When people meet me, they instantly observe that I have achieved an interesting social position within society — one that most people don’t have. I have no schedule, I am required to be nowhere, no one tells me to do anything. I simply am what I am on any given day.

I like to refer to this as **complete autonomy**.

In order to do this though, I had to learn a few incredibly important skills that allowed me the use of systems which grant me this freedom, autonomy, the ability to do whatever I want.

Some people look at me and assume that someone else must be paying my bills for me. I used to look at people who live this way and assume the same thing: “He must be a trust fund baby.” I assure you, this is not the case.

My parents both work very hard for their money, and while they’ve given me more than they ever needed to, they certainly didn’t give me a trust fund that pays out every month. As most of you know from Minimalist Business, I was able achieve complete autonomy by learning about systems inherent to the Internet etherspace which allowed me to automate my business.

In a sense, the internet takes care of me in exchange for the value that I added to it.

This is how Chris Guillebeau makes his living. This is how Tammy Strobel makes her living. This is how Colin Wrightand Miles Fitzgerald are designing their startup Ebookling, and how Maren Kate is designing her startup Zirtual.

Value added to the Internet = Internet takes care of you.

I want you all to figure out how to do this, but it will take a leap of faith in order to for you to cross over. The systems that you were told about before are broken, and you’ve got to suspend your belief in them long enough to realize that there is another system.

For some of you it won’t be hard to suspend belief in a broken system, just look down at your unemployment check, or glance up from your cubicle. It’s not working very much at all.

Some of the most successful newcomers to this scene are ahead of you because they had the courage to burn bridges behind them and embrace the idea that we’ve entered an age where the Internet will care for your well-being.

Defining a new way of thinking about freedom.

To make my next point, I want to put some metaphors into play that I may use for the next few blog posts if they work well.

You’re free to either use these metaphors as imaginary ideas, or you can actually view the world in this way. The difference between metaphor and reality is slim, language is simply a technological construction and can be used in any way that you please.** Your perception of reality is also largely an illusion**, and can be changed at will.

If you want to see zombies, you will see them.

Ask anyone what they think the most dangerous thing in the world right now is, and they’ll probably still tell you terrorists — when in fact** the most dangerous things you can do is drive a car, or sit on a couch** too long. Your reality is what you’ve been told or told yourself. I’d rather tell myself than be a servant to someone’s mind control.

Some definitions for a new reality:

**Drones. Have you ever walked down the street in the financial district of any major city and look around you? Hordes of people that we call worker **drones for a reason. Running back and forth from their desks to get a sandwich. I know about the drone hive cluster, because for a moment I bought into that illusion and I was one of them. Once you’re in, it’s difficult and/or impossible to un-assimilate yourself.

Many people have been convinced by mega-corporations that they need to slave away for 10 hours a day in order to make a little bit to afford their cable bill, where they can then sit down and watch cable news which convinces them that they need to hold onto their job desperately because everyone else is looking for one.

It’s a culture of fear, and some pretty powerful people are pulling the strings. Most drones don’t even know they’re drones, instead they think that this is all there is to life.

Get up, drive to work, sit at a desk, eat a donut, get up from desk, drive home sit in front of TV and eat products made out of corn from the middle of the supermarket, and wonder why they’re so goddamn fat.

You’re fat because you’re being used as a human battery in someone else’s system.

If this is you, I feel bad, but there’s another option.

**Superhumans**. This metaphor that I’m going to start using for people who’ve escaped the system, who live on their own terms. There are many paths to becoming a superhuman, minimalism is one of the easiest ones. Yoga is another shortcut to becoming a superhuman.

I recently started to realize that over the last year I’ve unintentionally began to draw superhumans towards me, as this blog and its influence grew in power.** These are people who’ve found shortcuts** around the drone system in order to bend reality to their will. They’re all charismatic, attractive, and incredibly talented.

It really does happen like it does in the movies. You wake up down day and realize that you’ve developed sophisticated control over one of your superpowers — such as passive income, minimalism, yoga, charisma, avatars or veganism, (I don’t actually do all of these things, just some) and slowly over time you realize that your power draws other people to you. You’re a magnet for a certain group of incredible people — and they’ll follow you anywhere — as long as you maintain your superhuman strength.

I’m starting to view minimalism as just one superpower in a network of other powers that I’ve been able to employ over the last few months in order to achieve more with my life.

I realize this is all metaphors (maybe you forgot? I hope you did.) None of us are really from Krypton or anything like that. But look around you, you are starting to realize that you’re surrounded by the living dead, haven’t you? When you drive down the street and glance into other cars you see the scowling faces of other drones.

Maybe they’re scowling back at your dead-eyes, if they could see past their windshield.

This is a cultural split. Those people aren’t alive anymore, they’re simply doing what they’re told. They can’t see freedom if you smacked them in the face with it.

There’s a very real battle going on here, but it’s not being fought with weapons or in the real world. This is a war between the darkness of a society that wants us to be zombies in their artificially constructed cages, and a future that wants us to live free lives supported by a digital world that gives us infinite options.

We’re living in the future… of what?

Over the last few months I’ve been investigating something… a deeper reason for minimalism.

Minimalism is a huge part of my life, and it’s a very real shortcut to becoming Superhuman. The fact is that minimalism is easy for me, and it’s also easy for a lot of other people too. It’s no longer a few people talking about decluttering closets — minimalism is a very real movement that thousands of people have embraced. Hundreds of blogs have sprouted up written by people who are living this lifestyle.

I know this because minimalism didn’t just allow me to stop worrying about money and stuff, it also allowed me to become location-independent, to grow passive income, and freed time in order to practice yoga once or twice a day for the last four months, this allowed me to drop my waist size down from a 32″ to a 29″ improve my overall health and charisma in general.

All of these systems are connected in some way.

This isn’t just minimalism at work, it’s something more, and I’m dedicated to figuring out the answer. Why? Because I know it will help you escape the reality that you’re trapped within to become superhuman and join us on the other side.

A generation of us are now living out of backpacks searching the world for the next great adventure.

The question is:

What is this deeper reason for minimalism?

Why has it become so easy to part with our stuff?

What are the implications of this change?

How can we harness this mysterious force of nature in order to become better than ourselves?

Anyway, I don’t have all of the answers at the moment. I’ve decided to delve headfirst into full-time research mode in order to investigate the implications of this change in the fabric of our very own society.

This mission is not without dangers. I’ve already uncovered some material that has challenged my own thinking, and will definitely challenge yours. I’m even a little worried that there are powers out there who’d rather this information not be made available to you.

There are people who’d rather keep you sitting at your desk. They want you there, because they need you to power their languishing empires.

I’m a little scared, and I know you are too. However, if we’re going to make any changes in our own lives and the lives of others, we have to take risks. **Freedom does not come without challenging the status-quo. **

I just worry that some of the people in power don’t want to be challenged.

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In the next article, I’m going to go over some very real actionable strategies that you can put into play in order to increase your superhuman powers using this mysterious secret force of nature that I’m investigating.

One of the most important superpowers you can command is the power of automation.