This is my old blog!
Find all my posts on Framtidskapten.com
Author: Michael Sillion
Kungliga familjen – Ett familjeföretag
Nu har jag sett ännu ett svenska rojalistiskt bröllop. Denna gången mellan Prins Carl Philip och Prinsessan Sofia. Jag tycker forfarande att Sverige som monarki fungerar idag 2015. Uppdraget som dom utför är tufft och väldigt bra för Sverige som nationalstat. Om nationalstaten i framtiden helt spelar ut sin roll kommer dom flesta kungshus också ha gjort det. Tills dess finns det ingen anledning att ta bort arvsrätten att födas in i ett familjeföretag.
Prinsessan Sofia och Prins Carl Philip
Starta din egen kungafamilj
Man kan se den svenska kungliga familjen som ett familjeföretag som har som uppdrag av staten att marknadsföra Sverige som turistland. Dom drar in miljarder till Sverige och är en mycket bra investering. Är detta rättvist att man bara kan födas in i detta familjeföretag? För det första går det också att gifta in sig i denna familjen, precis som vilken annan ansedd familj i Sverige.
Om du själv skulle vilja starta upp ett familjeföretag och vinna anseende världen över, i ett par generationer. Då kanske det skulle vara möjligt att konkurrera ut kungafamiljen som Sveriges mest folkkära familj och ta över uppdraget. Eller en blodig kupp kanske faller dig mer i smaken?
Alla är fortfarande välkomna att spela tronspelet [Game Of Thrones] om man vill 🙂
En kungafamilj som startup…
/Lord Sillion
Lord of the my own domain in The Matrix
15 Years In The Matrix
Red Or Blue Pill?
It’s now 15 years ago that I first took the “Red Pill“. It was the spring in 1999. A friend of mine had gotten us tickets to a pre-show of a movie that looked really cool. The event was hosted by Maya, the 3D rendering program that was used to make some of the effects in the movie. We went to Grand on Sveavägen in Stockholm with 200 other nerds who thought this was going to be something extra. And boy was we right. This was for me the most accelerating experience in my life. I remember coming out of the theatre so exited that I jumped over every bench, wall and bush I could find. After collecting my thoughts half an hour later I called my geek brother. Then I told him. That he was going to have to wait for months for the real Swedish premier of the coolest movie ever made… The Matrix.
Red Or Blue?
Later that summer we of course went to get tickets to the real Swedish premier. We went for the biggest and best theatre in Stockholm, Sergel 1. On the opening show when we entered the theatre we where all handed a little plastic bag with a red and a blue pill. The 3 of us, who hade seen it before immediately went bonkers of excitement again. We where some of the few people there who already knew what the pills represented 🙂
This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill – the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill – you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes. – Morpheus
Before the movie was about to start the head of Warner Brother Sweden stepped up on the stage to tell us we where about to witness the coolest movie premiere of all time and to honor that they started throwing out T-Shirts and Sunhats into the audience. Sadly I got none. It didn’t matter. Prior to the event I had entered every promo competition for the film I could find and had already won both a T-Shirt and some Matrix branded sunglasses. Mind blown. Again.
What is real? How do you define ‘real’? If you’re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then ‘real’ is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain. – Morpheus
Later I went to see it 2 more times that summer just to completely get into this new future. Finally there would be lots of cool movies. How could it not? How wrong I was…
I also have to mention that by that time I was already deep into Cyber-Philosophy. My favourite movie before this one was of course Ghost in the Shell that I had probably seen 20 times already by that time. I have read the comic and was completely in love with this philosophical cyber genre. My first official party I hosted as head of my party-section [Sexmästare] when I studied was a Cyber Party heavily inspired by Ghost in the Shell and Billy Idol’s Cyber Punk album. I even called my self Mikee Boy – CyberDemon of Joy then.
Ghost In The Shell
Dream Reality Party of 1999
Back to 1999. My brother was turning 25 and was coming up to Stockholm to have his party. I was hosting so I turned it into a heavily Matrix inspired party with live roleplaying called the Dream Party. A party where everyone had to come dressed as their cool Residual Self Image. So I had to go out and buy some cool sunglasses and get a cool haircut. The party was a blast. So from that day on I have now had this Residual Self Image of mine. It’s my Matrix Haircut. If you want to more about it you can listen to the podcast in Swedish: Gott Prat.
The Matrix Brothers
Later the fall I bought my first DVD player, Home theatre system and of course The Matrix on DVD. With it and Fight Club as my only first movies we continued to remind ourself what is really “real” and important in life.
The Dream World
The Matrix resonates with me on so many levels. I remember when was about 15. We used to stay up all night playing boardgames & roleplaying games. Afterwards we used to go outside and talk about games and other philosophical things for hours in the middle of the night just before going home. The neighbours weren’t so happy with us with our loud, long conversations. One occurring conversation was that there was no way of telling if we all lived inside a big collective dream. The Dream World.
Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world? – Morpheus
As I and many others now know more about the brain, it’s not far from the truth. What The Matrix opened our eyes in such a wide manner to. That we are responsible for our own experience of reality. The brain is literally a storytelling machine. It’s a pattern recognition machine that is so good that it can recognise it’s own thinking patterns. This consciousness became very useful for us. It’s an exceptional system for simulation of events. Past, present and future. It allowed us to become very effective at collaborating. Both our internal and shared stories made us into this amazing mammal we are today that has managed travel across 384,400 km of empty space to the moon and back. And we are just at the beginning of this epic tale of our story in the universe.
Your brain and all your sensory system are handling a staggering amount of data every second. Your conscious self take a very, very small part of this data and put together a thing that acts like a “Reality Feed”. Your story about you. Your own personal Matrix of the world around you. Now don’t be alarmed. You are still you, the whole you. Still in control of your thoughts, feelings and actions. You simply has an amazing way of experience the myriad och data and decisions that make up you. Without you going completely mad and bonkers on the way.
Morpheus: How did I beat you?
Neo: You… you’re too fast.
Morpheus: Do you believe that my being stronger or faster has anything to do with my muscles in this place? Do you think that’s air you’re breathing now?
Red or Blue?
We can’t fathom the difference of being real-real or dream-real. For all we know we could just be a simulation of big computer. A “Real” Matrix. So enjoy your story, as you yourself are writing it for you. I recommend taking part in the writing. Being the Architect of your own life and future. Doing this together with other like-minded Matrix Ninjas will elevate both you, the people in your tribe and the entire human race to new mind-boggling heights.
Do you want join on this epic quest of defining our own “reality”?
Lord Sillion
Architect of the Future
Holistic Thinking Ninja
Cyber Matrix Ninja
Our Dream Party of 1999
Min Stil – Vem är Lord Sillion?
Igår var jag i Kungsbacka och gjorde en Pecha Kucha. Jag hade sett kvällen innan att det fanns 2 avhopp och att Kajas som har det la ut en förfrågan om någon kunde hoppa in. Eftersom jag själv nu kan anses som en PK veteran med 7 tidigare tal så hoppade jag på utmaningen. På samma tisdag morgon sa Kajsa att det är skoj om jag kom med. Då kom jag på att jag kanske ska fråga vilket ämne det är. Det är “Stil” sa hon och det kommer passa dig perfekt.
Så med 2 timmars förberedelse begav jag mig till Kungsbacka efter att först ha tittat förbi en Open Call för #VarbergCalling for peace på Komedianten i Varberg.
Att våga komma ut som sig själv
Denna gången var det på Tio Pepe. Kajsa hade samlat mycket folk till deras Pecha Kucha #5 och det dök även upp en hel skolklass som skulle se. Dom blev en prefekt målgrupp till mitt ämne. Att våga komma ut som sig själv. Med 20 förberedda slides och en story-ark som påminde om det tal jag höll på WebCoast – Om att leva utanför ramarna. När mina bilder dök upp så fick jag in ett flöde direkt från hjärtat istället för det jag planerat. Och tur var det, för detta blev mycket bättre och ärligare till mig själv 🙂
Se det på Youtube här: Min Stil – Lord Sillion Pecha Kucha Kungsbacka
Min Pecha Kucha i Kunsbacka den 24 mars 2015
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=px7zUF7Bx70
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Så vem är jag?
Ni får lyssna på denna historien i min Pecha Kucha från Kungsbacka först. Under min resa som tog fart på riktigt när jag klev upp på scenen tillsammans med Mindless Self Indulgence så har jag bytt min bild av mig själv och mina titlar hela tiden. Det som är konstant är att jag är en framtidstänkare och futurist. Mina tanke går kring hur vi tillsammans skapar framtidens hållbara kreativa samhälle. Relationssamhället, det som Seth Godin kallar “The Connection Economy”.
Digital Strateg och Kreativ Ninja
Det jag kan och kallar mig nu är Digital Strateg, Visionär och Kreativ Ninja. Som digital strateg har jag koll på det mest som händer inom nätverkssamhället och hur framgångsrikt gör kampanjer och marknadsföring via social media. Som kreativ visionär jobbar jag med att sätt upp visioner för framtiden. Jag håller koll på det mesta man bör kunna som entreprenör från inkubator-processer till hur man får en kreativ hub att ticka med event, co-working ställen och kreativa människor. Then we have the Ninja. Som ninja lever man maximalt anpassningsbar till som omgivning. Man går all in på en mission eller uppdrag. Man kan arbeta agilt i små flexibla team som justerar sin kurs dagligen och ta sig ann mycket större utmaningar än större långsamma team. –
G33K, Dreamer & Dancer [Omvärldsbevakning]
Jag har också en sjuk mängd intressen som jag kämpar att underhålla med en allt större FOMO 🙂
Mycket kretsar kring intressen som kreativitet, podcaster, beteendevetenskap, teknik, datorer, spel (brädspel, datorspel, kortspel), e-Sport, League Of Legends, film, tV-serier, Sci-Fi, fitness, hälsa, empati, vetenskap, musik (Pop, Rock, Synth, Trance, House, Goth, Hardstyle Rave) och all things G33K!
Detta gör mig till fantastisk Omvärldsbevakare. Jag har en hjärna som orkar ta till mig massor med ny information och insikter varje dag. Detta gör att jag har en bra förmåga att se synergieffekter och koppla samman saker med en röd tråd.
Nu återstår frågan hur ska jag bäst använda min kombination av talanger för att hjälpa andra att bli bättre?
Vad tycker du att jag ska göra?
Jag behöver en Mentor!
Om ni läst min blog om Tai Lopez eller lyssnat på honom prata om vikten av en mentor så vet ni hur viktigt det är. Så jag är kanske precis som du i stort behov av en mentor som kan ta mig lägre. Är du en eller känner du någon som skulle passa mig?
/LordSillion
Holistic Thinking Ninja –
Mer om mig:
Min blogg om att leva:
15 Years In The Matrix
Och om min barndom och minnet av min far
Maria Gustafsons samtal med mig 2014 på hennes Podcast Gott Prat
Mina skills:
Mina Skills
Min session på Webcoast – Om att leva utanför ramarna:
Ruckusmaker Day
In honor of the 60th birthday of Steve Jobs on February 24th we celebrate what Seth Godin calls #RuckusmakerDay. That means you should do something out of the ordinary. Connect with someone, share your thoughts in a blog. Don’t just share a story. Make a story worth sharing. What Navid Modiri calls #storydoers. Here in Varberg we want to make change with #VarbergCalling for peace with Empathy, Creativity and Innovation. On 24th February I will hold a quick workshop in how to make change using Social Media in Varberg during Open Call. And I will attend an Entrepreneur meet-up to help other entrepreneurs to get up to speed with the connection economy. 
Make a Ruckus!
Commit to articulating your point of view on one relevant issue, one news story, one personnel issue. Every day. Online or off, doesn’t matter. Share your taste and your perspective with someone who needs to hear it. Speak up. Not just tomorrow, but every day. — Seth Godin
So what does it mean to make a Ruckus? Seth Godin explains it well in his talk at 99u. Making a ruckus means to do something that stands out. Something that might not work and that isn’t for everyone. To make something that would be missed if you didn’t. You do this by surrounding yourself with people who will challenge and inspire you to take your work, your art to the next level. To do something that builds connection so that someone else can use it to tell a story about themselves and the tribe they live in.
On Ruckusmaker Day you are encouraged to speak up, to have an opinion on something you care about. Too often we fall back on other people’s views and actions, we retweet their words and their thoughts – we feel safer riding on someone else’s shoulders.
Why is suddenly okay to do this work, that has never been done before in history? Because now it’s free to fail. With the power of the networked society we can no try something out and iterate or do something new until we succeed. In this paradigm shift to the Connection Economy we can suddenly dance with our fears. Because we are not alone anymore. We can now find our tribe and help each other out. If we make something that someone don’t like we can now say: It’s not for you.
If we are trying to please everyone, we will end up pleasing no one — Seth Godin
Be incredibly generous and connected to a community that will help all of us, to do more and better art.
Go make a Ruckus! Be a Ruckusmaker!
Go make a Ruckus!
Here you can listen to my thoughts on the subject in my 8 minute pod:
https://audioboom.com/boos/2923129-ruckusmaker-day-feb-24th –
LordSillion
Holistic Thinking Ninja
Holistisk inspiration
Varsågod!
Här får du ny holistisk inspiration och nya insikter. Hur bygger vi framtids samhällen, städer och imperium tillsammans? Hur ska vi anpassa oss till den Digitala Dimensionen som börjar påverka allting omkring oss? Och vad måste vi veta om dom påhittade historier som vi alla tror på just nu. Här nedan finner du 5 inspirationskällor som alla människor måste förhålla sig till.
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Darja Isaksson – Digitaliseringens möjligheter till en bättre välfärd
– Digitalt och Internet är en ny dimension. Allting omkring oss. All individer och sammanhang där vi organiserar oss på något sätt. Alla saker som vi använder. Alla fysiska platser är på väg att få en Digital Dimension .
– Maker-rörelsen är en av nyckelstenarna. För att den lär ut ett nytt tänk med DIY, Kreativitet och samarbete.
– All innovation är team-arbete. Samarbete och kommunikation är jätteviktigt. Vi måste alla lära oss att tänka kritiskt och ställa bra frågor.
– Den stora utmaningen är inte hur vi ska lära barnen att anpassa sig. Det är oss vuxna som Darja är orolig över. Om 5 år kommer massor ha förändrats. Mycket mer än dom senaste 5 åren sen 2010. Innan vi hade iPads och Social Medier hade slagit igenom på riktigt. Det handlar om vår Demokrati!
– Framtiden kommer mycket snabbare än vi kan föreställa oss. Robotar, AI och självkörande bilar kommer skaka om i grytan ganska rejäl bara inom 2-5 år. 46% av dagens jobb kommer försvinna på 20 år. Vi måste hitta ett nytt system hur vi tänker kring allting i samhället.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40nilhaiR9Y
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Dr Yuval Noah Harar
Jag gick en fantastisk MOOC i början av januari med Dr Yuval. Här kan ni se en timmes session från RSA som sammanfattar hans bok bra:
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
“Humans live in dual reality objective & fictional simultaneously & over time fictional has become dominant”
“Shared stories / “imagined realities” allow sapiens to weave unique networks of cooperation”
“Only humans have the power of abstract thought. You could never convince a chimp that he will get a banana ‘in the after life'”
“Believing the same stories = obeying the same laws” Dr Harari and the importance of imagination in collaboration.
“Most of human conflicts throughout history have been not about scarcity, but about stories that people chose to believe in”
‘We need to change the stories in people’s minds in order to create the better world’
“When need 10 million people to believe a story, u don’t need math, u need art”
“history of civilisation has been dominated by successful stories often accidentally”
“Even secular people still hold narratives that they take from ‘above’ some external law that resembles the following of religion”
“Most of the time we are thinking about made up stories e.g. money, EU, Google, religion. ”
“The American Dollar is one of the best collective stories, we all believe in”
“Silicon Valley is a narrative for today – one that could equal the power of any religion.” Dr Harari
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Vllgib842g
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Charlotta Mellander
Pratar om vad det är som attraherar unga till en stad och hur man får igång en kreativ hub i en stad. Talanger och lärande: Vad attraherar talanger
Viktiga saker att tänka på
Var vill unga, kreativa och/eller smarta människor bo? Dit ska du flytta eller starta din verksamhet.
Skapa en mångfald av utbud när det gäller allting. Kultur, mat, nöjen, upplevelser, event, natur, sport, hälsa och friskvård.
Tillräcklig kritisk massa för olika subkulturer inom den magiska pendlings-gränsen på 45-50 minuter.
Lärd dig att ha en holistisk syn och se utanför din egen bubbla / egna bubblor. Olika saker är viktigt för olika människor och vid olika tider i livet. Dom som bestämmer är oftast 50+ och tenderar att bara se till sina egna bubblor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iV51Wvmsfck
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Stefan Hyttfors
Jag hittade en ny video med Stefan Hyttfors. Det han har att säga är så viktigt så att alla borde lyssna på det en gång i månaden så att man vet att man är på rätt spår med sina tankar. Stefan Hyttfors om framtiden från 2014.
Robotar och AI kommer fortare av vad vi tror. Det finns inget sätt att “Fixa” jobben. Vi får hitta på ett bättre system istället. #AlltÄrPåhittat som Navid Modiri säger.
Jorden kommer finnas kvar. Det är vårt samhälle och vårt levnadssätt som måste bli mer hållbart och det fort om vi vill ha det kvar. Alternativet är väldigt farligt och slutar förmodligen i en katastrofal dystopi.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSRALbp0vdA
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Varberg Sessions 01
Under #VarbergSessions i januari fick vi en väldigt intressant insyn i hur Malmö gjorde om sig från en Varvsstad till en Kreativ Stad. Kärnan i att få det att fungera var en satsning på en central högskola och ett rikt stadsliv. Se dessa 2 videos om det: Del 1 Ilmar Reepalu om framgångssagan Malmö och Del 2 Möt Åke E. Andersson om forskning kring stadsutveckling.
Här kan du se hela inledningen från Varberg Sessions 01 med Anne-Charlotte Stenkil och Jan Malmgren.
http://new.livestream.com/accounts/1258478/varberg
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Holistic Thinking Ninja
Prep, Pitch and Pepp
Tonight I have been to a meetup with some fellow entrepreneurs that all joined up for a course in running your own business last fall in Varberg, Sweden. We all met up to share our stories and to do some pitching. We also talked about how we should sell ourself, our products and our services. It was all led by the awesome Jannike and Lovisa, who both radiate some much positive energy where ever they go.
Prep [Be Prepared]
When ever you are going to meet someone do your homework before you meet them. Read up on who they are and what they are passionate about. Show them that you are interested in who they are and what they do. Sincerely.
It’s curios that the knowledge of How To Win Fiends And Influence People are still not common knowledge and taught to every child, despite that is almost 80 years ago the Dale Carnage came out with his famous book and that modern science has come so far as to how to build genuine connection between people.
Pitch [Pitch Black or How To Convey Any Message]
We all need to pitch. We need to pitch our ideas to friends and family. We need to pitch our business proposal to potential clients and investors. It can be a short elevator pitch of 20 to 30 seconds. It can be in the more prepared format that some did tonight with a Powerpoint presentation of 7 slides with 30 seconds speaking time each slide totaling 3 min 30 sec. Or it can be longer really prepared pitch running 15-20 minutes with months of research and work behind it. Like the ones that Oren Klaff does.
The Croc Brain [The Lizard Brain – The Resistance]
If we want to pitch anything we must first get our words, pictures and story past the what Oren Klaff calls the Croc Brain and Seth Godin calls the Lizard Brain. we do that by telling an emotional story that resonates with the receiver. Oren Klaff, who is a professional pitcher of the biggest ideas and deals there is explains this well in his book: Pitch Anything. Or to just get the best part see or listen to this talk between Oren and Chase Jarvis. Even if his cases are bit extreme and most the time a kind of competitive pitching between people who are trying to “win” at any cost, you can still apply most of his thinking to your everyday pitching 🙂
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Pepp [And Boost each other]
Then we have what Seth Godin calls the Connection Economy. This is a very deep topic. I sum it up in my blog post. in short it’s about all this things: Trust, Permission, Remarkability, Leadership, Stories that spread, Connection, Compassion, and Humility. We all want to been noticed and feel important. So it’s all about making your customers, your suppliers and your coworkers feel special. We all need to connect more. We also should seek out people who make us feel good and stay away from toxic people who drag us down. It’s what true what Scott Dinsmore is always talking about in his Live Your Legend Local concept.
“The fastest way to do the things you don’t think can be done is to hang around the people already doing them” – Scott Dinsmore
In honor of that I’m hosting meetups where the main point is to meet up, share our thoughts, ideas and dreams of the future. To pepp each other and to hold one another accountable for the plans we all make. Do join us for the next one on February 8th in Varberg. Or do find one in of the other 44 countries all over the world hosting one.
You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with – Jim Rohn
Selling [Don’t Sell, Make A Connection Instead]
We are all in sales now like Daniel Pink says in his book. But sales does not mean what it used to mean. It’s now more than ever to bild a connection with your customer and give them what they need.
And don’t try to please everyone or make a product that everyone will want. Because if you try to do this, you will end up with a service or product that no one needs or wants.
GO Make A Ruckus!
The reason I’m so exited about all this is because they I have just finished Seth Godin’s latest audiobook in a form of a 2 hour compilation from his seminars called Leap First.
What am I Making Then?
I’m finally narrowing down what my art is and what I want to spend my time doing.
I will help people and companies to navigate the connection economy. I will offer to make speeches and workshops on how to best flourish in this modern society. I will help develop ideas, visions and strategies for this networked society.
I will create places and events where people can meet and share knowledge and be creative.
I will give the young so-called Hacker-clubs and Hackathons for us more “adult”.
I want everybody to have a curious mind about the future. And I want to teach people how to become a Modern Creative Ninja. That is was my first handbook is about.
LordSillion
Holistic Thinking Ninja
Seth Godin about the Connection Economy
I’m a big fan of Seth Godin. I listen to him on a lot of different Podcasts. I have several of his books as audiobooks on Audible. And have seen many of his online talks. Here is one of his best and my notes of it:
Seth Godin at Nearly Impossible 2013
The Notes
Your business idea should involve people needing their friends also using it in some way and talking about it.
You need people to subscribe to your ideas.
There is a story to every brand. What is your brand’s story?
Build a story into the product. So that people can tell it when using the product.
If you are making a product for everyone. You’re making a product for no-one.
Do something that we would miss if you didn’t
The book is just the Wrapper for how the Idea is going to spread
Ideas will spread further and faster than before
Books may go away as Idea-wrapper
If you wrap your Idea in something that can spread. It will spread more easily
If your idea is something that can be talk about. It’s more likely that it will be talked about.
If you are in the business of creating value for everyone you touch. You will never need to look for work again. If you are in the scarcity game you will need ever sharper elbows to get ahead.
When you do work that goes into world and touches people. Then, you are connecting
Would they miss your work if you stopped doing it? Would they miss you? Your work goes beyond Dunbars number.
If you give the A to people who did something with the right intrusion but failed a couple of times. Then they get the message. That Vulnerability is okay. You don’t need to be afraid to try and try again. Persistence and Grit will get you there 🙂
Don’t copy the people we admire but to become the people we admire 🙂
Put yourself on the spot!
Pick yourself!
What matters now in the Connection Economy
Trust
Permission
Remarkability
Leadership
Stories that spread
Humanity: connection, compassion, and humility
LordSillion
Holistic Thinking Ninja
The Storytelling Animal [Tell Your Story]
Have you ever come out of the movies like me, filled with excitement and felling totally exalted? Like your brain is on fire? Well Congratulations. You have just given your brain what it desires most in the world. An Awesome Story. Or have you skunked down in the sofa to see some brain-dead action in the hopes of turning your brain off? Not so. It can’t be done. In fact it is when you are in this state that your brains is the most perceptible to hidden messages and meaning in the story. Your brain never switches off. Think off what messages you are receiving when trying not to. Even when you are sleeping your brain is doing what it likes the most. It is making up its own stories drawing from your vast library of stored stories. And why is your dreams is so often filled unrealistic and magical events? Because your brain can’t tell the diffidence. That’s why your dreams all seem so plausible when you are in them. So Dream on …
This is your story
As you read this your brain is telling a story for you. Namely your story about you. If your brain is a healthy one you are the protagonist in this story. Your own personal hero. What if you can help your hero on the way? Let’s find out how you can help your hero along and use storytelling power to change the world.
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Exit light, Enter night, Take my hand, We’re off to never never land
Many believe the brain separates fiction from reality. In “reality” the brains stores everything as stories. Humans are creatures of Neverland. We live in Neverland because we can’t not live in Neverland.
It’s best put into a story by Terry Pratchett in thees words by DEATH when he talks to his granddaughter in the novel Hogfather or as dramatized below:
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YOU NEED TO BELIEVE IN THINGS THAT AREN’T TRUE. HOW ELSE CAN THEY BECOME? — DEATH
Storytelling is the heart and the soul of human nature. I have recently been reading “The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human” by Jonathan Gottschall. And it has been a 10 year-long wait to read anything inspirational about storytelling since I read “The Science of Discworld II: The Globe“. To say the least, it’s a must read! Or listen to in this excellent audio book 🙂
YOU NEED TO BELIEVE IN THINGS THAT AREN’T TRUE. HOW ELSE CAN THEY BECOME? — DEATH
Why does we like storytelling so much? It’s because our brain runs on stories. Our brain is basically a pattern recognition machine. It likes patterns. And stories are just very big complex meta patterns that our brain can identify and relate to. Our universe does not contain any Narrativium like Terry Pratchett’s Discworld but we humans acts as if it does all the time. That everything that happens for a reason and everything has a purpose and a destiny. This is what makes us humans so special and this is something we should treasure.
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It is always the present
The Past like the future does not really exist. They are both fantasies created in our minds. The Future is a probabilistic simulation we run in our minds in order to help shape the world we want to live in.
The Past unlike The Future has actually happened. The Past, as represented in our mind, is a mental simulation too. Our memories are not precise records of what actually happened. They are reconstructions of what happened — Jonathan Gottschall from The Storytelling Animal
Most of us believe our memory is filled with reliable info we can access at will. Not so. But memory isn’t an outright fiction. It is merely a fictionalization of what took place. Memory is an unreliable self-serving historian. It’s there to help us make decisions that help us along for the bumpy ride that reality is.
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Perceptions
Here is favorite quote from Emily Thorne in the Revenge tv-show. From the episode “Perceptions” of season 1:
“Years ago, I met a boy who introduced me to a book, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. In it, William Blake writes, ‘If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as infinite.’ But in reality our perception is often clouded by expectations. By experiences. As of late I find my perception is blinded by only one thing. — Revenge”
“Truth is a battle of perceptions. People only see what they’re prepared to confront. It’s not what you look at that matters but what you see. And when different perceptions battle against one another, the truth has a way of getting lost. And the monsters find a way of getting out.”
This captures in a great way how our brain works and how we live our life inside our own little Matrix. Experiences and expectations are all part of our perception of the past and the future. Our place in the story we are telling about our self.
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Pan Narrans
Storytelling has been around for as long as we have been humans. And it’s the storytelling itself that first made us into the storytelling chimpanzee we are today. You must embrace fiction. It will make you more empathetic and more able to navigate life’s problems and dilemmas.
Fiction pulls us together and unites us with common values. It’s the core that makes us into a groupish vehicle for our genes to pass down to our offspring as I discussed in my previous blog The Duality of Man [Can we work together?]. We use them to set a shared Moral Matrix for the group.
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Epilogue
As result of how successful stories have made us, we are also slaves under them. And they can easily be used to manipulate and mold us. If you want to burrow a message into a human mind. Work it into a story. But if we use the power of story for good, we can use it to change the world to the better.
But you must also use caution when confronted with stories and the “Truth” that many will want to tell you. As you know by now, the truth can never be told but a mere “Truthy Tale” of what happened in the past. Many will believe that their opinions are facts, when they are just that: Opinions.
This also means that we should be tolerant of the myths of all the cultures in the worlds as the bearers of these myths, are most certainly under the spell. Be vary of conspiracy theories as they are often the fiction of a storytelling mind who find patterns all to easily.
The truth is depressing: We are going to die. We are tiny insignificant dots on a tiny planet in a tiny galaxy. We need self-deception to keep depression at bay.
We are Figments of our own imagination. Until the day we die we are living the story of our lives. This story is constantly changing and evolving. It’s being edited and rewritten by an unreliable narrator and this story are more truthy than true.
Enjoy it while it last and make it a good one!
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The power of Storytelling
“With great power comes great responsibility” — Stan Lee
Now that you know more of the power of storytelling, will you stop loving stories so much? No, on the contrary, you will be able see life for what it is and enjoy good storytelling even more.
Day dream often! You and I are going to tell a greater story together how life on planet Earth will be in the Future!
/LordSillion
Holistic Thinking Ninja
It’s Your Turn [And My Turn]
Tomorrow it’s my turn. It’s my turn to host one of the over 300 Live Your Legend – World Parties of 2015 in over 70 countries around the world. We are all kick starting the new year by joining in this crazy idea that blown up to be something crazy and real.
Live Your Legend – World Party 2015
Live Your Legend Local kicked of last January with a global world party then. It’s now a year later with many inspiring meetings behind us. So now we step it up. Come join us in Varberg, Sweden or find your local party if you are reading this on January 6th. Else just come to the next metope in February. Here is my take on what it is all about.
Scott Dinsmore – How to Do the Impossible
It’s about several things:
Doing The Impossible
We all see people doing impossible things. Things we could only dream of achieving. How then did they do it? And how can you? The universe is a hostile place. Here is on of my favourite quotes of all time to illustrate it. It’s from Terry Pratchett’s book Hogfather:
THERE IS A PLACE WHERE TWO GALAXIES HAVE BEEN COLLIDING FOR A MILLION YEARS, said Death, apropos of nothing. DON’T TRY TO TELL ME THAT’S RIGHT.
’Yes, but people don’t think about that,’ said Susan. Somewhere there was a bed …CORRECT. STARS EXPLODE, WORLDS COLLIDE, THERE’S HARDLY ANYWHERE IN THE UNIVERSE WHERE HUMANS CAN LIVE WITHOUT BEING FROZEN OR FRIED, AND YET YOU BELIEVE THAT A … BED IS A NORMAL THING. IT IS THE MOST AMAZING TALENT.
’Talent?’
We humans have this amazing talent to make almost anything seem “Normal”. So the best way to make something impossible is to seek out the company of those how are already doing it. Our storytelling human minds will then quickly internalise their stories to make it our own and thus making the impossible a normal thing.
You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with – Jim Rohn
Not Being Alone
Almost all people who has ever made their dreams come alive has done so in the company and with the help of others. Other inspiring supportive people. Who all give their best to make something. So regularly hanging around and meeting people who already does the things you want to do or people who want to make their dreams come true as well, will boost you in making your dreams come true as well.
Start Dreaming and Dancing and Playing
So whether or not you have a dream you can either go find a dream or invent several new ones. It’s not really about “finding your passion”. It’s about living passionately. To get inspired by others and to inspire the people around you. And you want to be happy along the way. Happiness is not the end of your dream. Your dream will come alive if you are happy along the way. So start dreaming and playing and dancing on a daily basis. And your road or journey will become much more real and you will find it much easier to travel.
So it’s my turn to do this. It’s like Seth Godin says in his new inspiring book: It’s always my turn.
Let’s kick of 2015 into the most amazing year yet. A year of hope for the future. A year where we create our own future together.
Lord Sillion
Holistic Thinking Ninja
Lord Sillion - Holistic Thinking Ninja 