Taurus 2 -- "S:\Guardians\Keeper\Desktop\GivingEngine\Outreach\Orientation-Script\Draft06.xo"

I have a notable writing accomplishment to report!!! I have, at long last, written a story that has no protagonist, no conflict, and no plot! Great. 

I will be honest and say that I have reached a point in this year-long project where, for the first (but definitely not last) time since beginning it, I find myself looking back at the page I just finished typing up and asking with a lot of doubt and not a little hysteria: What on earth am I doing this for?

I have no clue, mostly. The funny thing is that what I've been writing has been helping me cope in my mundane, day-to-day life with exact issues that have insisted on being written about in the stories. I wrote this series of Taurus stories about systems of aid, their tragedies and magic, and our all-too-human dilemmas surrounding what it means to give and receive help from other humans. The month that I spent stitching the stories together was also most logistically and emotionally challenging month I have had at my day job, which happens to be in social services and involves high volumes of help requests from people in great need of assistance, most of whom do not hear "Yes" for an answer when they ask for the aid they require. Writing these stories--even for only five minutes at a time, dashed down in bits and pieces on Post-It notes and in the Reminders app on my phone--helped me keep pulling breath back into my body, helped me feel the grass beneath my bare feet. I don't know what on earth I'm doing, but more and more, I feel convinced that I don't really need to know. What matters most seems to be that I continue to carry on, as steadily and magically as a calf in a field.

This year, I am writing a short science-fiction/fantasy story for the Sun's journey through every 10 degrees of each tropical zodiac sign. Below is a story for Taurus 2, the second decan of the fixed earth sign. In the tradition that I practice, this decan corresponds with the Moon, and with the Six of Pentacles tarot card. If you'd like to know more about the heart of this project, you can read more here.

I spend a lot of time thinking about spiritual technology--a term that has excited me for a while now, but which simultaneously annoys me because I have such a hard time defining it in concrete terms. This story is one attempt at expressing a core question that I have regarding spiritual technology:

What kind of world-building might result in a sustainable, loving, exciting system for providing help to complete strangers?

To write one answer to that question, I ended up focusing mostly on another question:

What barriers do I most wish could be eliminated from the phenomenon of giving?

This story will likely be more enjoyable if you've read the Taurus 1 story from the immediately preceding post, first. Here's the link to that.

If you are able to donate money or other resources to the Greater Cincinnati Homeless Coalition, please check out their page here.

-----

"S:\Guardians\Keeper\Desktop\GivingEngine\Outreach\Orientation-Script\Draft06.xo"

by Lois Mei-en Kwa

ALL THAT FOLLOWS IS TO BE COMMUNICATED IN THE FOLLOWING FORMATS:

• Audio (all possible spoken languages)*
• Video (all spoken, signed, visual, and color-based languages)*
• Clairvoyant (all sensory modalities)* 

 

*Note to self-- Send outreach ethermails to potential volunteers for translation

WELCOME!

Greetings and salutations! We are so excited that you have come to check out the Giving Engine Room!*

* Note to self-- I really need to find a new name for this place. TBD.

My name is Keeper, and you might be familiar with me if you have ever submitted a help letter to the Query Void. Thank you for your interest in the Giving Engine, an exciting new partner project with the Void! Please help yourself to a complimentary snack, beverage, or altar offering from the self-veneration vending machine, make yourself comfortable, and relax throughout this orientation module.

What if all you had to do to give something away was to let it go absolutely? No known recipient. No confirmation of receipt or awkward expression of questionable gratitude. No guarantee that your gift will land where, how, or with whom you thought you wanted it to land. All you have do is let go. We'll handle the rest.

Over many millenia, we have maintained the Query Void in an effort to expand the limits of what it means to ask for help. Now, with the Giving Engine, we invite you to help us expand the limits of what it means to offer aid to other souls in need.

THE SPIRIT-TO-SPIRIT HELPLINE

It is a well-known fact that the afterliving need help, too. This is not because the afterlife is devoid of joy, but because it is rife with it. To have occasion to need each other is to know pain, and it is also to find joy.

We will always need each other. Let us help you help someone else, that joy might have this many more chances to meet us exactly where we are, no matter what world we currently inhabit.

YOU ARE ELIGIBLE TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS PROGRAM IF YOU HAVE:

• Willingness

...that's it! We all have unique gifts to offer to other souls, but we do not all have the willingness to interface with the Giving Engine at the time of hearing this message (and that is okay*.)

Please do not self-reject from participation in this endeavor. A soul with no quantifiable "assets" who has willingness to work with the Giving Engine has more compatibility with this program than does a wealthy soul who does not currently possess any willingness to depart with their wealth.

* Note to self-- At this point, dispense tangible minicard with contact information and invitation for the recipient to receive an expedited intake if/when they are ready to Give in the future. What photo/video/scent notation should I include on the design of the card? Kittens? Who doesn't love a kitten GIF? There might be issues with the scent notation, however. TBD.

HOW IT WORKS

The portal you are facing is designed to coordinate connections between souls who have something to give and souls who have a need of something you have to give. The Giving Engine manages the full process from separation to delivery, as well as any necessary stages in between. We may employ one or more of the following forms of technology to remove a gift from your ownership, store it safely, and deliver it to its recipient:

• Quantum mechanics
• Emotive teleportation
• High-efficiency flat-pack furniture storage in the space-time continuum
• Limbic resonance
• Email
• Pyschopomp courier service (same-day delivery)

The Giving Engine can process an ultrahigh volume of gifting activity, and we can deliver any form of gift, regardless of size (whether miniscule or mammoth), logistical complexity (transportation issues included), and placement on the materiality spectrum (we have handled deliveries of objects, messages, energetic packets, empathic memories, gift cards, and more!). No item is too tricky for us to remove from your ownership!

Simply enter the Engine Room and complete the Giving process. By the time you pass through the portal on your way out, your gift will no longer belong to you at all. You won't be able to take it back even if you wanted to.

ITEMS THAT CAN BE GIVEN INCLUDE AND ARE NOT LIMITED TO:

• Dream houses--fully constructed and without conditions issues or conditions of ownership, please--appropriately prepared for vulnerable newcomers to the afterlife to move into immediately upon their arrival
• Words of encouragement, comfort, affirmation, and hope
• Helpful directions to and knowledge of thinned veils that connect the afterlife to the world of the living, which might enable souls to locate and connect to their loved ones with greater ease
• Baked goods
• Lands originally bound to Indigenous peoples that you, if non-Indigenous, might have assumed claim to immediately upon your arrival to the afterlife out of a lifelong habit of reflexive ownership, a habit which you might now wish to change
• Books, poems, zines that you have written during your time in the afterlife
• DIY instructions, manuals, and guides on how to make a book, poem, or zine in the afterlife
• Memories of giving and receiving nourishing love and care
• Other afterlife resources for aid, opportunity, growth, pleasure, et cetera

JUDGMENT-FREE ZONE

While the act of giving can be a very afterlife-affirming experience, it can also activate several of your deepest fears, doubts, and capacity for resentment. Many souls have knowingly parted ways with their assets in the service of another, only to rack up a number of sleepless nights spent irritably compiling an ever-expanding list of facts that might determine if the recipient of their gift really needed what they had been given, or if they really needed it, or if they--had they behaved differently prior to needing the help they received--might have been able to meet their own needs by their own efforts.

After a basic accounting of the hours spent delivering this anxious stream of judgment within the lonely courtroom of one's own head, many Givers confirm that this is time that could have been better spent writing poems, taking a relaxing drive down the Socialist Mermaids' Coast to swim with the photosynthetic seahorses, porch-sitting with their ancestors, or watching paint dry.

Well! Never again do you have to allocate your precious time and energy towards evaluating the worthiness of the souls who have asked for your help, or questioning whether a soul who received it truly "deserves" what you gave to them of your own accord! Please read the following section on our Anti-Recipient Policy to learn more about how the Giving Engine is able to waive this psychic transaction cost for all participants. For now, while completing Page 6 of the Giver formwork, please be sure to note several formats of benefit that you think your gift might provide to another soul, no matter who they might be. It's okay if you do not generate an exhaustive list of possibilities at this time. Simply try to to imagine (5) possible outcomes.

We'll do the work of imagining the rest.

ANTI-RECIPIENT POLICY

Have you ever felt hurt by the response (or lack thereof) that you received after giving something meaningful to another person? Has your resentment regarding how the recipient of your gift mishandled what you so thoughtfully gave them ever resulted in an increase of emotional distance between you and your recipient?

Fear not--we have a solution for this all-too-human conundrum! No recipient? No resentment! Here in the Giving Engine Room, we take pride in promising that we will never, ever provide you with any information whatsoever regarding who asked for, received, accepted, rejected, rejoiced in, or abhorred your gift!

Rest in the total absence of any expectation that you will be praised or appreciated. Free yourself from the pain of unrequited giving. A gift to nobody is a gift to anybody. Let us help you help yourself by helping another soul in complete anonymity.

After you have completed the Giving process, please stop by the exit desk to receive the complimentary personalized gratitude gesture of your choosing.* Let us thank you so that they don't have to.

* Note to self-- Options should include, but not be limited to: thank you note, verbal thanks, hug, friendly wave, brief joyous dance-off, et cetera.

FINAL CALL TO ACTION [AT THIS TIME, DISPENSE TANGIBLE KEEPSAKE INFORMATIONAL FLYER, THE DESIGN OF WHICH SHOULD INCLUD BRIGHT, EASY-TO-READ LETTERS, TONES, SOUNDS, AND COMMUNICATIVE SENSATIONS]

No gift is too small, heavy, or laden with personal baggage. We all have something to give. All you have to do is show up, and bring what you have to share.

We'll take care of the rest.

THE END