[Rod_Cloutier]

Hello everyone, I'm back after a short absence.

Over the last several months I have experienced extremely rapid changes in my life circumstances. My 17 year old daughter was expelled from school. She then moved out to go and live with my parents who are in a city which is a 3 day drive away. Adapting to a partial empty nest at home. I'm preparing to downsize and move into a smaller home. My boss was promoted, and I don't like the new boss they hired in his place. Not to mention overdosing on Ayahuasca earlier this year, where I had a near death experience, and having to come to terms with that event and it's implications.

I expected rapid social change for society at large, because of peak oil, and AGW, demographics, and possibly the financial collapse of the system. It is different though when the consequences become immediate and personal. It is one thing to talk about news events going on 'out there', however one can't ignore change when it comes to knock on your own doorstep.

I think the hardest change to adapt to is the loss of expectations. When the best sought plans of mice and men don't turn out the way they were planned. You have choices and trade-offs, some choices and trade-offs come at a very steep emotional price.

I've had my crying spells, I've gone through stages of grief, and eventually I'll arrive at acceptance. One of the biggest changes, is moving out of the house I raised the kids in. It costs too much to maintain and heat, with the kids nearly adults I don't need a place of this size anymore. So were moving to something smaller, emotions come in however when I look at the baby trees my kids planted in the yard when they were little, and I can't take them with us. The trees will have to be left behind, and the new property owners will do what they wish including removing or cutting them down.

Getting rid of junk I don't need, moving into a less spacious but more affordable residence are the right choices, but there is pain in leaving memories behind. The trees the kids planted being left behind is so far the hardest consequence to face due to my emotional attachment to the memories. Life can be really sad sometimes!

I still have work to do on adapting to clinging behaviors, and moving along with the natural flow of life. Life has a flow and a push, you can only swim upstream so long before you become exhausted and you end up having to go with the flow of the river. This is especially tough to face if you don't like where the river is taking you.

Changes like this will happen to every family, every individual, in the future ahead. Our shared reality is the consequence of all the little changes and adaptations that each person and household makes extended into the aggregate. Culture changes in response to changing circumstances. Who could say that life in the 70's is even remotely like life today? Culture 40 years from now will be unrecognizable to the culture of the 20 teens.

In the back of my mind, I know that all these changes that I dealing with now, are absolutely minor, compared with what is coming for humanity down the line.

[Shaved Monkey]

I like change.
Moving from the city to a remote rural location ,moving from temperate to sub tropics ,reducing my income by 90%,growing more wanting and using less all have been good.
My lifestyle has improved.

[SeaGypsy]

Me too Shaved & the people who bought the houses I grew up in have kept the trees & looked after the places nicely so it is still a time warp not a rude shock to once a decade or so do a turn in the drive.

About 10 years post my peak of peaking about peak, the long run has been mostly positive. A lot of travel & career bucket list done, a new family (my eldest was born while I was posting here in 2009, about people eating dogs & living in floodwaters in the Philippines). I'm not less aware, just less invested in an outcome. In the end, we are worm food & energy, it's what happens between now & then we have some limited choice in.

The best thing for mental health is go help someone way worse off than you. Keep doing that until you work out how pathetic your wallowing is, & how happy you really should be.

Sent from my HUAWEI Y520-U33 using Tapatalk

[Ibon]

you can only swim upstream so long before you become exhausted and you end up having to go with the flow of the river. This is especially tough to face if you don't like where the river is taking you.

Thanks for your post. These words seem to hold a pregnant truth as they equally apply to an individuals struggle as well as to our whole species current dilemma.

[fleance]

Yeah, all you said is true about change. I think that if there is one constant in life that is change. Whether we like it or not we must go with it. The process of adaptation might not be easy but, we must do it in order to survive.

[careinke]

I used to tell my troops in a commanding voice "We must remain rigidly flexible at all times." A little humor, but truth when examined deeper.

[Newfie]

People who decide to live on boats go through similar stress when letting go of physical stuff. We are doing so now. One strategy is to photograph things you can't take with you. Its not the tree per se, it's the association, and that you can capture in an image.

Earlier in life I sold my parents home which was tough. But the area had changed so much it was no longer recognizable to me. I had not left the area, it had left me. It can work either way.

It's best to carry your home In your heart, if possible. I'm trying.

BTW sorry to hear about troubles with your kid. Ive had that experience, even now at 38 he is a heartache. Another idea to give up on, the perfect nuclear family.

[Pops]

Most of the stuffed talked about on this site is not first person, it's about them & then—
die-off • collapse • end of the world

never —
Laid Off • Pink Slip • Bankrupt


All doom is local.
The collapse will not be televised.
You are the sheep
.

[Cog]

I've never seen personal drama in a person's life that drugs do not make worse. stay off the drugs man and get some help

[Lore]

The collapse will not be televised.

It's already being televised and in the media everywhere. Most people just don't recognize it yet.

[Pops]

Actually Rod saw none of his issues on TV, as he said,

I expected rapid social change for society at large, because of peak oil, and AGW, demographics, and possibly the financial collapse of the system. It is different though when the consequences become immediate and personal. It is one thing to talk about news events going on 'out there', however one can't ignore change when it comes to knock on your own doorstep.

Looking at the tube and expecting it to tell you something about your own situation is a mistake. I'd say the coverage of the shooting in san bernado has been wall to wall since the event yet terrorism will affect virtually none of us... The response will affect us all but the shooting?

Reading collapse of society into every headline is not a feature, it is a bug.

[Rod_Cloutier]

Thank you all for the hearty welcome back. It is appreciated!

I am somewhat more involved in my personal life right now, vs that I used to spend alot of my free time 'searching' through conspiracy sites to figure out how the world really works, and what really is happening. I'm spending more time helping my younger daughter learn how to read better by reading with her every day. Reading is a lost art, all of the techno-whatever has taken away from quiet pursuits like reading that were quite in vogue in the past.

For all of the changes in my life recently, at least I don't feel that 'I'm stuck' anymore. I'm moving more and more with the flow of life, reducing resistance, accepting what is over what should have been. This is good practice for when things really start changing with civilization at large, in the aggregate. I've now got a leg up on that process.

I listened to this podcast today by Howard Kunstler, interviewing Chris Martensen and Adam Taggart. I'm pretty much in agreement with all of the processes that they are speaking about:

https://youtu.be/b-OAho3v5s8

I agree, as what is said in the program, that you can't regret getting healthier, getting outside more, enriching friendships, and putting your financial house of cards in order. The quality of life will improve no matter what occurs in the future if you embrace the changes you are presented with.

[careinke]

Most of the stuffed talked about on this site is not first person, it's about them & then—
die-off • collapse • end of the world

never —
Laid Off • Pink Slip • Bankrupt


All doom is local.
The collapse will not be televised.
You are the sheep
.

So true, work on the ones most likely to hit you first (like the nice list above). Then worry about the other shi, I mean stuff.

[AdamB]

The collapse will not be televised.

It's already being televised and in the media everywhere. Most people just don't recognize it yet.

And here we are..years later...same old same old? So the question is, are you claiming WHAT is collapse? Lower unemployment since you wrote this? High markets? Housing values up? Gas prices down? What change threw you for a loop with this horrifying collapse that no one can see except you?

[Rod_Cloutier]

And here we are..years later...same old same old? So the question is, are you claiming WHAT is collapse? Lower unemployment since you wrote this? High markets? Housing values up? Gas prices down? What change threw you for a loop with this horrifying collapse that no one can see except you?

I personally see that the 'Catabolic' collapse that John Michael Greer predicted is well under way. Slow decline culturally, economically, and politically, which will take 2-3 centuries to complete its fall has begun its process in earnest. None of us alive today will be here to witness the end state in the 24th century, it is mere speculation how the decline will proceed.

Personally, again, I have witnessed stagnating wages for my household vs. rapidly rising costs and household expenses. The Alice in Wonderland state of having to run faster and faster to stay in the same place. I have experienced Alvin Toffler's 'Future shock', as it is now politically incorrect to even wish people 'Merry Christmas' due to waves of immigration from Muslim, Hindu, and other cultures to our country as Christianity is no longer the dominate religion. Also I was on the bus recently where I had to stand because it was packed full, and I noticed that I was the ONLY white person on the bus. As well, all kinds of things that I took as cultural norms in childhood in the 70's are dissolving around me. I was watching the new 'Star trek discovery' show on TV last week and in one of the episodes the expression 'that's a fucking motherfucker' was aired on live TV- unheard of use of profanity on public TV, that would never have happened in an earlier era.

All around me co-workers, relatives, and other people I know have all experienced massive change in their lives and circumstance recently. The sheer rate of change suggests that 'the other shoe is about to drop', and the world in 10 years will be unrecognizable from the world of today.

Is this collapse ?

[Ibon]

Is this collapse ?

Much of it can go, as long as your spirit does not collapse then I would say no it is not collapse. The big paradox we have discussed hundreds of times is that we all know on one hand that radical reductions of consumption per capita are required to correct human overshoot and yet when applied to our own personal circumstances we do not recognize it in the macro sense but rather see it as personal loss. Look up thread what Pops wrote which I will repeat here:

Most of the stuffed talked about on this site is not first person, it's about them & then—
die-off • collapse • end of the world

never —
Laid Off • Pink Slip • Bankrupt

All doom is local.
The collapse will not be televised

For someone that never had a standard of living that gave them financial and material stability they will not see these symptoms of catabolic collapse. They will continue to live hand to mouth from one temp job to the next like you see with a huge majority of humans on the planet.

When we speak of collapse we have to recall that for many of us this means a decline in this standard of living where one expected and feeling entitled to certain guarantees; steady job, house, car, vacations, lovers, good drugs, rock and roll.

Can you spiritually handle that in life there are no guarantees?

One of the reasons we have so many angry folks, so many discontent with government, so many who are full of rage and hatred is that they believed in guarantees. To see the illusion of guarantees go up like a puff of smoke can be brutally disheartening.

It can also be liberating.

Can we really ever truly separate our personal circumstances from our macro understanding of collapse?

Are there homeless people sleeping under bridges with the sounds of 18 wheelers rushing over head pondering what we discuss here?

Maybe more than we think!

[onlooker]

This is a central issue here on this site. Macro change and personal micro change are two sides of the same coin. In the Preparing for the Future forum much discussions have ocurred about all types of preparations and also in other forums. Mental preparation is pivotal. Our civilization has endeavored to overly protect those within the richest and most modern countries. In fact this is a disservice as it leaves us totally unprepared for abrupt and massive change. It is normal and natural to be apprehensive about life and the future during these times. But we must rise above this state to find a state of Peace and also one of confidence and industriousness to feel we are NOT powerless in the face of change. So, confidence/action and a abiding sense of peace no matter what is happening is what hopefully can help you Rod and others to deal with the realities of the present and approaching future.

[Ibon]

Red Coultier, Onlooker, others..... all of you.

Check out this youtube video.

Very inspiring

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGPDPCg9qAY

Here is a guy who became a billionaire who did not loose the humility and human compassion because he recalls the times he was homeless.

I guess I identify deeply with this message because my own father went bankrupt when I was in high school and we lived under very destitute conditions for a brief time. I then discovered wilderness and hitchhiking and for almost 8 years I had a very feral life sleeping under my share of bridges, meeting homeless people, getting picked up by all kinds of crazy personalities. I never had a dime but I was happy. When I finally did have a few grand years later I went to Africa, travelled through Algiera, Niger, Benin, Cameroun. I even hitch hiked there and didn't even bother to get my polio shots and immunizations before going there. I should have been dead a number of times already.....

It was then years later I married a swiss woman and started a career that wealth wise took me quite far. It was those street smarts I learned while living homeless out of a back pack that I credit to my success and also having once known that life on the edge owning nothing I was never afraid or intimidated by asshole bosses who where just wimps to me.

I am sitting on top of the world here at 60 years old, 1900m above sea level in a cloud forest gazing down at the distant horizons...... grateful for everything life threw at me, good and bad. In fact, the bad was perhaps what I am most grateful of because it kicked me in the pants.

Our culture and society can definitely use a bit of economic decline....... let the man in the video be an inspiration.

[onlooker]

What an inspiring saga both yours Ibon and the Billionaires.
A good example of this despair is what has been happening to middle aged poor white Americans. A big rise in deaths via substance abuse and suicide. Again, persons who have a sense of entitlement and high expectations from the tradition that the American dream is the only path to happiness via economic achievement. Well, this is leaving whites those longest exposed to this message feeling like failures for falling short of the expectation of achieving the "American Dream". This destroys their entire world view. And to make it worse, during middle age they feel powerless to solve their "problems" http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shot ... of-despair

[Ibon]

What an inspiring saga both yours Ibon and the Billionaires.

Unfortunately we have a different style of billionaire running our country.