Once I had a discussion with my friends while walking around a forest in Wyoming. It was a conversation about what makes us unhappy. After much relating and pondering we came to a conclusion: the essential element that caused unhappiness was inertia, the tendency for all of us, for all of everyone, to keep doing the same thing over and over. Like a machine. Like the machine that we live day to day. Like the machine that is so many interchangeable parts that make up our world. And of course we are one of those parts. Unfortunately none of us were happy with that, we were (are) plagued by dreams, sleeplessness, leftover angst, overwhelming comfort, and so much anger at all the complacency around us.

So that night we coined a new word: ert. It is the opposite of inertia and perhaps a little of balance, but at least it is going somewhere.