the "off button"

Hi fellow ATS users.

i've been wondering and pondering with this idea/thought for a long time.
didn't have the required posts to make a topic about this.

the following;
i've been researching conspiracy theories for about 4/5 years now and still have a long way to go.
as i'm fairly young (22 years of age) and got my whole life ahead of me, i'm not sure what to do at this point.

the problem i've got is the following, since i've been reading up on conspiracy theories, my way of thinking and expressing myself have changed. (i'd like to think they've changed for the better)
i think it thought me to look more critically at things, from various viewpoints and also thought me that not everything is as it seems.
while these are all good things, there is another side to this story...

sometimes, when i read something on the web or hear something on the news, it enrages me. it enrages me a whole lot, to the point where i've little control left over myself. so infuriating.
but i don't have anywhere to go with this anger / frustration.
friends look at me like i'm some kinda nutjob believing in some of these conspiracies. my mum and dad think i went mental also, but they still have an awfull lot of respect for me.
the feeling of powerlessness is the worst, the thought of knowing that you, yourself, can't change the current situation or problems in the world, is what bothers me most.

that's why i'd like to ask you guys, if you don't sometimes wish you had an 'off-button' (hence the thread title)
that you just could go back to being a sheep. which in itself is a very loose used term of which i'm not sure what it describes.

well i'm very honest and dare to say that i'd like to go back being a sheep, totally unknowing and oblivious to what is going on.

a couple of days ago i read a post from a fellow ATS user, stating that he would stop his quest for the 'truth' what ever that may be.
and i'm asking if this is what i should do at this point, since i'm fairly young and have my whole life still ahead of me. should i, keep searching for the truth or just abandon my quest now and start living life the way i feel it should be lived?
because what i believe to be the 'truth', that knowledgde, isn't getting me anywhere or helping me in anyway.
instead i'm just growing more paranoid by the minute.

plz ATS, what are your thoughts and opinions?

plz share and take care

styx


forgive any spelling errors, english isn't my primary language

[edit on 17-2-2010 by kn0wh0w]

Oh, everyone has a off button in some form...Everyone is a sheep to some level, and everyone thinks that they have a grasp of the more important aspects of society.

You dont know the truth, you just are obsessed with a certain perspective of it...same as a person entrenched in conspiracy theories for 30 years, and some 15 year old thinking that American Idol is the only important aspect of civilization...

So, its if anything important to simply accept the fact that your perspective is just yet another illusion of life verses life, and that no matter how hard you try or how long you try it...you will never truely know the full truth on almost any given subject.

Learn and research, but accept that everything may be little more than a futile effort to deepen your initial illusion...such is life.

You raise a very good and important point when it comes to the world of Conspiracy Theory (CT). CT is potentially very addictive and not without its side effects.

The thing to keep in mind is that much of the strange workings of the world are beyond your control, and there is less than no value to getting angry over that which you cannot control. Similarly it is ridiculous to get worked up into a rage by things that do not directly effect you.

This is not to say that you shouldn't feel outrage, disappointment or compassion when you see horrible things being done as part of an elaborate game amongst the elites. You just need to find balance.

For a little shot of hope, check out the thread linked in my signature. My take on all this is not necessarily popular, but I think it may help you with your concern.

Another recommendation (if you haven't already read it) is the Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea. I find that regular re-readings of that book keep my sense of play engaged and enable me to better tolerate the chronic weirdness of the world.

reply to post by SaturnFX


thank you for your comment Saturn, it makes a lot of sense the way you put it.
once again thank you

it's hard after you read all these conspiracies to believe in almost anything what you see or hear on tv , newspaper , radio ... it's strange to look world and people from different viewpoint but i don't regret one moment because that

yeah it's nice to be sheep xD but is it worth it?

first you should be nuts to believe in all conspiracies ... there are not enough proofs, so, you can speculate ...

another thing, why you tell people you believe in all those things, I mean, its kind of a social killer instinct ...

and most of the people are blind, so, it doesnt matter what you say, it will never change if they dont want to

Originally posted by RobertAntonWeishaupt
You raise a very good and important point when it comes to the world of Conspiracy Theory (CT). CT is potentially very addictive and not without its side effects.

The thing to keep in mind is that much of the strange workings of the world are beyond your control, and there is less than no value to getting angry over that which you cannot control. Similarly it is ridiculous to get worked up into a rage by things that do not directly effect you.

This is not to say that you shouldn't feel outrage, disappointment or compassion when you see horrible things being done as part of an elaborate game amongst the elites. You just need to find balance.

I know I need to find balance, but i've been looking for that balance the last 4/5 years and i can't seem to find it. getting worked up over things like this is normal, as you said, but i get felling of pure hatred. (wich is wrong, i know) i just can't help it.

Another recommendation (if you haven't already read it) is the Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea. I find that regular re-readings of that book keep my sense of play engaged and enable me to better tolerate the chronic weirdness of the world.

I didn't know about the illuminatus triology, i'll try to check it out if i have the time.

i've read books like
the biggest secret - david icke (wich was my first 'conspiracy' book)
i am me, i am free - david icke
bohemian grove - Mike Hanson and Alex Jones
Money Matrix - by Mars

and so on...

I know many of you here consider Icke and Jones to be charlatans, so plz respect that i've read these books and respect those two for writing them.
no icke or alex attacks necassary in this thread

Originally posted by Faiol
first you should be nuts to believe in all conspiracies ... there are not enough proofs, so, you can speculate ...

I never said i did believe in all CT's. far from it actually.

another thing, why you tell people you believe in all those things, I mean, its kind of a social killer instinct ...

you maybe right here, but it isn't a crime to try and open one's eyes is it?

and most of the people are blind, so, it doesnt matter what you say, it will never change if they dont want to

true that

reply to post by kn0wh0w


sorry still learning to use this website.
what i wanted to say is, i don't believe everything i read.
far from it actually. to me things like
- JFK assasination
- 9-11
- NWO

and the likes are REAL conspiracies.
but true most of what you read here must be taken with a grain of salt.

reply to post by kn0wh0w


It’s easy to get annoyed on this site, over the more outlandish claims and pig-headed, close-minded attitudes, and away from the internet, it’s easy to get frustrated at people who won’t – or who can’t – accept that the world isn’t as cut and dried as it’s made out to be.

So, what do you do?

I found myself almost needing to correct or educate anyone who didn’t think like me, and that is a huge mistake. Not only because it’s arrogant, but who says that, just because I chose to “educate” myself - as to what may or may not be going on behind the scenes - on a conspiracy site, thus exposing myself to all sorts of uncorroborated information, I’m right?

You’re searching for the truth, and that is admirable, but I have to advise you that you’ll probably never find it.

You will find a truth that you feel comfortable with, or a series of realities and supposition that will captivate you till the end of your days, and that is fine. But as to finding the truth?

What is the truth? How do you quantify what a truth is?

Unless you manage to finally stand before irrefutable evidence of whatever it is you’re seeking a certainty about, and are able to reach out and touch it/read it, all you are going to have to work with are opinions and conjecture and research from other people.

So, does that mean that you should hit that “off button”?

No.

The more people who are seeking even a fraction of the truth the better. The more people who are willing to sift through all the BS and propaganda and fiction the better.

That way, perhaps someday someone will actually find that tangible, undeniable evidence. It may even be you.

Don’t hit the off button.

Just find a way of turning down the volume

reply to post by Beamish


wow, great comment as well Beamish!
like you allready said in your thread, i often felt the same need. (the need to correct people)
i stopped doing that a long time ago, because no one actually knows what the 'truth' is. wich i allready stated in my OP, that i don't know what the truth is.

as you point out further in your post and i agree with that perception of truth.
that truth is a (self-created) reality in wich YOU feel most comfortable.


but my problem is, that i don't actually feel comfortable living the way i do right now.
i'll try to take up on your advice and turn down the volume

[edit on 17-2-2010 by kn0wh0w]

Here is a good philosophy to live by in regards to the search for the truth.

"I know what I am told is truth, I keep and open mind, and dont pretend to know the actual truth about anything...but I can speculate till the cows come home."

That should make you seem clever to your friends, keep you personally sane, and is about the most accurate you, me, or anyone else can get to an actual truth in life.

reply to post by kn0wh0w


Hey there friend.

I believe I replied to your earlier thread, don't really remember, but perhaps I can help.

I get tired of this charade everynow and then too. I think everybody does. But the truth is, you'll never stop finding truth.

The more you try to stop, the more truth will come your way, the more things will just piss you off and you'll get angre. Eventually you'll come back and it will make your quest for the truth even more important to you.

I think an off button is just taking a vacation, go out into the world, explore what you want to do. Pick up a hobby that means something to you.

~Keeper

reply to post by SaturnFX


true and pretty deep.
thanks for sharing.
but you see, the problem with my friends is;
they ridicule me for believing that there might be other life out there. (aliens and ufo's)

first, let me state clearly that i'm not a firm believer nor a hardcore skeptic. (still on the fence)
one of my questions would be, how to adress this closemindedness (if that's even a word:lol


but it seems pretty clear allready that most of you feel that i need to carry on, just use a different approach.. right?

From now on, my philosophical gentlemen, let us protect ourselves better from the dangerous old conceptual fantasy which posits a “pure, will-less, painless, timeless subject of cognition”; let’s guard ourselves against the tentacles of such contradictory ideas as “pure reason,” “absolute spirituality,” “knowledge in itself”—those things which demand that we think of an eye which simply cannot be imagined, an eye which is to have no direction at all, in which the active and interpretative forces are supposed to stop or be absent—the very things through which seeing first becomes seeing something. Hence, these things always demand from the eye something conceptually absurd and incomprehensible. -- Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals

Be open to discourse, but don't construct your ideas from authorities telling you how you should think, or you will never know why you think what you do, the way you do. Know that you know nothing: Platonic lesson number one. Then acknowledge everybody else knows exactly as much as you - nothing.

reply to post by tothetenthpower


Hey there power!
replying to me in an earlier thread would virtually be impossible as this is my first thread.
picking up a hobby is a great idea indeed, and i did just a few weeks ago.
started playing tennis again, also would like to take up boxing on the side.
just to get some agression and frustration out of my system.
wich also may contribute to my touchyness the last few weeks, is the fact that i stopped smoking the ganja. (PLZ, don't turn this into a discussion about drugs or anything, because that truely isn't my intention)

just thought that i may add this, because i feel it contributes to my touchyness and that stuff is probably what got me into this world the first place

but i'll try to take up on your advice as well and continue to play tennis and (hopefully) some boxing in the near-future.

take care all.

pz, styx

Originally posted by kn0wh0w
reply to post by SaturnFX

 

true and pretty deep.
thanks for sharing.
but you see, the problem with my friends is;
they ridicule me for believing that there might be other life out there. (aliens and ufo's)

first, let me state clearly that i'm not a firm believer nor a hardcore skeptic. (still on the fence)
one of my questions would be, how to adress this closemindedness (if that's even a word:lol

but it seems pretty clear allready that most of you feel that i need to carry on, just use a different approach.. right?

Harrdcore scientists do not see any evidence of ETs visiting earth...however the same scientists dismiss discussions of earth being the only place in the universe as containing life.

Should they laugh again, simply state they can think they live in a jar, but you tend to trust the scientific consensus over them in this regard. As far as advanced civilizations, well...even if its a billion to 1 odds of that, there are far more than a billion billion stars out there to begin with...and with that many chances, again, it would be the knuckledragging morons that would say no straight across the board.

If they then try to get into ETs visiting earth...well, you dont know, they dont know, and if they try to say they know...laugh at their assumption (as thats all it is to begin with)

Absense of evidence is not evidence of absense..Atoms existed before we were able to detect them, and ET may exist even though we have no way to smoking gun prove them yet...

reply to post by kn0wh0w


I started around the time you did in my life 9/11 was huge cause i was researching this centered around JFK.

Once you get all the analysis all the opinions all the forecasts all the possible theory and authors you can only really settle into your own idea of how things work... Like anyone can write off and hit the off button. But when 9/11 happened I saw alot of intelligent ideas anddiscussion about things disappear and become catalyzed behind a whole new generation of truth seekers.

Whatever responsibility to the truth you feel you have you must in all cases defer to your own personal truth about your place in the world.

"Waking Up" was a big step. But laying in bed awake is kind of.. pointless.. Roll over go back to sleep or get up and decide what to do with yourself.




Personally the "market" of the truth movement just got too weird felt more and more like the Fear movement. So reading the information is interesting but the street corner doom saying mentality? Just got old.

reply to post by kn0wh0w


The nice thing about Illuminatus! is that it's a novel. It's a work of fiction that draws on real conspiracy theories. It, like much of RAW's material, is an excellent tool for tuning one's percetions to a less dire mindframe.

reply to post by kn0wh0w

but my problem is, that i don't actually feel comfortable living the way i do right now.

Because of Conspiracy Theories? That can happen.

Allowing into your normal life the concept that our world houses the most perplexing secrets is not only frustrating, but also daunting. And on many levels.

You know how to operate in a world that you recognize. When something appears that you don’t understand - but want to – irritation, disappointment and resentment can set in.

That’s normal for a questing mind. Don’t look on it as something wrong. You just have to refine those feelings into positive ones.

Consider this: ever thought that your discomfort is actually passion?

And on that subject: enthusiasm for a subject is good, but be mindful that it doesn’t morph into fanaticism.

The god of Conspiracy Theory often demands high prices.