The Anti-Soapbox: Collected Essays Read online



  The Anti-Soapbox

  Collected Essays

  by

  Aaron Garrison

  ©2014 Aaron Garrison

  Table of Contents

  Preface

  I. P.R.I.M.O.: Five Terms to Know

  II. Give Opinion a Second Chance

  III. Blurring the Line: Fantasy or Reality?

  IV. Help?: How I Learned to Do Nothing

  V. Stay Calm

  VI. Don’t Forget the “Why”

  VII. Defying Appearances

  VIII. Exploring the Illogical

  IX. Semantics Revisited

  X. Take the Silent-Mind Challenge

  XI. Windows to Nothing: The Eyes Lie

  XII. The Dangers of Expectation

  XIII. On Property

  XIV. The New Science

  XV. The Nameless Experience

  XVI. On Freedom

  XVII. Our Progress Thus Far

  XVIII. On Transactions

  XIX. Ten Thousand Voices Saying Nothing

  XX. Three Sides to Every Story: A Primer in Multidimensional Thinking

  XXI. The Miracle of Choice

  PREFACE

  “So much the worse for him who took the comedy seriously, who only saw what happened on the stage, and not the machinery behind it.”

  —Arthur Koestler, Darkness at Noon

  It’s been said that, in the confusion and shadow-play of this life, one either shines a light or becomes the darkness. This book is my attempt to do the former and avoid the latter.

  I’m no guru, certainly, nor do I hope to pass as one. Why am I publishing some 40,000 words of my views and advice, then? For me, these collected essays are less a sermon than a guidepost, my way of sharing some of the everyday wisdom I’ve learned along this roughshod path of ours. When I feel strongly enough about something to essay on it, I do so out of meaningful experience that’s proved somehow helpful to me on a practical level. Also, many of my essays have resulted from observing a general need in my fellow man. I see myself (and my past mistakes) in so many others; it would be callous of me to hoard the knowledge that has, in my case at least, spared me some suffering.

  Consider these writings a friendly comparing of notes, if you will.

  Yes, everyone has an opinion, and in these days of super-massive media and super-accessible self-publishing, everyone’s opinion is out there and available. This ubiquity of the written word is, of course, double-edged, as the same wide-open media has removed what few gatekeepers of fidelity and accuracy were previously in place, giving way to as much distortion as communication (a topic explored in one of the upcoming essays, as it so happens). Why pay attention to my writings, then, over the thousands and thousands at your disposal? Only you, the reader, can decide that. Again, I certainly don’t regard my perceptions as special or superior; I hold them dear, to be sure, but only because of the depth of my convictions.

  I am not you. Results may vary. The views expressed in this book stand alongside many.

  Right off the bat, know that this book is not an academic discourse, or at all formal; you won’t find a single reference made or fact cited. Some selections are, in fact, more instructional in composition, reading like how-to articles rather than proper essays. Though, a casual treatment is not necessarily a negative, for informality should not, I believe, be equated with invalidity. What’s more, some topics come off better when described informally, as to grant a bottom-up perspective that might be hindered by a more rigorous approach. It also bears mentioning that nearly all these essays give their lofty subjects a rather condensed treatment, by necessity of format; though, I do not believe them to be over-condensed, to the point of becoming distorted or losing focus. That said, just keep in mind that, as these vast subjects are squeezed into tiny essays, there is much omitted from these pages.

  Likewise, these essays were not written for the scholar. That is, their subject matter might appear rudimentary, perhaps outright obvious, maybe even a little naive. That’s not an unreasonable perception; however, understand that, obvious or not, these ideas are not universally understood. Because our educational systems are often dysfunctional (institutional and social alike), not everyone learns these rudiments of living, however basic and necessary. In fact, I suspect that for every person who was blessed with these truths at an early age, there is someone who wasn’t. For evidence of this theory, look no further than a newspaper.

  As it so happens, I was one such unlearned person, well into “adulthood.” Growing up, I was spared many of life’s most valuable lessons by all major influences in my development—family, school, TV, society at large. As a result, I was blunted at a deep, fundamental level of my psychology, left without the faculty to understand these vital lessons even were I somehow exposed to them—left unable to learn how to learn, as it were. I have suffered because of my ignorance, and I would prefer not to see others suffer similarly. Thus, I have compiled this book of essays, in informal, no-nonsense language, as a synthesis of my belated adolescence. I see this text as a kind of playbook for life, rather than anything artistic, entertaining, or at all elegant. In many areas, these essays parallel and overlap a self-help book I wrote, Learn Yourself: A Manual for the Mind; in fact, some have been circulated, in altered form, in support of that book.

  All in all, these essays are my light. Some might perceive them as such; others, as the very darkness I hope to forestall. Either way, I must shine, for better or worse.

  There is, no doubt, something of the liberator in my intentions. When asking myself how I might affect some type of real, lasting change in the world, that which would help prevent the mind-numbing non-education that characterized my upbringing, the answer was to write and inform, to the best of my ability. Naturally, this answer was inconvenient, but it was, also, what I knew in my heart to be right, at least in regards to my current station in life. After all, change is supposed to be visible, and dynamic, and instantly gratifying, perhaps with some fame and money thrown in the mix—not a collection of self-published books and other small-circulation writings, the equivalent of the proverbial drop in the ocean. Yet my humble writings are, I believe, the only truly effective action that is within my power to enact. It’s a soft approach, of course; but in my experience, idealistically trying to force change rarely sees lasting results, and often just adds to the problem.

  So, yes, this book is a drop in the ocean. Then again, without the individual drops, no ocean would exist.