Book was first published in 1997, all text in quotes (“”) are excerpts from the book.
Interpretations & Preparations
It’s not all doom and gloom, of course, there is hope and optimism. For example, the toxic and insane decisions, by leaders the world over, are exactly what is needed, to crescendo into a climatic correction. Our batshit-crazy-green-energy policies, wokeism, and university hospitals like Vanderbilt, mutilating young children for transgender signals of virtue, are exactly what is needed for society to take a stand, to make sure it never happens again.
“History warns that when a Crisis catalyzes, a previously dominant political party (or regime) can find itself directly blamed for perceived “mistakes” that led to the national emergency. Whoever holds power when the Fourth Turning arrives could join the unlucky roster of the circa 1470 Lancastrians, circa 1570 Catholics, circa 1680 Stuarts, circa 1770 Tories, circa 1860 Democrats, and circa 1929 Republicans. That party could find itself out of power for a generation. Key persons associated with it could find themselves defamed, stigmatized, harassed, economically ruined, personally punished — or worse.”
- The left is the dominant political party today…Oh the irony if their cry’s for social justice come true, but to their own demise.
Emerging in this Crisis climax will be a great entropy reversal, that miracle of human history in which trust is reborn.
The natural reaction function of the “insanity” is to either reject it so hard that we make sure it never happens again. Or, the roots have already grown too deep and we can kiss goodbye to common sense and 2+ 2 = 4. If the latter plays out, we’ll have to learn how to navigate a world where math is racist, and we become slaves to the government’s CBDCs that rob and control us, all to fund the troubled youth escorted into sex change clinics, like abortion clinics of today.
Both outcomes require a different set of preparations and there is much to consider; it could go either way.
“Classic virtues that didn’t necessarily pay off in an Unraveling (traits like trust, reliability, patience, perseverance, thrift, and selflessness) will become hard currency in a Crisis (4th Turning).”
There is little time to prepare our finances, our communities, and our families not to just survive intact, but to ensure that the outcome sets a new order that is bright, filled with opportunity, and a net improvement over the next 100 years.
We must participate, vote, and punch anyone in a supermarket throwing a tantrum, really fucking hard in the throat.
Many generational wealth opportunities have already passed us by. Bitcoin and Ethereum, the insane oil and equities rallies post-Covid, and then the great rotation into commodities, oil, and energy this year. Will there be others? Of course, there will be.
We are transitioning into a new 4-year cycle for Bitcoin, which is the 4th cycle since its inception; we all should be accumulating at low prices. History shows, that assets with a 16-year macrocycle will go parabolic at the end. Considering last week’s events with the UK backstopping their currency for their pension funds, Japan tapping out and printing in the name of yield curve control, and lines out the gold bullion shops across Europe, the set-up is there.
The energy debacle is unresolved for Europe and America, the resolution is where the opportunities lie. Will it be wind and solar or nuclear? What about raw materials like aluminum, copper, and uranium? Fact: It has been next to impossible for me to source high-grade copper at the machine shop for over a year now; Part III will explore these themes in more detail.
I suggest a more financially focused version of the 4th turning in “Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail”. Might be a good idea to read from other gurus to fully comprehend the shifts that are happening.
Because let’s face it, if you depend on mine or other’s interpretations, you won’t know what audible to call; our future is going to be all about reading the field and calling audibles, like Tom Brady after an Ayahuasca ceremony mixing Ritalin in his eggs for breakfast.
The End of the Culture Wars
“If the next Fourth Turning concludes successfully, some great leader may be credited with saving individual empowerment by making it compatible with higher ideals of social responsibility — much as FDR was credited with saving capitalism while forging the New Deal and Lincoln with extending liberty while redefining America’s nationhood.”
If that is supposed to happen, just like everything else that the authors predicted, then I ask, “How do you make individual empowerment compatible with higher social ideals for the collective?”
Obviously, the founding fathers of the Constitution already nailed it, and libertarianism is as sensible as it gets. However, they both lack a key solution to the need for social justice that the modern-day collective is addicted to.
Regardless of how amazing and effective the constitution is in its totality, it doesn’t fit into our modern era, which is desperate for a fresh new order to blindly follow. Standing in their shoes of cultural disgust, it’s a real challenge to adopt a philosophy created by a bunch of slave owners three hundred years ago.
Ayn Rand already showed us the way with her objectivist ethics too. Using reason, she made it obvious to see how sacrificing oneself for a collective of strangers is simply a coward, virtue signaling to feel superior over others. In addition, that’s a twisted lose-win social construct that only individuals with low self-esteem gravitate to. Sadly, this behavior is weaponized to mind fuck their peers, with public shame, for not sacrificing themselves for the greater good.
Only those that have not lived a life worth living are willing to sacrifice it for a group of strangers. -Ryan
The insanity of the lockdowns and vaccine mandates during COVID are a perfect example of why this behavior is the true pandemic of our time. The “individuals” who supported or played the role of authoritarian vaxers and lock-down extremism, finally ascended to their private heaven of virtue.
After a lifetime of failed personal efficacy, they had the perfect opportunity to finally resolve their low-self esteem issues by sacrificing their bodies and livelihoods for the greater good; at last, they had the means to feel and display that their life has value.
And look, those low self-esteem shamers were wrong on every mandate, every decree, and every bullshit rationalization that fueled their authoritarian decisions. These fuck-tards ruined not hundreds of millions, but billions of lives, and careers the world over; and they still are fighting via virtue signaling and shaming to push the same destructive agenda, and elect the same people that have already caused a global economic recession, currency crisis via devaluation, and energy crisis.
There is ZERO honor or virtue in giving up one’s hard work (harming oneself) for strangers that don’t give a fuck about you. It is the ultimate triage act of self-disrespect, masochism, and stupidity; hence, low self-esteem. Honor only follows when we respect and fight for ourselves and our loved ones, not a collective that has zero interest in your well-being, rather, they demand you give it up, give up what you earned, so they have to work less and have more; voluntary philanthropy is the only way.
And please, let’s not be silly to assume I imply we don’t help our fellow man when they need help. There is tremendous honor and virtue when we give our energy, talents, and surplus to help others. However, if the group that is governing the rules of society is taking from one group of “individuals” to fund another group of “individuals”, they are no better than a common thug; GFY.
History shows, unanimously, the horrific outcomes when collectivist ethics and ideals are put into practice. If anyone could deeply understand and articulate the pros and cons, it would be a woman born into communist Soviet Russia in 1905, who came of age under Lenin and Stalin, and escaped to America in 1931 to build a new life in America, it would be Ayn Rand.
Unfortunately, she is also culturally tarnished and quickly dismissed by anyone who is left of center. Her objectivism is threatening. It easily dismantles the ironic self-serving practice of putting altruism on a pedestal to serve one’s ego. When I mention her name in passing, people glitch for this very reason.
But man’s responsibility goes still further: a process of thought is not automatic nor “instinctive” nor involuntary — nor infallible. Man has to initiate it, to sustain it and to bear responsibility for its results. He has to discover how to tell what is true or false and how to correct his own errors; he has to discover how to validate his concepts, his conclusions, his knowledge; he has to discover the rules of thought, the laws of logic, to direct his thinking. Nature gives him no automatic guarantee of the efficacy of his mental effort. Nothing is given to man on earth except a potential and the material on which to actualize it. The potential is a superlative machine: his consciousness; but it is a machine without a spark plug, a machine of which his own will has to be the spark plug, the self-starter and the driver; he has to discover how to use it and he has to keep it in constant action. The material is the whole of the universe, with no limits set to the knowledge he can acquire and to the enjoyment of life he can achieve. But everything he needs or desires has to be learned, discovered and produced by him — by his own choice, by his own effort, by his own mind. -Ayn Rand
Amen.
So what’s the path of least resistance? Changing beliefs or repackaging sound government principles that they can believe in? It is impossible to change someone’s beliefs. No, terrible idea, folks only change their beliefs when their life experiences change, whether by choice or not.
It’s why right now, the Biden Administration has politically weaponized federal agencies and gone full authoritarian in their agenda by executive orders.
To reframe a sound government and package it so they can believe in it is the path of least resistance. All that is missing is a means for folks to virtue signal the sound reasoning of our founding fathers; unfortunately, that kind of sounds like an obsessive Libertarian…
If a person who can arrive neutral, in the center, this person can re-package the fundamentals of the Constitution, Libertarianism, and the core of Ayn Rand’s common sense objectivity, in an eloquent message or doctrine, or maybe in a manifesto to kindle the fire of individual empowerment, by making it compatible with higher ideals of social responsibility, it could be the fresh solution we need.
I digress.
There are three classes of people: Those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see.” -Leonardo da Vinci
The first time I was exposed to the concepts of the 4th Turning was a couple of years ago, and it instantly resonated with me. I found the cliff notes on Wikipedia, listened to a podcast that covered it, and thought to myself, “Got it”. I was so naive. A lesson to be learned here is to not assume podcasts, YouTube videos and brief overviews are all we need, they are only derivative interpretations of the original concepts.
Always dive deep.
And as I have learned with trading and investing over the years, one must fully be independent in one’s viewpoints and perspectives to make sound investment and life decisions. Offshoring one’s critical thinking is a recipe for disaster. Learning is not downloading data and information and regurgitating it like your favorite social media influencer on Instagram. It is full digestion of the data and then integrating it into one’s perspective, values, beliefs, and viewpoints.
I have a new lens to view the world now. This lens interprets the world around me with, “That’s 4th turning stuff right there…”
When I see a Gen-Xer taking over a local school from the prophet elder who built it -which happened here where I live- it makes more sense. “That’s a Nomad Gen-Xer taking the reins to resolve the problem, that’s an elder Prophet eloquently stepping to the side allowing what must happen to happen for the children.”
Just last night I watched this Joe Rogan podcast and instantly I thought to myself, “Ah, this guy David Smith is a hybrid Millennial/Gen Xer, hanging with the Nomad archetype Gen X leader Joe Rogan, rejecting the culture wars, identifying how it’s roaring into a climax today, and how to fix it for the children and future generations”. That’s 4th Turning stuff there, and this David Smith guy is on point.
I encourage the reader to keep the 4th turning in the back of the mind, it’s undeniable and kind of fun.
It’s easy to feel helpless in our ability to affect change, regardless of the outcome we want. For many of us, the most we can do is have healthy conversations, strengthen our communities, families, and friends, and discuss with younger generations so all can “see” the massive consequences of what is at stake here.
All of us can play a role to help those who can’t see.
The Nomad Generation | Generation X (13ers) entering Mid-Life will be the Leaders of the Resolution
Keep your eye out for the leaders, the ones making the tough calls, having to push the Boomer Prophets to the side and manage their indoctrinated Millennial followers; they will be the Nomad archetype, Generation X.
Guess who was of Nomad archetypes throughout history during previous 4th Turnings?
- All the signers of the Declaration of Independence
- Nathaniel Bacon and William Stoughton
- George Washington and John Adams
- Ulysses Grant and Grover Cleveland
- Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower
The two presidential candidates already positioning for the 2024 election are Nomad Gen-Xers, Gavin Newsom, and Ron DeSantis. Their profiles on Wikipedia juxtaposed to the goal of individual empowerment serving the ideals of social responsibility is intriguing.
Who’s the third mystery candidate????
The book covers all archetypes, however I believe the Nomad Archetypes are especially relative since they will be the leaders of the resolution that will ultimately decide our fate for the next 100 years:
“Their principal endowments are in the domain of liberty, survival, and honor. Cunning, hard-to-fool realists — taciturn warriors who prefer to meet problems and adversaries one on one.”
“As alienated Nomads replace Prophets in young adulthood, they become brazen free agents, lending their pragmatism and independence to an era of growing social turmoil.”
“Under 13er leadership, America will concentrate on building infrastructure and institutions, not on cultural depth or spiritual fervor.
“Unraveling-era Generation Xers, males especially, have been hit with a one-generation depression. From 1973 to 1992, the real median income for young-adult males fell by 28 percent, more than it did for the entire nation from peak to trough of the Great Depression. (During those same two decades in which youth incomes were plunging, real median income for seniors rose by 26 percent.)”
- That’s a 50% disparity driving Generation Xers to not participate in a system that does not have their best interests in mind.
“The 13ers’ gravest Fourth Turning duty will be their society’s most important pre-seasonal task: to ensure that there can indeed be a new High, a new golden age of hope and prosperity. For the Crisis to end well, 13ers must keep Boomers from wreaking needless destruction and Millennials from marching too mindlessly under their elders’ banner.”
- Epic fail.
“They will have to vote more and participate more, if they want to contain the Boomers’ zealotry. They will have that chance. Their own elected officials will surge into Congress as the Crisis catalyzes, eclipse Boomers around its climax, and totally dominate them by the time it resolves.”
- The 2022 November Elections and the 2024 Presidential Election
“As they go one-on-one with history, 13ers should remember that history is counting on them to do whatever hard jobs may be necessary. If 13ers play their script weakly, old Boomers could wreak a horrible apocalypse, and 13er demagogues could impose a mind-numbing authoritarianism — or both. If 13ers play their script cleverly but safely, however, a new golden age will be their hard-won reward. As they age, 13ers should remember Hemingway’s words: “Old men do not grow wise. They grow careful.”
- A war would be the catalyst to shift the focus now…from ridiculous toxic wokeism to energy sovereignty, domestic supply chains, electrical grid infrastructure, agriculture, manufacturing and more.
- Seems like it is already in play with the Biden administration’s disastrous handling of the Ukraine/Russian war; it has not stopped escalating and now tactical industrial sabotage is playing out with Nord Stream 2.
We failed miserably. Authoritarianism is the status quo. Outright lying, hypocrisy, gas lighting, and misinformation is all one can see coming from politicians and media.
The book explains we are a generation that feels the system left us behind. A system that incrementally made it more difficult every step of the way to flourish, while simultaneously encroaching on our freedoms. Generation X opted-out because the system consistently acted without our best interests in mind, while gaslighting otherwise for decades.
We didn’t vote, we didn’t participate to ensure our children and future generations would be taught sound education and more. I left the States in 2009 to live my best life and not be a chump playing a game rigged against me. Even though I voted via mail-in ballots, on a state and municipal level, my participation was an absentee one.
I am perplexed as I confront these facts and conflicting values. Yet, it saddens me deeply that if my generation’s brethren would have participated and pushed back with fervor, we would not be in this situation in the first place.
Regardless, if we learned anything from this book of cycles, like the seasons, it was inevitable; the fall must pass for the winter crisis to arrive.
Only a chump would sacrifice their own life or their families for a collective of entitled fuck-tards when there are other options.
Final Words
Clearly, I’m fired up. I must sound like a sloppy, disgusting, fat-ass human hoarder, with 13,000 cans of tuna, living in his Momma’s basement deep in the bayou of Mississippi, who just found God.
For the average person, right now they have no idea of the massive events unfolding in markets and central banks. It’s like everyone is driving along in a major city and can’t see the red lights flashing.
I have no idea what is going to happen, yet it would be foolish to not establish a playbook for the different paths that may play out, and it would be a shame to not paddle out at all.
The bottom line, it’s a future of probabilities for us to navigate regardless of the outcomes.
Most likely the 4th Turning is going to draw out for a few years. There is time to watch, plan, and call audibles and plenty of opportunities on the horizon; it’s the high probability of black swans around the corner that we must prepare for first.
So it’s time to nourish ourselves, get plenty of rest, check the leash, wax up the board, do a little warm-up…study the ocean, spot the peaks of the sets rolling through, paddle out and charge waves.
