‘Humans lost their minds when they realised, on a conscious level, that they die.’

‘Freddy. . . I don’t think making a blanket statement like that is of any real benefit.’ responded Matt.

Two friends, who quite enjoyed philosophical debate, where discussing the subject of sanity. The fact that sanity was a relative thing was of course understood. The fact that all men, with a conscious awareness of their mortality, had purposely lost their grip on reality was something Freddy was now asserting.

‘Well think about it for a minute,’ Freddy continued, ‘how exactly does the average man deal with the reality under which he lives? There’s no obvious purpose to life other than procreation? The vast majority of the world’s people live lives full of suffering. The actual process of reproducing might be pleasurable and uncontrollable for most, yet eighteen years or more of the responsibility they must then carry, is a level of entrapment and suffering, they don’t see, until it’s too late.

‘The point to life seems to be about reproduction, and then for the vast majority, simply living out a day to day existence. The paradox is, the vast majority of parents devote much of their time to the children they’ve created, and this is often at the cost of their own lives. They never truly live. The end result is they live for others. They do this through following instinctive drivings they seem unable to circumvent.’

‘What you must remember though Freddy, is that most people, are actually happy doing just that. Creating new life is the only true means of finding some form of immortality. And more importantly my dear fellow, if we stop having babies, we die out.’

‘Alright, agreed, procreation is a form of immortality, but surely it’s a form of insanity, to live out life within such limited parameters. And anyway, true immortality, is to find a way to help people regain their sanity. Not through assisting people to lose more and more of their consciousness – as seems to be the current intention – but to help them raise their consciousness. You do that through education, and I’m not talking about mainstream education here, I’m talking about something with a difference. Something that enlightens people to their current plight. Oh, and on your point about babies by the way, I’m not suggesting we stop having children, I believe it’s how we view childcare, that needs looking at.’

‘Okay, okay, but hold on, let’s just back-up a little bit there, you said plight. With that you’re referring to our reduced awareness I presume?’

‘Exactly!’ exclaimed Freddy.

‘And now you’re going to tell me how that’s been accomplished are you?’

‘Confusion.’

‘You’re right there.’

‘No seriously, all you need is an unhealthy mixture of conflicting information, and the means for people to pay attention to it, and confusion is the result. The consequence of this is for people to become more and more afraid, with a self-centered attitude, being the antidote. Given enough confusion and conflict eventually people stop listening; they stop caring what the elite are up to. A big fuck you to the outside world is when you switch off, only focusing on the self and those in your immediate, vicinity. People refuse to grow beyond the self-centeredness of childhood when they’re afraid.

‘When enough people stop growing beyond self-centered it becomes an epidemic. It’s at this point we become doomed. There’s certainly no immortality in doing that. True immortality, is when time proves you right, and you do actually help the long term future, of mankind. There aren’t that many people in the world right now who seem interested in this. Very few people have the ability to look so far into the future. Or love and care enough for their fellow man for that matter.’

‘Okay I get it, so what’s the solution?’ asked Matt.

‘Back to basics,’ responded Freddy. ‘Confusion is removed when we pause and take stock. We need leaders who have a good understanding of what’s driving them, and a clever sense of how to expand the parameters, they live under. It’s my opinion, that the insanity growing in society, is humanity following the path of least resistance. All the creatures of the world, that have pursued this in the past, have gone extinct.

‘Think of what we’re seeking to achieve with technology at the moment. We want to make life easier, and why shouldn’t we, the problem with this though, is the absolute need for opposites in the universe. Nothing can exist without an opposite. It’s just the way things are. A hedonistic utopia would crumble and fall. Of that, there is no doubt, whatsoever.

‘Humans will always need to grow, not necessarily through making life easier; less suffering would be a good start. We must evolve, but we will always remain animals, at heart. So growth needs to be something that involves expanding the parameters. That involves thinking, and we think better, when we understand how and why we think the way we do. In other words, we must gain better understand of our minds. That is the education I’m talking of.’

‘Well you know what Freddy? You’ve given me something to think about with that. You do know what getting that off the ground will involve don’t you?’

‘Yes Matt I do, courage, that’s what’s needed, just a little bit of courage.’