Yearning For Sleep

Sometimes we long for the same bliss that blindness and deafness brings.

**SPOILIER ALERT** This post contains a bit of content of a somewhat “religious” or Christian nature.  If you are offended by this type of content, no need to unsubscribe, just skip this one.  I typically save The Rumble Strip for content that is secular in nature, but once in a while, I just itch to opine about religion a bit.

“So then, let us (believers) not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober.”  1 Thessalonians 5: 6

We hear a lot about being awake or asleep in today’s world don’t we?  We live in a society where the red and blue pills from the matrix have morphed into gray pills, white pills, black pills, and purple pills.  Heck, there seems to be an “avatar pill” for how all of us are feeling these days.

It’s frustrating isn’t it?  It has almost become similar to the whole political “left/right” paradigm. Now we have a whole new cadre of “pills” to fight over.   “Oh, I don’t talk to her, she’s black pilled!” (For those who don’t know what the black pill is, in a nutshell, it means lack of hope… the end is near).  Or, “that red-pilled guy is a fanatic!”  (Right wing extremist) and so on and so forth.

 So, I’ve been “awake” most of my life.  I was the boy in school that always seemed to think about things a bit differently from my peers (and got in trouble for it too!).  I remember being 18 years old lamenting public schools and how they were destroying kids.  I remember being in my early 20’s and preaching that changing Merry Christmas to Happy Holidays was going to help destroy our culture.  In my late 20’s the piercings, tattoos, black lipstick, and makeup started to raise its spiky head and I was laughed at and ridiculed when telling others that my gut was telling me these young people were lost and needed help.  In my 30’s when I told people that farmers and ranchers selling off their land to environmental groups was going to catapult us into a land where all our food was going to need to be imported, I often heard, “that will never happen here”.  People snickered when I would tell them that shutting down our industries and shipping all our jobs to other countries was going to leave behind a population that didn’t know how to make things anymore and we would be reliant upon other countries for everything.  In my 40’s I was screaming about the TSA and how it would be used to train the public to accept being groped, herded, barked at and made to accept having a picture of their naked body taken before they could travel.  In other words, people were being trained to give up all privacy (and it worked).  In my 50’s I was warning about 5G and predictive programming in movies and TV shows, and how all of this would be used to teach people to accept ridiculous “mandates”. Now, in my 60’s I can’t even begin to list all of the things I’ve been warning people about… mostly to blind eyes and deaf ears. 

If it is, or was, going on in the world around me, I’ve been screeching at the top of my voice about it my entire life.  The list of things I’ve been “awake” to above is just a tiny fraction of the things I know/have known that are going on, the trends I see, and the path society is on. 

… and I’ve been right.

Many of you reading right now may be exactly like me.  You’ve always known that something isn’t quite right.  You watched as things went on around you and felt helpless as you told your friends and family members about them, only to receive polite half smiles, snickers, and maybe even outright laughter.  Others of you may have only recently become “aware” of the hellishness going on in the world and you are shocked and maybe even a bit dismayed at this new found discernment.  There’s a lot of truth to the saying, “once you’re awake, you can never go back to sleep.”

I’m writing this because I know it can be very frustrating and depressing to look around and watch everything you thought you knew being turned on it’s head.  You no longer have those rose colored glasses that you used to wear 24/7.  The sand you used to keep your head in is now infested with sand fleas and is cold so you can’t stick your head back in.  The ignorance you once enjoyed as “bliss” is so far away you can barely remember walking around in darkness. 

I often hear from people (especially young people or people who are recently “awake”) that they just wish they could turn it all off. That knowing what’s going on is too upsetting and they never asked for the gift of discernment in the first place. 

I’ve been there and know how you feel.  In fact, there are days when I yearn for just a week of complete ignorance.  But that rest never comes. I limit myself to exposing myself to information that I am interested in, I avoid *any* kind of advertisements whether on websites, radio, TV, or podcasts.   I don’t watch any corporate media whatsoever.  If I read the paper, I just skim it and only read a full article if it contains sanity.  Yet still, the nagging in my gut continues.

In the end, I always end up being grateful for having what I consider a God given gift of discernment and common sense.  I am not sure where it comes from and a lot of times I don’t consider it a gift.  But, I start to think about all of the things I would have either not been prepared for, or all of the things I would have fallen for without this incredible “gift!” I think about the sorrow that’s been avoided, the pain I haven’t had to endure, and the misery I’ve been prepared for.  When I look back on my life and imagine it without the “knowing”, I shudder.  I Imagine if I’d fallen for every scheme, every scam, every bit of fear mongering, and every  bit of negative propaganda throughout the years without that big question mark over my head.  Would I have been a male “Karen” in the age of “covid” out screaming at people for not wearing a mask?  Would I be one of those people who froth at the mouth every time a politician I don’t like gets elected?  Would I be one of those who are in debt up to their eyeballs and can barely afford to feed themselves?  Would I be one of the hapless fools who don’t even have a weeks worth of provisions in case of a “rainy day?”  Would I be… one of the lost?

When I was reading the New Testament of the Christian Bible today I came across Paul’s words to the early church regarding hard times/end times.  He warned them about how times were going to be.  How the ignorant would be saying, “Peace and safety” while the world crumbled around them.  He went on to encourage the early church by saying; “But you, brothers and sisters are not in darkness…”  He reminded the “awake” of his day that those who believe in The Way are all “children of the light…”   He reminded us that:

God Wins.

So don’t be discouraged! Don’t long to relinquish your gift. Don’t stop being aware. Don’t stop warning others. Use your gift to change the world. And, if the world doesn’t change around you, always remember it’s *always* possible to change *your* world. Don’t give up and don’t give in to things you know are wrong. If people laugh at you for your knowledge and discerment… find new people.

God always wins in the end. It’s believing that that’s the hard part. Once you grasp that concept by faith, nothing the monsters of this world are doing can shake you!