1: From the bottom of the Lobster pile

I'm on a thirty-plus-year befuddled, disjointed, delusional, self-absorbed exploration of life from my twisted little corner of world. I’m hoping to use this environment for varied purposes. Sometimes to test my ideas. Maybe other times to test yours. Sometimes to share what I’ve learned. Other times to talk about what I have yet to learn. The exact direction as of now is unknown other than to blab on the general subject of “life”.

I don’t know how much I don’t know. I will probably bring pre-conceived notions, self- and other- limiting beliefs, and just plain bullshit into my writing whether I want to or not. The point here will be to expose them to daylight and see what survives.

Not every time I write will it be this dramatic, but sometimes. At times I may talk about something ethereal. Other times quotidian. Sometimes I will use words like quotidian, other times I’ll recommend that someone fuck off…or maybe exchange a simple encouraging word instead. Keep going.

Speaking of going we’ll see where this takes me. It’s an experiment.
If there’s an audience out there for this, great. If not, you already know what to do.

With that out of the way, I’m just going to jump into it. One of my current thoughts regards a concept from Jordan B. Peterson’s second book, 12 Rules for Life. He points out that the system by which we experience our place in the hierarchy of life is old. It’s so old that lobsters, who have been around since before trees existed, work on the same exact neurological mechanism. They too experience low serotonin when they receive a message that they are lower in the hierarchy than another. And when they do, their physical posture and behavior changes to something more submissive, skittish, and defensive. Give them modern day happy pills and Poof! They change back to confident behavior. Fascinating.

I’ve noticed in myself that I have a big hang-up with my position in the socioeconomic hierarchy and that when I perceive myself to be headed downhill and losing financial freedom or worse, security, the world becomes a dark, constricted place, and I an unwantable wretch who cannot think of solutions no matter how shallow the problem. I wonder if the lobster and I are experiencing the same thing: an increased level of perceived threat in the world that surrounds me, indeed my whole reality. Boy, what a powerful chemical that serotonin is. Lo and behold, without fail, when my finances improve, so does my outlook on life and self. I feel better. My perception that I am not among the lowest on the totem pole and that I have the money with which to keep the zombies at bay (to be explored in depth another time) yields a real improvement in mood, vitality, creativity, motivation, and thus capacity to self-improve…or at least enough spirit to try.

Then there’s relationships. For whatever reason, I gravitate towards being the passive/submissive one (bottom lobster - JBP). Surprise, surprise, when I’m in a relationship, life looks limited, boring, hopeless, and I feel lifeless and inert. All the vitality that was there during the chase, before my self-submission (definitely a whole subject unto itself), is now gone. Maybe it’s being an eyes-to-the-front predator, or a male, that makes it so that (much!) more of my brain is engaged during a hunt than it is afterwards, when life is just a gather. The world is bigger, I am more capable, the odds are in my favor, I see colors, I smile…Hard to know if that is what’s happening. Probably it’s more complicated than that. All I know is, the world and I look very different based quite largely on my perceived situation. This tells me that much of what I call reality is of limited commonality with others’. In my (little) world meanings are assigned in accordance with my own physiology, belief systems, perceptions, and hopefully skills (currently: lack thereof).

The skill that I hope exists, believe exists, is one in which the subject is able to freely choose the hierarchy in which they perceive themselves. It’s impossible for everyone to be top lobster in a hierarchy of seven billion, or that of Formula 1 pilots, or MENSA. It cannot be that the rest of us get the scraps of serotonin that the elites drop in their consumption of the world. And yet so much of our economy is based on peddling those scraps. (A post on that subject might be worthwhile). There has to be a way to self-define a hierarchy in which ‘top lobster’ is (as Peterson says) good for self, and for others, and the world, and through time but also perhaps most importantly, achievable. This I believe lies out there beyond the horizon of my denial or my limited self-image/belief. Currently, I see myself near the bottom in a pile of billions. Not surprisingly, I don’t see a way out/up and there is no fire in me.

It cannot be that I and others like me are relegated to a dark, low-serotonin corner for life. If it is, it is not worth watching this one to the end. Might as well put down the popcorn and go home. There has to be another way.

What is your perceived place in your hierarchy? Did you choose that hierarchy freely or are you subject to it? And how does it color your world?

More wonderings to follow.
Until next time.
Cheers.