Most people don’t know what their lives depend upon.
They know they need money, electricity, food and somewhere to live. Beyond that, the supporting machinery remains largely invisible.
Their salary arrives.
Their medication is dispensed.
Their phone connects.
Their cards work.
The landlord repairs the boiler.
The supermarket shelves are full.
The government recognises their entitlement.
Their spouse remembers the passwords.
Their employer supplies their identity.
As long as these arrangements function, they feel like permanent features of reality.
They aren’t.
They’re dependencies.
A dependency isn’t necessarily bad. Human beings cannot live without depending upon other people and systems. The fantasy of complete self-sufficiency is adolescent nonsense. Even the survivalist in his woodland bunker depends upon tools, fuel, medicine, manufactured components and knowledge created by thousands of strangers.
The problem is unexamined dependency.
More specifically, it is dependence upon something that:
you don’t understand;
you cannot influence;
has no substitute;
can be withdrawn without warning;
or would destroy your ability to function if it disappeared.
This protocol reveals those points of failure before circumstances reveal them for you.
It may be uncomfortable.
That is part of the work.