Switching Scripts

FREEMANSPERSPECTIVE

Almost all of us were raised to follow a more or less uniform script through our lives. Sometimes it was specifically taught to us, and other times we just absorbed it by watching others. But regardless of how we were trained, there are two primary problems with following this script:

1. Following a script is unbecoming to a thinking being and leads in bad directions.
2. Such scripts reflect what worked a generation ago, and yesterday is gone.

We all know the details of the script, of course. It goes more or less like this:

• Do well in school.
• Rebel with music from the entertainment corps.
• Get shoes, clothes, and gadgets with the best corporate logos.
• Get a university degree. (If your family isn’t rich, take student loans.)
• Take a job at a big firm with good benefits.
• Get a loan and buy a house.
• Build a 401(k).
• Believe in democracy.
• Send your children to daycare, then school.
• Buy brand-name goods.
• Watch the best in entertainment.
• Rely on Social Security and Medicare.

Do these things, and people in authority will approve of you. In fact, nearly everyone from the previous generation will approve of you. After all, you’re following the script that they wrote, back in 1984, a generation ago.

It No Longer Works

In 2014, however, this script no longer works. Manufacturing jobs are way down, selfemployment is down, and even the number of military jobs seems to be declining. We all know college grads who can’t find a job, and others who are working at Starbucks… and lucky to get that.

Poll after poll shows that the Millennial Generation (people born between the early 1980s and the early 2000s) have very little expectation of doing better than their parents. The reason for that is obvious: The old script isn’t working. And while the older generation is emotionally committed to the 1984 script, the young generation isn’t. They know they’re being screwed.

Still, the old script is being promoted in media and by politicians. Almost the entire older generation – or at least those who are televised – do homage to this script, and repetitively.

What is promoted isn’t working for most of us, and government/corporate promoters will change last of all.

So, what is to be done?

Switching Scripts

The obvious answer to the question above is to switch scripts: to stop doing what no longer works, and start finding things that do work.

The problem with doing sensible things such as this, however, is that they’re scary.

Those of us who have gone to traditional schools and grew up surrounded by the televised culture (that is, almost all of us) were taught to stay within the lines and to take part only in things that have been authorized. Venturing outside the borders of the approved seems dangerous to us. That’s for weird people.

But what we find authorized is the script from the last generation, and that no longer works. So, we can either stay within the lines that were drawn for us, or we can act on our own judgment, go rogue, and work at improving our situations.

However dangerous leaving the authorized script may feel, it’s the only reasonable path to take. 1984 is gone.

So, What Is the New Script?

Obviously, there isn’t one. We have to start creating it ourselves. But if we don’t do this, the only alternative is 1984’s script – the one that worked for the generation that is in power now, and who sees the world through 30 year old lenses.

Furthermore, the most effective new ways of living won’t be handed to us from some genius authority. They will form in bits and pieces, based on the things that are working now. And it will come through many minds and by many examples, not from unified and authorized sources.

Come to Dallas in October

This October 17-19, we’ll be inaugurating a new festival, called the Going Rogue Festival. The purpose of the festival is to find, promote, and explain the things that are working now, outside of the authorized script. We’ll be covering everything from Bitcoin to home schooling to 3D printing to home farming.

We have a great group of speakers, with more to be added, but this is not just a seminar: It’s a festival. We’ll also have vendors displaying their products and services, catered meals, and a great group of people to meet, work with, and grow with.

Please come if you can. There is a discount for early registration. GoingRogue.co (When asked for a coupon code, please enter FMP)

Paul Rosenberg

[Editor’s Note: Paul Rosenberg is the outside-the-Matrix author of FreemansPerspective.com, a site dedicated to economic freedom, personal independence and privacy. He is also the author of The Great Calendar, a report that breaks down our complex world into an easy-to-understand model. Click here to get your free copy.]

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