You won’t find this town using a map app, but we’ll get you there!/Image: Licensed Adobe stock, Argus.
Honk, honk, right-wing travel aficionados! We best pile in our sports utility vehicle so we can get a head start on our day trip to a place called Egotown, where we have much to see, and much to learn. We know, we at Spread Your Right Wings (SYRW) know: Alt-you already know everything worth knowing, Your intellectual, moral, and spiritual evolution is done. You’re perfect. So are we–duh! All of us on the right wing are and have nothing to discover. Just trust us–hop in.
Ok, full tank of gas? Check! Bottled water and assorted thirst-quenchers? Check! Snacks? Check! Cell, phones, tablets, reading material, games? Check! Seat belts buckled and doors locked? Check! Let’s get this show on the road! *tires screech*
Related: Read all about the new species of insect researchers discovered on the White House lawn.
In 200 Feet Make a Right Onto Interstate Zero
Yes, readers, these are some of the simplest directions for a road trip you’ll ever read–and yet the most difficult to grasp in some ways. They’re laid out in Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose. However, the brilliant metaphors are all courtesy of a little group of people called: The Folks at SYRW!
Anyway, all we have to do is stay on I-0 until we get there, And so we begin. These sunny days with billowy clouds moving slowly across the sky are the best for road trips, no? You don’t get that sun glare in your eyes, which then makes everything look green. Snow blindness, they call it, right?
All right, all right! We’ll get to the point! In fact, your irritated interruption–totally understandable–came at the perfect time. Let’s pull over to see the first landmark on our trip, the Steam of Consciousness. It’s a babbling brook, all right. It was named after the incessant chatter, the non-stop dialogue that goes on in our heads. It empties into the Sea of Self. We are the thought–the words–because we identify with them.
The 51st State
Just ahead you’ll see the State of Being. There’s the Welcome Center. Let’s have a look inside–what would a road trip be without fun stops along the way that orient us as to where we are and where we’re headed.
This brochure says that the State of Being became synonymous thousands of years ago with the States of Having, Doing, and Feeling. We are because we have x, because we do y, because we feel z. But perhaps we aren’t x, y, or z. Perhaps we just are. No, we didn’t drop acid before beginning this vehicular adventure, silly readers and fellow travelers!
It’s hard to verbalize these thoughts, as they are all about the illusory nature of life and how language, the Stream of Consciousness, and how through them we try to give form to the State of Being.
On We Go, to the Gas Station of Identification
We’ve also elevated identifying with things to the level of an art form, haven’t we, readers? Like children, when our toy breaks or is confiscated, we cry and yell, because we feel that when anything we’ve identified with is taken away or diminished our selves have been diminished. We feel angry, sad, hurt, understandably..
But we’re not seeing that we are whole complete, and beautiful just because we are and not because of what we identify with. Because we are what, you ask? Nothing. We just are. And that is okay. It is enough. It is more than enough, in fact.
And: If you’re guilty of a crime, remember: you’re just one irrelevant memo away from innocence!
And Now: Egotown and What It Has to Do With Being Right Wing/Trump Supporters
And, here we are. Yes, it’s not where you’d expect to be brought on a road trip by a trusted friend, we know. The buildings are faded and crumbling. It’s a ghost-town. Leaves are piled up in every doorway. See that big house right there? It’s rickety and ramshackle, dilapidated and derelict. And it has a crooked, creaky “Make America Great Again Sign” in the front yard. We’re going to go inside–calm down!
This is the ultimate point. Once we’ve identified with something like the words, “Trump supporter,” our egos, which we all have, including all of us here at SYRW, can make it difficult, painful, and feel like a self-murdering slog to say “I’m no longer a Trump supporter.” It feels good and comforting and like everything is as it should be to rationalize, justify, and make okay everything President Donald Trump does, because our ego is intertwined with it. But almost nothing Trump does is worthy of rationalization, justification, or making okay, and to continue excusing his horrific behavior and choices simply wrong. It’s damaging to the nation and everyone in it. And the world, in fact.
We have to tell our egos that we are whole and complete and actually better humans when we say, “I do not–will not–support Donald Trump. And that doesn’t diminish who I am. I was a total, intact human before, and I will be after. So there, ego!”
Let’s get back in our car and try to avoid the late afternoon traffic. Thanks for joining us on this hippie-dippie–at times trippy-road trip. We hope it made some sense.
Everyone buckled in? “Aaaaaaaaand…99 bottles of beer on the wall, 99 bottles of beer. You take one down and pass it around. 98 bottles of beer on the wall/98 bottles of beer on the wall…”
Also: 7 ways to lie to the most important person in the world–you, of course!
Final Destination Thoughts
Wow, that was some trip, huh SYRW readers? Who knew a simple, day-long road trip could show us so much. Well, attempt to show us. We hope you didn’t do the following during the times of quiet when we were gazing out the windshield and windows: observed like spectators but resisted internalizing Tolle’s message of spiritual growth. In fact, we hope you didn’t spend the whole way home reacting, listing all the reasons Tolle’s description of ego and how it works against us was wrong, never advanced your own philosophy on the subject, just tearing his down.
Until our next sojourn, SYRW readers, keep the light of wanderlust alive inside you, even as your heart is dead.
We at Spread Your Right Wings generally don’t like people, the Internet, or interacting with people on the Internet. Seek out someone—in person—to talk to and laugh with about this article. Check back with us as we continue to mock the right wing. Follow us on Twitter at @worstaltlife join our Facebook group, and follow us on Instagram at @worstaltlife. If you simply must get in touch with us, DM us through our Facebook group. Also, please, please see the disclaimer in our About section.
© 2018 Akbar Khan
