There is no issue more pressing for society or dire for the individual than that of their own personal power and freedom.

***If one does not know or like themselves they are destined to be possessed by the ideas in their local environment or have the muscles of their spirit - that of agency, independent thought, courage, self-expression, creativity, and joy [among countless other logues, both ana & homo] - atrophy.

If this happens then one’s life no longer belongs to them, they merely live within a hall of mirrors consisting of their past. One flees from their fears into the conditional embrace of their fantasies before the two morph into one another and the cycle starts once more.

It sounds terrifying but I believe that the majority of the world lives lives’ of this degree of luminosity [Plato’s allegory of the cave, anyone?]

It is absolutely pertinent that one embarks on the journey and frees themselves from the chains that surround their minds. When one’s own intuitive guidance in life is compromised, one becomes open to the dominant ideas of their community. One is forced to conform to the others around them, even if it strongly contradicts their own internal knowing, because life DEMANDS CERTAINTY. Without it, the foundation of one’s entire being is unstable. That stability MUST be reinstated before action can be taken.

One can not walk on a floor that crumbles beneath their feet.

So, too, can one not live without a solid conceptual foundation of how they should live.

But externally-sourced existential & moral frameworks are inherently flawed because the only conviction one has to them is their convenience. One does not value them because of their content but because of the pragmatic value of soothing their discomfort.

One holds no loyalty or allegiance when they lack self-trust, self-respect, and self-reliance. Without one’s own conviction to themselves unto death, one is exceptionally susceptible to external suggestion, even if one strongly disagrees with it. It makes it very easy to just follow orders.

The consequence of one disowning their internal guidance affects the very core of one’s entire life, the way one see’s & values oneself, what one thinks one is fundamentally, what one believes themselves to be capable of, the type & content of their experience - everything.

Eventually one loses all ability to think or act for themselves. One is truly dispossessed - out in the cold, alone, and powerless. One becomes a stranger to themself.

On the most intimate, core level of life, a rejection has taken place.