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We live in a crazy world, so normalcy can, in its own way, be a form of insanity.
But when your delusions put you at the mercy of that crazy world, you have a problem.
What this piece outlines are some warning signs to watch for to ensure that you're not powerless in the face of weaponized delusions, from a world that wants you as crazy as it is. Let's start.
The Process of Losing Your Mind
As someone that once dabbled in crazy, I have some unique insight into how you can fall into a cavern of delusion.
When thinking about that process, I came to identify some steps that are good warning signs before you get too deep:
1) Awareness
You can't have delusions about something you're not aware of.
Sense impressions, like sights and sounds, can be liberating or locking.
Social media is a place where your sense impressions are at the mercy of the algorithm, or whoever controls that algorithm.
You can't have a desire to purchase a product that never flashes in front of you, can't want to date a person you never know exists, can't like a band whose output is an unknown.
Just existing in the world forces us to forfeit some level of our control over our sense impressions, but we should be cautious about our sense doors, and what we're being made aware of.
2) Paradigm shift/Possibility
By becoming aware of something, it can spark a conception of a future we never considered, a thought we never entertained, a negation of something we believed.
This paradigm shift moment opens a door, or more than one door, to other possibilities, whose validity we're not yet certain of. Which leads us to the next step:
3) Certainty That You're Right About Something
If we're hit with enough possibilities and paradigm shifts, we're usually bound to focus on one, and think there's accuracy to it.
The more we entertain or see a certain possibility, the more we'll think it's true, or at least has a sliver of truth in it.
A change of mind is especially convincing. You see the old idea you've disavowed, and think because you've moved on from it, that the new idea is more accurate.
Sometimes this kind of thing isn't explicit. Your certainty takes the shape of below-the-surface assumptions that alter how you interact with the world. Which leads to:
4) Seeing Only Evidence That Supports Your Beliefs
You don't want to be wrong, so you unfortunately begin naturally filtering out disconfirming evidence. It can be a very unconscious process.
Because it can be unconscious, it can be unstoppable for some. Your biases are fed and made bigger. You start to see yourself on one 'team' over another.
And when we're unsure of things, we often look to others to see how they behave with something. And those people may be in one stage of this process themselves, locking us in a mutually-reinforcing delusion loop.
5) Association Producing Supposed Confirmation
Once you have it in your head that something is true and you have valid evidence, your mind will naturally start the process of association producing confirmation.
Isn't x similar to this?
If that's true, then that must mean x.
x wouldn't have happened if y wasn't true.
x is a sign that I'm on the right track.
Other people wouldn't do x if that wasn't the case.
Serendipity, synchronicity, and such will begin to be weaponized against you, as everything seems to become relevant and significant.
You're now on some waterpark slide tunnel heading to depths without the required arms or legs to swim.
An ancient idea similar to what I'm referring to here is Buddhism's "dependent origination." You're now, as Ajahn Chah said, falling from a tree and hitting each branch without the ability to recognize you are.
We don't want to get to this point, ideally, but by being *aware* of this part of the process, and not thinking yourself immune to it, you have hope of freeing yourself.
Let's talk about some things to avoid, or at least wrangle yourself away from.
Simulation Theory And Other Mental Fentanyl: How To Avoid The Danger
Whether your politics are informed by a conspiracy associated with a letter of the alphabet, or you think the world is reminiscent of a pre-Columbus map, there are many theories out there for you to split your mind open on.
Perhaps the most modern, and dangerous is "Simulation Theory." The idea that we're all living our lives in some computer designed by actual real humans, or a future civilization.
It's modern because computers weren't there to speculate about 2000 years ago, and it's dangerous because of the influence of pop culture touchstones like 'The Matrix' series. Those movies being readily available, and us being aware of them, can lead some vulnerable minds down the process we outlined earlier.
In ten years, with AI advancements, and whatever else we have in store for us, ideas like this may only get more potent. Or they may split into different directions.
Each generation has its own conspiracy to submerge itself in, and the next one will too.
One helpful reframe for the "Simulation Theory" idea is highlighted by a Reddit user that said "Who cares? If we live in a simulation is that any different than being in the alternative “real”? We’re all just part of that universe anyway."
Whether that's reassuring to you may differ from person to person, but I found it to be a particularly effective reframing.
No matter the theory being cooked up like meth in some internet troll's head, a solution to untangle yourself continues to be the Socratic Method.
My post, 'Socrates In Your Head' is my personal way of changing my mind for the better, and cutting off the cognitive dissonance cancer before it becomes fatal.
If you feel like you're too much *in* your own head with problems like these, I highly recommend getting a notebook and pen and unscrambling your brain before it's taken over by an extremely certain pernicious parasite.
Final Thoughts
Losing your mind, perhaps ironically, is most common when we're clinging to our thoughts.
When we won't let them pass by without digging our fingernails into them. And it's extremely dangerous.
By speculating excessively, you lose time and progress on priorities. When they slip, it's like a traffic pile-up in your life. You feel rushed, you feel unstable, you don't stick to your valuable routines, you don't keep good habits going, you cut corners.
There's already documented sad stories about things like AI, and the stories will continue to be generated because we're all working with the same human brains.
But being aware of the possibility that you could be wrong is the first step to not being dead wrong.
Here's to hoping that you're unfazed and consciously uncertain as the world develops new things to go insane about, because it surely will develop them (maybe).