Introduction
In the monopolized internet era, attention is money and individuals, as well as corporations, fight to gain your attention because you cannot spend money on something you aren’t paying attention to.
Before widespread connectivity, you would shop when you needed or wanted something, even if that want was to go shopping. Today companies and people will push you to shop even when you don’t want to, for things you don’t need, and may not even want.
Products and services are designed to be addictive.
In the 80’s, cigarettes, and a few other products were the only items engineered to be addictive.
Now, food, media, ads, and more are engineered to keep you addicted–there is additional difficulty for the virtuous to compete in a capitalistic system, which is why it’s crucial to subscribe to the philosophy of “voting with your dollar”.
Have ethics and morals in how you spend your money if you want a world of ethics and morals.
Companies are incentivized to disrupt your focus on your life and your path because when you are training yourself across body, mind, and spirit, you are not actively being their customer–this goes against their wishes.
Most companies do not care about you, they care about you giving them money–even if that comes at the cost of your well-being. Many will sell you poison and smile while you are dying.
Because of this relationship, it is crucial for the individual to manage how companies can access them. Filter emails from companies who beg you for money, handle junk mail using this method and in general be diligent in defending your time and your assets against those who would take either and not give you a fair exchange.
The Fear of Being Alone
Because of the constant bombardment of distractions to earn money from your time and your assets, we have been trained to not be in silence so Solitude feels foreign.
We need solitude and silence in order to strengthen the relationship we have with ourselves.
If you’re constantly spending time with social media, music, podcasts, videos, ads, and social media, you don’t have quality time with yourself, you have inferior time with corporations.
These things aren’t bad in and of themselves, but to refuse to moderate them reduces your fulfillment because you have less time and focus to pursue fulfillment, which will not come from engaging in one-sided relationship dynamics with soulless corporations that exist to take your assets and distribute them to others.
Much of the content we consume can be educational, like podcasts, but consuming is different than training. Looking at math memes, watching math video shorts, and hearing interesting facts about math, is not training mathematics.
We often need to be alone to focus and improve our masteries. “alone” can be soleness of focus, so focusing on progression without distractions like music, or the mental tug of seeing your phone on your desk within your grasp.
Mind challenge: A return to silence
Bath yourself in silence occasionally. You need silence to truly be alone with yourself. No controlled outside stimulus–meaning stimulus you can control, which does not include animals, the wind, etc.
If you usually study, work, or whatever pursuits you have, with music or podcasts, pursue without external noise occasionally. This could be one hour of studying in silence and then returning to background music without words or at the more extreme end, doing a 24-hour meditation in a dark room.
You can return to silence as vigorously as you want. Jiri Prochazka, the fighter, modern Samurai and former UFC light-heavyweight champion, goes into a dark room with only books, the UFC Belt( his totem, a physical mantra), and a bed for three days at a time to train his mind, body, and spirit.
This is a vigorous reset from the noise of the world.
Doing a three-day light, food, and interaction fast is not a good starting place. What you are seeing is the result of the pursuit of mastery over the self across body, mind, and spirit. Jiri Prochazka understands The Way that Musashi Preached. He lives mastery over the martial arts.
Being alone strengthens the relationship with the self. This is crucial to develop as it affects all areas of the self and all pursuits of the individual.
The pursuit of tolerating silence, which really is tolerating being with yourself, is another disciplined pursuit of mastery to aid the wanderer.
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