meaningful step toward shifting this upside-down paradigm on multiple levels.

The government’s standards for health leave much to be desired. Federal dietary guidelines are set by people influenced by the corporate agricultural lobby. Higher consumption of government-subsidized foods is associated with a higher incidence of common chronic diseases. Food stamps pay for heavily processed fast food. My public school lunch offerings included Pizza Hut and Subway, and Lunchables are deemed acceptable fare in public school cafeterias today.

Eating cleaner, less processed, nutrient-dense foods—ideally from smaller producers with cleaner cultivation practices—simultaneously opts you of the dominant system and helps you bolster your health so you are less dependent on the same system’s ‘solutions.’ The simple act of tending to your health is a small but significant act of defiance—both philosophically and materially—against institutions that presume ownership over you while promoting disease.

Further, spending time in nature, building strength and stamina, and caring for your connective tissue and fascia, for example, make your physical body more resilient. This is as vital as being mindful of what you consume considering Americans’ most pervasive chronic health ailments are preventable with diet and lifestyle. 

Often harmful pharmaceutical interventions compound this chronic disease epidemic. Their approval process is managed by the FDA, which is in large part funded by the companies seeking approval. Opting out of this corrupted system is essential for disempowering the companies that supply the majority of food and medications with the government’s backing. FDA-approved food and drugs undoubtedly contribute to America's widespread health problems. Many “safe” food additives are correlated with disease while pharmaceutials often suppress symptoms without addressing the root causes of illness.

As mentioned briefly in Part 1, one example (there are many) is replacing traditional medications with more holistic treatments. Cannabidiol (CBD), which has been extensively studied, provides relief for a wide variety of issues and comes without the side effects of many traditional drugs. To reiterate (from Part 1), I understand that not everyone can simply stop taking traditional drugs they rely on, and these medications can serve a purpose in some cases. Even so, in these instances, natural options may help lessen side effects or even improve the outcomes of more standard therapies.

In another example, I have spent the better part of this year doing a limbic/brain “rewiring” program, which uses neuroplasticity (the brain’s ability to change itself and create new neurons and neural pathways) to heal from a chronic, mystery illness that seemed adjacent to autoimmune disease. The program, called the Dynamic Neural Retraining System (DNRS), has helped thousands of people heal from debilitating conditions including POTS, fibromyalgia, Lyme disease, Mast Cell Activation Syndrome, various autoimmune diseases, and a wide variety of sensitivities.

DNRS uses targeted visualizations and several other techniques to heighten neuroplasticity in the brain and “rewire” it to calm down a glitched-out fight-or-flight response. When the brain is caught in fight-or-flight, the body gets stuck in perpetual stress and survival mode, which can lead to chronic health issues that are difficult to treat. Many people who have completed the program were told they’d be sick for the rest of their lives but healed fully with DNRS, even weening themselves off pharmaceuticals. I have seen drastic, positive changes in my health this year that I look forward to sharing in-depth when I am fully healed.

Since I know I own my body, I also believe it is on me to take care of it, not outsource it to authorities with clear conflicts of interest. The act of taking responsibility for your physical health supports the philosophy of owning yourself and helps you opt out of the ruling system.

Taking responsibility for your well-being

Emotional and spiritual health are just as important as physical health. Many people in positions of power seek control over our consciousness, whether through the use of propaganda, public schooling, or the manipulation of social media. While this usually affects our minds and how we think about the legitimacy of ruling institutions, it inherently carries an emotional element.

When our internal experience is reactive, terrified, and chaotic, we are more susceptible to the designs of those in power—those who seek to control and influence people and keep them under the trance of statism and subservience. (This is not to say reactivity, fear, and suffering stem only from government propaganda or the consequences of government policies. We all had childhoods, and few of us grew up without having difficult experiences that conditioned us toward reactivity, anxiety, depression, avoidance, and other difficult emotions and states of being.) 

Further, stress, depression, and anxiety are global issues (and they were prevalent before COVID-19, lockdown orders, and the media’s incessant coverage, which greatly exacerbated these conditions). It is hard to look at all the suffering in the world and not recognize that the external chaos is a reflection of our internal experience.

Those caught in the neverending stream of fear-mongering and hyperactivation (on both sides) often expect the government to address their discontent and fear so they don't have to feel their discomfort. Afraid of Republicans? Democrats? Economic collapse? Viruses? Immigrants? Guns? Vote for me, and I will fix it so you don’t have to feel scared!

The expectation that agents of government will (or even can) make our problems go away perpetuates an authority-driven mentality: People give away their power and agency in the hopes that someone else will improve their lives, vanquish their perceived enemies, and quell their fears. Rarely does this actually occur. Most often, government authority increases while freedom decreases.

Some of the greatest dystopian novels touch on the role emotions play in authoritarianism. The infamous two-minutes hate in 1984 kept the proles enraged, fixated on their perceived enemies, and loyal to Big Brother. In Fahrenheit 451, a key factor maintaining the authorities’ control was the population’s dependence on drugs to numb their suffering and stay fixated on their screens. They were also conditioned to loathe those who questioned their programmed reality. People caught in this kind of reactivity, division, and desperation to find peace are easier to keep locked in their place at the bottom of the ruling class hierarchy.

Most of us are not taught how to be with difficult feelings when we are growing up, largely because our parents and guardians weren’t taught, either—and neither were their parents and guardians. This is an intergenerational pattern. However, if we can learn to take responsibility for our emotions and human experience instead of relying on people in power to do it for us, their promises of heroism carry less potency and appeal (not to mention that the government and their cronies are often at the root of the societal problems that unnerve us). Cultivating peace within ourselves makes us less psychologically dependent on authoritarians who promise to do it for us and less susceptible to manipulation that disconnects us from our inner power and agency.

For me, this peace has come with practicing self-compassion and holding space for my difficult emotions when they arise. This has allowed me to extend more compassion to others. When we are connected to ourselves and our own humanity, it is easier to recognize it in others—even those with whom we may vehemently disagree.

Seeing past the divisions, which, in my view, are mostly a consequence of the inherently adversarial political system, makes divide-and-conquer agendas less effective. Breaking free of these control tactics helps us see more clearly that our neighbors—domestically and abroad—are not the root of the problem. This does not mean we should “compassionately” submit to oppressive policies because our neighbor thinks they are moral. But remembering that said neighbor is a victim of programming (just as I and so many of us once were) and believes they are acting morally brings me more peace than judging and blaming them for what the ruling powers have produced.

That said, people who no longer buy into the system would also stand to benefit from going inward and cultivating peace within themselves. Some of the most reactive, dysregulated people I’ve encountered are those who have checked out of the propaganda. It’s something I’m still working on myself. Of course, anger, frustration, and despair are all valid responses to the current dystopia and all its injustices and brutality. However, getting stuck here and letting these feelings hijack your inner experience means the authorities still have their claws in you. Are you truly free if your well-being is constantly jerked around by the actions of people in power?

In the coming weeks, I will elaborate on several practices I have found beneficial in taking responsibility for my well-being and becoming less hooked by the system. For now, to summarize, they include spending time in nature, reducing screen time, exercising regularly, breathwork, meditation (there are many kinds), yoga (there are also many kinds), and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. The DNRS program deserves another mention here because it cultivates emotional well-being by helping soothe the limbic system, which is largely responsible for regulating emotions. Some of the top concerns DNRS helps address are anxiety and depression, and I’ve found that since starting my rewiring process, the agitation that hummed in the background of my experience for most of my life has quieted down immensely.

Additionally, some of my favorite resources include writings and talks by Tara Brach, Ram Dass, and Pema Chodron. Their wisdom, along with the Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook by Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer, has given me powerful tools to navigate the difficult experience of being human.

Of course, different methods and perspectives resonate with different people, so what works for me may not work for you. It is worthwhile to discover what does work for you and your individual preferences and concerns.

We can have all the material, technological, and strategic solutions our seemingly infinite human intelligence can imagine and create. However, if we continue outsourcing our power and agency to others and staying caught in our unconscious reactivity and suffering, these material solutions will not be sustainable. We will continue to revert to tribalism, herd mentalities, and divide-and-conquer agendas as we blame others for our problems, avoid our inner struggles, and rely on the ruling class to fix the problems it created. Claiming ownership over your body, mind, heart, and spirit and taking responsibility for your overall well-being is essential to evolving past the current paradigm.

Part 3, the final installation of this series (for now!), will explore the crux of what I have been speaking about for years: breaking free of our conditioned belief in government and its violent authority to embrace peaceful, voluntary relationships and interactions.

*Note: The Tolstoy quote in the subheading of this article appears to either have different translations or have evolved over the years (hence the “commonly attributed to” wording). A different version of the quote reads, “…everybody thinks of changing humanity, and no one thinks of changing himself.”