Hallo people of Steemit,
It’s great to be here…
I found Steemit weeks ago…
It’s taken me a while to put get going with it.
I have found it extraordinarily difficult trying to put words together for my introductory post.
It’s not short, so I am reading it out to make it more accessible:
I’ve much to learn about all things Steem, and I figured the best way to learn was to get on board and just write.
I don’t really have a problem writing…
Rather, I feel I have so much to convey, that I sometimes feel lost as to how to go about it.
The rollercoaster of life has thrown me about a bit, as it does all of us… and… even though I don’t want to admit it, I find myself feeling shy posting on the internet.
I’m not introverted generally, it’s just that circumstances have been such that, over the years, whenever I got close to blogging in any form, something always got in the way.
Yes, I know, many may be thinking ‘procrastination’, but it’s not quite like that…
Well, not entirely anyway… not entirely at all… Actually, I’ve so very much to say about it all, I’m not really sure where to start.
Yes, I know we live in a culture now, in which digital-discourse is second nature to just about everyone… Still, for a very long time I’ve held back from publishing my personal thoughts online… for many reasons… I’ve participated, but not enough.
We all put up such a front in our lives out in the real world…
It’s necessary I suppose, we’ve all got different modes, public personas, versus our natural private personalities… It takes a lot of guts to post ourselves online warts and all, the truth of who we are… Some are exhibitionist, others less so.
I have many strengths, and I’m trying to overcome my weaknesses, although it’s clear that breaking through the shyness barrier is proving a bigger obstacle than I anticipated.
Tragic circumstances in the early 2000’s derailed my life and those of so many close to me, bringing isolation and depression in ways that I’m unsure whether I will ever be able to write about.
I think that’s what I’ve been wrestling with, trying to articulate things here, and perhaps that’s been the creative ‘block’ for a long while… Too much serious stuff! The thing is, underneath all of these complex circumstances, I’m a cheerful bloke!
There’s so much that that I would like to do in this lifetime, and after seeing so many years go by, feeling so restrained, encountering so many problems that I could do nothing about, it’s sometimes difficult to feel energised.
The frustration inside, emotionally has reached levels that I’m not sure I can even articulate.
Things that I wish hadn’t happened, happened.
But then we all have those moments eh?
I’m not sure when, if ever I shall write about those things...
I have so much else to write about anyway, so many other creative avenues to travel, maybe it doesn’t matter.
Although I’ve been working with computers and the internet in various forms since around the year 2000, I never quite got to the point of fulfilling those other creative arenas in quite the ways that I always wanted to – websites, journals, video, graphics, programming and music… Rather than flowing though all these subject areas, I seemed to stumble along for years, my energy constantly depleted as I tried to keep too many plates spinning at once…
Times were massively challenging, I always felt that I had to be in more than two places at once… Troublesome circumstances, relentlessly heart breaking…
When I was ‘here’, I always felt as if I should be ‘there’…
When I was ‘there’, I always seem to feel as if I needed to be back where I was, when I was ‘here’!
A torrent of emotion lay hidden away inside… The personality trying so hard to mask it all with a smile… all the while feeling as if nuclear-bombs were going off inside of me emotionally, and all jammed into a box inside of my heart, jammed shut to try to keep an even keel.
How can I explain all this without going into detail?
We all go through hardships and tragedy in our lives, some more than others…
And I surely know that I have many blessings in my own life… I have to say though, that I sorely wish the last 15 years had been very different for me, and for those close to me.
Anyhow, the points being, that I always wanted to engage, fully and creatively with people online, and to evolve with new technologies as they developed…
Waiting until the time was right to let loose online…
Ahhh, there never seems to be a right time!
I’ve a Facebook account, and I never really got into it properly, not in the ways that so many others have… I always felt that there was something wrong with it…
I tried using Facebook, but it always felt to me, as if it was plugged into a huge Artificial Intelligence algorithm that somehow didn’t seem to have the interest of its users as its core….
Funny eh? … It just never felt right to me… And I get the feeling quite a few others feel the same.
I’ve so very much to say about all that … I remember my first experience online in the very early days of the internet – Once connected, the computer screen seemed to have an entirely different energy to it, compared to when it was offline…. It was as if it had some kind of ‘live’ energy to it … I mean the sense of it was so much more ‘visceral’, as if it had feeling… I know that might sound odd, but that’s how it felt to me way back then, anyhow.
Like all of us, I soon got used to being online...
... especially when I moved from telephone dial-up internet - remember that? - to a big-pipe-cable-modem, and super-fast broadband… Jeeze, it’s so fast now… Sometimes I think we don’t even realise – myself included – the power we have at our fingertips.
Then of course we went from that feeling that it was somehow ‘odd’to be online, to its opposite, feeling that it was now odd to be offline…
It got to the point, where if we booted up on a machine that wasn’t connected to the internet, it felt kind of useless – no matter how much powerful software was installed on it, or how much could be done without an internet connection…
Suddenly, if it was offline, it felt somehow impotent, as if it was missing something.
Anyhow, getting back to the point once again, being on Facebook, to me had the feeling something akin to the vibe similar to that of the supercomputer ‘Hal’ from Stanley Kubrick’s '2001 a Space Odyssey'...
Ok, so, most people won’t have felt the same – as far as I know – but that’s how it felt to me…
Actually, Facebook, the first time I used it, felt rather more sinister than Hal…
Ok, ok, I know that all seems over the top, and yes, I suppose Facebook is connecting people… And a great deal of good comes from it, I admit – but where is all that data ultimately going? And why?
And why does Mark Zuckerberg feel the need to cover up his laptop webcam with a sticker anyhow?
I mean if even he and his programmers don’t feel secure, what are we dealing with?
Steemit, on the other hand, seems to have a whole different vibe to it.
Sure we’re still dealing heavily with computer algorithms, a new blockchain, whales and all manner of whatnot, most of which I’ve still to decipher and comprehend… but nevertheless it still feels that there’s an overwhelmingly human presence that is driving the whole Steem thing…
Wow speaking of blockchains, I really missed out on bitcoin too. I remember stumbling across Bitcoin sometime in the earlier days when the price for one bitcoin was very low… I was going to buy £10 worth… I’d registered with a trader & downloaded a wallet, but I never got round to the purchase!... All because of the relentless and turbulent nature of life at the time… Ah, but never mind.
Anyway I think Steemit is a good thing, unless of course it turns out that Dan Larimer and Ned Scott of Steemit are just institutional lackeys like Zuckerberg playing out some grand master plan directed from high above and the powers that be… Somehow though, I don’t feel that is quite how it’s going to turn out… I hope not anyway.
Steemit really does seem to truly be something that is evolving from digital grass-roots, it’s true inception being from something noble and good, perhaps? I hope so…
Facebook, on the other hand, sure does has some weirdness about it though:
And… I could be wrong about Zuckerberg… Maybe he really is a genuinely nice guy, and really is the inspirational ‘flame’ and creator behind Facebook?… I don’t know.
So, yes, there does seem to be a lot going on with Steemit right now, what with the dollarvigelante crowd, the backlash to all that, the power of whales, and all the discussion regarding the effectiveness off upvoting, stuff I just don’t know enough about yet…
I guess it doesn’t matter, it all seems to be part of the development and evolution of Steem anyway… It appears to be a self-evolving system. Steemit is in beta phase, and huge amount of its development is influenced and powered by its users… it seems that way anyhow.
Sure, there’s controversy, but then, how do you actually combine a currency ‘ecosystem’ with a blogging platform and keep it in an open network?
Nevertheless, there’s a sense that something entirely new is being born here… Something good.
I guess, that’s also a fundamental aspect of what I would like to focus on too: The idea that a peaceful world is possible.
I feel strongly driven in that regard…
After all, more of the world is at peace than not.
You wouldn’t think it, watching the television news, but I think that’s true.
Admittedly there may be so much that is amiss in the ‘real’ world: chaos and confusion, politically, morally, financially. So many ways…
Yet, we are all reaching out to find better ways… in our own ways…
I can see that a world of peace, harmony and balance is attainable.
Others may disagree, and for some reason it’s the accepted ‘wisdom’ that:
“no mate, sorry, peace just isn’t possible in our world…. Look around … Look at history… it’s just not human nature mate, we’re all hard-wired to fight”
Well, I fundamentally disagree with that, but nevertheless, it’s just a thought…
‘peace is possible’ vs ‘peace is not possible’
It’s a variable that can be changed!
We create every moment of our lives on this earth – all of us…
It’s just that the nutters have been at the helm for so long…
They’re trying to bomb the world into peace?
But it won’t work… of course it won’t work!
Their plan is so fundamentally wrong...
Anyhow, I’ve certainly digressed from my introductive words here (is that even a word!!?!)…
Despite all that seems amiss, we absolutely do live in the most amazing times right now…
So much of our lives can seem so very scary, and yet, solutions do exist.
Almost as if they are inherent to the problems we experience, I think that the solutions to all these things, lay dormant, waiting to be discovered.
It’s as if the turbulence we experience collectively, and individually contain the hidden gifts that will enable us to work towards a more harmonious world.
After all, if we haven’t experienced war and chaos, how can we know to choose to experience true peace?
I know for sure, that once we can properly figure out the ‘truths’ in this world of ours – and in our very lives - we will naturally gravitate towards better, saner ways of going about things.
Yes, I know that ‘truth’ is sometimes considered a nebulous concept…
It’s often argued that truth is subjective,
and you’ll hear people say:
"my truth is different to your truth",
and we can get mixed up in all of those kinds of deep philosophical arguments’…
Nevertheless, I still maintain that there are things that can be defined as truths.
For example:
- ‘the ground is underneath our feet’,
- ‘the sky is above our heads’,
- ‘the sun comes up every day, even if it is obscured by clouds… one day it won’t, but for now, it does…’
All of the above, as long as we stay within the proximity of earth, we can all agree, are pretty much fundamental truths… for now…
I say ‘pretty’ much, because the nature of reality is far more elusive than we realise, at that whacky atomic level, and in some ways, there will always be exceptions to the rule…
And truths will look different from different vantage points… yes…
But, for the purposes of us all getting along together on planet earth, we can agree that there are such things such as ‘truths’…
And we should clearly define them if we’re going to create a world with any kind of lasting peace.
Anyhow, I’m getting carried away with all this… I was supposed to write a short introduction!! I have so very much to write about… I guess I’ve stored up a lifetimes worth of comment!
All this time I’ve watched the struggle between mainstream and alternative methods of media, and now it feels as if we are reaching some points of real convergence.
The mainstream can no longer ignore the internet chatter, and although there is much obfuscation, and we live in a world that seems to be losing its collective mind sometimes, I still look out of the window and see a very peaceful world…
We’ll get there.
That spirit that the internet used to have at its inception - the idea that freedom of speech, and the tools for true democratic discourse were inherent within it - those are the things that seem to be gaining a lot of focus again, and those ideas seem very much alive on Steemit. Once again, I hope so.
###As it goes, this post may actually be something that kind of saves my life.
Sounds dramatic doesn’t it?
But it’s actually true…
I’m hoping that it will spur me on to write more…
God knows that I have enough to write about!
I would like to feel comfortable enough to broadcast further, and by just writing these words, I’m encouraged to go ahead and blog and Steem ahead!
We’ll see…
I hope this is enough, and will do as an introduction.
As far as verification goes, this is me:.
(the date is the 12th, last Friday & i haven't got round to formatting and uploading this until know, but it'll do : ) )
Very glad to be here Steemers…
Cheers to the evolution of new systems and better ways of life!
So, if you’ve got this far, help me, give me a bit of a boost – upvote me, encourage me, I’ve tonnes more to write, a heck of a lot to contribute to the world around me before I leave this life, and I’ve many many creative tricks up my sleeves once I get going… Feel free to comment, encourage if you can, and any constructive comments welcome…
Either way, just posting this, for me, seems to be the most cathartic and healing thing that I could ever do…
I’ve got a feeling that I’m saving my own life just by posting it. I hope that my words come across good enough for you all to see where I’m coming from… We really can do something incredibly good in these strange and wonderful times that we are living in…
A better world really is possible, and I get the feeling that we’re collectively reaching that curve now… We’re working it out… We’re not afraid, and we won’t believe the BS anymore…
###We don’t need revolution – that just goes round and round and round – What we need is ‘evolution’
And we’ve got the tools now… we really have – We’ve got the brains, the info, the computer power, the bandwidth – hey, we’re reaching critical mass now – We can break the light speed barrier, burst on through to the other side, and make this new wave work! – I know we can...