This World is Not The World

When you spend a great deal of time online, in forums like this one, it becomes so easy to fall into the trap of believing that what is true of this world is true of the one in which we actually live. Be it real or simulated, that actual world holds and contains our physical forms, our bodies, along with the physical manifestations of all the people we know, and all the other living and non living things with which we interact on a daily basis. That world is the one that matters, the one that really matters, not this one. This world only matters to a small minority of people. Mostly a fortunate few who live lives of privilege and want for little, or want for too much, but not out of necessity, but rather out of greed or desire for power or influence. Of course that small minority also contains a few good persons, with true intentions, idealists, the naive, people seeking to make both worlds a better place. Hoping that somehow both can become more open and honest, more caring and loving, less hostile, less fearful. When those good people see and read and hear the words and ideas of the others they are hurt, and pained, and they are scared. They try to fight back here, in this world, and so they write, and say, and read other things that attempt to show how wrong those others are. To prove to themselves and everyone else that they are in the right, that their beliefs are the correct ones, their ideals the ones we should fight for. Both sides, all sides, the good, and the bad, and the in between, they forget that this world is not the world. They forget that what they do in this world is not the same as what they do in that world, and the impacts they can have here may or may not have similar impacts, or any impacts, there. They confuse the one with the other. Both worlds seem equally real to them. When the things they do in this world invariably fail to change that world, the world, our actual world, they feel powerless, frustration builds, then fear. They lash out in this world and the good become the bad, the bad the worse, and the good in this world and that world grow ever smaller in number. The confusion must end. This world is not the world. It never will be, it never can be. Never forget that.