A New Series, A New Beginning

This is the lost story of Lord Ankhwenefer, known to the Greeks as Chaonnophris the Rebel, the last native Egyptian Pharaoh. The brilliance and heartache of his rebellion weave 
a tale that history has forgotten.

Until now.

July 8, 2019

Writing a novel is an adventure, each one a creation with its own world, story, characters and as such, each one requires a different approach. People often ask me how to write a novel, which is amusing, for the answer is so obvious—in order to write a novel, you must, well, write a novel.

I wish I had a formula that was more exact, but I don’t. I’ve written six novels, and the only thing they’ve had in common is that with each telling, I’ve improved as a writer. Yes, there’s a research phase, a brainstorming phase, an execution phase and then a publication phase. But what happens within those phases is up to the author and the story that wishes to be told. And that is the biggest difference between my writing in 2011 and my writing now—in 2011 I wrote stories that I wanted to tell, what I’m about to release to the world in 2019 is a story that wanted to be told.

In 2014, while researching rebellions in general, I stumbled upon a Wikipedia entry about the Great Egyptian Revolt of 200 B.C.E. It was at most four sentences long and mentioned two men, Horwenefer, who launched the civil war against the Macedonian Ptolemaic Empire in 205 B.C.E, and his successor, Ankhwenefer, who held the Upper Kingdom, approximately 80% of Ancient Egypt, until 186 B.C.E.

This entry intrigued me because I’d forgotten that the most famous last Egyptian Pharaoh, Cleopatra VII, was NOT Egyptian, she was Macedonian, and the last of the Ptolemies to rule. What followed for me was deepening interest in Ancient Egypt, many strange coincidences, books literally falling off shelves to be read, and about a year spent ruminating on this Pharaoh named Ankhwenefer and his forgotten place in history.

In the fall of 2015, I sat down to write my third eHuman novel, a story I wanted to tell. Instead, a Pharaoh came to me and insisted I write his story instead. Trying something new, I listened to the muse, and thus began the greatest adventure of my writing so far. Diving into Ancient Egypt is to visit an entirely different world, rich with custom, ritual, religion, architecture, and characters so interesting, I had a hard time keeping track of who was “real” and who was imaginary. One of the few facts we know about Ankhwenefer is that he was arrested in 186 B.C.E. by a Macedonian general, and afterward, Ptolemy V spent two years chiseling his name from every surface in southern Egypt. Everything he’d built or written was destroyed. His name lived on only in journals and records of merchants, tax collectors and slave owners as they documented their woes during the time of the "Rebel King." While his actual history is lacking in primary resources, I had carte blanche when it came to creating this tale.

Four years after I sat down to write his story for the modern age, I’m proud to announce that the first book, Origins, will be released October 1, 2019 by Literary Wanderlust.

People follow me on social media for different reasons. My Facebook friends tend to be readers of the eHuman novels. Twitter is a blend of readers and those interested in my work in universal basic income and technology. My Medium followers are mostly those dropping in for modern musings on the state of the world—from politics, to technology, to modern parenting. If you’ve enjoyed any of my writing on any platform, I ask you to give The Song of the King’s Heart Trilogy a try. Why? First of all, I wrote the first draft of all three novels in one go. This means that if you like the first one, you won’t have to wait decades (ahem) to see how it ends. The second book, Blood and Chaos, is about to go into the production queue as we speak and the final book, Civilization’s End, has just been given to my editor. The goal is to release an installment each year, starting this fall. A second reason is that Egypt is overdue for a revival. There is a majesty waiting to be unearthed in our imaginations, a civilization that lasted over 4,000 years in perpetuity. That’s about four times longer than Rome, and there’s a reason for their lengthy success. The Song of the King’s Heart may be the story of how their era ended but remembering their culture can inspire us to live with more beauty, love, and art in our lives. We can learn from a civilization that believed that all are one, that words have power, and that living in accordance with nature can advance humanity.

Interested? Origins will be released worldwide on 10/1/19, but you can preorder a Kindle or print copy on Amazon or my publisher, Literary Wanderlust. Preorders create excitement on Amazon and drive the novel's placement in their searches. Want to read it sooner? I have ARCs, both digital and print, for free to anyone willing to give an honest review on Amazon and/or Goodreads before the book comes out. Message me @NSallakAnderson on Twitter, FB, or Instagram, and I’ll be in touch.

Releasing a novel is a strange mixture of anguish and ecstasy. On one hand, it feels like Christmas Eve and I can’t wait until the big day. On the other hand, I’m like a parent dropping my kid off at his first day of preschool. How will he be received with the other children? Will he be cared for? What will the teacher think? It’s quite uncomfortable, but can’t be avoided, as any writer can attest. When a story wants to be told, it will haunt you until you do so. All the rejection, anxiety, and insecurity are nothing compared to the emptiness of living with a story untold.

As always, I’m grateful for your time and attention. Writers need readers and I hope readers will enjoy the story of Lord Ankhwenefer, Good Being of Isis and Rebel King...the last native Pharaoh of Ancient Egypt.

Practicing Discipline in Scientific Discovery

In 518 BC, the Greek mathematician, Pythagoras, founded a school in which the topics of mathematics, music and philosophy were studied with great discipline and secrecy. Men and women were welcome to live in community and study together, and eventually this group of individuals would contribute much to the subject of mathematics, including:

1. The sum of the angles of a triangle is equal to two right angles.
2. The theorem of Pythagoras — for a right-angled triangle the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares on the other two sides. The Babylonians understood this 1000 years earlier, but Pythagoras proved it.
3. Constructing figures of a given area and geometrical algebra. For example they solved various equations by geometrical means.
4. The discovery of irrational numbers is attributed to the Pythagoreans, but seems unlikely to have been the idea of Pythagoras because it does not align with his philosophy the all things are numbers, since number to him meant the ratio of two whole numbers.
5. The five regular solids (tetrahedron, cube, octahedron, icosahedron, dodecahedron). It is believed that Pythagoras knew how to construct the first three but not last two.
6. Pythagoras taught that Earth was a sphere in the center of the Cosmos (Universe), that the planets, stars, and the universe were spherical because the sphere was the most perfect solid figure. He also taught that the paths of the planets were circular. Pythagoras recognized that the morning star was the same as the evening star, Venus. (Source)

Most mathematicians would agree that the work of Pythagoras and his followers changed the subject forever. When looking at his school and the pedagogy, it’s obvious that the schooling was about more than math. Music and art, especially geometry in art, were very important. Pythagoras felt that these subjects were intimately linked to mathematics, and to study one meant to study all three.

Most peculiar were the philosophical aspects to this training. The School maintained that every human had a soul and that through math and music, the soul could be purified. In addition, strict procedures were in place to facilitate the growth of each person’s soul, from giving up their possessions to being vegetarian, to regular meditative practices. All of these things were part of the curriculum.

Of course, this spiritual aspect of the school’s training is often seen as religious, and rightly so. For the ancients, God and Science were one. This remained up through the Reformation and Enlightenment, when Science finally broke free from superstition and set about to conquer the world and take it from God. Overall, we have countless reasons to give thanks for this — from the Inquisition, to the discrediting of Galileo, to the burning of libraries, to the witch hunts — religious dogma has proven itself dangerous, not only to science, but humanity in general.

Yet here we are, about three hundred years into Science without God, and I sense that we might have thrown the baby out with the bathwater. While superstitious beliefs often stand in the way of progress, the “spiritual” discipline that religion brought to the scientist was not without its merits. We may teach that we are just a bunch of atoms and molecules randomly bopping around in the universe, but it doesn’t take a PhD to see that something else exists within us — call it consciousness if we must. Or the observer. That part of our system that decides what to do. That part of humanity, and many other animals as well, that lives and is obviously not there at death. This could just be energy, but it’s a force none-the-less and when left unchecked, can wreak havoc on those around it.

Angry children are annoying. Angry adults are terrifying. When we maintain that our physical bodies are the only real part of us, we run the risk of letting that emotional, conscious part of us, run amok. The “soulful” practices in Pythagoras’ curriculum made sure that each scientist took the time to understand themselves, their deepest selves. To know their weaknesses, to see their instincts of fear and domination, and overcome them. Discipline is the way towards “knowing thyself” and in many ways the lack of this practice in our scientific pedagogy is partially to blame for the various negative ways we’ve used technology over the centuries. It’s easy to use our inventions to dominate others if we have no control over our own greed, anger, fear and frustration.

I believe that the heart of Pythagoras’ curriculum was to first see yourself for who you really are, identify your threat to others, and overcome that, all while studying the wonders of mathematics, astronomy, architecture and music. He believed that studying these subjects, when coupled with fasting, the giving up of belongings and living in community, would create the ideal school from which new innovation and ideas would come forth. Ideas that would change the world for the better.

We now hold in the palm of our hand the ability to modify our genes, create super-children in labs, nuke an entire city and blow a hole in the atmosphere. We also hold the keys to solving global hunger, sheltering every human being, and extending life while curing most disease. When our scientific training is devoid of any hint at truly knowing thyself, and actually denies the importance of practices such as meditation, exercise, eating well and serving others as key to any good pedagogy, what sort of direction will our scientific innovation take?

We don’t have to go to church, or believe in Jesus, Allah or God to know that within us lies a power beyond mere atoms. Call it what you will — consciousness, soul, spirit or, for those of you who have read my eHuman novels, the Lux — there’s a part of each human making decisions. It’s the part we hope to download into computers someday. That part of us is every bit as important as our memory or ability to learn advanced technological concepts. Modern practices such as learning a new instrument, meditating every day, exercising, and serving in the community at large helps to discipline our nature and get us in touch with who we really are. Life is more than getting a good degree at our top universities. As scientists, we owe it to the world to take the time to invest in getting to know our deeper nature, and ask the questions that are so hard for science to answer.

“Who am I?”

“Why am I here?”

“What is my purpose?”

“How might I serve?”

#timesup: People and Planet Need to Matter As Much As Profit

image by Susanne Jutzeler courtesy of Pixabay.com

I went to business school in the late 90's. Many of the titans of modern business did. We learned a lot about supply and demand, market shares, and competition. Not so much about environmental degradation, stewardship, or fair wages. Many of our case studies involved companies who had moved production overseas to lands of cheap and/or free labor, or to countries who had lax environmental laws, and how such brilliant business decisions improved their ROI and shares. Rarely did we discuss the economies left behind. Why should we? The costs of closing up shop and leaving a town aren't factored into the equation. Those costs are carried by the taxpayers, paying taxes being something savvy business owners have lobbyists make sure they can avoid.

Recently, my son and I traveled to upstate New York, along the Hudson River, to visit colleges. As we made our way from Albany to Burlington, VT, he noticed the dilapidated state of the towns. Homes boarded up, main streets empty, streetlights broken, a single gas station where all the action occurred. This wasn't the first time he'd seen poverty, but it was the first time he'd seen economic abandonment. It terrified him.

What do I mean by economic abandonment? These were once steel and lumber towns, thriving places where the middle class owned homes, nice cars, and built churches with steeples, bells and art. Main streets lined with mom and pop stores where festivals for every occasion were once held. If you stand now on the street corner and close your eyes, you can almost smell the roasting corn on the cob and hear the high school band playing in the parade. When you open your eyes though, you see nothing on the streets but a fast food bag, blowing by on the breeze.

Poverty is something my son knows, we live in Santa Cruz, CA, and our streets are lined with the homeless. There's a huge encampment along the river where the business district begins. While this is heartbreaking, this sort of poverty often seems distant to us...that sort of poverty happens when you're down on your luck, or struggling with addiction. It's a story we tell ourselves, that if we play the game correctly, then we can avoid such a predicament. That's a false narrative, of course, but humans are all about survival, and often it's the stories we tell ourselves that enable us to continue living as if there's nothing wrong, because the problem seems so much bigger than us.

But the poverty of economic abandonment speaks of a different road to nowhere--a road where you played all the games correctly, and still got screwed. A game where your town leaders let an industry come in and build a plant, often poisoning your water supply, in exchange for great, middle-class jobs, weekends off and health care. You take that job and work loyally for the company, perhaps for forty years, before retiring with a nice pension. Your sons and daughters work there, and you expect that to be the story for generations to come.

Until that day when the company packs up and abandons you for cheaper pastures. They're tired of paying you a living wage. Or perhaps they have to start cleaning up their environmental waste due to new laws and that's just not profitable. So they fire up the cash machine and build a plant in China and close down, leaving nothing to the community except a toxic factory that will fall to ruin along the riverside--and they don't even have to clean up. Troy NY, is a good example of this. As you drive away you can see where the new economic development is occurring, but underneath are the scars of decades of economic abandonment, littered about the newly hopeful landscape.

Economic abandonment is the way of the MBA. Business students are taught to seek cutting costs at all costs. Get around unions by leaving the country. Get around the EPA by setting up shop in developing nations so starved for investment that they'll allow toxins to pollute their air and water. Down go the costs and up goes the stock.

What can we do to make a difference? Because sooner or later, all the world's people will realize they deserve a living wage for their work, right about the time business leaders are able to automate them away. Those same people will also want clean air and water, right about the time the richest of us do what? Fly away to another planet? If you hear them speak about it, that's what they say. The plan isn't let's figure out how to create honest businesses with creative solutions to these problems. No, UBI and Mars seem to be the answer for most of our titans of business, and while both are cool ideas, I'm honestly not impressed.

Here's an idea that doesn't require inter-planetary travel: No company can be traded publicly that doesn't balance people and the planet with profit. Set worker and environmental standards within the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that must be met. A company must pay workers a living wage, be responsible for all environmental issues such as pollution and sustainability, and still make a profit. If you can't, you don't get to go public. For companies currently trading on the index, they can be given a timeline to come into compliance, or be forced to buy out their shareholders and go alone.

As the Uber IPO shows us, a company not only doesn't have to care about it's workers (their drivers are striking the day of their IPO) it doesn't even have to be profitable (in 2017 losses reached an adjusted $1.8 billion). This is completely insane and not sustainable.

Inequality is growing. Our water and air are deteriorating. #timesup for a lot of things right now, but if we don't focus on the human right to work and the planetary right to life, nothing else matters.

Privacy Policy for Odin's Bones

Privacy Policy

built the Odin's Bones app as a Free app. This SERVICE is provided by at no cost and is intended for use as is.

This page is used to inform visitors regarding my policies with the collection, use, and disclosure of Personal Information if anyone decided to use my Service.

If you choose to use my Service, then you agree to the collection and use of information in relation to this policy. The Personal Information that I collect is used for providing and improving the Service. I will not use or share your information with anyone except as described in this Privacy Policy.

The terms used in this Privacy Policy have the same meanings as in our Terms and Conditions, which is accessible at Odin's Bones unless otherwise defined in this Privacy Policy.

Information Collection and Use

For a better experience, while using our Service, I may require you to provide us with certain personally identifiable information, including but not limited to This app does NOT actively collect user data or id for 3rd party use. Android, Unity and Google Play does collect crash data information.. The information that I request will be retained on your device and is not collected by me in any way.

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This Service may contain links to other sites. If you click on a third-party link, you will be directed to that site. Note that these external sites are not operated by me. Therefore, I strongly advise you to review the Privacy Policy of these websites. I have no control over and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third-party sites or services.

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These Services do not address anyone under the age of 13. I do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from children under 13. In the case I discover that a child under 13 has provided me with personal information, I immediately delete this from our servers. If you are a parent or guardian and you are aware that your child has provided us with personal information, please contact me so that I will be able to do necessary actions.

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I may update our Privacy Policy from time to time. Thus, you are advised to review this page periodically for any changes. I will notify you of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page. These changes are effective immediately after they are posted on this page.

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If you have any questions or suggestions about my Privacy Policy, do not hesitate to contact me at www.ehumandawn.blogspot.com.

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Stepping Through Oneself—The Beauty of the Out of Control Life

Image via Pixabay

I’m a control freak. At least, I like things to be in their proper places. Like the beloved Auri in, The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Patrick Rothfuss, often I find that things inside of me aren’t right unless things outside of me are.

Most of my young life I had a plan, and for the most part, those plans worked exactly as I wanted. Sure, people would upset me or let me down, or maybe I missed out on an award, a kiss, or an opportunity, but with a plan, I could rush through the pain of failure, get back on my feet, and still be…me.

Twenty years ago, when my birth control failed, I got my first taste of a plan crumbling to the ground with no way to put back the pieces, no matter how hard I tried. Until that moment, I saw the future clearly—I would work in a Fortune 500 tech company, rise to the top as a female leader, and live in a condo on Lake Shore Drive. Then my son was born, and I discovered that the feminist promise of “having it all” had obviously been created by someone not like me. For I couldn’t handle “it all” and after two years of trying to be the perfect working-mom-wife-in-tech, I was far from leaning in, rather I fell out, and into my home, trying to raise two children, with no plan.

At first, I made new plans. Lots of them. Plans were my way to survive, but as the children’s needs began to grow and change, I found my plans being foiled, time and time again. The darkness set in. Hormonal depression is common after giving birth, but few mention the identity crisis that birth brings the modern woman. From a young age, we told that we’re more than mothers, that caregiving is for other women, those who can’t, and that in this unfair world we women must fight, break through that glass ceiling, and focus on nothing else. The world of breastfeeding, diaper changing, and toddler discipline doesn’t fit in that narrative. The mother is not only demonized in this modern myth, she is forgotten. As such, I was lost.

I spent the first four years of my children’s lives trying to figure out who I was with them. Twenty years later, I’m still not sure who I am with them, except that once I let go of plans, once I stopped leaning in, and learned instead to weave in and out of the various callings in life, my identity became, well, meaningless.

As my sons leave me, I’m entering yet another phase that modern feminism has no place for—middle aged with at least another 40 years left before my sons bury me, filled with a desire to work in the world in a new way. The home has no meaning without children to raise, and while I’ve worked many part-time jobs, none have become my focus, because in each phase and stage, their needs changed, and I changed with them. I’ve been a school-teacher, a blogger, a novelist, an Airbnb hostess, a dance company director, a CTO for a startup and a novelist. But mostly, I’ve been a woman, weaving in when need be, and out when the time calls for it. To live with my sons in peace and satisfaction, I’ve had to let go of any real plans, for the plans of life are always changing.

That’s not to say I don’t have plans now. Oh, I do. I’m in school, retraining to re-enter tech. My time as a CTO taught me that I wanted to be a part of the world of technology, just as I had when I was 18 and starting out at Purdue in CS. However, unlike my 18 y.o. self, I’m no longer sure exactly what this plan will bring. Meaningful employment, yes, but where, or how, or what? I have no idea. And honestly, I like that. Not because it will hurt less if the plan goes awry, for midlife is full of pain and change, but because I’m ready for that pain and change. Knowing that I’ll never truly know myself, because I’m ever changing, is fine with me.

What is the purpose of a middle-aged woman? One whose children have left her? What is the purpose of marriage at this point? What is retirement when you’re just getting started again? Who am I, now that they’re gone? Feminism doesn’t answer this, because it focuses on power dynamics and the acquisition of that economic power. This, my friends, is about love, and no ism can help me here.

As my sons wonder what their next steps are, I too, share that anxiety. Yet it’s okay. In the tapestry of life, there’s a new row to begin, a new color to add to the pattern I’ve been creating. I have a novel coming out in the fall, a trip planned to France to celebrate my 21^st wedding anniversary, and something to add to the tech landscape. Beyond that, anything is possible, and I can see no further than each stitch I make.

Who am I? The one who watches all the plans come and go, who delights in the patterns that emerge, as this little life unfolds.

Delight or Disdain…The Choice of Our Times

Image via Pixabay

“I was there when God put the skies in place, when he stretched the horizon over the oceans, when he made the clouds above and put the deep underground springs in place.  I was there when he ordered the sea not to go beyond the borders he had set. I was there when he laid the earth's foundation.  I was like a child by his side. I was delighted every day, enjoying his presence all the time, enjoying the whole world, and delighted with all its people.”  ~Proverbs 8:27-31

Life is complicated. Events come at us, sometimes from out of nowhere, sometimes barreling down the highway of destiny right at us and there’s nothing we can do to avoid the impending collision. There’s much about life in the body that is in flux and in constant change, no matter how strict of control systems we have in place.

There is however, one thing that is completely ours to choose, and that’s our state of mind. We can look at this world and one another with delight, intrigue, and curiosity, or we can gaze with eyes narrowed, disdainful of all we don’t agree with, and hell bent on proving ourselves correct, and still in control, no matter what the cost.

A lot has been written lately about why we should quit social media, including studies that show less time on Facebook and other apps like it actually makes us happier. I think this is correct, but not because the algorithms create our dis-ease. We create our dis-ease through the constant arguing and disdain for one another and this behavior has rendered social media useless to me. I haven’t deleted it, I simply never enjoy my time on it anymore. Because every damn thing is a crisis, an opportunity for someone to get all riled up. Even the most innocent post can make the masses writhe in self-righteousness, as if their comment is going to save the poster from falling into the abyss of stupidity.

There are people who live in constant fear of Trump setting off WWIII, while others are terrified that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is going to create a Stalinist state. A tweet from the junior congresswoman or the president of the USA will raise the collective blood pressure to a state nearing a national emergency. And that’s just politics. Refuse the flu shot and get attacked as stupid and unscientific, even if you’ve had every other vaccine in the book. Enjoy praying the Rosary and be called a misogynist for propping up the Catholic Church. Like a local restaurant and be condemned for eating there because maybe the owner donated to the KKK forty years ago. Post something about the importance of homemakers and childcare you’ll start a mommy war in ten seconds flat.

And yet, under all of this constant online complaining and criticizing is our desire to be happy. Self-help gurus are making millions telling you how to be happy when perhaps the answer lies within your own mind, your own heart, and your own will? What if the secret to happiness can be summed up thus: either you delight in life, or you disdain it. The results of that decision will be clear, I can promise you that.

 Surviving Change by Choosing Joy

“Looking up at the stars, I know quite well

That, for all they care, I can go to hell,

But on earth indifference is the least

We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn

With a passion for us we could not return?

If equal affection cannot be,

Let the more loving one be me.”

~ W.H. Arden

I’ve written before about how hard the transition from my career to staying home with my kids was for me. I was pregnant with my second child when my nanny quit and while interviewing others to take her place, I found that perhaps I was the one meant to the job. Only in hindsight can I admit that some part of me wanted to be with my children all day, even if it wasn’t as stimulating as my job. But back then, I never would have admitted such a thing, for to admit it would have been a defeat. When I told people of my decision to stay home, the standard response was, “Oh, I could NEVER do that, I’d go crazy all day with nothing but the kids. Good for you thinking you can.”

While I knew part of me wanted to be with my babies, for I delighted in their company, the other part of me disdained everything motherhood stood for. And that was the part of me that had to be corrected if I were to be satisfied in that situation. For delight doesn't mean constant joy, it means finding satisfaction in the work that life requires of us.

I turned off the TV and the news, for the world was filled with disdain. I threw out the Pottery Barn and clothing catalogs, for I could no longer afford such things. I traded in Working Mother for Mothering magazine, since I needed to be surrounded by literature that supported mothering in this way.  I surrounded myself with parenting literature like Mindfulness Parenting and You are Your Child’s First Teacher. It was a slow process, it took two years of effort and a good shrink to finally find peace with my decision, and while I’ve never learned to live fully in the now, I do know that I can live with more delight, if only I chose to focus on the beauty in the chaos that defines life.  Even when the affection isn’t equal, choosing to be the more loving one is the way to peace. This is especially true in the divided, snarky, arguing and mistrustful society we currently reside in.

The Devil vs. Wisdom

It is written that when God created the world, Wisdom delighted in it. She (the gender that the entity is often referred to) danced above the waters, adored the animals, and delighted in all its peoples. She loved life, for she was life, and as such, loved herself. This is the essence of wisdom, and something that most of us miss—for to look upon another with delight is to delight in one’s self. The opposite is also true—to disdain others is to disdain yourself.

In most traditions disdain for mankind the Devil's motto. In his great masterpiece, Faust, the German poet Goethe uses the devilish Mephistopheles to show us just how this part of our psyche disdains us, for all our gods and devils are reflections of our own consciousness.

“About suns and worlds I don’t know beans, I only see

How mortals find their lives pure misery.

Earth’s little gods shaped out of the same old clay,

He’s the same queer fish he was on the first day.

He’d be much better off, in my opinion, without

The bit of heavenly light you dealt him out.

He calls I Reason, and the use he puts it to?

To act more beastly than the beasts ever do.”

~Mephistopheles

It seems that as we approach the Twenties, to be snarky and disdainful is in, and to delight is seen as childish, naïve and foolish. Everyone rushes to cut the other down, to make sure their criticisms are heard. Even common dialogue is veiled sarcasm. I’m used to my father arguing my every plan, it’s a game we play, but a world full of Debbie Downers is truly exhausting.

After fifteen years of being a teacher and novelist, I’ve begun to return to tech and I’ve noticed that when I share this decision with others, they tend to be negative. “Are you sure you want to do that?” “Women in tech are treated so horribly.” “Who wants to be a code monkey all day?” “They work developers to the bone, you’ll never have time for anything else.” Honestly, when I left tech all anyone could say was how could you, yet now when I return, they say it’s horrible and I should stay away?

Methinks it has nothing to do with tech, or career, or work, or family. It has to do with the fact that to judge one another is the way of humanity, and it’s holding us back from taking our evolution to the next level. Which is a shame, because it just proves Mephistopheles right.

I myself would rather delight with Wisdom as the world changes.

Thus Spoke Eve to God: “Yes, I ate the apple…and it was delicious!”

Image courtesy of pixabay.com

My son is in the throes of college application season, writing essay after essay about lessons learned in life, his character and experiences that define who he is. It’s hard to write about yourself in this way, especially when most of the prompts feel disingenuous. So when one comes around that sparks his creativity, he can’t help but apply to the university offering him the chance to create a world, rather than blather about himself.

The University of Vermont is one of those offering optional prompts worthy of kids these days. One of them in particular asks what you would do if a time traveler gave you a remote that can bend time for you but has only rewind and pause. Which button would you choose?

My husband and I pondered the question, neither of us sure we’d want to stay in the moment, but also not wanting to re-live the past. We have few regrets and the natural course is forward from here. Eventually he said, “I’d go back in time to the Garden of Eden and tell Eve not to eat the apple.”

Something about that didn’t feel right. The Garden of Eden is one of the most powerful myths of the West. It defines our civilization, and the three religions of the book, in a very specific way. Eating the apple of Tree of Knowledge of Good an Evil has brought just that—good and evil. War, separation, environmental destruction, abuse, all these things exist because we ate the apple. Yet every symphony, love poem, great story and cultural innovation have also come from the same source of knowledge.

Then it hit me, yes, I’d go back in time to rewrite the story of the Garden of Eden, but Eve would still eat the apple. And when God arrived later that day, the benevolent being would find his children dancing butt-naked to the music of the winds in the trees and the songs of the birds. When he asked what they were up to, they would turn to him and Eve, stepping forward and holding out her hand, would present the core of the eaten apple. The Great Creator would pause, wondering what his child would do next, for the fate of history would be decided with her answer.

“Did you eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?” he’d ask.

“Yes,” she’d reply with a smile, “and it was delicious!”

Our Stories Shape Our Culture

The story of the fall as it is written is understood by many scholars as the separation between man and God. In that moment, we fell from perfect union with the Divine and into our humanity, becoming nothing more than bodies to be subjected to pain and torture. In Genesis, God finds Adam and Eve trembling in the bushes, fig leaves sewn to cover their genitals, ashamed of who they were. How horrible to go from divine union to isolation in mere moments. Why would the acquisition of knowledge cause us to cower? Or make us feel sinful and in need of constant correction?

The reasons for such a religious foundation have long been debated, but I’m no longer interested in why the creators of Judaism, and by extension Christianity and Islam, wanted to teach humans that to know what God knows is a sin, or something we should feel ashamed about. I’m more interested in how that myth hinders us now that we’ve entered the Anthropocene Age. For we are no longer animals, slaving away under the sun trying to feed ourselves. That toil has been overcome, and thanks to our technical advancements, we now know how to feed the world. We’ve conquered the punishment set out to us by the gods. In reality, humanity has become the hands of the Earth, and as such, we are as powerful of a force upon this planet as any god. We’re on par with our storm systems, rivers, earthquakes and volcanoes when it comes shaping the face of this planet.

Yet the environmental devastation caused by our industry combined with nuclear weapon arsenals peppered across the world, doesn’t auger well for the future. It appears the hands of the Earth have taken their knowledge of good and applied it heartily towards greedy goals, and thus evil.

To me, it’s not surprising that humanity as a group would behave in such a way. When more than half the population has been raised on the toxic myth that they are sinners for wanting the knowledge to create, that they are mere bodies that must toil to eat and give birth, that salvation exists only if God wishes to give it to them, then how else would we act? We ate from the tree of knowledge and suffered for it. Therefore anything we do with our minds and with our knowledge, must also make us suffer.

A suffering, shameful, sinful race will only create in separation from the whole. It will never be able to see its place in the web of life nor within the divinity of the cosmos. A sinful people can only sin, therefore they will not see the face of God in their brother, and thus will kill their brother, not truly understanding that to do so is to commit suicide. A shameful people can’t hear the wisdom of the winds, the ocean and the planet itself that unceasingly whispers the truth, “We are one. We are one.”

It isn’t surprising that the hands of the Earth, raised to believe they are dirty, greedy and unworthy of God’s love, would act accordingly. As Lady Bird Johnson said, “Children are likely to live up to what you believe of them.” If our Father in Heaven thinks we’re sinners, then we’ve grown up exactly as we should.

The Technological Age Demands a New Myth

This is a problem, because we can no longer afford to think so little of ourselves. The Garden of Eden is a myth that has run its course, if for no other reason than it is now dangerous for humans to continue to see themselves as children in need of punishment. This mindset has taken every beautiful thing we’ve created and turned it into a game of war—we fight for raw minerals, human collateral, territory, and wages. We spill our filth into the rivers, oceans and the air we breathe, simply because we must make endless profits fueled by endless war. Meanwhile, we cower in our individual homes, plugged into our entertainment devices, ashamed of our bodies and spending millions on self-help books and diets that will only make us feel even more lowly. How thin is thin enough? How rich is rich enough? Many of us who are well off swim in a sea of guilt, knowing that our brothers and sisters only go hungry and suffer from disease because we don't have the will to grant our technological blessing upon all.

Moreover, we continue to create because we can’t help it. We ate from the Tree of Knowledge, and thus are co-creators with the divine whether we want to own up to it or not. As humans, our minds are programmed to continue to find new ways of living, to harness the forces around us, and push the boundaries of civilization. This is human nature and we shouldn’t be ashamed. Instead we must accept our power and understand that we are the hands of the Earth and co-creators with the Divine. We shape the cosmos with our thoughts and build the world with our will. We can create the Garden of Eden, or we can destroy it. Sorry Elon, Richard and Jeff, you can’t fly away to another planet and leave this one behind. For wherever you go, there you are.

Our technology demands that we leave behind the victim mentality and the illusion of separation. There is a new myth, one that reminds us of the love that lives within each being in the universe. This is the love that binds us together, that links seemingly different systems into a glorious web of life. It is this divine union of all life that makes it impossible to pollute a river without also killing off various forms of life, including humanity. There is no separation in the air we breathe, nor are our minds individual, like it or not.  It is madness to continue to create while also being ashamed. There is only hell for the world if we stay on this course of self-loathing. Even our machines will hate us, because we will teach them to do so.

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Come with me back to the Garden of Eden…

God sees Eve delight in her discovery, watches Adam dancing under the golden sun, and he breathes a sigh of relief. They have accepted the challenge with joy.

“You think it delicious?” he asks.

“Yes, my Lord. Your knowledge is the most wonderful I have ever known,” she replies.

“I wondered when you two would discover it,” God admits. “I’ve been waiting for you to take your rightful place at my side. Come, my children, we have a world to create…together.”