The Gun powder Effect...

I was questioned by someone today as to why I use the term Gun Powder Effect, as well as what and why I use it.

Well I can tell you that when people say Ping Pong ball effect, I look down on it. Everyone can imagine a bunch of rat traps laid on a floor all ready to spring into action. And all it takes is just one to go off to set off almost all of the rest. I don't like using this term because it just seems too easy to reconstruct. Sure each individual rat trap is hard to reset, but it isn't as catastrophic as you would want to imagine. You could replace them with rocks, boulders, and even mountains. But that is something that can't be imagined properly. No. I just don't like the way it is portrayed.

One would use the Domino effect but.... Like rat traps and ping pong balls... they are simple and easy to reconstruct. It just takes time.

No... All the dominoes in the world can't even amount to what I am going to explain here:

The Gun Powder Effect:

The way I picture it, everyone has two things. These two things are forever attached to us. A spark, and gun powder. A spark can be ignited in several different ways. But simply explained it is a spark. The gun powder should be self explanatory but to make it quite clear? It is black powder. But to avoid being labeled a racist.... GUN POWDER. (Explosive composition.)

Each and every time you mess up, get into an argument, or for what ever reason cause anything bad to happen in your life you are dropping gun powder. While at the same time creating a spark. From simply smoking a cigarette to detonating the entire planet earth.... They can fall into the category of some sort of wrong doing. The more times you do something wrong the more gun powder gets dropped, and each time the spark is there. There is no way to truly keep this gun powder from spilling, nor is there ever a way to stop the spark from emitting. But the volatility, or grossness, of each occurrence is determined by your perception, and nothing more.

To simplify what I am saying: You can limit how much of a spark is ignited and how much gun powder you drop. But all it takes is that one miss step, and what is created is one of only two things.

A controllable fire that you can put out, resulting in recourse and reconstruction.

Or the complete obliteration of everything the gun powder has touched.

It all depends on you.

A number of examples can be used here but that is how I see it. Ping pong balls and dominoes just seem to be the sugar coated way of telling this tale, as compared to gun powder.

a reply to: GiulXainx

Okay, so what you are saying is you don't control your anger, it controls you?

Or you excuse your actions when you are angry because of the "gunpowder effect"?

Sorry about that you say, I was out of control, It wasn't my fault. It was the gunpowder effect.

a reply to: intrptr

Either your spark, or the spark from someone else sets it off. It can be applied to any situation. It could be someone's laziness that drives someone else to light up a spark big enough to hit the gun powder. And it just so happens that his gun powder trail crossed over yours. That's what I am saying.

a reply to: GiulXainx

I thought you were trying to explain the worldwide nuclear proliferation problem. My example would have been everyone in the basement has a book of matches some books have 20 some have 2 matches and the basement has a gas leak.

In your example all it takes is a instigator, and the crowd is the gunpowder. Then it's riot city?

a reply to: GiulXainx

Your anger is your own. Don't blame others for you "going off". Its not their fault you are an angry person.

"Dudes a powder keg".

"Yah, lets get out of here before he goes off on someone."

No one wants to be friends with a volcano thats waiting to blow.

a reply to: intrptr

Yeah I can say I am an agry person. But I have a lot of thought that goes behind it. At least I can keep my spark from getting too big while also keeping too much powder from falling out. But like I said.... Someone elses spark can set yours off. or my spark could set off theirs.

a reply to: GiulXainx

Yeah I can say I am an agry person. But I have a lot of thought that goes behind it.

So what makes you angry?

I don't mean what sets off the anger display, but whats behind the angry feelings?

When you think of your anger what event or person comes to mind that makes you the 'most' mad?

a reply to: intrptr

A post from left field.

What sparks my anger? A lot of things. Most of the time it is people not willing to follow rules. It is so simple to be a better "anything." Yet people continue to make the same mistake without ever knowing that, what they continue to do only adds to their gun powder. I may not be the one whose spark sets it off, but I can see that these people don't ever see how much gun powder they have dropped. It could be a co-worker. It could be another driver. It could be the waitress you see becoming ever more angry with each new tip she gets from her customers, and forever becomes even more angry. Probably because she expected something better. It could be doctors that sign me up for another prescription that ends up not working. It is a number of things. But I'd say the more you learn about this planet and the way things are operated, you begin to hate it.

I have been through too much and lived through several different situations, only to come out of it more angered.

It has gotten to the point where I no longer care about it, or myself. I tried to "do the right thing" only to be lead down the path of that individual. The rocks may have been cleared from the path, but it doesn't make it any less treacherous.


But at least I was able to come up with a philosophy behind it. You can't live with nothing but good, because everyone would probably commit suicide due to pure boredom. Their lives would be so perfect that they would begin to do even less the next day. Until the point where life becomes so still that they don't see a purpose to live. In fact the line between good and evil would be completely erased would mean that they would prosper to the point of simplicity.

You can't live with all evil and no good because everyone would be killing each other to the point where only one was left... and due to his own fear of being alone would kill himself. his own paranoia with creating another would come with fears of betrayal, and deception. Thinking that he himself is the only one, and overwhelmed with how things are supposed to work. He would kill himself, or live long enough to see his last breath as he sat on his kingdom in a forever bored state of mind.

It is between the balance of both good and evil where society can live. Where so many other things can exist. When too much good is outweighing the bad, something really bad shows up. But when too much bad plagues the planet, something good comes out of it. It is like that old teeter totter reference. So many of us want the good side to be way above the bad side, when at the same time so many want the bad side way above the good. Almost like an auto balance is occurring. That is why I like to remain neutral. Like being the bouncing ball between the dog and its master.

a reply to: GiulXainx

A post from left field.

What sparks my anger?

No, what builds it up inside. Why do you have so much that its ready to blow at any time?

Thats what I was asking. Its okay though like you say you are the one that has to live with yourself.

a reply to: intrptr

What continuously adds to it you say? It will always be there. It will never stop filling.

It is easy to forget how full your cup is when you fill it unless you continuously maintain it. Or drink out of it. But sometimes you find yourself drinking an empty cup thinking there was still some left. Other times you trick yourself into thinking nothing is left to find that actually... there was some left after all. Sometimes it was completely filled.

Like Schrodinger's cat in a box theory, you never know just how much is actually there unless... you check it. In this case create a spark.

But what is it about my anger that keeps on tacking on like a snow ball effect? It is like an injustice collector. I never let it go. It forever grows on me. You could say "Oh let it go." But how can you when you can remember every dream, and every day you are awake? What we are taught in school is to retain knowledge. I think for me it went in the wrong subconscious alignment and recorded my daily life because I found school to be rather.... boring. reading a book? The only class I ever learned anything, that I was able to retain, was when one year my science teacher had us doing science experiments every day. and it would vary vastly from day to day. I can remember most of the # taught in the Magic School Bus over any other year going through a science class. (oh #... here I go opening up a whole other topic within my mind as I type this....)

Everything just builds up to the point where my brain categorizes everything to particular groups. Each time a new ass hole maneuver is done in front of me I put it into the asshole driver category. There are so many things that people do, that I am able to guess what their next course of action is. Almost like guilt by association. But I know that there can exist that 0.001% who actually does something that I agree with. Or is for the better. Right in the middle of the chained events I had strung out. A different reaction that didn't involve asshole antics.

But my mind for ever categorizes things and keeps them placed there. And when I see something similar happen again I can chain together a list of events that the person would do next. And when they do something new? I notice just how much more drastically it has changed since the last time a similar chain of events were strung together.

Kind of like how I piece together my music. it starts out simply enough with just a basic drum set, or an instrument... sometimes even a sound effect. But it all starts building up from there. You hear a note maybe every other beat. Then the drums become a bit more clear. Then another note starts showing up every beat. Some sound effects and randomness starts showing up. Then it starts to play a melody that doesn't just hit a note on every beat. Sometimes the notes swing. Sometimes they happen at a different intervals to change the Melody or the Harmony. Sometimes a second instrument is added in that comes out of no where. Then it continues to build upon itself for ever and ever without an end. But all things have to come to an end right? Not if you continuously keep going back and adding maybe another 4 minutes to a 16 minute track. Soon enough it becomes an hour long. But usually our minds like to sum things up even further. To the point where the beginning is no longer needed but is still retained. Everything gets summed back up into a 6 minute track.

It just keeps building up and building up and building up. I can recall it upon request. But sometimes I have trouble with certain memories if my mind deems them unimportant anymore. Or if that chain of events never unfolds again.


You can say the same thing about music, movie, video game, or fashion trends. They disappear for a while... then low and behold they just pop right back up and is celebrated once more.

I think it is our urge to be a different individual that drives this. Only because so many people don't do this.