The Wrong Wolf

Image Copyright Disney 2015

I recently re-watched the movie Tomorrowland. Released in 2015, Disney's Tomorrowland is a very thematic movie that has a good message and, like most science fiction movies that aren't already a part of a major franchise, it was not a financial success.


I don't blame this entirely on the movie being science fiction. I liked it a lot, but I also accept that it's not a great movie. And while I like the theme and the message it's trying to send, I think it raises a very valid problem while its solution is somewhere in between too general and too implausible to be useful.


But that's only sort of tangential to the point. In the movie, the characters reference a "story" about two wolves. In real life, it's actually an old Cherokee Legend.

The Two Wolves

The story/legend goes that there are two wolves that are constantly fighting. One is darkness. It's doubt, fear, hate, and everything that comes about through negative thinking and focusing on negative things. The other is light. It's hope and ingenuity and creativity and everything that comes from focusing on the good. The story asks the question: which wolf wins the fight? It also provides the answer: Whichever one you feed.

This is an interesting philosophy for me, but it's also a difficult one in practice. It's interesting to me as a writer, and it's interesting to me as someone living in the current political climate.

To Acknowledge the Wrong Wolf is the Feed the Wrong Wolf; To Fail to Acknowledge the Wrong Wolf is to Feed the Wrong Wolf.

To focus on the darkness is, to a degree, to feed it. It's to make that wolf stronger and more able to fight. However, to ignore the darkness is to allow it to exist. By not being aware of the evils of the world, one can fall victim to them. In being aware, by not making others aware is to allow them to fall into them while you remain safe. But, at the same time, I know that when I look too hard at the dark things in the world, when I think about them too much, it causes me to collapse. It feeds the wrong wolf.

And there is so much wrong with the world that it's overwhelming. I don't think anyone disagrees with the idea that there is a depressing amount of things wrong with the world today. So, if everyone already knows that things are wrong, is there any point in talking about it at all? Is there any point in acknowledging that wolf as it eats the elephant in the room?


Well, yes, at least, I think so. Because not everyone agrees on which things make up the darkness and how it manifests. Not to mention that there are many new manifestations all the time. So, the only way to reach the truth and to spread the truth is to acknowledge it and talk about it, even/especially with people of different opinions. To what end? To do something about it.


Of course, when speaking to those who have differing opinions on specific manifestations of that wolf, it's important to do this in a civil, informative, and open-minded manner, being willing to adjust ones views in the way of superior evidence, and being willing to walk away when it becomes clear that a) the other side isn't providing arguments based on reason and fact and b) that the other side isn't willing to listen to fact. Continuing in an anger-based discussion is nonproductive, and it feeds the wrong wolf.

To Be an Author is to Direct the Wolves' Food Supply

When people read, when people engage in fiction, it touches them. A lot of people don't acknowledge this, but there is something inherent in the way that our brains interact with fiction that makes it affect us.


We might disagree with the premises and ideas proposed in a fictional source. We might understand the examples and ideas being presented to us, recognize the author's point, and not take it. But, even if the author's goal isn't accomplished, the reading still affects us. It might even affect us by causing us to dig our heels in more against whatever ideas the author is proposing.


So, while they can't always control what their effect will be, authors have an effect on how people deal with the wolves (on a personal level as well as a societal one). Authors can end up making people feel hopeful towards the future, or making people feel doomed. They can make people aware of evils in the world, or they can make/keep people ignorant. And they can do so much more.

Heroism and Other Lies: A Dreadful Balancing Act

I've mentioned before that I'm very pro progress. I think that our development of robotics and artificial intelligence is really cool. I think that we're on the verge of all sorts of advances in medicine, technology, and numerous other fields. I think that's good. I want humanity to embrace that. I want us to work on building a shining shimmering future (like the ones that we used to imagine; like the place depicted in Tomorrowland). These things are exciting, good, and hopeful. These things feed the right wolf.


But technology development isn't without risk. Especially when the people who control it are motivated more by profit than by progress. There's a lot of darkness that can be brought about by technology. The same inventions can be used to feed either wolf, and a lot of times they are held by or bought out by those who primarily feed the wrong one. (See the entire Cyberpunk genre)


I didn't set out to write cyberpunk when I was starting Heroism and Other Lies, but I more or less ended up there regardless. One of the major themes of Heroism is technology and the future and hopefulness vs. consequences. I really wanted to be able to paint the future with a hopeful brush while acknowledging and demonstrating the risks of our current paths. I don't know how well I did or didn't accomplish that in season 1. I have a pretty good idea of how to better balance the two in season 2, if that were ever to become a thing.

Dragons, Wolves, and Shadows

The working title of the novel I'm currently working on is Dragons, Wolves, and Shadows. It isn't the name that I want to go with, but even the fact that it's a working title is somewhat telling. All three of those elements are elements of the wrong wolf. Does my project contribute to the wrong wolf, or does it provide hope that we can beat it? I don't know.


I do know that partway through what I have already, I became aware of a rather dark and hopeless tone in the story-because the start has to work to set up a lot of the things that will be worked against the rest of the book. I went back and altogether created another character, just to add some light early on.

I end a lot of these posts this way:

I have no idea what I'm doing. I want to feed the right wolf, but the truth is that most of the time I don't know how. When I am hopeful, it is hopeful about being able to overcome the darkness. Without the dark, I don't know how I'd be able to be hopeful or feel or think positive things.


I feel, with my writing, that especially if I expect to have an audience, it's important that I feed the right wolf, and that I help other people to do so as well.


But I think a large part of the problem is that I don't have the solutions. Hope alone isn't enough to solve the problems of the world. Ignoring them doesn't work either. But I also don't really know how to fix or face them. I don't know how to stop the wrong wolf. I guess maybe I hope that if I shine a spotlight on it, someone who does know how or who can do something will be more likely to notice and do something. But in doing so, I'm afraid that I just make the shadow bigger.