A truth does not mind being questioned. A lie does not like being challenged.

Oh what a tangled web we weave….

If there is one thing that becomes ever more apparent, the older we get, it is the truth. 

Perhaps that stems from life experience. Or perhaps it is due to intuition and the overall vibe we receive. It might come from having weathered the consequences of another’s lies as to leave us far more aware of the potential downfall of accepting what is said to us without consideration.

Whatever the cause, as we age, we sense with more accuracy, the likelihood of something being true versus some alternate flavor of reality that suits the originator’s greater purpose.

So when we lose, do not lose the lesson. If we are victim of someone’s desire to alter the truth to serve their own selfish needs, then it is incumbent upon us to wake up and smell the roses. To recognize that we project a vulnerability in the area that someone has opted to exploit, and to reinforce those aspects of our being so that the next one is incapable of doing the same.

We are living in troubled times. The truth is being massively distorted on a scale heretofore unknown. Humanity is susceptible to large media and those who are really adept at utilizing large media to service their own selfish agendas are leveraging every aspect of the persuasive nature of media to propagate those lies into the minds of more simple people who are less likely to take the time to research the matters at hand and discern the truth from fiction.

The great thing about telling the truth all the time, is you are never caught. You can discuss and answer any last question and so long as you are remaining within the boundary of what is true, there is never a moment of weakness that is revealed. 

Conversely, a lie may make its way around the world five times over while the truth is still tying their laces, but a lie has trapdoors that can be exposed through the intelligent diligence of asking all of the right questions, surfacing the facts and confronting that lie with inconsistencies that eventually cause the house of cards that are supporting the lie to crumble. The entire world of crime dramas are built on this simple procedure. People are heavily addicted to this form of entertainment because subconsciously they want to see the liar get their just deserts. 

The truth, and nothing but the truth could not be more important now than it has ever been. In the next couple years, the truth will play one of the single most important roles in the evolution of humanity. Everyone would be wise to recognize that truth is a luxury that is afforded to us in a free society. Our obligation to protect the right to access the truth is one of the most important of all of our obligations as citizens of planet Earth. 

Happy Monday!

The way you love is magic in its purest form.

LORELAI

What is love? How does it happen? Why does it happen? What is the internal mechanism that changes when we love something? Is it purely emotional? Chemical? Neural? What physical proof do we have that love even exists?

Do you want to witness a magic trick?  Fall in love with something or someone.

One of your favorite artists releases a new track, and from the moment you hear it, you know you absolutely love it. Why?

Your baby is born, and all through the womb, you are falling in love with it, but something incredibly potent happens as the baby takes its first breath and cries. What exactly has happened in that transformative moment in time?

You are walking through an art gallery, and turn the corner, and suddenly, there it is. The one piece of art that absolutely takes your breath away. One second earlier, you did not know it exists, and in the next second, you know you cannot live without it.

Is that not magic?

We romanticize love taking place in the heart, but in actuality, it is all in the brain…

A few notes from Harvard on the topic of what is love: Love can be distilled into three categories: lust, attraction, and attachment. Though there are overlaps and subtleties to each, each type is characterized by its own set of hormones. Testosterone and estrogen drive lust; dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin create attraction; and oxytocin and vasopressin mediate attachment. Lust is driven by the desire for sexual gratification. The evolutionary basis for this stems from our need to reproduce, a need shared among all living things. Through reproduction, organisms pass on their genes, and thus contribute to the perpetuation of their species. Meanwhile, attraction seems to be a distinct, though closely related, phenomenon. While we can certainly lust for someone we are attracted to, and vice versa, one can happen without the other. Attraction involves the brain pathways that control “reward” behavior, which partly explains why the first few weeks or months of a relationship can be so exhilarating and even all-consuming.

Dopamine, produced by the hypothalamus, is a particularly well-publicized player in the brain’s reward pathway – it’s released when we do things that feel good to us. In this case, these things include spending time with loved ones and having sex. High levels of dopamine and a related hormone, norepinephrine, are released during attraction. These chemicals make us giddy, energetic, and euphoric, even leading to decreased appetite and insomnia – which means you actually can be so “in love” that you can’t eat and can’t sleep.

Last but not least, attachment is the predominant factor in long-term relationships. While lust and attraction are pretty much exclusive to romantic entanglements, attachment mediates friendships, parent-infant bonding, social cordiality, and many other intimacies as well. The two primary hormones here appear to be oxytocin and vasopressin.

Katherine Wu, the student at Harvard whose material I have shared, writes more extensively on the topic. You can read it here. https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2017/love-actually-science-behind-lust-attraction-companionship/#:~:text=High%20levels%20of%20dopamine%20and,eat%20and%20can’t%20sleep.

Wishing you a loving Saturday!

I don’t trust words, I trust vibes. People can tell you anything, but a vibe tells you everything.

Do you ever get “that feeling” when you are speaking with someone? That feeling can be a complete range of energy across the full spectrum of positive to negative. 

That’s a vibe.

Filmmakers are especially good at creating the appropriate vibe during a movie, as are authors, musicians and any other form of artist. The vibrational energy that something emotes is unmistakeable. Given that our beings are just a massive conglomeration of vibrational energy, it is no wonder that our vibrations are sensitive to those from external sources.

Collectively we encounter countless vibrational forces throughout the day. They come through feelings and emotions, conversations, what we see, what we read, watch, listen or concentrate on. These vibrational packages intercept our internal vibrations in unique ways.

Da Vinci observed that if two pebbles are thrown into still water, each creates concentric rings that emanate from the point of entry into the water. As these waves encounter the waves from the other pebble, they do not flatten out, but rather, briefly intersect and continue in their original course of direction. From this, he reasoned how both sight and hearing work and vastly changed our understanding of the human body.

Given our understanding of wave form dynamics, it would stand to reason that when a different wave form, such as a vibe coming from another person, encounters the waves that are coming from our own being, that the outcome might be similar. There is a brief intersection of the two and then each vibration continues on their own path. 

As a direct result, the resonant frequency of the uncomfortable vibe that has passed through you, leaves you feeling uncomfortable because the wave of that entity has literally passed through your own vibrational field.

Some call it a 6th sense, and perhaps that is exactly what it is. Others just call it intuition. By any name or explanation, there is unquestionably an overall feeling that is cast by others. Finding our own personal sensitivity to such, facilitates our own ability to navigate through life with greater confidence and security.

Next time you are getting the wrong vibe, pay closer attention to why you might feel that you are sensing this and increase your overall internal alert to possible problems ahead.

Happy Thursday!

To live fully, we must learn to use things and love people, and not love things and use people.

BUDDHA

How many possessions in your life do you really love? Forgetting about the items that are life essential, and solely focusing on the ones that are in your life because you appreciate them for some reason or another, how many would you estimate you have?

In contrast, how many people do you have in your life that you genuinely love?

Whatever ratio you are able to produce from the two questions above will give you a metric as to the things in life that you ultimately value.

Morality is, for the most, part taught at home. An absence of such creates a void in a human being who works to traverse the world to their benefit while simultaneously missing some of the core ingredients that make for a fully realized life.

Without that morality, the person is left to find their moral compass through the observation of others while simultaneously transposing their life experience atop a series of variables that have manifest out of their own personal encounters with others.

When a person is enlightened, they recognize the higher value in another human being, and in doing so, they discover an even higher value within themselves. How could this not be so?

It is only through the personal determination to rise above societal norm that a person is able to look past their possessions in order that they might see the greater wealth in life that arises from meaningful relationships stemming out of respect for others.

Possessions are a wonderful accoutrement in life, but so many of us make the mistake of valuing them above and beyond everything else, and only through self realization comes the opportunity to transcend the attachment to those possessions in order that we might discover and even deeper value system within our own being. 

Happy Tuesday!

Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.

ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

Have you ever met a real genius? They are incredibly few and far between. 

Many of them do not even realize they are a genius. They clearly know they are very smart, but usually it ends there.

In contrast, there are those who are self-proclaimed geniuses and they are (almost without exception) far from the mark, and more likely malignant narcissists. 

Deepak Chopra says, “This is the nature of genius, to be able to grasp the knowable even when no one else recognizes that it is present.”

The deeper I studied da Vinci, the more clear it was to me from his own notes that he clearly did not think he was a genius. He had a a healthy ego and thought very highly of himself, but his doubt that he could know and understand everything leaves me believing that even he did not see these qualities in himself. And yet, he is one of the only humans in history to test as genius in all 7 measurable metrics.

As life evolves, those of us who are working to invent the future, stand upon the shoulders of the giants who came before us, so that we may have a better glimpse of what could potentially lay ahead. 

In the path to climb upon their shoulders and assimilate information and experiences that they have amassed before us, we are treated to a connected dots experience of watching how they did it. It appears very linear and obvious (after the fact), yet with a genius like Edison, we get a greater glimpse of what it took…. In response to a question about his missteps, Edison once said, “I have not failed 10,000 times—I’ve successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.”

Steve Jobs explained  his attempts to get Atari and HP interested in his and Steve Wozniak’s personal computer this way, “So we went to Atari and said, ‘Hey, we’ve got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we’ll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we’ll come work for you.’ And they said, ‘No.’ So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, ‘Hey, we don’t need you. You haven’t got through college yet.'” 

When Bell telephone was struggling to get started, its owners offered all their rights to Western Union for $100,000. The offer was disdainfully rejected with the pronouncement, “What use could this company make of an electrical toy.”

Fred Smith, the founder of Federal Express, received a “C” on his college paper detailing his idea for a reliable overnight delivery service. His professor at Yale told him, “Well, Fred, the concept is interesting and well formed, but in order to earn better than a “C” grade, your ideas also have to be feasible.

Genius is such a rare find on this planet, but it is omnipresent and most of them do not even see it in themselves. 

Happy Sunday!

You are always one decision away from a totally different life.

We make hundreds of decisions every day. Most of them are made on a subconscious level. Others require more focus. Some are critical. And then there is the one single decision that can change everything.

What gives way to making a decision of that magnitude? Sometimes it’s circumstance. Sometimes it’s dire need. Sometimes it is driven by desire and other times by passion.

Regardless of the stimuli, when a decision of magnitude awaits our focus, we are intensely determined that some aspect of our current existence must change.

When we find ourselves at that crossroad, choices that we are facing could not have greater magnitude, nor greater consequence. If we are to accelerate into a future of our own making, we are compelled to face the tough choices. They may not be pleasant, nor easy to reconcile, but when that moment arrives, we have no alternative but to see the circumstances for what they are, intelligently evaluate all of our options, and then be decisive.

Making those tough choices and life are really one of the greater moments that define us. In some cases, they create limitations and in other cases, they open doors to a future that we could not possibly imagine.

In your quest to reconcile yourself to having to make such a decision, you might find strength by giving yourself credit for getting through some of those days in which you were certain you could not go on.

But, what if you have been assigned this mountain in order to prove to others that it can be moved? If you are feeling completely lost and helpless for a solution, may I suggest that the first step to turning everything around is believing in yourself? Because the reality is that you will never know how strong you really are until strong is the only choice you really have.

The truth is your life is not going to change with the same mindset that caused the problems. Let that sink in for a minute.

Rock bottom is the solid foundation from which I rebuilt my life, and discovering your personal worth in such a low space can be one of the most empowering options in life.

You really are only one decision away from completely changing your life. You just have to make it. 

Happy Thursday!

Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.

STEVE JOBS

The Illusion Factory has always attracted the very brightest minds to our team. This is not an accident, it stemmed directly from my being told at age 20 that I was a J”ack of all trades, master of none” by a Creative Director at Gray Advertising. His dismissal of me and my photo portfolio that day, and my response, that “I was a Jack of all trades, working to be a master of all,” was laughed at by him, as he ushered me in my disappointment to the door. I told that man that I was going to turn The Illusion Factory from a photography studio into an advertising agency the very next day and hire people who were polymaths like me instead of “one offs” like him was not appreciated. Nor were the final words out of my mouth, which was… “and I am going to start going after all of your clients because they will want an agency of multitalented people instead of specialists who were more expensive overall.”

I did what I threatened, the very next day. And the Illusion Factory became an agency, and then a production company, and then a gaming studio, and PR company and marketing agency, and tech entrepreneurial developer.

Everyone is so excited about the metaverse. But to us at The Illusion Factory, that is so 17 years ago. Why? Because we inspire young, bright minds to join us and discover greater things about their polymath minds. So when Second Life was brand new, we were one of the very first big companies to jump in and start developing metaverse experiences for our clients. Overall, we built about 40 metaverse interactions and were on our way to building our own V World platform. But then the global collapse came about and money dried up, so we took all of our business models and built Sizzle instead. Making the entire world into our metaverse.

Again, we were scolded that we were “boiling the ocean” and that “Bezos started with only books” and told to “narrow focus.” I am sure Walt heard a lot of discussions about how “Coney Island is fine for entertainment, why build Disneyland?… it is too ambitious!”

Now, as the metaverse reappears as Web 3.0, I am reminded at how much I loved Web 1.0 (the world of Flash) and all of the experiential things we used to build in that space. That was when web was fun. But suddenly, web had to represent e-commerce, and Web 2.0 turned it into Duplo blocks for 3 year olds. The web went from amazing to boring in 60 seconds. And stayed there for more than a decade…. But low and behold, as Facebook changed their name to Meta, we discover that the metaverse is back! The metaverse takes what was boring about Web 2.0 and opens it back up to experience. Bandwidth can support this now, computer processors can as well. The time has come. 

And Sizzle is ready to be the bridge between the real world and the virtual world, like no other platform in place as of this writing.

Innovation is not something you do. It is a mindset. I could not be more grateful to that Creative Director at Gray Advertising for insulting me at 20 years old. He sent me on a life mission that has allowed me to collaborate with the brightest minds around. And for that I am eternally grateful.

Happy Wednesday!

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

Think different. 

That was Apple’s mantra. (Even if they did not use proper English as it should be Think differently.)

The world is changing so incredibly quickly at this moment, we are continuously on the watch for new options, opportunities, and challenges. During this time, we are battling a wave of new obstacles and counter forces, each appearing capable of eliminating our dreams, hopes and desires. 

The more we work to evolve, the faster the circumstances around us evolve, making a continuously unstable playing field on which we must make our plans, evolve our approach and perpetually explore every option at our fingertips. 

Under circumstances of this nature, it would almost appear impossible for us to find a proper course on which we may navigate our path to a new safe harbor. Even as we have chosen that course, circumstances may evolve and the path we have set out upon will require new perspectives, approaches and means to accomplish whatever we put forth at the outset.

Yet, despite all of that cacophony in which we operate, we manage to prevail, time and time again. How is this possible? 

Presumably it is due to a continuous set of sensory apparati in our beings that tune into the harmonic distortions that impede us and give us internal warnings that things are changing and that we are going to have to take a new approach if we are to succeed in our respective mission.

The Illusion Factory has earned our place in the future by helping to invent it. Our approach has always been to look at how things are produced currently and project how they will evolve and then invent the pathways, approaches, methodologies and experiences required to help our clients in their pursuit of the future opportunities that await them.

It is no wonder that Apple adopted their mantra, as the continuous wave of revolutionary experiences that they have created has evolved humanity in countless ways. Try and imagine what it was like before you had any computer whatsoever in your access, let alone one in your home! How many phone numbers did you have memorized before you had your first smart device? We, as a specie, have evolved into a cyborg (part human and part machine) as a result of the invention of the iPhone and following that, the Android devices. The smart device is clearly an external hard drive to accommodate the human brain and which augments that brain in countless ways. 

Life will continue to put new problems in our path, and therefore make it incumbent upon us to work daily to find our path between where we are currently and where we are headed. As best as I have been able to calculate, that path is a nonstop maze of solving new problems, and evolving into new beings along the way. 

It may not be easy, but if we embrace it as a fact of life, it is not only fun and challenging, but perhaps it is one of the greatest adventures of all time.

Happy Tuesday!

The problem in our country isn’t with books being banned, but with people no longer reading. You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.

RAY BRADBURY

Cultures of control abhor the prospect of free thought. The necessity to dominate the mindset of a population is the very top priority of a society whose dictatorial, authoritarian regime must ascribe.

In writing Fahrenheit 451, in 1953, Ray Bradbury created a dystopian vision of a future America in which all books are burned by “firemen.” While potentially shocking to some, it was really just a recap of older chapters in history such as the Bonfire of the Vanities in Florence, in which supporters of the Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola collected and burned thousands of objects such as cosmetics, art, and books in the public square of Florence, Italy. The focus of this destruction was on objects that might tempt one to sin, including vanity items such as mirrors, cosmetics, fine dresses, playing cards, and musical instruments. Other targets included books which Savonarola deemed immoral, manuscripts of secular songs, and artworks, including paintings and sculpture.

In all cases, fictional or real, the need to extinguish free thought remains the topic of concern. If a dominant society is imposing their will upon the people, rather than enabling a true democracy in which the people are able to create a safe haven to disagree publicly and debate the alternate options until such time as one of those options are adopted by a majority, then any outspoken opposition to that dominant society must be silenced, lest it create discontent among the masses.

Dominant societies grow comfortable, and in doing so, are much more willing to overlook those in the world who do not have the means to survive. This is currently, and has always been the case with Homo sapiens. Ask any Neanderthal, (if one were still alive to ask), and they would most certainly agree. 

I think freedom of speech is one of the most compelling of topics because I am so continuously divided between my belief in the freedom, and my fear of those who speak in dialogues that directly threaten me and everyone I love and care for. 

We are most certainly bringing this issue to a boiling point (again) in this country as we struggle to maintain a truly representational government of the people, by the people and for the people.

As more and more distraction layers are spun out of those who wish for all of this to subside so that they may continue to dominate their positions in the current world order, we would all be wise to watch what is allowed to be spoken, read or shared and that which is banned, and try our very best to understand who is banning a topic or person or book, and why they are motivated to do so.

Happy Monday

Wise people are not always silent, but they know when to be.

When is it best to speak up?

The subtlety of knowing what to say, when to say it and most importantly, when not to say it, could not be more important in life. We might study the art of diplomacy with an expectation of improving our knowledge of such, but much of this is learned empirically, either through our own actions or in watching those of others.

Sadly, the art of learning empirically comes with a tough downside. There are moments where we speak our mind as if it were the most important thing in the world, and then we discover that it was the most ill-timed opportunity as we watch whatever strategic move we felt we were employing, disintegrate right before our very eyes. 

The tragedy of these moments is that with greater knowledge, we might have been better served to have learned the art of silence instead. The adage, “It is better to keep your mouth closed and thought a fool, than open your mouth and confirm it,” could not be any more applicable.

In the course of running The Illusion Factory, I have been exposed to countless businesses, methodologies, approaches, strategies and tactics, most of which I knew very little about going into the discussions with the clients. I would say my clients have taught me every bit as much as I have taught them, if for no better reason than I have mastered the art of asking the right questions and not answering the wrong questions with a weak answer, or lying and pretending to know something I do not know. People are very quick to help you if you admit ignorance at the outset.

In personal relationships, the same principle applies. Regardless of which kind of personal relationship you are in, there are times you speak your mind, and other times when holding your tongue and allowing a circumstance to be is (by far) the best option. 

As I was discussing earlier in the week, sometimes silence is your greatest ally. Sometimes it can be thunderous in the silence it communicates to the other party. In that silence, the other party must consider all of the possible reasons for your silence, which may set their mind ablaze with considerations. This can be both a great strategy when timed appropriately, as well as a wise move, when you are trying your best to field the circumstances you have found yourself within, and are still contemplating your best options for resolution.

The short-lived enjoyment of blurting out what is really on your mind, is most often times rewarded with less than what you had hoped for in your calculated thoughts. After enough of these luxuries in allowing your internal being to communicate bluntly with others have exploded in your face, only then does your rational mind take control of the tongue and put everything in check long enough to really consider your options, even if your very best option is doing and saying nothing.

Happy Friday!