Rules Optional: Inaugural Post

rulesoptional — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 09:37:31 +0000

The more I read and the more I write, the clearer things become. There was a moment in which I thought reform would be sufficient… that incremental change would lead to the fulfillment I seek. Maybe that time was yesterday, maybe it was a million years in the past. The delineation of moments is no longer clear. At this very moment, I find clarity only in revolution. I have grown weary of nihilism. The former modus operandi has destroyed itself without my assistance rendering nihilism irrelevant in any case. No proof of its self-destruction is required beyond the universal awareness that a thousand impulses in each of us are restrained and muted each day of our lives.

I have a confession to make; I have never cared for culture and society. As a child I remember being conflicted with the question of my occupational goals. That conflict was repressed to some extent by socialization, but it has always lingered. At times, the romantic current of the “American Dream” swept me through life. At times, I found temporary solace in telling myself that “I work to live, not live to work.” I deluded myself with the axiom “work smarter, not harder.” Ultimately, those images were revealed as facades and those words of wisdom reduced to mere platitudes. Everything made sense for a time. Unfortunately, it only made sense while I maintained a framework of assumptions. You are reading the words of a man whose framework of assumptions has been reduced to ashes. The internal conflict I felt as a boy will not subside. That conflict was rooted in purely subjective human instinct bereft of any assumptions. I now know that the conflict I felt was not related to a laziness toward work, but a fundamental desire to experience life directly… an experience only possible without the assumptions our culture so lovingly provides. I have given into the fact that culture is no friend to me. I have never felt better.

There is no reform. Too many of the rules of the game are based on painfully misguided tradition. Too many of the rules of the game are rooted in myth and mysticism that was itself born of myth and mysticism. The problem is, this is not a game. This is my life. I don’t have time to change the world one rule at a time just so I can avoid the alienation and walking dead mentality offered by culture.

Where does that leave us? Anarchy? After spending hours defining that maligned word we still wouldn’t agree on a definition and some of us would still have images of insane individuals dressed in black smashing windows. No… Anarchy is not the answer. My solution is summed up in the domain name. The rules each of us choose to live by are optional. I’m not talking about some “rules are made to be broken” nonsense. I’m not talking about laws. The rules of society and culture that all of us live by are pervasive. They are so deeply ingrained in our minds that we seldom consider them there to be broken. I’m not on a rampage. I don’t care about breaking the rules. However, I’m only going to follow the rules that stand up to scrutiny. The rules that don’t stand up to scrutiny will simply be ignored. Someone else can follow them.

This post is already running longer than I’d intended, but is merely a fraction of what’s racing through my mind. I’ll be cranking out content here regularly. I may indulge and diverge from strict adherence to my goals once in a while, but my focus will remain on revolutionizing life relating to the context of work and the construction of individual subjective frameworks that allow us to live. Please join in the adventure by commenting below or messaging me on Twitter @rulesoptional.

Why is this titled “Inaugural Post” when there’s content published before it? All preceding content philosophically outgrew sailtotrail.com. I made the decision to pull content over place that makes more sense thematically. While those previous posts were written first chronologically, they were written with the spirit of this post in mind.

Blogging: The World's Biggest Ponzi Scheme

rulesoptional — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:19:45 +0000

Blogger Mentor?

Now that this blog is averaging about three visits per day and has seven RSS subscribers (it may be less actually, I’m afraid to look), I figured it was time to start alienating people. To add insult to injury, some might view this as self-referential and non-hilarious irony… Translation: hypocritical.

I’m not doing going to delve into the history of the term or provide dictionary definitions or quote wikipedia in an attempt to prove the headline scientifically. Off the top of my head: Ponzi schemes are those in which the people initiating them collect money from their earliest followers, then some money flows back to these people as more investors are convinced. More money then flows to the early adopters. People begin to see that they are making money and the whole thing builds momentum until things snowball and the prophecies are self-fulfilled. Adjusting for talent, industriousness, and luck, the farther down the food chain, the lower the return on your investment. As time progresses, these people start to reach the, “hey, what happened to my investment” moment. This isn’t necessarily the end, but cracks start appearing in the framework and eventually spread.

Look at blogging through that lens for a second. The most famous and successful bloggers have a network of followers out there referring people back to them. Information gets passed down the line. Everyone on the chain is blogging about how to make money blogging… and surprise, the path to making money blogging starts to sound eerily circular:

Integrate yourself into the blogging community by paying tribute to those from who you’ve learned by providing psychologically powerful “social proof” by way of referrals and comments on their blogs thus providing them with more content and making them look smarter and respected.
Create marketable content about helping others make money though blogging including the steps of building social proof aspect of Step 1.
Profit on the information by selling books, e-books, and advertising about how to do the things in Step 2.
Get those you’ve taught to now perform Step 1 for you.
Rinse and repeat ad infinitum.

Anytime you can fill in the following blanks with the same word three times, there’s potential for this type of self-perpetuating self-promotion: ______ers _______ing how to _______.

Marketers marketing how to market. Teachers teaching how to teach. Advertisers advertising how to advertise. Coaches coaching how to coach. Consultants consulting on how to consult. Bloggers blogging about how to blog. Social Media-ers Social Media-ing how to Social Media?

You’re right, MLM… multi-level marketing might be a more accurate term. Ponzi Scheme makes for a flashier headline. I’ll let you duke it out over which term is more appropriate.

It’s at this point, that I’m going to let a little wind out of the sails and get serious for those still reading this. Reading this without seeing the smirk on my face as I write write it might lead you to think I’m judging all of this as wrong, evil, nefarious, et cetera. Also, I started writing this post with tongue firmly planted in cheek and ended up sounding more like a damning critique than I expected since my intended level of damning critique was exactly zero. I swear… it wrote itself.

Despite being conflicted about writing this, and again about posting it, I was compelled by the following reasons:

I have consistently felt hints of this while reading blogs over the last few years.
As a reminder to myself to add value whenever possible, examine all processes, and not simply recycle information.
As clarification to anyone reading this site that the focus here is providing information to help you do what you want, not how to blog your way to bloggy blogging.
Blogging is not for everyone. If you’re not comfortable writing or sharing or whatever, then don’t. There are plenty of other options.
Blogging about things other than blogging is great and highly recommended!
Successful bloggers are used to criticism, have thicker than average skins, and are generally capable of reading things critically rather than personally. Y’all can take it.

There are at least two undeniably positive things you can say about the process: It’s smart and it works. There are some psychological buttons that get pushed that cause it to work and they don’t happen accidentally.

I’m hesitant to pose a specific question because I’m curious where this discussion could go without direction. I welcome your comments as always.

Rules Optional » This Site

Rules Optional: Inaugural Post

Blogging: The World's Biggest Ponzi Scheme