u/AccountantQuirky8253

Is bravery the absence of fear?Or is it facing ones own internal issues?

Many people outwardly project confidence and exuberate an egotistical sense of self but on the inside are slowly dying from their own guilt and shame. To face a fight against another is easier than confronting themselves.

"I laugh in the face of danger. Then I hide until it goes away" - Simba

This quote resonates with individual passion for courage but humorously contradicts itself with dichotomy.

What is it to be fearless?

It was a typical day in June. Everybody was going about their ways. Society continued dutifully, each person following their assigned criteria. Men and women went to work, children went to school. Doctors healed, and teachers taught. Technology had been evolving and expanding very quickly over the past few years, and it was perplexing to hypothesize in regard to how it would change within the next short period of time coming into the future. We would adapt, as we always did, but sometimes it was with difficulty.

As I sat in class and listened to the monetized lecture the teacher spoke aloud, I gazed off into the distance outside the nearby window. The classroom hummed quietly, not with voices, speech, or conversation, but with systems and programs, technology and devices. We were accustomed now to that noise, to the background distortion of silence, to the undertone of quiet technological cacophony. Even in my own mind, I never found silence. It seemed as though it had become difficult simply to be quiet.

I looked around the classroom at my fellow peers. Most sat in a hypnotic gaze, their attention fixed on their phones rather than the teacher who had likely spent hours preparing her lesson, perhaps even days rehearsing and refining the lecture she now presented to us. Yet as she spoke with careful focus and dedication, she seemed unaware of how little focus the classroom returned to her.

Then, for a brief moment, Ms. Hawkins looked up from the pages she had been reciting from. She paused, almost as though she were searching for recognition, for someone to acknowledge her existence and confirm that she was still being heard. I glanced back instinctively, and our eyes met.

I do not believe there was another soul in that room who noticed she had stopped speaking.

She had fallen silent, and yet nobody noticed.

Ms. Hawkins continued on, appearing almost depleted, perhaps even defeated, as though she understood she could not compete with the endless distractions technology imposed upon us. She continued reading nevertheless, her voice steady despite the absence of attention within the room. It was her job, and she knew that attempting to reinforce discipline or demand attention would only invite conflict, resistance from students, complaints from parents, perhaps even reprimand from administration. So instead, she persisted quietly, speaking not to a classroom, but into a void of divided attention and artificial engagement.

At that moment, without warning, it was almost as though the world itself had stopped spinning.

Everything went black.

Everything went silent.

In an instant, the endless hum that had surrounded us for years vanished completely. There were no buzzing lights, no vibrating phones, no distant electrical current hidden behind the walls. Nothing. Absolute and utter nothingness.

The darkness felt unnatural.

The silence felt worse.

It settled over the classroom with an unbearable weight, pressing against my ears so intensely that I could hear my own breathing. For the first time in years, perhaps for the first time in my life, there was no technological undertone lingering beneath the atmosphere. No artificial presence filling the empty spaces between people and their thoughts.

The silence was uncomfortable because we had forgotten how to exist within it.

Around me, students slowly looked up from their devices, their expressions no longer hypnotized or detached, but confused. Uneasy. Almost frightened. Some tapped at their phones repeatedly, only to be met with dead screens reflecting their own faces back at them. Others laughed nervously, instinctively trying to dilute the discomfort with humor.

But nobody truly spoke.

Nobody seemed to know how.

Something was wrong.

Something had happened.

It did not take long for uncertainty to transform into panic. Perhaps five minutes passed before the realization settled heavily upon the room: our communication systems were gone.

No signal.

No connection.

No access to the invisible network we had woven so deeply into our lives that we no longer recognized it as separate from ourselves.

We were powerless.

At first, the reactions were subtle. Frustrated sighs. Repeated attempts to refresh dead screens. Nervous laughter masking discomfort. But as the minutes dragged onward and nothing returned, the atmosphere began to fracture.

Voices rose over one another.

Questions collided without answers.

Students stood from their desks, some pacing, others speaking too quickly, their words tangled together with confusion and fear. A few demanded explanations from Ms. Hawkins as though she possessed authority over whatever had just occurred. Yet she looked no different from the rest of us, uncertain, pale, silently overwhelmed.

It was frightening to witness how quickly order dissolved into disorganized chaos.

Without our systems, without instant communication and endless streams of information guiding our thoughts and behaviors, people seemed unable to stabilize themselves. It was as though the structure beneath society had never truly been human at all, but technological, artificial scaffolding mistaken for independence.

And now that scaffolding had vanished.

Ms. Hawkins did her best to ease the growing uncertainty within the classroom, attempting to calm the rising panic before it consumed the students entirely. She spoke softly but firmly, urging everyone to remain seated, insisting that whatever had happened was likely temporary and that help would come soon.

But her meek voice was quickly swallowed by the chaos around her.

The students no longer viewed her as an authority capable of restoring order. Without functioning systems, schedules, announcements, notifications, or direction from the outside world, her words alone seemed insufficient. Her lack of command over the classroom became painfully apparent as conversations spiraled louder and more frantic around her.

Some students ignored her entirely. Others demanded answers she could not possibly provide. A few had already begun pushing toward the classroom door, driven more by instinct than logic, desperate to escape the suffocating uncertainty settling over the building.

Ms. Hawkins tried again to regain control, raising her voice slightly, though even then it carried hesitation rather than authority.

It was hopeless.

For years, discipline had not been maintained through respect, trust, or genuine human connection, but through systems, structured schedules, surveillance, digital dependency, and institutional routine. Now, stripped suddenly of those invisible mechanisms, the illusion of control collapsed almost immediately.

And beneath it remained only fear.

Ten minutes had passed, and by then the louder students had already appointed themselves as leaders within the confusion. Restless and emboldened by panic, they made the authoritative decision to leave the classroom and venture back out into the world beyond the school walls. They insisted that remaining seated and waiting quietly was pointless, that someone needed to find answers, to understand what had caused the darkness and the silence that had swallowed everything so suddenly.

A small group followed them almost immediately.

Not because they trusted them, but because movement felt safer than helplessness.

The classroom door swung open, and for a moment the darkened hallway beyond resembled something unfamiliar, almost foreign despite being a place we walked through every day. The fluorescent lights overhead remained lifeless. The usual echo of distant conversations, lockers slamming, and footsteps had vanished entirely. In its place lingered an oppressive stillness that made the school feel abandoned.

The students disappeared cautiously into the corridor, their voices fading as they moved farther away, swallowed gradually by the silence consuming the building.

The rest of us remained behind.

Waiting.

Listening.

Hoping someone else would discover the answers we ourselves were too afraid to seek.

Curious what other's opinions/perspectives are on assistant deputy minister at Public Service and Procurement Canada, Alex Benay.

The situation I am currently in really makes me step back and reflect on why I’m so hypervigilant. It’s why I’m always on guard, constantly questioning...because so much information, whether facts, personalities, intentions, or meanings, can be misrepresented. It feels like very little of what we’re told is fully genuine or authentic, and it’s hard to distinguish between what’s real and what’s presented as truth.

I think about it like the moon landing: we see it broadcasted on TV, we see photos, and we’re told it happened, but none of us have personally been there. We rely entirely on what we’re being told. That’s the perfect example of how distraction, manipulation, and misinformation can be embedded in things presented as facts and very few people take the time to investigate or fact-check.

In the context of this course I'm in and the ACE study, seeing someone confidently present information that is objectively incorrect (like the claim about C-PTSD being in the DSM-5 in Canada) triggers that same skepticism. It makes me question not just that statement, but the whole framework of the teaching: what else might be presented inaccurately, intentionally or not? It reinforces my sense that I have to stay alert, question, and analyze everything I’m being taught.

It’s exhausting, but it’s also a reflection of how tuned-in I am to authenticity and truth. I notice when facts, intentions, or representations don’t line up, and I can’t just accept something because it’s presented confidently.

I, many times before, have been complacent.

I've given into conformity and sucked society's dick. I've done what everyone has told me to do.

For what?

I've shut up so that it wouldn't offend others.

Nobody fucking cares about YOU. They care about their goddamn selves.

Even Mother Fucking Theresa had her own damn plan and she didn't give a fuck what other people thought about it.

Honestly, what is it that we claim Jesus did for others in order to abolish our sins?

Oh yeah, he was fucking crucified.

Roses can be red,
that’s what they said,
but with you
violets are never blue
because that isn’t true.

You know what you do,
and you can’t deny
that survival exists
each time you try to pry.

When the truth and lies
are laid out to dry,
side by side,
we try to comply
but emotions run high.

Conflicting missions
are only exhibitions
if you listen,
if you can see,
that the sugar bowl
is empty for me.

Roses can be red,
that’s what they said,
but with you
violets are never blue
because that isn’t true.

You know what you do,
and you can’t deny
that survival exists
each time you try to pry.

When the truth and lies
are laid out to dry,
side by side,
we try to comply
but emotions run high.

Conflicting missions
are only exhibitions
if you listen,
if you can see,
that the sugar bowl
is empty for me.

Hidden beneath the sheath of arbour,
the layers of fauna cover her trauma.
In perpetual abundance she veils identity from envy,
as necessity denies interference of alignment
in all its complexity.

Yet her divine wisdom anticipates creation,
reflecting projection and all interception.
Holding her breath in silence,
she weeps sorrow, not for tomorrow,
but from borrowed energy,
simultaneous synergy
and arousing magnetic mystery.

She gives but doesn’t get;
what she’s met with shifts and tests to make her forget.
Resentment receiving builds severed relations,
deceiving ties unweaving
and lives depleting.

She is aware,
but does not dare
to stare it in the eye,
for when she tries not to cry,
her heart and soul, they
slowly die.

By: Me

Hidden beneath the sheath of arbour,
the layers of fauna cover her trauma.
In perpetual abundance she veils identity from envy,
as necessity denies interference of alignment
in all its complexity.

Yet her divine wisdom anticipates creation,
reflecting projection and all interception.
Holding her breath in silence,
she weeps sorrow, not for tomorrow,
but from borrowed energy,
simultaneous synergy
and arousing magnetic mystery.

She gives but doesn’t get;
what she’s met with shifts and tests to make her forget.
Resentment receiving builds severed relations,
deceiving ties unweaving
and lives depleting.

She is aware,
but does not dare
to stare it in the eye,
for when she tries not to cry,
her heart and soul, they
slowly die.

By: Me

Hidden beneath the sheath of arbour,
the layers of fauna cover her trauma.
In perpetual abundance she veils identity from envy,
as necessity denies interference of alignment
in all its complexity.

Yet her divine wisdom anticipates creation,
reflecting projection and all interception.
Holding her breath in silence,
she weeps sorrow, not for tomorrow,
but from borrowed energy,
simultaneous synergy
and arousing magnetic mystery.

She gives but doesn’t get;
what she’s met with shifts and tests to make her forget.
Resentment receiving builds severed relations,
deceiving ties unweaving
and lives depleting.

She is aware,
but does not dare
to stare it in the eye,
for when she tries not to cry,
her heart and soul, they
slowly die.

By: Me