I’m not going into politics here. Just the cold hard facts of life. Tyrants are everywhere, from leaders at the top of the world to managers at entry level jobs to family members that rule with an iron glove. These tyrants are here for us and we’re lucky to have them. But why? But how?
The short answer, followed by the long answer, is that tyrants are the most difficult humans to love, they’re the most in need of love, they’re the most difficult humans to be around, and they’re the least likely to change their behavior. What this all means is that tyrants offer each of us the ultimate opportunity to feel, express and temper our sense of freedom (to be and to experience love).
Let’s start the long answer by diving right into the topic of Luck. What does that word mean? I’m not asking what it says under “luck” in Webster’s Dictionary. I mean, what does it mean? When I explore that question I arrive somewhere peculiar. It’s an unfamiliar place, but paradoxically, it has all the inexplicable familiarity that I experience in my nighttime dreams.
Luck is not a subject of comfort. Luck is not a matter of ease. Luck is the realization of our expanding awareness. Huh? Bare with me. When people say “count yourself lucky,” most of the time they are referring to a near-death or near-injury or near-trouble moment in our life. It’s a judgement based on surface level perception.
What if we were to move forward in time to see all the causes and effects of our actions, based on our “lucky” moments? We might see that deciding not to jump into the fray of life, or avoiding danger, or by not being “in the wrong place at the wrong time,” actually lead us to an even more disastrous outcome. We would say instead, “oh, in truth, we weren’t so lucky.”
Maybe that moment of abuse, danger, pain, is here for us to catalyze our experience into reflection so that we may come to a deeper awareness of being, for the (tremendous) sacrifice of feeling comfortable now. That isn’t to say that all challenges are the same. Some experiences can be incredibly difficult, like being on the receiving end of violence and aggression. In those experiences, Luck doesn’t feel at all like an appropriate term to use.
But our most painful experiences in life offer us our most powerful reflections, don’t they? Do those reflections not offer us a deeper awareness of reality? For example, we learn how to love more fully when we practice forgiveness. We are more able to empathize and connect with people in pain when we’ve felt pain.
That being said, the concept of luck becomes the value we place on our ever-expanding sense of self and other-selves. Simply, we are “fortunate” only when we believe in ourselves and other-selves and when we have come to the understanding that we, as human beings, are never victims of experience, but explorers of experience.
We are lucky to have clarity. We are lucky to see that what we want goes against the grain. We are lucky to be loved and to give love freely. We are lucky to have tyrants pushing us around so that we may transcend the illusion of separation. We are lucky to have departed from our victim mentality. We are lucky that our sense of freedom does not depend on another’s will.
What we see when we look out into the world is a reflection of our inner world. We are just as much tyrants to ourselves as the tyrants that rule over us in society. So where to begin? The only place that we can. Within.
Recently, I found myself taking inventory of all the moments when I reached what I call critical mass, when my longing for change had become undeniably real. In those moments, I woke up to the realization that I was seeing the world through the eyes of a victim. With those eyes there was no hope, there was no relief from work or judgement or trauma, there was no ability to grow and become happy, or at the very least, become content.
With the eyes of a victim, I couldn’t help but make decisions out of desperation. I was desperate to socialize, desperate to feel safe, desperate to be loved, desperate to be autonomous. You can imagine what decisions I made with all that desperation. I worked jobs I hated. I spent time with people with a long list of conditions for love. I became a weekend warrior, compartmentalizing my time to feel joy and creative expression. I abused substances and took for granted so many of my experiences.
Desperation is the secret sauce of what tyrants offer us.
Desperation is an appropriate reaction to the tough love of tyrants. It moves us to experience and “fail,” over and over again until we cross out every possible decision made out of desperation, knowing firsthand that it can only lead to one outcome, collapse. Only when we become aware of this through reflection or we are beaten so badly by our experiences that we must face it, do we reach a new horizon of being.
Our experience of being-ness depends on our level of awareness. Our level of awareness depends on our willingness to sacrifice what we believe are truths. Belief without awareness is illusion. Illusion keeps us in victim mentality and victim mentality breeds hopelessness, fear, self-doubt, self-harm, avoidance of action, lack of connection (all feelings of lack, really).
The freedom and joy that we hope for in our collective journey here on earth depends on our awareness that everything we need is within. It depends on enough of us seeing “the kingdom of heaven” or “the Buddha,” inside our consciousness. Learning how to harmonize and love our internal tyrants gives us the strength and courage to do the same with outside tyrants, and eventually to spread the contagion of living and creating without fear.
Tyrants offer an opportunity to build a heavier (or maybe more graceful) wrecking ball to knock down the obstructions that keep us from embracing our inherent freedom. It is an immutable part of our being that is ever-present but slippery. The longest I’ve been able to hold on to that sense of freedom can be counted in days, but never in weeks. On top of that, I’m not sure if what I experienced is anything but a taste or a scratching of the surface.
I believe that if we move through life with clear eyes and hearts that we may be able to see opportunity to practice what/who we are in every moment. That practice can be gentle and stimulate a little change here and there, or it can be aggressive and lead to immense change, quickly. Tyrants inside or outside have given us an opportunity to stand up for ourselves, to test our faith in self and to ultimately move us all to unlocking our deepest power, to love unconditionally and create only that which is good, beautiful and purifying.
We are lucky to be ruled by tyrants.
COMMENT-WISE
Comments from around the interwebs, with or without my contribution. I believe these are wise, heartfelt and relevant words from strangers, to strangers.
ESO-EXCERPT
A sample of secret knowledge, selected by me, available to all.
Excerpt from Carlos Castaneda’s The Fire From Within, Chapter 2: Petty Tyrants
The following is Castaneda’s retelling of a conversation he had with his master Don Juan, a Toltec seer.
“[Don Juan] explained that one of the greatest accomplishments of the [Indian] seers during the [Spanish] Conquest was a construct he called the three-phase progression. By understanding the nature of man, they were able to reach incontestable conclusions that if seers can hold their own in facing petty tyrants, they can certainly face the unknown with impunity, and then they can even stand the presence of the unknowable.
‘The average man’s reaction is to think that the order of the statement should be reversed,’ he went on. ‘A seer who can hold his own in the face of the unknown can certainly face petty tyrants. But that’s not so. What destroyed the superb seers of ancient times was that assumption. We know better now. We know that nothing can temper the spirit of a warrior as much as the challenge of dealing with impossible people in positions of power. Only under those conditions can warriors acquire the sobriety and serenity to stand the pressure of the unknowable.”
I vociferously disagreed with him. I told him that in my opinion tyrants can only render their victims helpless or make them as brutal as they themselves are. I pointed out that countless studies had been done on the effects of physical and psychological torture on such victims.
‘The difference is in something you said,’ he retorted. ‘They are victims, not warriors…The [Indian] seers of [the time of the Spanish Conquest] couldn’t have found a better ground. The Spaniards were the petty tyrants who tested the seers’ skill to the limit; after dealing with the conquerors, the seers were capable of dealing with anything. They are the lucky ones. At that time there were petty tyrants everywhere.”
This book is the 7th of a series of 8 books that Carlos Castaneda wrote while following his master, Don Juan, a secret seer who practiced ancient Mexican “sorcery.” I recommend reading them in order. Concepts evolve through the series. Happy reading!
larkonthelam UPDATE!
My trials, tribulations and transparencies—choosing to live outside of societal norms like getting jobs, getting into co-dependent relationships, paying taxes, and just about everything else that people tell me I need to do.
CURRENT SITUATION
I’m currently living with two friends in Northern California. We’ve established an empowering community filled with support and challenge. We currently share resources and are seeking a new living situation that cuts our need to pay rent in exchange for a mutually beneficial partnership, like co-stewarding land (plenty of agriculture experience) or on-land event planning. One craiglist ad and we’ve received over ten replies for possible partnerships.
I’m sick of job applications, leases and contracts. I’ve chosen to not be employed, but rather work off-the-books here and there. This has freed up my time and tested my faith that “everything will be alright,” as long as I make soulful decisions in my life. One of the friends that I live with has picked up more work (by “chance”) since I’ve left a full-time job.
SPIRITUAL PROCESS
Processing/understanding/transmuting emotions
Shame: I’ve been forcing myself to work and never rest, I’ve continually betrayed sides of myself my whole life by working unconsciously
Confusion: I’ve been lying to myself that “I don’t know” what I want or how I feel at any given time
Realizing that my roommates/friends are reflecting to me parts of myself that I need to see, that I’ve ignored
My careful side that prepares for future curveballs
My guarded self that protects me from abuse, judgements
Understanding that my motivation to write feels “right,” but is headed for the same collapse it always does without embracing community
WORK & MONEY
Current work
Two garden clients: pruning, weeding by hand, planting, irrigation maintenance, general planning. $25 an hour.
Interviewed for a woodworking job. It was $15 an hour. It would have started with me sanding all day. I’d have to also do paperwork. Decided against it. Realized that I was considering it for the wrong reasons: to support the community like I use to and a fear of resting—the pain and boredom that comes with it.
Income ($225)
Garden client #1
$75 one day
$100 one day
Garden client #2
$75 one day
Expenditure ($68)
Coffee/Tea
$16 total
Gas
$52 total
Bank Total ($122)
Before this week, $35
SPECIAL EVENTS
I won a fun little comment competition on Chuck Palahniuk’s substack, Plot Spoilers. I wrote a micro story in the language of those pesky little online ads that use bad language and the promise of money or sex to get you. Check out the prompt. Check out the announcement.
Reward: Multiple catnip toys, a robot that shoots lasers around the room for cat’s pleasure, a small book of Edgar Allen Poe stories, a pickle eraser, a pack of herb seeds, a card with a legendary writer’s signature.
I went to a wedding in Soda Springs, CA. Basked in the love of old friends telling the groom how important he was to them. Danced my face off.
Follow larkonthelam on instagram!
SUBSTACK LOVE
My reading recommendation for a piece written by another writer on substack
Many of us have read about the benefits of ice baths. But writer Clint Nolan of The Elixir substack shares his COOL personal, week-long experience with it. It’s a refreshing read on a popular subject. In a world where there’s enough chaos to make our heads spin, health actions like cold water plunges help us bring order into our lives (and bodies). Enjoy the read!
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Before you go, check out and subscribe to my free fantasy series, SPIRON! Introduction letter to the series is below. Prelude and Chapter 0 is out now.
You have shared some astute wisdom that is only born through accepting all experience as "learning moments".
I too have had harsh teachers in my life--so many petty tyrants. So many moments that felt like hell to go through. Family members who pushed me down to stand on top of me when all I wanted was a little love. Employers who took advantage of my work ethic while gaslighting me to feel like I could never earn my true worth.
And then at some point I realized my ability to rise from those galvanizing moments with a forgiving attitude is what made me into who I am today. Their pressure forged me into a diamond from a lump of coal. Those people were only capable of treating me how they treated themselves, and it was my job to forgive them to release myself from my former victim mentality.
No one gets inspired by stories of the person who had an easy life from the time they were born until they died. The person who had it all made and laid out for them without having to work for anything.
They care the most about the ones who get their teeth kicked in, and get back up swinging each time. The ones who refuse to quit even when everyone else has.
The Kingdom of Heaven is indeed within, yet it is only accessible to those who choose to believe in their own power. And in my experience, true power is kind and only found through acceptance.
It is good to know you, Cody. I swing alongside you, hermano.