I just held my poor friend Britt captive as I went on a
15-minute rant about how a young adult Sci-Fi novel changed my entire
perception of the universe. Yes, I read
it when I was age 11-14. Yes, “Ender’s Game” and the accompanying series is
totally geared towards 12-year-old boys. Yes, it is to this day the coolest series
I’ve ever read. Those who know me well
understand that, deep down, I am actually a twelve-year-old awkward nerdy white
boy. I only recently figured out how to
dress like a girl, and that ability is definitely still shaky. ((I am currently wearing a camo sports bra
and an orange plaid flannel shirt, accessorized with a hideous lime green
rubber watch from Walgreen’s. The look
is really pulled together by a total of about three square centimeters of
chipped dinosaur-blue nail polish spread between a few of my fingernails. HOT.))
Anyway. In the course
of this rant, I made a bunch of connections regarding how this intellectual
obsession with this Sci-Fi series has morphed over the past 10 years or
so. It started with the concept which subtly
powers the Ender series: Energy bridges are created between sentient beings in
the universe, and what would happen if a self-aware being inexplicably
manifested in the network of energy that connects all sentient things. (WooWoo!!) For a while this concept turned into a
somewhat odd understanding of Catholicism in my Catholic-school-saturated high
school brain, but then it morphed into a long obsession with the nature of
human consciousness, which climaxed during college when I was simultaneously
taking a reading course on Artificial Intelligence, an Intro to Psychology
course, and the nursing course in Human Physiology. At the time I even wrote an article for the
school paper about a theory called Quantum Consciousness which sounded titillatingly
close to explaining the science behind the Ender series. At some point in this journey I also became
obsessed with the idea of auras, particularly the way that Pamala Oslie, a
California-based clairvoyant, perceives people’s auric energy. Add into that mix “Womb Wisdom: Rediscovering
the Ancient and Forgotten Powers of the Feminine,” my most recent fascination
with astrological charts, my ongoing lifelong desire to attend every single
religious service that exists, my fascination (and lack of any hard knowledge
of) advanced physics, and a whole lot of Eastern philosophy, and you have what
my Grandpa would call a Grade-A Hippie Nutjob.
I guess it’s all just part of being in your 20’s and trying
to figure out what you believe and how the world works, so it’s nothing
particularly unique. But honestly, I’m
totally convinced that it is all connected somehow, and I sincerely hope that
this discovery process never ends. What
if science, religion, and new age hippie-thoughts are all just three pathways
leading to the same common revelation about existence? How awesome would that be? It just seems to make the most sense to me
that the most elegant solution is something simple, like E=mc2, that would blow
open a whole new world of thought possibilities by creating a common thread
through which we can understand the universe.
At this point, all of these concepts (energy bridges, sci-fi worlds,
quantum physics, human auras, astrology, Buddhism, Catholicism, Atheism, womb
wisdom, neurology, the human brain) have amalgamated into a big, crazy, slushy
soup in my brain, and they are almost indistinguishable. It's a tasty-ass soup though, and I can’t get enough of it.
What crazy ideas are hopping around in your brain? I am always totally game to discuss. Let’s talk.
