“The Matrix is surely the kind of film about the matrix that the matrix would have been able to produce.” — Jean Baudrillard
Did the ancient world also contemplate that same possibility—of reality being trapped in a matrix?
In Plato’s Cave… he writes how we are imprisoned—sitting chained in the dark of a cave, side by side, facing a stone wall, our backs to the entrance, mistaking the manufactured flickering shadows projected from outside the cave onto the stone wall for the only true reality.
How allegorical, and how accurately, is that describing our world today?
Many people go through life and don’t even see the possibility of a cave in Plato’s sense—but the way Plato described the reality that is projected? Via the firelight (pixels?)
Projection?
Follow that train of thought… Read this next contemporary quote:
“There is nothing more mysterious than a TV set left on in an empty room. It is even stranger than a man talking to himself or a woman standing dreaming at her stove. It is as if another planet is communicating with you. Suddenly the TV reveals itself for what it really is; a video of another world, ultimately addressed to no one at all, delivering its own message.” — Jean Baudrillard
TV. Projection. Like Plato inferred. That is so Orwell’s Big Brother and so Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451…broadcasting manufactured reality, and then come the phones.
The moment we move away from the fixed screen, we reach for the phone. We never actually step out into the light—we just change the size of the glass. Unless we escape. But do we? Can we?
I’m simply observing here…taking note of what I see, hear, and read…
“…these joggers sleepwalking in the mist like shadows who have escaped from Plato’s cave.” -— Jean Baudrillard
The image: an intentionally segmented, ‘broken,’ glitchy collage created from my own artwork—women sleeping peacefully in chairs.
Because I ask:
Is sleep just a timeout to recharge and regenerate? How ‘batteryspeak’ is that?
Is a power nap, or beauty sleep, or siesta merely “charging” our batteries so we can wake up and receive the next scheduled dose of the broadcast?
Or is sleeping simply avataring—logging out of this simulation to drift in some other, unrendered realm while our physical forms sit still?
Who is actually asleep, and who is awake?
Do many of us consider it to be awake when we focus our time and effort on fighting for rights attached to one more label to be heard within the manufactured virtual herd of a manufactured virtual society?
Instead of seeking the terrifying freedom of being truly awake and escaping the herd?
What does that even mean today?
My personal take on this? I don’t think that these ideas of a matrix existing and avatars and imposed overlays (virtual, etc.) are ‘good things.’
What is out there?
I believe there is a Light Realm and a Dark Realm that we ‘log into’ according to our frequencies.
Thoughts are frequency speak. Prayers from the heart emit frequencies. These frequencies, to me, are the plug-in to the outside realm we belong to.
Is the matrix, if it exists, an overlay of the dark on reality?
I think reality was ‘hijacked’… and the arrival of Jesus came in response to ‘seek and save the lost.’
Who would be considered lost? Those who see the chaos, deception, and intentional traps created to distract and cause a ‘falling away from God.’ Most often, it means that the lost fell victim but were able to see the entrapment and repent. One can’t appreciate what the light means if they don’t see the dark and what it means.
From ancient times, many caught on to the existence of a false, manufactured reality that was a dark overlay on a hijacked world—like Plato wrote in The Cave.
The Bible is actually about this cosmic war between the light and the dark, which is the direct cause that triggers such a reality hack and hijack.
The dark seeks to destroy God’s creation. It acts loudly and subtly. Deception, twisting reality, and chaos are weapons. Fooling the unsuspecting? Their hobby. Being attached to only this world is their motto.
Jesus’ presence in this physical realm was an overwhelming, massive victory in this war—allowing the dark to continue their thing (what a tactic!) but guaranteeing those seeking the Light, having faith in Christ and his teachings, to escape the trappings of the dark and thus saving their God-created souls from perishing in a godless realm.
Gnosticism speaks of this as well—as do the Apocrypha and the books of the Philokalia.
I see The Matrix as a film that expresses a multi-layered concept containing Christian and Gnostic concepts.
It is very difficult to sink one’s teeth into a concept such as The Matrix and reality—and not encounter the role of religion, faith, and God in the premise.
Don’t get me wrong—religion is a set of laws that govern behavior and mindset. I’m not a fan at all.
But faith? That’s a whole different story—that is a one-on-one between the individual and what they believe.
I live by my faith—above anything and everything. That is what allows me to see the world and humanity—society and reality—culture and history—without becoming one with the world but passing through and taking field notes of the experience. After all, we are here for a reason—I believe that.
So, this matrix question. I’m not ‘believing’ it—I am observing it. I observe all sides to all things I see.
And I see many sides to this matrix concept.
Some see God in the equation; some see that this proves there is no God. It all depends on the simple statement: “Everything boils down to perspective. It all depends on what lens we choose to view reality and to experience life.
I don’t seek to argue, defend, or preach. I believe what I believe—and this journal helps me to explore and understand reality from many lenses. And everyone interprets the world as they see it. Respected fact.
So I’m the last one who can preach—literally—but I’m not afraid to share my faith and interpretations of the world, no matter what the lens, because I don’t seek to offend. It’s in the spirit of speaking my truths.
We are all in the same world to believe whatever our hearts and minds tell us to. That is the beauty of self-sovereignty. But for how much longer will the sovereignty over ourselves be recognized and understood and fought for?
We are too busy, as a society, fighting for the right to be labeled in the herd in the way we see fit. Right??? As if a label means freedom. Freedom comes from within—not from the world. We should fight for the right and freedom to be ourselves. Outside any herd: herd-speak and herd mentality.
But circulating my thoughts around this matrix and reality concept—I just question the role of ‘time’: Has this played out and already finished, or is it still playing out, and are we experiencing it in real time?
After reading The Book of the Apocalypse in the New Testament, it makes me wonder—Christ revealed the signs and happenings that will occur in this world, and I compare them to what we are experiencing now…
“In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)
Food for thought.
So…from a Baudrillard quote I accidentally came across this morning that got me thinking, I ended up blurbing about the Matrix. I felt the need to write about my faith, which I normally don’t add to an online journal, wondering about the timeline of the events in the apocalypse…and here we are…in the atelier…observing reality…Til next time… Sosanni