The 7 Signs That You’re Onto Something Big
“I actually think that 1984 came to pass. Orwell’s writing about a totalitarian state, and that part isn’t the case. But the notion that you might live in a society that rather rigorously limits your available behavior, and that watches you to make sure that you do, you know I think we are increasingly seeing, but what’s interesting is that it’s not big brother, we’re doing it to ourselves.” –Michael Crichton
If you occasionally have original ideas or suspect that imagination is the largest part of what most people call, “intelligence.”
Be careful.
Imagination, courage, ambition, or new ideas that can improve the world, move things in a more voluntary direction, or allow us to do more with less…
These are not things that society welcomes.
Society will watch you in case you display too much of an interest or commitment to doing good works in the world. If that interest goes past talk and into action… the thought police who are watching you might take action.
Why? There are many answers, but Hugh Macleod’s brilliant take on this is one of the most simple ways to describe the phenomena of what happens when (most) people encounter great ideas.
“Good ideas alter the power balance in relationships, that is why good ideas are always initially resisted. Good ideas come with a heavy burden. Which is why so few people have them. So few people can handle it.” — Hugh Macleod, How To Be Creative
You’ll know you’re onto something big when others start protesting you, watching you, disparaging you, using you as a punching bag when you’re not there, etc…
They will spend their time watching you for any deviations of behavior outside a small box of “normal.” If you do deviate, conversation will grow uncomfortable until you leave. Afterwards the thought police will release their uneasiness and report you to each other. If you’re really onto something, they will report you to those that will attempt to slow you down or dissuade you.
We live in a dystopia and a society that hates good ideas.
The only thing society hates more than good ideas are the people that bring them forth.
The good news is that the crowd is predictable. Yes, thought police might be watching you day and night to make sure you remain comatose… But there are seven tells from them (and a sick culture) that you can identify to confirm that you’re onto something big.
1. You’ll become aware that you are no longer having the ideas, but like a gravity well, the ideas are being drawn to you.
The right ideas will attach themselves to and around you, and they’ll be impossible to shake off.
“I did not have the certainty. The certainty had me.” –Carl Jung
You might not be able to see where they are leading, but you’ll feel pulled. You’re like the captain of a fishing ship who knows something BIG is in the nets… but the catch sometimes seems so big that you’re afraid to look in the nets or pull it up. You’ll try not to think about the catch as you go throughout your day, but you won’t be able to help it. When certainty or an idea has you… you know you’re onto something big.
2. People will be intimidated by you, and they will begin to imitate.
This is how a flawed society will treat you if you have original ideas. Others will try to steal, imitate, or take what you’ve presented as their own. This is the only way that most people’s ego’s allow them to compliment other people. And if you’re onto something big enough, no one will be able to bring it into the real world in the way you envision it.
Imitation is what people do who don’t have original ideas. Some people will do this in a nice way, and others will be unconsciously furious that they have to imitate instead of invent.
The people who are angry will be frustrated that their imitation is paying homage to those who have built up their imaginations. These individuals will never consciously give you a compliment. For them, imitation is how they transmute their hatred of your ideas. Imitation and hate are the only ways that people who are hurting know how to show respect.
Often, this intimation and hatred will begin when notable (sane) people begin to publicly affirm your success. Those who are not sane will be angry, imitate, copy your work and take credit, or downplay what you’ve done. Realize that this is literally the nicest thing they are able to do.
They’re hurting. Don’t be offended if someone is intimidated by a skill or talent you’ve developed. Watch for signs of intimidation that show themselves through imitation.
“Passive, submissive imitation does exist, but hatred of conformity and extreme individualism are no less imitative. Today they constitute a negative conformism that is more formidable than the positive version. More and more, it seems to me, modern individualism assumes the form of a desperate denial of the fact that, through mimetic desire, each of us seeks to impose his will upon his fellow man, whom he professes to love but more often despises.” ―René Girard
Make no mistake- intimidation and imitation might be flattering, but they aren’t always friendly. More often than not, they are the precursor, or signal, that isolation and scapegoating are right around the corner.
3. Others will hate you, and it will force you through isolation and loneliness.
If you don’t hate anyone, the first time you discover that other people hate you will be startling. Real hate is a foreign concept to healthy people. The first time you experience it firsthand will likely be when you’re on the trail of something big.
I can remember the first time I found out someone hated me. Specifically, they wanted to kill me. In this case, it was an interpreter. I thought we were friends who occasionally played ping pong together. He thought I was someone he would eventually kill. Luckily, we caught him plotting to kill us and stopped him.
This is obviously an extreme example, but when you discover that people hate you, one natural response is isolation. Isolation is the only place where someone who doesn’t understand hate can come to terms with it.
Don’t shy away from this. The desire to isolate yourself because others hate you is self preservation at it’s best.
“Sanity in this culture, requires a certain amount of alienation.” –Terence McKenna
If you’re looking for sanity in a place where insanity is often the norm, you’ll need to get comfortable with alienation. This might be the only place where you’re safe.
Isolation, ridicule, and intense loneliness in your journey are powerful signs. When you have to exit the crowd because people hate you, don’t worry about it. From the safety of being alone, you can meditate on why certain people hate you. It will lead you to the waters of sanity.
Again, Jung gives a powerful reminder about where these pursuits ultimately lead:
“It is … only in the state of complete abandonment and loneliness that we experience the helpful powers of our own natures.” –C.G. Jung
You’re going to need the helpful powers of your own nature… especially if you’re going to avoid becoming a scapegoat.
4. You’ll notice others embarking on part time or full time efforts to turn you into a scapegoat.
“Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly.” –Albert Einstein
Nowadays, there is part time everything… including scapegoating. Plenty of people don’t want to work full time, so they settle for part time work. More often than not, they find it.
What is scapegoating?
All throughout human history, genius has occasionally emerged. When those damn thinkers arrive with good ideas and plans… the crowd tends to…
…kill them.
Scapegoating is the age old practice of punishing those who: do too well, make you think, or banding together as a crowd to hurt, steal from, or economically isolate them.
Scapegoating happens because people live in tightly controlled and monitored environments. It takes too much mental work to reform these environments, and any expression of displeasure could threaten an individual’s placement on an imagined hierarchy. Those who fall into the habit of conforming within those bundles of conformity become unconscious thought police. When the thought police encounter someone who makes them think… they don’t get the joke.
That level of scrutiny and judgement will cause intense neurosis amongst those living under it. They will unconsciously harbor deep resentment from the pressure of other thought police to conform. These resentful marionettes handle the work of scapegoating those who choose to think for themselves. Be careful around them, because unexamined resentment and anger will always seek expression.
The scapegoat is often an individual who commits the sin of making the wrong people have to think. When the thought police have to think, they immediately begin looking for scapegoat. When they find an individual who is non threatening, they go to work placing all their unconscious frustrations onto the scapegoat (a living sacrifice). The more people accept life under the watchful eye of the thought police… the more the desire grows to scapegoat others (even if it’s just the small time scapegoating of suggesting that someone should lose their job because they said the wrong thing).
“Everywhere and always, when human beings either cannot or dare not take their anger out on the thing that has caused it, they unconsciously search for substitutes, and more often than not they find them.” –René Girard
When they notice “thought crime” occurring, they will put all of their unconscious frustrations on the person committing said thoughtcrime.
5. People will start to take notice and try to subtly (and not so subtly) stop you. You’ll notice people asking you to scale things back, take a break, or start critiquing you on how you’re spending your time. Your interests and actions will be viewed as troubling signs.
“Resistance by definition is self-sabotage. But there’s a parallel peril that must also be guarded against: sabotage by others. When a writer begins to overcome her Resistance — in other words, when she actually starts to write — she may find that those close to her begin acting strange. They may become moody or sullen, they may get sick; they may accuse the awakening writer of “changing,” of “not being the person she was.” The closer these people are to the awakening writer, the more bizarrely they will act and the more emotion they will put behind their actions.
They are trying to sabotage her. The reason is that they are struggling, consciously or unconsciously, against their own Resistance. The awakening writer’s success becomes a reproach to them. If she can beat these demons, why can’t they? Often couples or close friends, even entire families, will enter into tacit compacts whereby each individual pledges (unconsciously) to remain mired in the same slough in which she and all her cronies have become so comfortable. The highest treason a crab can commit is to make a leap for the rim of the bucket.
The awakening artist must be ruthless, not only with herself but with others. Once you make your break, you can’t turn around for your buddy who catches his trouser leg on the barbed wire. The best thing you can do for that friend (and he’d tell you this himself, if he really is your friend) is to get over the wall and keep moving.
The best and only thing that one artist can do for another is to serve as an example and an inspiration.”
The War Of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle — Steven Pressfield
But why will there be a subtle pull and call for you to scale back?
“Everybody wants you to be boring, so they don’t have to be interesting.” — Stefan Molyneux
If you start becoming interesting by pursuing a big idea, this will deeply irritate most people. Often, these are people who believe deeply in abstract notions of sameness- everyone and everything must be exactly the same. Only then can they remove all pressure off themselves to ever be interesting.
If you take delight in your work, or are onto something big… the thought police will find you, and they will try to get you to stop. Don’t stop. Double your intensity and push full steam ahead.
6. Procrastination or wasting too much time planning will become impossible.
You’ll be caught in movement, and the fact that you used to procrastinate over anything will become absurd. The love of being in motion creating what you’re creating will eventually overpower everything else.
When you are truly onto something big, most procrastination will disappear. All the procrastination you did prior to this big idea will feel as if it’s been a safeguard that has somehow protected you, or got you to save up your energies for what truly mattered.
The bigger and better the idea you’re pursuing, the less that time management and procrastination will be an issue.
7. You won’t be able to find examples of when it’s been done before.
When you’re really onto something big, you might find that words escape you.
You can’t describe it. That could be trouble… or it could be a good sign.
There are, indeed, things that cannot be put into words. They make themselves manifest. –Ludwig Wittgenstein
Big ideas for the highest good are anomalies.
The more of an anomaly something is, the more anomalous of an individual is required to pull it off.
If you and your idea are singular, the less you’ll be able to describe it to those who worship sameness. No matter.
If you find that the journey is a mystery. And the further you go, the more of a mystery you’ll become. These are the primer materials for the creation of art.
“You are some kind of a mystery suspended between two eternities. And in that moment, when a mind looks out at a world and asks the question, ‘What is it?’ In that moment art can be created.” –Terence McKenna
Revel in the fact that you and the thing you’re doing can’t be defined. Because the more detail and analogous your path becomes, the less it is your path:
“If you can see your path laid out before you, it is not your path.” –Joseph Campbell
The path won’t look like you think. Besides, if you knew exactly what was going to happen there couldn’t be any surprise or real excitement!
You won’t be able to see far, but that’s a beautiful thing. Keep moving, and choosing the most prudent paths as they arise.
If you notice any of these seven things happening, they might be signs that you’re onto something.
Something big.
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