The Circus

Are your watching the show or running it?

Britney Spears told us in 2008.

It's a circus.

We laughed. We streamed it. We went back to watching the show.

Here's the thing about a circus though — somebody built it. Somebody trained for it. Somebody decided what went in the ring and what stayed outside it.

And then there's the audience.

The audience shows up, pays the price of admission, watches other people do extraordinary things, goes home, and talks about what they saw.

Most of us have been the audience.

Not because we're passive people. Not because we lack ambition or intelligence or desire. But because nobody showed us the alternative was available. The show has always been on. The scroll never ends. The news cycle never closes. The drama never resolves. There is always something else to watch.

And while we've been watching - our own signal has been running in the background, largely unattended, broadcasting whatever we last pointed it at.

This is where it gets interesting.

Because the show runs on an algorithm.

And you've been feeding it.

What if nothing is actually a coincidence?

In March last year I ran an experiment.

I wanted to know - not theoretically, not philosophically, but actually - whether we have more authorship over our reality than we've been told.

So I sat down and asked to be shown a black cat. Then I let it go completely.

A friend walked into my house shortly after and said unprompted - you'll never guess what I just saw.

Two cats fighting.

I asked what colour.

Black.

I didn't see the cat directly. It arrived through someone else, in a way I couldn't have arranged, at a time I wasn't looking for it.

Most people would call that coincidence.

Maybe it was.

But I ran the experiment again. Asked for a bird - something out of season, something I'd recognise as out of place.

I got a ladybird. In winter.

Two experiments. Two results that arrived sideways. Undeniable enough that I kept going.

The distraction is the point

Here's what I've noticed working with people and the lives they are building.

The ones who are most distracted are not the ones who lack focus. They're the ones who haven't yet realised that their attention is the most valuable asset they own.

The circus exists because attention is currency. Your attention specifically. The scroll, the drama, the outrage cycle - these are not accidents. They are a very well designed system for harvesting the one thing that determines what you create.

When you understand that, the circus looks different.

And so do you.

The experiments

This summer The Library is running The Circus - a complimentary classroom built entirely around experiments.

Simple ones first. A black cat. One good thing per day. A parking space in exactly the right spot.

Then more advanced ones. The timing of a call you needed. The moment you stopped watching the clock and something resolved itself.

No theory upfront. No science at the start. Just you, a question, and what happens when you actually look.

The science comes at the end. And by then you won't need convincing because you'll have your own data.

the circus

Britney was right. 

It is a circus.

The question is what role you're playing in it.

The clown with the custard pie - performing for the crowd, keeping everyone entertained, taking the hit so the show goes on.

The audience - watching, commenting, sharing, going home having consumed someone else's extraordinary.

Or the ringmaster - the one who decided what goes in the ring. Who trained for it. Who built it deliberately and stands in the centre of it without apology.

The Circus classroom is complimentary inside The Library.

The experiments are waiting.

What if it turns out you're the main act? 🎪