🐈

in a decentralized situation the only meaningful “center” as a point-of-reference is self the difference between the two insanities is the difference between aloneness and loneliness

loneliness yearns to be closer to the group but feels cast out and rejected. eventually the distance grows so great that the tether to sanity breaks self can no longer be recognized and reaffirmed through the mirror of Other

in a decentralized situation the only meaningful center is “self” yet ironically this situation is found WITHIN the group that loneliness so desperately tries to be a part of

just as a galaxy appears as a dot, once inside the galaxy there is again either another cluster that looks like a center or a state of no-center

e.g. as an employee, you may feel that the executives are part of some sort of “in” group but look more closely and they are rather solitary and competitive at the center of every in-group is a mutual pact to agree on a set of values which projects coherency. a “culture”

thus loneliness is artificial because the group (or Other) it seeks to be a part of does not exist. it only APPEARS to exist. the illusion is a fractal set of problems embedded in each other similar to how becoming a multi-millionaire unlocks the desire to be a billionaire

the problem of loneliness thus cannot actually be solved as an unhealthy response, the problem isn’t about getting to a solution but the intractability of the problem statement itself “I” as a whole self can never be a “part” of something w/o losing the “I”

a cult “solves” loneliness by adjusting its culture to be hyper expansionary, similar to how a cancer cell’s mutation causes it to grow uncontrollably everything is measured against alignment with culture and especially on how much growth and audience the new member can offer