BASELINE YOUR LIFE
An Outline of the Major Principles
INTRODUCTION
The Question We’re All Asking and Answering
When asked, “What’s wrong with the world today,” people's responses vary widely.
Below are the statistics of the 100 people questioned in the video above.
The ONLY Answer MOST of You Should be Giving
What’s interesting is no one said, “Nothing. There’s nothing wrong with the world today."
But that’s exactly what they, and YOU, should be saying!
There is an extremely small number of people in the world who are justified in saying, “There is something wrong with the world today.” What separates the two groups and what makes only a very small minority of people justified in claiming something’s wrong with the world?
The answer is “assumptions and misconceptions,” assumptions and misconceptions about the universe, about the meaning of life, about human nature, about our ways of life... assumptions and misconceptions that were made centuries ago and have simply been carried over to today, rarely ever being questioned.
Not assumptions about specific philosophies or religions necessarily, though they do come into play, but first and foremost assumptions about things we all very evidently and undoubtedly have in common
All of the assumptions fall under and support one particular egregiously false assumption, making it the ideal starting point for readdressing all of them - the inevitability of conflict. It’s conflict after all that results in all the world’s problems, right, as we subject one another to harm or control in various ways?
My Rebuttal to All Other Answers
If you believe conflict is unavoidable, in other words, that it will always exist, then I say, you have no justification for ranting about the problems in the world, and you especially have no grounds for proposing solutions. Let me break it down for you.
1) If you believe conflict is unavoidable, then you very likely will do less to prevent it.
2) In fact, you probably preemptively react to the mere thought of it, thus creating it, because others, seeing your preemptive measures are also compelled to react preemptively, creating an escalation of potential for conflict.
3) Therefore, if most everyone’s creating the potential for conflict, then of course conflict is unavoidable. Eventually, the pontential will turn kinetic.
I’ll get to those times when conflict really exists and isn’t just preemptively created, but for the most part, those times are far fewer than believed because most instances of conflict are the result of the escalation. Stop the escalation process and real moments of conflict would be even fewer and farther between.
If you’re the majority, then any solutions you propose are futile because they don’t address the real problem - ending conflict. Instead, because you’ve never even considered conflict could be avoided, your solutions only end up causing more conflict. I gonna say this next thing with all the lovingkindness in the world:
You’re creating the conflict you’re railing against!
I was creating the conflict I was railing against, which is way I made the video you see on www.imtheproblem.com.
Exactly why and how we go about creating the conflict we're railing against will be explored extensively on this website. And believe it or not, with this understanding we can actually take steps to minimize conflict.
The Justified Few
Only those who believe conflict is NOT unavoidable have any grounds for ranting about problems in the world and proposing solutions.
They are the only ones willing to reexamine our assumptions and misconceptions and address the underlying causes of conflict.
They are the only ones able to create truly viable solutions targeting conflict instead of the myriad of "problems" that grow out of conflict.
They are the only ones not creating the conflict they are ranting against!
Where Do We Go From Here?
So, if you were asked, ‘What’s wrong with the world today?” would you be willing to say, “Nothing”? To accept the conflict all around you as truly unavoidable and simply allow it to play out without contributing to it?
Probably not because you assuredly have reservations, probably even some counterarguments as to why conflict exists, how removed you are from its source, and how you’re justified in any instance where you engage in conflict.
In the sections that follow, most all of those reservations and counterarguments will probably be addressed.
In the end, you’ll either agree and not complain as much or you’ll join me in correcting the real problem; either way, I can guarantee there will be less conflict.
LIFE IS WALKING A TIGHT ROPE
"You Got a Problem with That?!"
We should first be certain there are problems that need correcting. I’m saying there are and describing the forms in which problems can exist (which I'll do in the next major section), will help in revealing why I believe there are problems needing to be corrected.
I say, “help” because what are really important to understand are the alternatives, aren’t they? We wouldn’t tackle anything, consider anything a problem, if there were no alternatives to consider beforehand.
Most of us won’t bother to take time to consider the fact there are 24 hours in a day a problem because there’s no alternative, no point in figuring out a solution.
Like any situation over which we know we have zero control, we just deal with it.
Depends on the Alternatives
The alternatives in the overall situation we call "life," however, compel us not to just deal with it, and rightly so. We definitely have alternatives.
You’ll find any problem I identify has associated alternatives and that the alternatives probably always involve a balancing act with consequences.
This balancing act known as 'life" is further complicated because it’s being done on nearly invisible tight ropes (truth) and with no safety equipment (logic and hope).
I believe we can make the balancing act far more stable by ensuring all the appropriate measures are taken for us to achieve “the goal” - getting across the tight rope as far as the metaphor is concerned - more efficiently and effectively.
The real world goal mankind should set will be recounted much later in this outline.
The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing but...
The intricacies of the concept of truth are beyond the scope of this outline. It would be best to simply bottomline the topic in such a way as to be useful for the discussion going forward.
In general, agnosticism is the ideal philosophical stance.
Higher truths, such as the truth about mankind’s origin, are relatively unknowable.
The only truths we should be concerned about are those which are self-evident to EVERYONE and undeniable by ANYONE.
On a personal level, truth should take precedence in people’s daily lives. They should never do anything they can’t readily admit to, basically.
The Tools of the Trade
The primary tool for analyzing the veracity of a potential truth is logic, self-evidence and undeniability being the litmus tests, while mankind’s goal determine’s its usefulness.
In order to refrain from a defeatist attitude when truths leave us with options hope should be our other tool, which is practically honed by mankind’s goal.
Our task leading up to the goal is to find the alternative, in any given situation with the fewest negative consequences (doesn’t perpetuate problems or create new ones).
Weighing alternatives with the above in mind would allow us to get rid of many alternatives as not enabling an ideal environment for mankind’s wellness.
But an ideal environment isn’t the goal, a clearly defined end state is; this end state is imperative if we are going to achieve the task of determining the best alternatives consistently.
In order to know exactly what should be thought of as negative within any given alternative, we have to clearly define “negative;” thus, we move on…
Cans of Worms of a Different Color
But first, keep in mind, this is merely an overview of the principles for Baselining Your Life.
Life is so interwoven, no topic can be mentioned without potentially veering off in numerous other directions. I’ve done my best to keep this concise by pointing out intersections, but not taking them, instead making certain to stay on a course that leads us to a foundational understanding of the origins of and solutions to conflict. I will certainly address this material and much more in the “Baseline Your Life” book, for which this website and my blog serve as precursors.
THE PROBLEM WITH PROBLEMS
"Can Your Tell Me Where it Hurts?"
All the answers to “What’s wrong with the world today,” can be categorized in 2 ways, usually as a mixture of both.
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Problems of pain:
Physical, emotional, mental, and/or spiritual suffering (I define the “spirit” unconventionally, which I’ll get into when I speak to human nature under Faulty Assumption #1).
Problems of pain are felt, sensed.
Example: racism can result in physical pain, emotional abuse,
mental anguish, and to an extent, spiritual impairment.
Pain is a problem because it ultimately leads to severe lose, such as death.
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AND/OR
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Problems of perspective:
Comparing aspects of the world to an idealized mirror.
Problems of perspective are imagined, perceived.
Example: racism can result in injustice (contradictory laws), such as
a constitution that claims all men are created equal, but segregates races.
Perspective is a problem because it ultimately leads to a breakdown of integrity of a concept (to include the concept of self), to the point of meaninglessness.
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Of course, this is not how most people think about the problems in the world, as evidence by the statistics displayed at the outset of this outline; most people are too in the weeds, passionately focused on the details of the “problems.” Why and how people are getting themselves caught in the weeds will be described in great detail throughout this outline.
As explained, I’ll also cover the alternatives, beginning with how we categorize problems. How problems are categorized here is exactly how our problems should always be assessed. The fact our problems can be divided into pain and/or perspective is a truth that is enforcing itself, but we’re ignoring it. You’ll see why I’m asserting this when I begin talking about human nature in depth in the next major section.
Problems of Pain indepth
Is pain a problem?
It’s certainly not a fun experience, but can we really call something that’s an integral part of life a problem?
Pain let’s us know where to set our limits and survive. We learn not to put our hand in fire for instance. So, isn’t pain a good thing?
Moreover, carefully managed pain enables us to exceed our limits and grow stronger. A very, very important note one this will come up later.
Most people even suggest we have to know pain in order to know pleasure. A very, very important note on that later as well.
Besides the fact pain is a useful part of life, it’s really not possible to eliminate pain, but that seems to be precisely our goal.
Except we’re not really trying to eliminate pain, so much as get to a perpetual state of pleasure, even though we know pain is inevitable.
This is very likely why the most people think we have to know pain in order to know pleasure. This too has a very, very important note, which will come up later.
Considering all this, the absence of pleasure, even for a moment, triggers a fear of impending pain, even though we haven’t experienced it yet, and we tend to fall into a downward spiral.
The certainty of pain is most evident when it comes to our needs, especially physical needs; of course, this is also where we see our habitual pursuit of pleasure.
Take hunger for example, we don’t merely satisfy, we over-satiate thinking we’ll stay in a state of pleasure longer.
Using that same example, we see that over-satiating carries altogether different, but just as consequential pain with it.
And then there’s this certainty: all pain will eventually lead to death if unchecked.
Most of us are scared to death of death.
Causing us to focus our efforts on controlling all pain.
It’s not that pain or death is a problem. The problem is fear of pain and death.
Erroneous assumptions, which I will begin thoroughly listing a couple sections from here, feed into that fear.
Fear of pain causes us to enact those preemptive measures to pain that hasn’t even happened.
For example: We rage at people for cutting us off on the road, but they never even came close to hitting us.
As explained, those measures end up growing exponentially as others react likewise, causing us to inflict entirely useless pain on one another preemptively.
So, while fear of pain is the real problem, the excessive pain we inflict on one another is the byproduct, the decreasing of which proves we’re acting less on our fears.
We need to alternatively accept the fact pain and death are unavoidable and do everything in our power not to fear them.
We need to realize the fact our fear leads to preemptive actions which cause excessive and useless pain for the rest of the world.
We need to focus on the alternative fact we would ensure our own survival far more effectively by alternatively minimizing the pain we inflict on others.
These alternatives will be supported throughout this website.
All the answers to “What’s wrong with the world today,” can be categorized in 2 ways, usually as a mixture of both.
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Problems of pain:
Physical, emotional, mental, and/or spiritual suffering (I define the “spirit” unconventionally, which I’ll get into when I speak to human nature under Faulty Assumption #1).
Problems of pain are felt, sensed.
Example: racism can result in physical pain, emotional abuse,
mental anguish, and to an extent, spiritual impairment.
Pain is a problem because it ultimately leads to severe lose, such as death.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AND/OR
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Problems of perspective:
Comparing aspects of the world to an idealized mirror.
Problems of perspective are imagined, perceived.
Example: racism can result in injustice (contradictory laws), such as
a constitution that claims all men are created equal, but segregates races.
Perspective is a problem because it ultimately leads to a breakdown of integrity of a concept (to include the concept of self), to the point of meaninglessness.
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Of course, this is not how most people think about the problems in the world, as evidence by the statistics displayed at the outset of this outline; most people are too in the weeds, passionately focused on the details of the “problems.” Why and how people are getting themselves caught in the weeds will be described in great detail throughout this outline.
As explained, I’ll also cover the alternatives, beginning with how we categorize problems. How problems are categorized here is exactly how our problems should always be assessed. The fact our problems can be divided into pain and/or perspective is a truth that is enforcing itself, but we’re ignoring it. You’ll see why I’m asserting this when I begin talking about human nature in depth in the next major section.