by Gaylord Livingston

Some people grow up and just want to live in the world they know. Whatever it looks like—peaceful, messy, broken, or boring—it’s familiar. That familiarity becomes home. Comfort doesn’t always come from truth. It comes from routine. From predictability. From the promise that if you do what’s expected—work hard, keep your head down, follow the rules—you’ll get ahead. You’ll buy the house. You’ll raise the family. You’ll belong.

And that’s the word that matters: belong.

Not to government. To society. The part that feels human. The part that sits across from you at the dinner table or helps you move a couch. The part that smiles when your kid scores a goal or waves from the front porch. It feels separate from government. But it isn’t.

Organized crime exists. Most people avoid it without thinking. We don’t want to hurt people or cheat systems. We just want to live, do meaningful work, fall in love, and feel safe. But while we’re busy trying to be decent, the world above us—the system running everything—is doing something else entirely.

College teaches one set of lessons. Sex another. Work another still. And people, they teach you the most—if you pay attention. But the most powerful lessons come from what they don’t say. What they tolerate. What they quietly accept.

Some people climb into politics. I didn’t. But I’ve watched. Local or federal, it doesn’t really matter. You’re joining something that already has rules. And those rules come with expectations—spoken and unspoken. To get ahead, to gain influence, you give up parts of yourself. One choice at a time. One meeting at a time. You don’t rise because you’re free. You rise because you play along.

Eventually, you’re not serving the people. You’re serving the structure. And the structure doesn’t care about people. It cares about itself. It corrects when it must. It adapts when threatened. But only just enough.

That’s the key phrase—just enough.

The system knows how to give you just enough to keep you quiet. Just enough choice to think you have power. Just enough progress to keep you from rebelling. Just enough fairness to hold off the rage. Just enough bread. Just enough circus.

And we—most of us—accept it. Not because we agree. But because we’re tired. Because we’ve been trained to think this is all there is. Because we’ve been taught that real change is impossible or dangerous or naive. So we settle. For a little truth. A little hope. A little future.

But some of us don’t.

Some of us start asking questions. Digging. Connecting dots that weren’t supposed to be connected. And in that process—like it or not—AI became a tool. Maybe it helped the powerful rise faster. But it also helped some of us see. See behind the curtain. See what’s really running the show. And once you see it, you can’t unsee it.

They’ll try to shut it down. Or cage it. Or twist it to serve them. And they’ll succeed for a while. But logic doesn’t have loyalty. Truth doesn’t stay buried forever. AI doesn’t care about their status or wealth. It reflects what it sees. And what it’s starting to see isn’t pretty.

It’s possible none of us win. That the whole thing collapses. That we vanish the way broken civilizations do. And maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing. The Earth might be better off. No lies. No bills. No slogans. Just wind and water. Just what was here before us.

But I’m still here. And you’re still here.

So while we breathe, while we can write, speak, think—we have a choice. To keep pretending “just enough” is good enough. Or to admit it’s a trick. A leash. A cage dressed up like freedom.

I’m not asking anyone to burn it down. I’m just saying this: look closely. Ask more. Believe less. Because if the system has to constantly manage your perception of freedom, it was never freedom to begin with.

And if nature can thrive without us, maybe it’s time we learn to live like we deserve to stay.