THE GOBLIN NEWSLETTER 130 - POTENTIAL (Patreon)

This morning’s meditation on the Calm app was about writing a love letter. I wrote one in my head to Katie but I decided to write another one to America this morning. I love America the same way I love humanity. I’m fully aware of how humanity started as proto-human apes fighting for survival on the steppe & the brutality of the survival of the species. I understand how that brutality extended out into our attempts at civilization & how that brutality still emerges when the elements warrant it. That brutality is baked in. That said, humans & America are really trying to be better. Things might go back, but things are also constantly going forward. I view America as potential, a machine for unlocking potential. Sure, there are plenty of the self-interested & bad-faith actors, because you get that in any system, artificial or natural, there will be parasites & predators. Evolution has created niches for these things, but also it has produced a niche for self-reflection & advancement. I understand that the word “Potential” is too big & abstract for most people to pin anything specific on, but that’s part of my point. Humanity is too large & varied to pin something super specific on as far as a goal. So I speak of potential. That is something that can develop. I use this word because “progress” has been loaded with too much stuff, from a political agenda that can be cold scientism on one hand & emotional leftism on the other. So I go with potential. I also go with an understanding that to build up something you need to use elements that are seemingly at odds with each other, these things create a dynamism, an energy born out of friction. This is (one of many) reasons I am against the idea of national divorce. This removes a certain kind of conflict, but robs everyone of the potential that is created by managed, conflicting forces. 

x SEAN

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