58mm f/8 1/125s ISO100

I love playing with snoots.

73mm f/8 1/125s ISO100

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24mm f/4.0 1/125s ISO100

40mm f/8.0 1/125s ISO100

28mm f/2.8 .4s ISO400

    The title of this post is a quote from Louis Pauwels. It rings just as true today as when his father told it to him. This simple quote is a fundamental aspect of the human world. You would be wise to ponder it's meaning.
    So very often do I hear people discussing, debating, and complaining about what is wrong with the world today. I admit that I have indulged in this type of speculation on more than one occasion, but I am going to tell you the secret of what is really wrong with the world. This is it, the absolute true nature of all of humanities problems. Are you ready for it? Here is the answer.
Q: What is wrong with society, humanity, and people in general?

A: Nothing.
    That's right. There is nothing wrong with us. Each person is walking around doing what they want, for better or worse. We are all following the quote, we are all getting what we resemble, not what we deserve. If you are unhappy with what you have, it is usually because you think you deserve better than you resemble. Ghandi believed in this idea also when he said “If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As  a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards  him. … We need not wait to see what others do.” This quote has often been shortened to "Be the change you wish to see in the world."
    It is time to wake up and realize that you are telling people how to treat you every minute of every day. How you dress, how you walk, how you talk, your tattoos, jewelry, everything about you is a message that you are sending to each person who looks at you, unless mommy still dresses you every morning.
    If you don't like the cards you've been dealt, shuffle the deck. Get treated like trash? Fix your tattoos, buy some different clothes, change SOMETHING. Until you've tried changing yourself, your life will never change.
    Anton LaVey said: "The clothes make the slave." and this is where you should start. How you CHOOSE to dress is a reflection of who you are. It might not be accurate, but every person who looks at you will treat you like you are asking to be treated by your clothes. It may be unfair, but it's a fact. If you aren't willing to try dressing different, you aren't willing to change your life, so stop complaining about your misfortune.
    The depth of the quote at the top of this page reaches far deeper than clothing, it reaches into our souls to deep places that psychology has not yet developed terms for them. Ponder it and see how deep it goes.

45mm f/8.0 1/125s ISO125

28mm f/3.5 1/25sec ISO400

35mm f/8.0 1/125sec. ISO100
    If you came from another planet and watched Earth, you would no doubt laugh (or whatever your race's equivalent to laughing is) until becoming physically ill. The human race sometimes seems to me to be a bad situation comedy. We endlessly worry ourselves over the most inane and trivial matters, often while allowing much more dangerous issues to slip past us unresolved.
    The internet is a blazing example of the habits of our strangeness. The inexhaustable power of information sharing and communication the internet provides is far beyond the science fiction fantasies of any previous time on this planet, and what do we use this impossibly powerful tool for? Primarily to look at pictures of nude people and secondly to broadcast our every thought to as many others as we can.
    The countless hours we spend on facebook pushing our inanities on others is trumped only by our never-ending search for erotically exciting imagery. The strangest thing about these habits is that we don't need the internet for either of them.
    In the time before the internet people were spending their time looking for erotic images and broadcasting their thoughts, but we did it outside, in the analog world.
    I fell in love with the internet before it was a reality, but as time goes on, I am disappointed in how it has grown up. I still spend my waking moments seeking erotica and broadcasting my thoughts to others, but I have grown bored with photos and social networking long ago, and now seek these things in the third dimension. I miss the tactile sense.
    How long until we lose the ability to register physical sensation? The flat screen of the smartest cellular device will never feel like reality, and as friendly as I am with my keyboard, I find myself staying away longer and longer.
    As my ghost lingers on in the social networking world as a voiceless shade I live on, in a different world, a world where I can touch and taste and smell, a dirty, disgusting world full of wonderful deliciousness, and I wonder why I ever wanted the digital in the first place.