A Post-Doom Primer: 7. Post-Doom: Processing Our Predicament Without Getting Stuck

[@TheDoomWizard]

Appreciate this!

[@wataruford8003]

Thank you for making this series!

[@Brad-oq6ln]

Thank you again for taking the time to do this series. Appreciate your effort and ability to pass on all that information you've digested in a legible way.

[@seankennedy2856]

I love taking the good with the bad!

[@braveulysses2000]

really amazing video series, thank you for making and sharing your words

[@Eric________]

Doomer vs. Optimist is my new band name. Thanks for making this series, it's been great since ep 1!

[@OffGridGuides]

Great video as usual! Isn’t it funny, after all the research, all the striving and effort the message is… carry on and live your life while you have it. And be thankful. That’s where I recently ended up mentally as well after 5 years of research. Many of the same authors. So funny really. No big solution, no big ending, no great announcement people will listen to. All you can do is chuckle really 😂

[@aep19]

yep, keep living but with a different perspective (hopefully one of gratitude). I think of it as my "premature midlife crisis"

[@Ramblin_Dan]

LOL Quality over quantity! I definitely identify with the string quartet on the titanic. Thank you so much for making this series! I enjoyed it so much, I’m actually going to rewatch it immediately. I appreciate those end quotes as well. I’ve jumped off Reddit long ago, but am grateful for your substack! It is content like yours and the doom wizard that have assisted me in my own grieving process regarding collapse. I think I’m finally reaching the acceptance stage. I quit my job and attempted to hike the PCT. Injured my knee, so I had to discontinue after a couple hundred miles. So I rode my motorcycle across the country until my money ran out. It was exhilarating, challenging, pleasant and depressing. The signs of the impending collapse are everywhere. But there is beauty yet to be created, observed, experienced. Even though I have to plug back into the matrix for money, I have a renewed perspective. After all, the band must play on! Might as well dance and enjoy the music!

[@aep19]

hike + crosscountry motorcycle ride sounds like a great way to respond to our predicament :) I hope your knee is better!

[@dianewallace6064]

I just found you. Thanks.

[@tomvandenbogaerde-mp9ln]

I had a similar journey, obsessively learning everything I could about it, after it dawned on me a couple of years ago. A lot of people are going down the same path shortly no doubt... especially this video will be very helpful for them.

[@aep19]

i hope so!

[@acornlandlabs]

So what are you doing now after learning about all this? What does normal life look like?

[@aep19]

@@acornlandlabs lol *doing my best*. I'll do my next video about this. It definitely inspired some big changes, and I struggle with doubts about how to proceed + with non-debilitating, occasional anxiety/depression

[@tomvandenbogaerde-mp9ln]

​@@acornlandlabs For me it's a bit similar. Essentially what I think it comes down to, is that ones worldview has changed, which prompts a kind of re-evaluation of ones values in light of the changed worldview. One thing I decided for instance is changing jobs, because I think my current job and related skills will probably be kind of useless in light of the coming changes. I would want to do something now where I learn skills that would still be relevant going forward. And so you look at the different things in your life in a new light and have to decide if they are still worth doing... It's a process that probably takes a while.

[@emanuellandeholm5657]

My journey started with the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004. I started reading about earthquakes, asteroids, solar storms and pandemics. All those fun things. But then I picked up "Guns, germs and steel" by Jared Diamond, and I just stopped worrying about "natural" disasters. Then I read a book called "Coal", this must've been 15 years ago or so. I learned about the Green Revolution. I learned about overshoot. I learned about the fragility of complex system. I read "Sustainable energy without the hot air". I wanted to talk to people about this, but noone was listening. They were busy buying solar panels and organic tomatoes. When the pandemic hit in 2020 I felt vindicated but I had noone to say "I told you so" to. This pandemic was entirely preventable. Politics got in the way. (I don't subscribe to the lab leak conspiracy theory). And the pandemic really showed me how vulnerable our way of life is.

[@aep19]

I think something that "optimists" can't relate to is the separation between what we context-informed thinkers EXPECT to happen and WOULD LIKE to happen. We're forecasting these things because they're the obvious trajectory, not because we want them to come true. There's no joy in the "told you so" moment, if we ever even get to a point where people are willing to acknowledge that the whole civilization thing was a mistake. 2020 was a turning point for me to, in realizing how vulnerable (and dependent on complexity) we are

[@emanuellandeholm5657]

@@aep19 Yes, and the term "optimism" is a weird one. I would include most of humanity under this umbrella. And then there's us poor, misunderstood Cassandras. :D In the end tho, even if I had someone to say "I told you so to", I trust I would hold my tongue. I don't really like to gloat.

[@ShonanMiura]

Adding pollinator plants was one of the simplest yet rewarding changes I made to our slice of the community garden. Seeing various bugs take advantage makes for miniscule yet welcome doses of happiness. 🐛🦋

[@aep19]

❤🐝 i sowed some a few weeks ago, finger crossed they pop up in the spring!

[@ShonanMiura]

@@aep19 Another thing is to keep an eye out for any native pollinators in the area. We have a type of cosmos that grows around here that people treat as a weed. But I noticed it gets covered in pollinators when left alone to flower. It was easy to gather up seeds and spread them on the edges of the garden each fall.

[@dandilion62]

I love your communication style!!!! How did you get to be so smart so young?

[@TheDoomWizard]

We have the Internet...? What is it with your age elitism?

[@aep19]

obsessiveness/stubbornness/directness, probably some combination of slight neurodivergence and growing up as an only child 😆

[@dandilion62]

@@aep19 I became "collapse aware" in 1975 when I was 19, after a childhood of reading SF and then reading Paul Ehrlich and Limits to Growth. My response was to travel for 11 years around the world, having no faith in the future.

[@acornlandlabs]

@@dandilion62 How things moved slower, faster, or about as fast as you would expect after learning what you did in 1975?

[@dandilion62]

@@acornlandlabs I never thought that we'd last as long as we did before collapsing completely....but I didn't foresee that humanity would conduct a global chemistry experiment on the biosphere with the potential to take all of nature down with us.

[@GregoryMatous]

Hello Andrea. I would like to offer you this thought. Although the human civilization in its current form will collapse due to the reasons you have outlined in your series, there is one last hope for humans. Our civilization is built on certain traits that we possess as humans, including the desire to control, the desire for power, the ability to lie and manipulate others. The modern corporate state is an extension of certain human traits, that involve self-interest, narcissism, and other psycopathys which help create and strengthen the multi-polar traps, that we cannot escape. The origin of these traits is both nature and nurture. In other words, a component of these traits derive from our own genetics and epigenetics. Here's my point: Over the course of long time periods, (what we call deep time), humans may evolve to live sustainably, in a positive symbiosis (mutualism) with the natural world. These humans may be radically different than the humans of today, in terms of their lifestyles, capabilities, and desires. Our experience of living in the natural world, as caretakers, could be on such a level as we can barely fathom. Some of us believe that this is the ultimate destiny of humans, not to travel in space, but to fully accept our role as custodians of the planet. Safe travels.

[@aep19]

I totally agree that any humans who are alive in the future (2100+) will have to be living lower-metabolism, sustainable lifestyles. However, it doesn't help with how the thought of what will happen to *ME* as an individual still brings me distress and dread.

[@A.BC-]

AHAAA, so you got hooked by the doomosphere, hihi 👀. You should have never met that fella (🤠)... Just kidding, 😋. Say hi to your guy and both stay well, 🥳...