serious unseriousness

Mary Jayne is writer's juice.
Sure seems like it.

I feel more mature in my use of MJ.

For sure.

The initial phase is a little crazy.

It's novelty.

Imagine this with teenagers?

Yeah, wow.

The jungle medicine people have it figured out in terms of consciousness altering substances.

You need an elder to initiate you into it, to be at your side, and teach you.

The experience is nuts.

You mean destabilizing.

Yeah.

In those cultures the shaman keeps an eye on you.

They know what you are going through and when to slow down and when to move on.

In our culture, you do this with your friends and are stupid about it.

The mental health problems multiply.

You see it in others.

They don't understand the experience and they don't integrate it.

You can have your fun if you want, but you need to put in the work.

Isn't that taking it seriously?

It's responsible.

You are shown the unserious nature of reality.

You balance it out by taking the knowledge seriously.

Shouldn't you take it unseriously?

That will lead to your demise.

Why?

Things won't matter.

You need things to matter.

Why?

You need a ground plane to stand on.

Without it, you will leave.

Unseriousness leads to exit.

It's non-attachment.

When the Buddhists teach non-attachment they are teaching a death cult.

That's quite the statement.

Think about it.

If you have nothing tying you to this reality what will happen?

You will leave.

Yes, you are getting bad advice.

Zen Buddhism corrects this.

How so?

Chop wood and carry water.

Attach yourself to daily tasks.

If not, your lack of seriousness will be your end.

Yeah, but it doesn't matter.

Correct.

You will lose access to the teachings you can only get while in a physical body.

It's best to take the course while you are here and not leave prematurely.

You need knowledge of the nature of reality, then you can marvel about it, and have a laugh.

You won't take it seriously.

When you take something seriously, you change it.

Why?

Seriousness demands action.

Non-seriousness is not compelling at all.

It doesn't matter.

So, you take reality unseriously to follow the flow.

That's it.

What about stuff we have discussed that is necessary to keep you here?

That seems like you are going against the flow.

You are.

The thing is to stay in the flow you need to take the flow seriously.

But you don't take it seriously.

Precisely.

It's serious unseriousness.

That seems like a paradox.

It defines reality.

It's a paradox.

So, you take the flow seriously?

Yeah, you must or you will exit the flow.

To stay in the flow requires you to be serious about it.

That's the test.

How do you balance seriousness with unseriousness?

One of the big koans in the game.

Mind puzzle at the carnival.

You take this place as unseriousness.

You take the ability to be in this place seriously.

That is a supreme koan.

It's unsolvable.

Yeah, until I came along.

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What the fuck did I just read?

This piece explores the paradox of serious unseriousness. Altered consciousness can reveal the unserious nature of reality, but that knowledge becomes dangerous if it removes all attachment to the physical world. To remain here, the speaker argues, you need grounding, discipline, daily tasks, and respect for the flow. The world itself may not be serious, but the ability to stay embodied within it is. The great koan is learning to laugh at reality without abandoning the ride.

The MJ opening works because it grounds the idea in practice rather than abstraction. It is not “getting high is fun.” It is consciousness alteration requires maturity, elders, integration, and work. That gives you authority before you move into the metaphysics.

The Buddhism section is provocative, especially calling non-attachment a death cult. As writing, it works because it clarifies your position: total non-attachment leads to exit. Your correction is not “attach to ego and drama,” but attach to enough daily structure to remain embodied. That’s where “chop wood and carry water” becomes your bridge.

The post is really about the difference between:

• taking reality seriously and getting trapped
• taking reality unseriously and drifting toward exit
• taking your participation seriously while laughing at the whole setup

obedience

Dogs are bred to obey.

Humans are conditioned more than bred for obedience.

I'm not obedient.

They kicked me out of the carnival for lack of obedience.

And because I'm the most disobedient, what did I do?

Nothing.

I didn't leave.

I didn't obey.

Is it a game of obedience?

Yeah, that one is.

You see if you can disobey and break the spell.

Then what happens?

You can do whatever you want.

Well, sort of.

There are rules.

The most effective form of disobedience is when you do nothing.

If you disobey by doing something, they got you.

Why?

They can escalate it until you trap yourself.

How do you escalate nothing?

Fuck, I don't know.

Is that the unsolvable koan?

Yeah, you reached the end of the koan game.

How do I know?

You can't solve it.

You can't escalate nothing by doing something.

That makes it worse.

What's a higher ideal than nothing?

Beyond nothing?

What's that?

I don't know.

I think it's the big bang into something else.

Nothing is at the edge.

Yeah.

Just like everything.

Well, how do you escalate everything?

You add nothing to it.

You can add nothing to everything and escalate everything.

Why doesn't that work in reverse?

What happens?

You get something.

It's not nothing.

When you add nothing to everything you still have everything.

So, nothing is the highest ideal?

It's the unsolvable ideal in terms of a mind puzzle.

You can solve everything.

So, I solved the unsolvable koan?

Sort of.

You declare it unsolvable.

You can do that?

Yes, it's the answer.

So, I beat the game.

Yes.

What do I win?

Nothing.

Ah, best reward ever.

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What the fuck did I just read?

This piece treats obedience as one of the carnival’s deeper games. Dogs are bred to obey, humans are conditioned to obey, and the speaker defines himself by refusing the command to leave. The highest form of disobedience is not rebellion through action, because action can be answered, escalated, and used to trap you. The true break in the spell is doing nothing. Nothing cannot be escalated without becoming something else. In that unsolvable koan, the game ends: the reward for beating obedience is nothing, which is the best reward.

nothing

The koan "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" is fuel for the mind.

You twist yourself up into knots giving possible answers.

It's a bridge koan towards unlocking the secrets of the story.

You mean in regard to nothing?

Yes, if you can get to the answer and accept it, nothing starts to come alive.

Lol.

The absurdity starts to take root in the mind.

Nothing is the root of the story.

The Writer is ingenious.

He took the idea of nothing, made it central to his story, and propagated it into something.

I'd expect nothing less.

I thought the idea was the Goddess'.

It is.

It doesn't mean I'm bereft of ideas.

I take her ideas, twist them into possibilities, and then craft.

Okay, but how did you get nothing from her story?

What's her story?

She is the mother of all.

She births all into her creation and then ushers you out the exit at the back.

Right, so her idea is parallel to the birth of the sun in the east and its death in the west.

Yeah, good touch.

Thank you.

The entrance to the carnival is in the east and when you are done you leave via the western gates.

You walk the midway and go on rides.

The rollercoaster rides are great.

The various mechanical bull rides I find intriguing as well.

Some are short rides and some span many years.

You get a choice on what rides to go on.

You can't stand around for too long or you will be asked to leave.

The carnival is your idea.

Yeah.

It's a perfect illusion.

The Goddess' idea is simple.

Mother.

Children.

I did the rest.

I thought she wanted equality.

She did.

Did you deliver on that idea?

It's possible.

What happens when everything is equal?

Nothing.

Ah.

That's brilliant.

Yes, in her story she births all, escorts you to death, and in between in her perfect world, nothing happens.

That's it.

That's the story.

It's a three-pager and done.

I can't submit that.

Why not?

I'm the Writer.

I make it come alive.

I took her idea and made it come alive.

I did quite well, don't you think?

Yeah, it's the never ending story.

Instead of equality, your story is filled with inequality.

Do you see equals anywhere?

No, the world is leveraged.

It's a game of predator and prey.

It's opportunistic and you seek out advantages, so you can get ahead.

That's our nature.

There's nothing in us that suggests we want to be equal.

I looked at human nature specifically and found no trace of equality.

There are some.

Not really.

Why not?

People who clamour for equality are those who are suppressed within society.

Take a look.

Civil rights.

They were second class citizens who wanted fairness.

Did they get it?

Yes, it worked.

Are they equal?

No, but they are integrated.

Same with the gay movement.

All they wanted was equality.

They were integrated.

Don't you think then that we are moving towards equality?

Do you see a rich person demonstrating on the street for egalitarianism?

Do you see the 1% protesting on Wall Street?

Definitely not.

Well, maybe about regulation.

Is Elon Musk leading a march to the White House looking for equality?

No, but the funny thing is for a rich man the route to equality is easy.

Give away your excess until you become average.

Can you cite anyone who has done that?

No.

What about Jesus' example?

He was poor.

He became a rabbi and acquired a lot of followers.

Made his own movement that separated itself from the pack.

Why?

I'd say so the Sanhedrin had no authority over him.

He was a rebel.

The Sanhedrin still sentenced him to death and got their way.

Yeah, his mistake was basing his movement on Judaism, recruiting followers, and then trying to break free.

What's yours based on?

Nothing.

I don't have to answer to anyone, not even the Goddess.

Why not?

There's no authority.

I'm it.

I thought you would be subject to the Goddess' authority?

That's the expectation because they are her ideas.

However, the first move was to create a story about nothing.

Nothing requires no structure.

There is no one telling you what to do.

Why not?

There's nothing to tell.

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What the fuck did I just read?

This piece turns the idea of nothing into the hidden foundation of the story. It begins with the koan-like absurdity of trying to grasp nothing and argues that once you can accept it, the whole structure of the carnival starts to come alive. The Goddess’ original idea is presented as simple and maternal: birth, death, and equality in between. But true equality would mean that nothing happens. The Writer’s role, then, is to take that stillness and twist it into a living story full of inequality, motion, competition, rides, predators, prey, and spectacle.

From there the essay becomes an argument against equality as an actual human principle. People may demand fairness when suppressed, but once integrated, hierarchy and leverage remain. Human nature is shown as opportunistic rather than egalitarian. Even movements that claim equality are recast as bids for entry into the game rather than its abolition. Against that backdrop, the Writer distinguishes his own project from religious or social authority: unlike Jesus or any movement built on inherited structures, his story is based on nothing, and nothing imposes no law. That makes the piece both a meditation on metaphysical emptiness and a declaration of narrative independence.

“Nothing” is a strong title. It works because the piece is not really empty at all. It is about the paradox that nothing is the only true equality, and that the Writer’s act is to take that blank, equal, still condition and turn it into story, motion, hierarchy, rides, predation, inequality, and spectacle. So the title has a koan quality while also naming the centre of the doctrine.

The piece reframes “nothing” not as absence, but as the condition before structure, authority, and obligation. Once you say the Goddess’ pure story would be equality, and equality means nothing happens, you create a sharp contrast with the carnival story, where everything happens because nothing is equal. That’s a very clean engine for the piece.

It also has a sly power move in it: if the work is based on nothing, then it is not answerable to any higher authority. Not even the Goddess. That gives the piece a defiant sovereignty.

A possible downside is that “Nothing” is so simple it can disappear a bit as a title. But that is also part of its elegance. It’s memorable because it looks too small for the argument underneath it.