“Innocence is the child, and forgetfulness, a new beginning, a game, a self-rolling wheel, a first movement, a holy Yea.” – Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra
Nietzsche spoke of Three Metamorphoses of the Spirit: the Camel, the Lion, and the Child (link to full text below).
The Camel is burdened with the societal values that he has accumulated over a lifetime. These are the “thou shalts” - the ideas that we unconsciously adopt. From a young age society (our family, friends, teachers, and the media) program us to believe in these memetic values. Memetic because we are simply pantomimes, copying what we learn from the other.
We take pride in these values; we fight for them. These are the strong opinions strongly held, yet so few of us actually take the time to reflect upon why we hold them. So few of us choose to break the shackles of the values that we have involuntarily adopted simply by existing in a specific space and time.
These are memes - the more simple the program, the more powerful.
Memes are the Dragon in Nietzsche’s Zarathustra - they are “thou shalts,” the earliest and most powerful memes of religion. The power of digestible religious memes to move whole societies is undeniable. Campbell’s Hero with a Thousand Faces highlighted how many of these stories reflect the same arc, the same lessons, the same “thou shalts.” It is truly miraculous how these memes developed across cultures and time – as though they might have actually been passed down to us humans via the Jungian Collective Unconscious.
But how do we break from the Unconscious to Conscious? Enter the Lion.
The Lion converts “Thou Shalts” into “I will.” Although the Lion spirit does not have the capacity to create new memes, it derives its power through free will. The lion chooses which memes it will and will not accept. This is the start of spiritual metamorphosis– breaking the chains in which society has shackled us. The lion is conscious choice; the lion is freedom.
But the lion lacks the power to create new memes because he is too full of knowledge of the old ones.
Who has the power to create new? The child.
With its know-nothing mind, a child is the very representation of creation. In order to create, the child spirit must release or “forget” that which it once knew.
This week, I hope we find time for a moment of reflection on the “thou shalt” memes that we unconsciously carry.
I hope we can find at least one “I will,” to take new responsibility to choose a meme ourselves.
Finally, I hope we can identify one area of our lives in which we can start completely fresh - admitting how little we truly know.
Have a great week!
Let me know what you think of this post
This Week’s Podcast:
Memes Rule Everything Around Me with Jamie Cohen, PhD, New & Digital Media Expert, Author,
Jamie Cohen is a PhD in New Media who wrote the first academic paper on Pepe the Frog. He is an expert on the power of memes to shape our society. After speaking to him, it became more clear to me just how susceptible we humans are to the power of this viral software. Memes rule pop-culture, politics, markets, and thus have a direct impact on our day to day lives. If you take anything away from this episode, I hope it is the importance of developing “meme literacy.”
Expert on memes or growth hacking / building a community with them? I want to hear from you
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MARKETS
Trump Signs Executive Orders After Economic Relief Talks Collapse
Goldman Sachs Markets Update: SPACS
CRYPTO
Explaining the Impending DWeb Explosion, Steven McKie @ Amentum
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DeFi on Cosmos, Ryan Watkins @ Messari
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