The Future is a Choice

The Future is a Choice

Here’s a question that should keep you up at night: Are you a passenger or a pilot in your own damn life?

Most people drift through their days like they’re riding in the back of a cosmic Uber, staring out the window, vaguely wondering where they’re headed. They assume the universe has a plan, that things will just work out, that some invisible driver has the map. They are passengers, spectators to their own existence. And they are dead wrong.

The Problem: The Myth of Equilibrium

The biggest lie we’re ever told is that life is about finding balance. Stability. Homeostasis. It’s a comforting thought, isn’t it? That if we just work hard enough, meditate long enough, or buy the right self-help book, we’ll arrive at a state of perfect, static harmony.

Bullshit.

This idea of equilibrium is not just wrong; it’s a recipe for stagnation and decay. It’s a one-way ticket to irrelevance. In the grand scheme of the universe, equilibrium means death. It’s the state of maximum entropy, where everything is uniform, disordered, and lifeless. A warm, flat, cosmic soda. If you’re seeking balance, you’re seeking the grave. You’re a Backward-Looking Person (BLP), clinging to a past that no longer exists, trying to freeze a universe that is defined by its relentless, forward motion.

Reflecting on my own journey, I realize how often I resisted change and clung to familiar patterns, even when they no longer served me. I made countless decisions aimed at preserving my sense of self rather than embracing growth, inadvertently holding myself back. This personal struggle underscores the vital choice we all face: to either remain in a state of inertia or to actively shape the future we want. So what does this all mean for you, right now, in your life?

The Application: Pilot Your Own Damn Ship

So what does this all mean for you, right now, in your life?

It means you have a choice.

You can be a passenger, a BLP, and let the currents of the universe carry you wherever they may. You can pretend that the past is a safe harbor and that the future is something that happens to you. You can seek the false comfort of equilibrium and slowly, imperceptibly, fade into the background noise of the cosmos.

Or you can be a pilot.

You can be an FLP who understands that the future is not a destination; it’s a creation. It’s something you build, moment by moment, with every choice you make. It’s about embracing the inherent instability of life and using it as a source of energy and creativity. It’s about consciously engaging with your endocannabinoid system, not just through cannabis, but through diet, exercise, mindfulness, and novelty. It’s about becoming a dissipative structure that thrives on change.

It makes me laugh to reflect upon some of the choices I've made in my former life. Man was I a fucking idiot! I used to resist change; I used to hold on to things that were not; I made horrendous decisions every day, all in the effort to preserve my ego and resist change.

The Takeaway: How to Seize the Controls

Becoming a pilot isn’t about some grand, heroic gesture. It’s about the small, daily practices that rewire your brain and body to be more adaptive, more resilient, and more forward-looking. Here’s where you can start:

1. Feed Your ECS: Your endocannabinoid system thrives on novelty and challenge. Try new things. Learn a new skill. Travel to a new place. Eat different foods. Break your routine. Shock your system out of its complacency.
2. Embrace Volatility: Stop trying to make your life perfectly stable. It’s a fool’s errand. Instead, learn to thrive in volatility. Start a side hustle. Diversify your investments. Build a network of allies. Create multiple streams of income. Make yourself antifragile.
3. Export Entropy: You are an open system. You must export entropy to maintain your structure. What does that mean in practical terms? It means you need to create. Write. Build. Make art. Solve problems. Contribute. Don’t just be a consumer of energy; be a producer of order.
4. Practice Self-Organization: You don’t need a grand, top-down plan for your life. You need a direction, a vector. Start with a simple set of rules, a personal algorithm, and then let the process of self-organization do its work. My rule is simple: move toward what fascinates and energizes me. That’s it. The rest takes care of itself.

The future is being built right now, with or without you. It’s a swirling vortex of chaos and opportunity. You can either be pulled into its wake, a passive spectator to the greatest show in the universe, or you can grab the controls and learn to fly.

Which role are you choosing?

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