Regardless of who we are or where we live one truth seems unmistakably clear; we live, work, play, think and just plain exist in two very different worlds simultaneously, while moving seamlessly between and within them in real time. The more obvious of these two realms is the physical ‘real’ world that lay all around us, the place where our physical bodies reside and the space in which we live and eventually die. And then there is the dominion of our (non local) consciousness, some might call it the ‘mind’, ‘soul’ or ‘self’, the place only ‘I’ may find me, myself and mine.

Essentially we exist on two ice floes, which for the vast majority of us are permanently locked together and seemingly inseparable. But for those of us who begin to open our minds and plumb the depths of the rabbit hole, there is an increasing awareness that these two ice floes can and will not only move separately, but at different speeds and levels of awareness.

For the most part we believe that the first world, the so called ‘real’ world, is authentic and genuine, while the second place is just a space, a figment of our mind. And I guess the proof of this lay within our global insane asylum, for if we inmates were not so crazy in the mind, then our world would not be so very confined. But for this particular inmate it is well past time to release me, myself and mine from the self imposed ties that bind.

I am not a victim and I am not a slave. I am what I decide I am both in the physical realm and within the space of my mind. For far too long I have allowed…….no, more honest words would be passively enabled, my physical world to be fused and formed not by my own mind, not by my own inner being, my ‘self’, but by all the other minds with whom I share this physical world, some of which are much more nefarious and soul sucking than me and mine.

My ego proudly asserts that I alone make my fate, and to a large extent this may be true, at least in the ‘real’ world. But up to this point if it is true it’s only because I have allowed the prevailing default mind control program to dominate me with only slight alterations and modifications to suit the egotistic belief that I am unique in a world not of my own making.

For the most part I live in a reality created by those who do not have my best interests in mind, who wish to control my mind and subvert my consciousness so that the body obediently follows.

My Cognitive Dissonance is that up until a half dozen or so years ago this Cog did not believe he was just another custom colored gear in the reality machine operating system, an emotionally comforting self deception that I desperately wanted to believe in order to rationalize my conformity.

Few wish to march to a different drummer, to be a self imposed outcast from the herd, a contrarian, a loner. Please, please, may I join your self-affirming pod? Born a perfectly unique individual, we spend the rest of our physical lives trying the die just like all the others. Conditioned from birth to believe that ‘I’ was only fit to be part of a ‘we’, breaking up is hard to do.

As I began to seek out answers to the questions that were rapidly forming in my mind and soul I quickly found that there were no end of people, places and things that promised me they had “The Answer” (which as we all know is actually 42). The problem was that often, if not always, “The Answer” promoted by “A” conflicted with “The Answer” offered by “Z”. And yet when examined individually, and most importantly with an open mind, they both made some sense while isolated from both worlds.

Worse, regardless of whether I was examining explanations promoted from the ‘real’ world perspective (aka the scientific worldview mindset) or the esoteric point of view (the woo woo world as some would call it) they all ultimately required blind ‘belief’, a giant leap of faith that this was truth and that was not. “They” of course would loudly claim that this was not so, that it was the other side that required the faith. See…here is my proof.

The one common denominator I consistently found among the self professed truth purveyors was that whoever was speaking from whatever point of view they were promoting, the narrative was always one of self assured confidence that wisdom and light was their exclusive domain. No wavering, no self doubt, no hedging allowed when spouting “The Truth”. To express any uncertainty whatsoever was, and still is, considered a sure sign of weakness and will never be entertained. This belief is nearly universally held and is of course promoted by all self proclaimed authorities.

While the word “Propaganda” has been almost completely intertwined with government controlled information, the reality is that we are all propagandists in the purest sense of the term. When we speak, write or communicate an idea or thought, we tend to present our best argument in favor of our point of view and either diminish, ignore or subvert contrary information that does not help our case and might actually torpedo it.

I am just as guilty of this practice as anyone else, though I do try my best to at least expose myself as a propagandist by declaring myself one with as much certainty as possible. What I try to do in an attempt to compensate for what comes naturally to all of us, primarily because we have been immersed in this authoritarian culture from birth, is to inject a smidge of humility into the equation by exposing my flaws, doubts, confusion and uncertainty. In short, to be aware of my ego and its sometimes subtle, sometimes enormous, influences upon “me”.

There is a saying I am sure I’m about to butcher. There is your truth, there is my truth, and then there is the ‘truth’ which can usually be found somewhere in between, possibly even in the middle. I suspect the actual location is not fixed and will almost certainly not be found between the two promoted “truths” simply because it would be outrageously narcissistic to proclaim that all the undiscovered territory is safely contained between the two “know” end points. It is the epitome of egotistic expression to confidently claim that I occupy one end of the universe, let alone the very center.

Even if one does not accept this premise, and you most certainly should not simply because I am promoting it, what is one to do if one is lost in the wilderness without an accurate compass, maps or signposts, also known as static answers? Well….if you want better answers, the only solution is to ask better questions. And the only way I can see how we can formulate better questions is to expand our perceptive minds and awareness and dump our preconceived notions and beliefs overboard.

I don’t have all the answers. In fact I only have a few. What I have, at least when I can convince my ego that new knowledge is not threatening to it, and thus to me, is the desire and capacity to explore and expand my severely limited universe and seek out those better questions. I am willing to go it alone, but it seems silly to even try when I am not alone in my desire to look beyond my nose and push back the barriers of the ‘known’ body of knowledge and wisdom.

How do you eat an elephant, particularly one that just appeared out of nowhere right in front of your eyes? One bite at a time is the only answer that works for everyone and one that seems to work for me. Over the last seven years, as my growing awareness of the grand facade grew, I began to make changes both personally and professionally, some small and seemingly inconsequential, and others huge and life altering. With the help and encouragement of Mrs. Cog I am once again turning the wheel of life and embarking on another life altering metamorphosis.

Would you care to join me, to observe or even to participate, in a real time thought experiment of alternative reality creation played out in a semi public forum? If you would like to do so then may I introduce you to a new portal into the mind of Cognitive Dissonance?

Cognitive Dissonance

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