The Energy Never Dies

"None of us just live in isolation. Everything is in context... you think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you." — Kamala Harris

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Lately, I've been revisiting certain phases of life that I've overcome — not with the intention of dwelling, but simply feeling the feels, if you will, and reflecting on how those experiences have shaped who I am and who I'm becoming. It's been this practice of allowing myself to sit with what was without judgment, just observation.

Through meditation, this thought emerged — not gradually, but all at once, with the force of something that had always been true but never articulated: I am the amalgamation of energies from both of my parents' side of the family. That the desires I have and envision for my life, the purposes I create, are not just of my own making but carry the weight and wisdom of my ancestors as well.

I know. It sounds a little woo-woo, right?

But here's the thing: this wasn't one of those fleeting meditation experiences where you feel something vaguely profound and then move on. This was one of those moments with a deep sense of knowing, where logic wasn't part of the equation. The kind of knowing that sits in your body before it makes its way to your mind.

What surprised me most was how the universe seemed to conspire to help me process this realization. As if reality itself was saying, "Okay, you're ready to understand this now; here's some confirmation."

When The Universe Speaks Through Pop Culture

First came the Instagram reel. I'm scrolling through my feed, and suddenly there's Kamala Harris talking about the coconut tree — that now famous moment where she says we exist in the context of all in which we live and what came before us. The timing felt almost supernatural. Here I was, meditating on this concept of inherited energy and ancestral presence, and the algorithm served me exactly what I needed to hear. The synchronicity was undeniable.

Then came my decision to re-watch JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. I had stopped around season four and only vaguely remembered what happened, so I thought, why not start from the beginning?

And here's where things got interesting.

The JoJo Revelation: Patterns Across Generations

Watching JoJo's Bizarre Adventure from the beginning with the context of knowing what happens in later seasons completely shifted my perspective. The entire saga begins with Jonathan Joestar and Dio Brando: archenemies locked in a battle that should have ended when Jonathan defeats Dio. Should have. But Dio doesn't truly die. Instead, he becomes — whether directly or indirectly — a recurring problem for every single generation of the Joestar bloodline.

As someone watching all the seasons with this bird's-eye view, I could see the common thread, the DNA of conflict and heroism woven through each generation. The Joestars across different seasons are distinct individuals with their own personalities, circumstances, and choices. Yet there's this unmistakable throughline: similar characteristics, parallel struggles, déjà vu moments where you think, "Haven't we been here before?"

It's the same pattern playing out differently each time.

There's this specific scene in Season 1, Episode 8 on Netflix that resonated with me deeply. Jonathan has just defeated Dio and says, "You had to be destroyed, Dio." The finality in his voice, the certainty. And then — in what should have been Dio's final moment — energy shoots from his eye, nearly killing Jonathan. Dio didn't die. He couldn't die. Not really.

Watching that scene, I found myself saying out loud, without even thinking about it: "Energy cannot be created nor destroyed."

You know that phrase from basic physics class, right? The First Law of Thermodynamics. It's one of those things everyone learns in school but rarely considers beyond passing the test.

But hearing myself say it in that moment, in response to this fictional character's refusal to truly die, made me feel the weight of what that law actually means.

The Science of What Never Dies

Let's talk physics for a second.

The First Law of Thermodynamics states that energy cannot be created or destroyed in an isolated system; it can only be transformed from one form to another. This isn't just some abstract scientific principle. It's the fundamental rule governing everything in our universe. When something appears to "end," its energy doesn't vanish. It transforms. It transfers. It continues.

In the case of Dio, his malevolent energy didn't disappear when Jonathan defeated him. It transformed, persisted, became embedded in the world in new forms, haunting generation after generation of Joestars. The conflict didn't end — it evolved.

And isn't that exactly what happens with inherited trauma? With ancestral patterns? With the unresolved energy of those who came before us?

When Black Eyed Peas Become Philosophy

This realization sent me down another rabbit hole. I remembered the Black Eyed Peas album THE E.N.D., which literally stands for The Energy Never Dies. A song from that album, "Rock That Body," had recently gone viral on TikTok, and I loved it so much that I decided to listen to the entire album looking for hidden gems I might have missed.

Here's what struck me about that album title in this new context: it wasn't just a clever acronym. It was a statement about permanence, about the way things persist beyond their apparent conclusion. Music is energy:  sound waves, vibrations that move through air and bodies and time. Even when a song ends, its impact doesn't. The energy of that music continues in whoever heard it, in whatever it inspired, in the cultural moment it created.

The Black Eyed Peas understood something fundamental: endings are illusions. Energy transforms. Energy continues. Energy never dies.

The Philosophical Foundation: Descartes and the Nature of Doubt

This brings me to a class I took at FSU where we studied three philosophers: Montaigne, Pascal, and Descartes, examining their perspectives and how they responded to each other's ideas. I was particularly drawn to Descartes and his method of radical doubt.

Descartes began with the conviction that the mind is the basis for all knowledge. He wanted to establish a new foundation for understanding that would be free of uncertainty. This meant starting with introspection, examining his own thoughts. His central question was simple: What can I know for sure, beyond any possible doubt?

Through his method of systematic doubt, Descartes questioned everything, even the reality of the external world. He asked himself, "How do I know that the world as I perceive it is real?" He questioned mathematical truths, contemplated whether a powerful, deceiving being might be manipulating his perceptions. His goal was to find a belief so certain that it couldn't be doubted, a solid ground upon which to build all future knowledge.

And what did he find?

The one thing he couldn't doubt was the fact that he was doubting. If he doubted, then he must exist as a thinking being. From this came his famous realization: "Cogito, ergo sum" — "I think, therefore I am."

This was Descartes's first indubitable truth. From there, he believed he could begin reconstructing a system of knowledge, free from all previous uncertainties.

But here's where Pascal enters the conversation with something crucial: there are some truths received by God — or by whatever you want to call the divine, the universal, the ineffable — that logic cannot conceive or make sense of. There are forms of knowledge that exist beyond rational proof, truths that we know in ways that precede and transcend logic.

This is where my meditation insight lives. In that space where knowing exists before proving.

The Science of Inheritance: DNA as Ancestral Memory

While discussing these ideas with my roommate, we got into a conversation about genetics and DNA — how they're not just physical blueprints but also encoding mechanisms for experiences and even metaphysical aspects that get passed down through generations.

This isn't just spiritual speculation. There's actual science here.

Epigenetics — the study of how behaviors and environment can cause changes that affect the way genes work — has shown that our DNA carries more than just instructions for eye color and height. Traumatic experiences, environmental stressors, even dietary patterns can create markers on our DNA that get passed to descendants. These experiences can literally alter gene expression in ways that affect you, even if you never experienced those events yourself.

The field of transgenerational epigenetic inheritance has demonstrated that experiences can be biologically embedded and transmitted across generations. It's as if our cells carry memories, our DNA holds stories that predate our conscious existence.

When I learned about this, I immediately thought of Tanjiro from Demon Slayer.

Demon Slayer and Cellular Memory

Throughout Demon Slayer, there are multiple moments where Tanjiro's presence, or something he says,  brings fear to the demons he faces. Not fear of him specifically, but a deeper, almost primordial fear. The demons themselves realize that it's the cells of their master, Muzan, embedded within them that are reacting to Tanjiro. Their bodies carry a memory, a recognition, a fear that exists at the cellular level.

The demons panic because they're experiencing something they don't consciously understand — a reaction that bypasses their awareness and comes directly from the very structure of their being. It's inherited fear. Genetic memory.

This is exactly what epigenetics suggests happens in real life. Our bodies carry memories that our minds may not consciously access. We react to things we've never personally experienced because our ancestors experienced them, and that information got encoded into our biological inheritance.

Bringing It All Together: The Coconut Tree Revelation

So let me connect all these threads:

If energy cannot be created nor destroyed — if it only transforms...

And if I'm watching descendants from a family go through similar circumstances across generations, though different in specific details...

And if I exist in the context of all in which I live and what came before me...

And if our DNA literally encodes ancestral experiences and passes them forward...

Then it stands to reason that I am indeed the amalgamation of the energies of my family line.

I am not a separate, isolated individual who spontaneously appeared with desires and purposes that are solely my own invention. I am a continuation. A transformation of energy that preceded me. The unresolved patterns, the inherited gifts, the ancestral wisdom, the generational trauma — all of it lives in me, through me, as me.

The desires I have for my life? They might be echoes of my grandmother's unfulfilled dreams. The purposes I create? They could be my grandfather's interrupted missions finding new form. The things I'm inexplicably drawn to? Perhaps they're callings that have been trying to manifest through my lineage for generations, finally finding in me the context and consciousness to actualize.

A Message from Black Is King

Recently, I re-watched Beyoncé's visual album Black Is King, and I've been completely consumed by the intention and messaging of the film. There's so much there that I'll be writing a separate blog post dedicated to unpacking it, but I need to mention a few quotes that moved me deeply and tie directly into this exploration:

"History is your future... one day you will meet yourself back where you started but stronger."

"No true king ever dies. Our ancestors hold us from within our bodies, guiding us through our reflections."

These words articulated something I was feeling but hadn't fully expressed. The idea that our ancestors aren't just gone, relegated to memory or spiritual metaphor. They're within us: in our bodies, our impulses, our reflections in the mirror. They're guiding us not from some distant realm but from the very cells that compose us.

And that final quote that I can't shake:

"Your roots and your story will be reborn."

What I'm Still Making Sense Of

This is something I'm still processing. Still sitting with. Still allowing it to unfold in my consciousness without forcing it into neat conclusions.

What I know is this: there's a profound awareness emerging in me about things I've known and felt intuitively but haven't fully realized or understood. Not yet.

The knowing came before the understanding. The feeling preceded the logic. And maybe that's exactly how it's supposed to work.

Pascal was right; there are truths that logic cannot fully conceive. Descartes was right, too; the certainty of our own consciousness is the one thing we can't doubt. And both of these things can be true simultaneously: I know this with certainty, and I cannot fully explain it through logic alone.

I am grateful to have pondered on all of this because it's bringing awareness to layers of existence, I knew were there but couldn't quite name. It's illuminating connections between science and spirituality, between individual experience and ancestral inheritance, between the immediate present and the long arc of generational time.

Energy never dies. It transforms. It continues. It finds new vessels, new expressions, new iterations of the same fundamental patterns.

And I am one of those expressions.

We all are.

As always, stay tricky, be open-minded, and get curious

  Until next time,

                                                                                                     Tricky Sol

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This is part of an ongoing exploration. I'll definitely be circling back to these ideas as they continue to unfold. If any of this resonates with you — or challenges you — I'd love to hear about it.