Click here to view the next lesson.

2 - Learning

Bits & Pieces & Forces

Happy Day! 🥳

We heard from Allan Watts and his metaphysical view about what we are made of. Here we get to review the scientist perspective.

Rest assured that if you are not schooled in science, it matters not. All we need is some music.
‍

Twelve Particles, Four Forces… and an Earworm

Twelve fundamental particles of matter.
Four fundamental forces of nature.

And a tune so catchy it will colonize your brain like Disney’s It’s a Small World.

Years ago, I was at Disney World enjoying that very ride.

Halfway through, it broke down.

Not briefly.
Not charmingly.

Two full hours.

Trapped in a little gondola.
No escape.
That song… on a loop.

When I finally saw daylight again and stepped onto dry land, I’m fairly certain my ears were bleeding. If not physically, then spiritually.

Earworms are powerful things.

Which is precisely why this next musical clip matters.

You can find it — and many others like it — at a project called Symphony of Science.

No link provided.

You know why.

Go search for it.

Let your Reticular Activating System log the signal.

The act of seeking matters.

Why This Matters

Music has a peculiar ability to bypass intellectual resistance.

You can argue with a lecture.
You can debate a paragraph.
But a melody?
A rhythm?

It slips past the gatekeeper.

Before you know it, you’re humming quantum mechanics in the shower.

“Twelve particles… four forces…”

And while your conscious mind is mildly amused, something deeper is reorganizing.

The structure of reality becomes familiar.
Friendly.
Memorable.

The universe stops feeling abstract and starts feeling intimate.

And yes — it may lodge itself in your mind for hours.

You’ve been warned.

But if you’re going to have something looping in your head, it might as well be the architecture of existence.

Go find it.

Press play.

And if you’re trapped with it for two hours…

Well.

Welcome to the club.

‍

You’re going to enjoy exploring that site.

It takes the core theories of modern science — things that normally sit in dense textbooks or academic journals — and turns them into music, animation, and wit.

Elegant. Catchy. Slightly mischievous.

And memorable.

You will not forget that there are twelve fundamental particles of matter and four fundamental forces of nature.

Not because you memorized them.

Because you absorbed them.

Think about that for a moment.

Everything you have ever touched.
Every mountain.
Every ocean.
Every market crash.
Every symphony.
Every argument.
Every kiss.

Twelve particles.
Four forces.

So few “things”… expressing as ten thousand things.

One suchness.
Endlessly rearranging itself.

When science is presented this way, it stops feeling intimidating and starts feeling intimate.

The universe becomes less of a cold mechanism…
And more of a beautifully choreographed dance.

And when you truly grasp how simple the underlying structure is, something shifts inside you.

If reality is built from so few ingredients…

Then perhaps your life is not as complicated as it sometimes feels.

Perhaps it is simply energy — organizing.

And perhaps you are far more capable of participating in that organization than you were ever taught.

‍

A Mass of Jiggling Things

My favorite description of the universe comes from this clip:

“A mass of jiggling things.”

When I first heard that, I thought:

Finally.
Physics I can work with.

I will no longer resent my waistline.

It’s not fat.

It’s… enthusiastic jiggling.

Jokes aside — that phrase is brilliant.

Because at the most fundamental level, that’s exactly what created matter is:

A mass of jiggling things.

Fields fluctuating.
Particles oscillating.
Strings of energy vibrating in structured patterns.

What appears to you as a tree…
Or a wooden coffee table…
Or your own hand…

Is not solid in the way your senses suggest.

It is energy — organizing itself through specific patterns of motion.

It shows up as “tree” because of how it jiggles.
It shows up as “table” because of how it jiggles.
It shows up as “you” because of how it jiggles.

Think of it less as construction…
And more as choreography.

A dancing universe.

Two “Things” Behind Everything

Earlier we simplified reality into twelve fundamental particles and four fundamental forces.

We can simplify it even further.

Everything falls into two broad categories.

Now, don’t let the labels intimidate you. Physicists love naming things after the people who discovered them. It’s their version of graffiti.

So we have:

Fermions – named after Enrico Fermi.
These are the particles that make up what we call “matter.” They take up space. They stack in orderly ways. They create structure.

And:

Bosons – named after Satyendra Nath Bose.
These are the particles that carry forces. They mediate interactions. And unlike fermions, they can pile into the same state together.

Very different behavior.
Same underlying suchness.

All of this activity — the structuring, the interacting, the vibrating — we summarize with one word:

Energy.

Again, not a “thing.”

A description of change.

You Are Not Sitting Still

Look around you.

Perhaps you’re in a quiet room.
Chair. Lamp. Screen. Walls.

It all feels fixed. Stable. Motionless.

Now fast-forward your mind one million years.

That chair? Dust.
That lamp? Dust.
That house? Dust.

Constant change — just moving at speeds your senses smooth over.

Even now, as you feel still:

The Earth is spinning at roughly 1,000 miles per hour at the equator.
It’s orbiting the sun at about 67,000 miles per hour.
The solar system is orbiting the galaxy at over 400,000 miles per hour.

You are not sitting still.

You are flying through space at extraordinary speeds — inside a coordinated cosmic dance — while calmly reading this sentence.

Perspective helps.

Energy Cannot Be Destroyed

There is a foundational law in physics:

Energy cannot be created or destroyed.
Only transformed.

Matter and energy are interchangeable. Different expressions. Same underlying reality.

Think of ice.

Morning sun melts it to water.
Heat turns it to vapor.
Vapor rises, cools, condenses.
Falls as rain.
Freezes again.

Same underlying energy.
Different forms.
Different “jiggles.”

That is the world.

That is you.

Constant transformation.
Constant reorganization.

Alive. Dead. Or Just Jiggling Differently?

This understanding shifts perception.

Most people think:

Tree = alive.
Wooden table = dead.

But at the microscopic level?

Both are organized energy.

Both are fermions and bosons in motion.

The difference between a living tree and a wooden table is not “life versus no life.”

It is organization.
It is pattern.
It is frequency of interaction.

Nothing is ever truly static.
Nothing is truly inert.

Everything jiggles.

That realization opens the door to deep philosophical questions — and we won’t run from those.

Even something like an eight-ounce ribeye steak and a cow standing in a field are, at the most fundamental level, arrangements of the same categories of particles.

Same underlying suchness.
Different organization.
Different choreography.

Now — before we wander too far into late-night dorm room debates — remember why this matters.

When you realize that everything is fundamentally dynamic…

Including you…

You stop clinging to fixed identity.

You stop saying, “This is just how I am.”

Because there is no static “am.”

There is only patterned motion.

And patterns can change.

You are not a solid object trying to improve.

You are a dancing field learning new steps.

That should feel liberating.

Even if it jiggles a little.

‍

Meet Jeff

If everything is fundamentally organized energy…

If everything is a mass of jiggling things…

Then the line we draw between “alive” and “inanimate” becomes… blurry.

A house.
A car.
A loaf of bread.

All structured patterns of fermions and bosons.
All expressions of the same underlying suchness.

Different complexity.
Different organization.
Same foundation.

Which may explain something I’ve observed my entire life:

Every woman I have ever known intuitively names “inanimate” objects.

Not occasionally.

Routinely.

Cars have personalities.
Boats have moods.
Plants have preferences.
Even kitchen appliances get spoken to as if they’re part of the family.

There is an instinct there.

An intuitive recognition that separation might not be as absolute as we pretend.

For example:

Our golf cart is called Jeff.

Perfectly normal sentence in our house:
“I’m just taking Jeff to the beach.”

For months, our neighbors thought we had a child we were deeply ashamed of and refused to let outside.

They would hear:
“Trevor, are you taking Jeff out again?”
“Yes, Jeff loves the sunset.”

No child was ever visible.

The mystery unraveled when one of the neighbor’s children innocently asked:

“Why doesn’t Jeff ever come out to play?”

At which point the parents realized Jeff… had four wheels.

Now — is Jeff “alive” in the biological sense?

No.

Is Jeff an organized expression of the same universal energy that animates us?

Yes.

And when you start relating to the world with that awareness — even playfully — something subtle shifts.

You become less dominant.
Less dismissive.
Less separate.

You begin participating with your environment rather than merely using it.

And whether you name your golf cart or not…

That shift matters.

Because when you stop seeing the world as dead matter…

You stop moving through it like a conqueror.

You start moving through it like a collaborator.

Even if your collaborator’s name happens to be Jeff.

‍

Playing With the Energy

As a cartoonist, it is completely natural for Jess to interact with what others might call “inanimate.”

I watch her move around the house.

She doesn’t just walk into a room — she engages with it.

She dances past walls.
She bows to doorframes.
She greets plants.
She thanks the kettle.

She puts googly eyes on everything.

Not as a prank.

As recognition.

There is something deeply pleasurable about being around someone who feels the life-force in everything.

She doesn’t believe objects are alive in a biological sense.

She relates to the energy expressing through them.

It changes the atmosphere of a home.

It softens it.

It animates it.

It reminds you that the world is not a warehouse of dead materials — it is a field of participation.

Ancient Knowing

Across cultures, there have always been frameworks that describe life as evolving through many expressions.

In theosophy, there is the idea that consciousness experiences itself through mineral, plant, animal, and human forms — and that the human experience is not the pinnacle, but a stage.

Other traditions speak of seven ages.
Seven veils.
Seven densities.
Different ways of describing increasing refinement of awareness.

Science, interestingly, has its own version of this humility.

Modern physics suggests that for anything to exist at all, it must operate in more dimensions than the three spatial and one temporal dimension we consciously perceive.

Reality is deeper than it looks.

Some people seem to intuitively feel this.

They don’t draw a hard line between animate and inanimate.

They sense continuity.

One suchness.

The Lakota Perspective

Kent Nerburn’s writings about the Lakota people illuminate this connection beautifully.

In his conversations with tribal elders, the theme of relationship appears again and again — not just between people, but between people and cars, bicycles, houses, stones.

Gratitude for what is used.
Respect for what is touched.
Awareness of connection.

He recounts these words:

“That’s what I’m talking about when I talk about connections. They aren’t something we make up. They’re there. And that’s what worries me about your people and the way you understand the world. You think you can decide what connections matter. You can’t.

We see your anthropologists here on the reservation. We see your church people. But we never see your scientists. But they’re the ones who should be coming. They’re the ones who need to know what we know.

Our knowledge is long knowledge. Deep knowledge. It is one of the Creator’s laws that we become strong in what we do over and over. If we do something for a lifetime, it will make us strong in that knowledge. If we do it for a hundred lifetimes, it will make our whole people strong in that knowledge.

We Indian people have been listening and watching for hundreds of lifetimes. We understand the connections. We understand the relationships. It is who we are, it is how we live, it is how we think.

That’s why I have wanted you to stay around. We have this knowledge. But your people won’t listen.”

There is no hostility in that message.

There is sadness.

And invitation.

Listening Again

In 2026, we have extraordinary scientific tools.

We can measure gravitational waves.
Map the cosmic microwave background.
Detect subatomic particles that exist for less than a trillionth of a second.

And yet…

The wisdom of relationship — of connection — is something we are still relearning.

Physics tells us we are entangled systems within larger systems.

Ecology tells us nothing exists independently.

Neuroscience tells us perception is participatory.

Ancient traditions have been saying this in different language for millennia.

One suchness.

Ten thousand things.

When Jess puts googly eyes on the toaster, she’s not regressing into superstition.

She’s expressing participation.

When the Lakota offer gratitude to a stone or a tool, they are not confusing categories.

They are honoring relationship.

And when you begin to see the world not as separate objects, but as connected expressions of a single field of energy…

You move differently.

You speak differently.

You consume differently.

You create differently.

You listen.

Transformation is not just about improving your personal outcomes.

It is about remembering your place in the web.

And when you remember that…

Even the walls feel like they’re listening.

‍

Homework: Practice Participating

If everything is one suchness…

If the same underlying energy expresses as you, your chair, your car, your coffee mug…

Then let’s experiment.

Not philosophize.

Experiment.

Take a full day away from the course.

Yes — step away.

Transformation isn’t built by binge-watching insight. It’s built by embodied shifts.

For one day, move through your world differently.

Participate.

When you sit in your favorite chair, pause.

Instead of collapsing into it while scrolling, place your hand on it.

Thank it.

Not theatrically. Not performatively. Just quietly.

It has supported you — literally — for years.

When you get into your car, before turning the ignition, rest your hand on the dashboard.

Acknowledge it.

It has carried you safely through heat, traffic, distraction, rain.

That is not sentimental.

It is relational awareness.

When you pick up your phone — the object you interact with more than almost any human — notice it.

This small device connects you to knowledge, to opportunity, to people you love.

Instead of unconscious tapping… try conscious engagement.

Throughout the day:

Thank the water from the tap.
Notice the door handle.
Appreciate the shoes that absorb your weight.
Smile at the coffee mug.

You do not have to believe they are “alive.”

You are practicing awareness of connection.

You are softening the illusion of separation.

And here’s the interesting part:

Watch what happens internally.

Does your pace change?
Does irritation decrease?
Do you feel slightly more grounded?
Slightly less alone?

When you treat the world as dead matter, you move through it transactionally.

When you treat it as organized energy participating with you, you move through it relationally.

This is subtle work.

Playful.

Private.

No one needs to know you’re thanking your steering wheel.

But you will know.

And by the end of the day, ask yourself:

Did the world feel different?

Or…

Did you?

‍

Yes… Even Your Shoes

When you put on your shoes tomorrow morning, thank them.

They carry your weight.
They absorb impact.
They take you where you intend to go.

At first it may feel ridiculous.

Good.

You are not performing for anyone. No one can hear your thoughts.

And in many cultures — including the Lakota — this kind of relational awareness is so normal that they would likely laugh at the idea that it needs to be taught in a course.

Gratitude toward what serves you is not mysticism.

It is coherence.

When Sages and Scientists Agree

Now step back for a moment.

From the metaphysical perspective…
From the physics perspective…

We arrive at the same conclusion:

Everything is made of the same underlying “stuff.”

One suchness.
Fermions and bosons.
Energy organizing.

The sages said it poetically.
The scientists say it mathematically.

But they are no longer arguing.

They are nodding.

When I was younger, one question fascinated me more than any other:

If everything is made of tiny “things”…

What keeps those things in shape?

Why doesn’t the chair dissolve?
Why doesn’t your body drift apart?
What is between the particles?

Is it empty space?

Is it some invisible glue?

Is it nothing?

Or is “nothing” not what we think it is?

That question — what is in between the things — changes everything.

And in the next activity, we’re going to explore it.

Because when you understand what holds structure together…

You begin to understand how to reshape your own.

Microscopic Insight, Macroscopic Change

Before we go there, I want to ground all of this.

It’s easy to get swept away in the microscopic — particles, forces, quantum fields.

But transformation is not about becoming fluent in physics vocabulary.

It’s about changing lived experience.

That’s why I’ve included an interview with Jess below.

Jess joined the Transformation Experience in October 2020.

In this conversation, she describes how understanding the microscopic nature of reality — the “mass of jiggling things” — radically shifted her macroscopic world.

Her relationships.
Her creativity.
Her confidence.
Her outcomes.

This is important.

Because insight without application becomes entertainment.

Understanding without embodiment becomes trivia.

Jess helps us bring it back down to Earth.

From the quantum to the kitchen table.

Watch the interview.

Notice what resonates.

And keep one question in mind:

If the structure of reality is more fluid than you were taught…

What else in your life might be more fluid than you assumed?

‍