Wonderful post. Thank you for taking the time to write it. Your writing style is delightful.

About "critical but stable" I believe we are on a verge for a macroscopic change and getting closer day by day. I don't think it will be world war III yet but it will be "pre-ww3" meaning a circa 10 year long time span when we can either fix the non-sense currently ruling our life and society or we perish.

Call me crazy but I'm longing for this to happen. This "hang on" feeling is excruciating.