{"id":1760,"date":"2025-05-28T15:21:07","date_gmt":"2025-05-28T19:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/?p=1760"},"modified":"2025-05-28T15:21:07","modified_gmt":"2025-05-28T19:21:07","slug":"pronoia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/pronoia\/","title":{"rendered":"Pronoia"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ComputerLast night, tired and slightly under the weather, I came home, made a hot toddy, and went to my computer. The cord said, \u201cfully charged,\u201d but no matter what I did, the screen stayed an unresponsive black. There wasn\u2019t a way to turn it off and on, and I couldn\u2019t find a reset pinhole (wasn\u2019t there one of those on laptops?). It didn\u2019t matter what keys I pressed. So, I put down the lid and imagined, in the morning, writing a frantic email on my phone to some folks I had planned to connect with via zoom and an unplanned trip to the Apple Store.<\/p>\n

And I went to bed. Apparently, I needed sleep, and I actually slept rather than worrying. One of the things I say is that my electronics support me\u2014and if you let them, I\u2019m betting they do you as well. I do believe in doing things moment by moment, so all I could do at this point was sleep.<\/p>\n

Sure enough, when I woke up the computer was working just fine, thank you.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So how does the world work for you? Where does unexpected support come from? Or is the positive alien to your experience? Yes, you have the choice of either possibility being true.<\/p>\n

For some there is the expectation and experience of everything going wrong. Electronics don\u2019t support you; they need to be replaced. People can\u2019t be trusted. Everything is too expensive. Yes, I have had to replace things. I could use new electronics. Most of my jeans and shoes and some of my shirts seem to be all worn out at the same time.<\/p>\n

\"blackOn the other hand, a new friend gleefully took it upon herself to rescue a dress I love that had embarrassing holes by adding butterflies and has repaired at least one pair of pants. I\u2019m told she\u2019s working on other things now just from the pure joy of it. Plus, all my electronics do work, thank you very much.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Right now, I\u2019m in the process of finding my next place to live. After some discouraging \u201cno\u201ds, both from where I was looking and from my feeling a place wasn\u2019t right, I went back to a couple of places I viewed last February. The price had gone up in the building I thought I liked the most, but in February nothing was available. Another, while still in a great location, was a bit iffy re management and didn\u2019t have an apartment that would have overcome my concerns. But the third! Well, the price for this one is less than the others; the reasons it didn\u2019t quite work in February have disappeared; and there are financial incentives for moving in now. No, the application process hasn\u2019t been smooth, and assistance for a physical move isn\u2019t in place quite yet either.*\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So again, I\u2019m called to presence. There are lessons here, including knowing it\u2019s ok to depend on new friends, dream a little about all the options, and, apparently, the need to finish this Conversation.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t a Pollyannish existence. It is considering \u201cpronoia,\u201d that the world is working in your favor, vs. paranoia, that others (and everything?) are against you. While writing this I am conscious of a lot of evil and disaster in the world.\u00a0 <\/span>You don\u2019t need a list. How can one say that pronoia is possible when people suffer and cause suffering? When the housing doesn\u2019t come through?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Pronoia isn\u2019t really about what\u2019s happening. Neither is paranoia. They\u2019re about your reaction to what\u2019s happening. Paranoia is seeing the Universe as out to get you rather than expressing curiosity as to how and what might unfold. Being willing to buy a new laptop, to explore other cities as places to live, and to rearrange one\u2019s spending plan one more time for unexpected bills without viewing those bills as personal threats. It\u2019s getting three hugs instead of one (because I actually like hugs), meeting two people headed out on trips that have at different times called me, and being reminded that one can get a lot of things just by asking (all flats for my wings and extra celery please).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"teddySo, when things aren\u2019t going well, where can you see pronoia vs. paranoia? Can you offer gratitude<\/a> in your current situation? (Gratitude and curiosity are two major responses if you want a happier and more abundant life.)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know about you, but, while I am realistic about the world, I\u2019m voting for happiness and ease. I think it improves our actions, and our future, as we effectively hold to the premise that what we do changes the world.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

_______________________________________<\/p>\n

* Of course after this was written, assistance for the physical move appeared from multiple places.<\/p>\n

All photos by Spirit Moxie. From the top:<\/p>\n

Computer with blank screen
\nThe resurrected dress with butterflies
\nBear supervising the set up of a new apartment<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last night, tired and slightly under the weather, I came home, made a hot toddy, and went to my computer. The cord said, \u201cfully charged,\u201d but no matter what I did, the screen stayed an unresponsive black. There wasn\u2019t a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,70,87,86],"class_list":["post-1760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asides","tag-curiosity","tag-gratitude","tag-paranoia","tag-pronoia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s6DJHl-pronoia","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1760"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1766,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1760\/revisions\/1766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}