Player 2 Press Start
We're writing new histories—are you game?
Some recent testimonials from clients who’ve benefited from my transformation coaching. If you’re interested, contact me at zeitvillemedia@protonmail.com or go to Work With Me.
“Since working with Paul I’ve started my own business, tripled my income, clarified my purpose, found a great relationship, and most importantly: reconnected with a long-ignored passion. His guidance through all those has been essential, and I would strongly recommend him to any ambitious person looking to grow faster and better understand their calling.”—AJ Pitts, writer at Greco Gum & Pirate Wires, @AJ_Odyssey
“I have had two readings with Paul and each one felt like arriving in a place that was always there for me, just waiting to be discovered at the right time. Obviously very skilled in the technical aspects of astrology, Paul is relentlessly thorough. He has an otherworldly ability to connect with people on a deep level that is not intrusive, but rather incredibly supportive and warm. You don't have to explain yourself, you are already understood. Working with Paul is a blessing of the highest order. Millions of stars recommend.” —Victoria J., client since 2024
You can also check out my three ebooks: The Patchwork Manifesto, The Astro Cheat Sheet and Energy Is A Story
In my previous newsletter, I described how spring 2025 represents the introduction of a new media landscape and new mythological imagery. The collective unconscious is gravitating towards a new kind of heroism that stands in contrast to the passivity, anxiety and paranoia of the 2010s.
But I also mentioned that there would be a bridge between the two eras that we have to cross.
What that means is that we haven’t completely disposed of the claustrophobia and edginess that pervaded stories of the 2010s. It still feels raw to us, this whole notion of individuals being eaten up by a totalizing surveillance system. Someone like Mark Zuckerberg still comes off as a villain to many people.
But this new heroism is extremely active and involved, less likely to accept a passive fate. It may seem a bit aggressive, ready to go tit for tat with the world: “OK, you challenge me? I challenge you back!” Everyone knows we’ve seen plenty of this in recent tariff debates, which is war by a different means.
Likewise, many people in my network are reporting shifting alliances and partnerships, where commitment plays a star role. “Are you in or are you out?”
It’s a two-player game that we’re faced with, and I don’t just mean that with respect to modern romance or America versus China.
The game is between us and history in general, because these new mythologies are pushing us away from being passive consumers of history.
This is a time of pressing start, of joining forces with your reality so that you can envision yourself as a participant rather than part of the village herd watching world headlines as if they’re this week’s Netflix installment. It’s a game of reciprocity—the river of time wants you to jump in, so that you can chart new territories and new histories. But you have to press start, or it doesn’t work.
Of course, the big tariff headlines play with this reciprocity theme, too. They’ve revolved around this idea of tit for tat, compliance and negotiation.
As this plays out, people are trying to find some definitive take on who will win the war.
But this is the fog of war, this is the cloud of unknowing. Gut instinct and intuition are challenging old logical models, where the newscaster just sums everything up with the nightly news—“And that’s how the west was won, folks.”—then we go back to our normal lives.
The passive consumption of wartime narratives will not satisfy a growing irritation within the populace. More people are becoming outspoken—yes, sometimes unhinged—in a way that draws a line in the sand.
But there are growing pains. Last newsletter I mentioned that audiences will also change alongside the new heroism and new imagery that's coming into focus very strongly this spring. We’re standing at the cusp of a new decade-long media cycle.
The transition won’t be easy. Nostalgia will blend with an urge for fresh kinetic imagery. Consider this piece of AI art that circulated social media over the past week. In what appears to be an ad from the early 2000s, Angelina Jolie is playing “Tomb Raider”…the game that inspired a 2001 film of the same name, where Jolie acted as the protagonist. See below.
People are hungry for adventurous stories, but we haven’t figured out what this means for our future.
Our ability to process heroic or “violent” or warlike narratives is under pressure, because we are used to being passive consumers of these stories. We’re used to living vicariously through them—but now, things have shifted and we have more direct influence on our reality than ever before.
It's not a simple situation where all of the sudden we get these aggressive headlines and one side goes “boooo!” while another side goes “yayyy!”
That’s the Big Tent way of years past, and it kept happening because there was still some kind of social contract in place. We might call this contract “consensus reality.” Let’s say your candidate didn’t get elected president. “Ok, well, better luck next time then.”
Alright, maybe people weren’t THAT passive—but we’ve moved to a more destabilized landscape where consensus reality has exploded. More people think news is fake, elections are rigged and that leaders don’t care for their well being.
The tides are turning. Calculated outcomes aren’t valued as much anymore, because it makes society feel like a machine. People in general are becoming more emboldened and less intimidated by mob mentality, arriving at new systems of value that can enliven society. I think too many people are sick of being told that things they do are “problematic.” This has created pent-up demand for a society where things happen spontaneously again. Locally, there may be more interest in sports clubs, for example. People are done being catatonic, always living in fear.
So let’s dive in and explore this emerging landscape in which we consume news very differently—and how we’re starting to see ourselves as agents of history.
Bring On The Melee
So we’ve arrived at something that feels maybe a bit unsettling: the landscape in which stories exist is becoming just as different as the stories themselves. This is a double shot of espresso, a real one-two punch.
We are learning how to speak, critique, argue and articulate narratives in completely new ways.
Narratives of the recent past felt like characters were placed on a stable chessboard while fearsome opponents like the surveillance state closed in on them.
But now? Ditch the chessboard. The “ground” on which stories take place is more like a river, a kinetic stream.
After all, how many times did we see people going schizophrenic over the tariff narratives this past week? “It’s over, no we’re back in action, no it’s the apocalypse again…”
This makes it hard to take satisfaction from the passive consumption of news. It would be easier if there was a stable social contract and we could place our bets, kick back and enjoy the movie.
Now we’re not sure what’s going to happen. Everything’s messy and open ended, like a current in a river.
This will have an extremely irritating effect on many people, once they realize that their perceptions are generally lagging behind world events. We no longer have the simultaneous global participation that defined the 2010s, where social media allowed us to shape events in the moment as they were happening.
The whole concept of live streaming (or live tweeting, even) will change and so will some of the foundational axioms of the social media age. Our approach to world narratives will have to evolve or perhaps be shed, and that will leave people in a state of shock, then disbelief, then bargaining and regret and acceptance.
They can no longer passively influence events from the comfort of their handheld utopia. Sharing a viral post will not be the same as pressing start and joining the game.
Many people will therefore be forced to take action in their own local realms in order to express any kind of power in the world. One example is that people may change the way they process or perceive information. They may take action by saying: “I’m still gathering data on this, but I’m leaning pro-tariff (or anti-tariff) for now.” Rather than global banners like: “Team Tariff all the way, baby, ride or die!”
As we know, people are often not up to this challenge and are resistant to it because there's uncertainty in it, and therefore, as this realization dawns on people, you'll notice frustration spreading like a wildfire across the land, looking for some kind of scapegoat or sacrificial lamb to consume with sharp flames.
People who never thought twice about the stock market before last week are now saying that tariffs are the reason why everything's going to hell in a handbasket. Maybe you agree with them and that’s fine. But the difference is that extremists want to scratch that big tribal itch, find some narrative “out there” that will tie everything together for them while they go on living life normally. If the flavor of the week was invasive plants from China rather than tariffs, that would be the thing they based their Theory of Everything on.
Isn’t it funny how that works? People will voice their sweeping perceptions but then just unconsciously go about their day, as if drive-through coffee, Netflix and a handful of social media likes will always be there, like a static reality supporting their cherished routines.
But that’s all changing.
You can expect more people on a daily basis to feel a sense of urgency—they know something is pushing them to activate their reality with new perceptions.
Will this push people too far? Or will it be a new way to experience transcendence in everyday life? Maybe this is a chance for new types of civic participation to occur, leading to a happier and more involved populace?
Let’s keep going to find out.
Un-Pause
In fact, this is what we might say is at the heart of narratives going deeper into spring:
At an emotional level, people feel these stories are taking aim at our habitual uses of technology and social media routines.
Our general loop of passively accepting one version of reality based on a headline—that’s breaking down.
Do you see how much this stands in contrast to the 2010s already? The ultimate expression of the 2010s was the #hashtag. All it took was one headline to give people a sense of identity. Days would march on as the same #BigEvent just hung around on social media feeds, as if God himself had pressed pause on time. One long Groundhog Day.
We are developing new ways of placing ourselves in the world, where we can’t press pause on events but instead have to run, swim and leap along with them in order to enjoy a sense of truth.
I think we’re coming to understand that these bigger wars and headlines are something that we should indeed be concerned over, but they really serve to mobilize us in our hyperlocal, micro realities.
Therefore, we might say that a large degree of sacrifice is occurring, and people around you may be feeling a bit of “emotional consolidation.”
Instead of seeing a headline like it’s a big summer movie where you get points for “being in the know,” instead you’re finding meaning by breaking away from this habit.
There’s a lot to be optimistic about here. This is a chance to activate your agency in tangible and exciting new ways. It’s a hot time for entrepreneurs, mavericks and rebels. It’s not a great time for blackpillers and doomsday merchants.
I think the pornification of doom has led many people to think that we are running out of solutions when it comes to anchoring our society in something of measurable value. It's not impossible to think that the quality that makes us most human—and distinct from machines—can and will be the basis on which a new society is valued, formed and operated. I’m speaking of courage, of passionate emotion.
Of course, with utopian projects come utopian problems and this will certainly be a messy journey if it is so chosen.
Next Level
Essentially, all of this is balancing out a certain emotional deficiency that we may be feeling as we try to catch up and apply ourselves to this new narrative landscape which rewards bold heroism and incentivizes others to be heroes in their own stories.
The effect is contagious and it's very DIY oriented.
Again, this is extremely different from the spectacle-oriented narratives of the 2010s where it was easy to gain some kind of metaphysical grounding in the world simply by “tuning in.”
Sure, we're all going to miss this and experience nostalgia for collective culture, like in the 60s where everybody was for example watching The Beatles and immediately felt like they were part of something bigger.
But we have to understand that these new opportunities are giving us the purity and the goodness that we've been wanting for a long time. It's just that we're going to have to change our methods and get more comfortable with a lot of intuitive work and gut instinct rather than viral memes that promise a shiny half-truth right out of the box. Short term pain, long term gain.
It's funny, I don't think that the old ways of perceiving narratives will go down without a fight.
People may die on the hill of some headline so that they can feel justified and righteous.
These are the kind of nostalgic holy wars that I spoke of in the previous newsletter and they're already taking shape right before our eyes with the tariff debates. That's why I said things are going to move really quickly. It's not going to take very long for us to realize that fresh stories are populating the landscape and we’ll have to jump away from stale forms of anger. Aggression will get channeled into trailblazing new adventures.
By the time we get to summer, the element of adventurous speed will be pervasive in stories around us.
So take a deep breath and buckle up because plenty is about to unfold. The world is asking for a new kind of reciprocity from us.
Welcome to the frontier.
Some recent testimonials from clients who’ve benefited from my transformation coaching. If you’re interested, contact me at zeitvillemedia@protonmail.com or go to Work With Me.
“Since working with Paul I’ve started my own business, tripled my income, clarified my purpose, found a great relationship, and most importantly: reconnected with a long-ignored passion. His guidance through all those has been essential, and I would strongly recommend him to any ambitious person looking to grow faster and better understand their calling.”—AJ Pitts, writer at Greco Gum & Pirate Wires, @AJ_Odyssey
“I have had two readings with Paul and each one felt like arriving in a place that was always there for me, just waiting to be discovered at the right time. Obviously very skilled in the technical aspects of astrology, Paul is relentlessly thorough. He has an otherworldly ability to connect with people on a deep level that is not intrusive, but rather incredibly supportive and warm. You don't have to explain yourself, you are already understood. Working with Paul is a blessing of the highest order. Millions of stars recommend.” —Victoria J., client since 2024