The Layman's Answers to Everything

The meaning of life according to some guy who likes TV and stuff.

One of the recurring themes of Lost, involves a character named Desmond who is able to jump his consciousness around to the past and future of his life. Last season, Desmond’s mind traveled back in time with his memories in tact. This enabled him to predict everything that would happen as he remembered it. Last week, the consciousness from Desmond’s past jumped into his present, and had no idea what was going on. If you think this is confusing, I’m only scratching the surface of this episode.

Like the writers of Lost, I’ve always been fascinated with the idea of being able to communicate with the past and future versions of ourselves. In fact, the main character in my (currently on the back burner) book, The Layman’s Answers to Everything*, decides to put the theory into practice by giving advice and sending out warnings to his past-self, in hopes it will avoid certain pitfalls and take advantage of opportunities that he hadn’t. The character’s main motive in doing this, is that he believes that if he continues to send out messages to his past self, his future self will send out messages to him, helping him to avoid pitfalls and take advantage of opportunities that his future self had missed (or, possibly had not missed, but just wanted to confirm that it was a good move).

If all this sounds like science fiction, I actually make a pretty good argument in the book why such a possibility is currently supported by quantum theory. But, I digress. The point is, I’d like to put this little experiment into practice right now by answering questions from my past self, and seeing if I can get any answers from my future self.

During my last update (12/17/2007), my past self asked my future self (now my present self) five questions, four of which I now have the answers to. Let’s revisit them now, shall we?

Past Marc asks:

My next update will be in March. By then I’ll likely know:

1) When did the strike end?
A good question Past Marc. The strike officially ended February 12^th, 2008. It would’ve been nice if it had gone a few months longer, but I’ll take what I can get.

2) When did Lost begin and how will the season likely run?
Switching from Wednesdays at 9PM to Thursday’s at 10PM, Lost Season 4 began on January 31^st. The eight episodes that were completed before the strike will run until March 20^th.  The show will then take a five-week break and return on April 24^th. It will then run five more episodes until May 22^nd. So, there will only be a total of thirteen episodes this season instead of the scheduled sixteen. The three lost Lost episodes will likely be added to next season, bringing its count to nineteen. Of the three possible scenarios I came up with in my last update, the reality is closest to the first, except I never thought they’d truncate the season. Instead, I figured they’d run the episodes into June—which still may happen if they can’t complete the episodes in time.

3) Did the 8 episodes from Season 4 do damage to my theory?
So far, so good Past Marc. Since I’m expecting my content edit back from my editor soon, I decided to send out this update a couple weeks early. For this reason, I only have info on six of the eight scheduled episodes. Of all the information that’s been revealed so far this season, I’d say ninety percent of it has either supported or been neutral to my theory, and ten percent has not supported it.  Thankfully, there have also been significantly less bad blows (i.e. Ben’s stash of cash and passports) than huge victories (i.e. confirmation that Desmond is only time-traveling in his mind, the boat belonging to Widmore, Hurley seeing Charley in the outside world, etc.)  Even better, so far, all of the issues can be explained by my theory. As I’ve said though, even if the theory is completely wrong, it does manage to explain everything, is very interesting, and is positioned as an alternate theory in the book.**

4) How much re-writing the attorney/ editor suggested I do?
I have mixed feelings about the theory anyway, because the attorney said I’m better off if it’s completely wrong. Then again, perhaps getting a claim would be a blessing in disguise, adding mega-publicity to a book that “Spills the Answers to Lost.” So again, I’m in a pretty good position here. Still, I did make some changes to the book per the attorney’s suggestions in hopes I could win a lawsuit if it comes to that. As far as how many changes the editor suggested I make during the initial evaluation, the answer is, a lot. But most of them were technical, grammatical, syntactical, and concerned with getting more sources. Unfortunately, most of my sources came from my brain or Wikipedia, so I wasn’t able to add much. I’m still waiting on changes from the line-by-line content edit. That’s the biggie.

5) When will the book likely be released?
I don’t know this yet. Mostly depends on how much longer the content edit takes and how long it takes me to go through all those red pixels. iUniverse says it usually takes about three months from start to finish. Since I submitted the manuscript the end of January, that would put it at the end of April. Future Marc? Any idea?

Future Marc Says:
Actually, it took until June, but this was actually kind of a goal for you for spiritual reasons that you’ll discuss in your next update just before the book comes out.

Cool, I can deal with June. Just out of curiosity, I don’t see how the folks at Lost can write, shoot, edit, and air five more episodes by April 24th. They’re gonna come back a bit later right?

Sorry Past Marc, they did it. But the episodes did feel rushed in my opinion.

Oooh, speaking of the episodes, who’s Ben’s man on the boat, who are the fifth and sixth members of the Oceanic Six, and will we find out who’s in the coffin by the end of the season, if so, who is it???

Michael is on the boat, the fifth and six members of the Oceanic Six are Jin and Sun, and yes, in the season finale, we found out who’s in the coffin. Just in case some of your readers want to be surprised, I’ll tell you later.

Fine. Any heads up you can give me about possible reveals that will wreak havoc on my theory or sub theories?

There are a couple doozies, but nothing we won’t be able to explain away.

That’s cool I guess. Oh, will the folks at Lost/ABC/Bad Robot Productions, be suing me over the book?

For that information, I’ll have to ask my future self. It’s June now. So far, no.

Okay, I have so many other questions, but I guess I’ll keep it to just one. A tarot card reading I had said I’d be meeting a blonde girl by the name of Tracy that I’d be dating—any truth to that?

Dude, you should get your money back. She was wrong on just about everything.

All righty then. Well, I guess next time we’ll find out how well my gut-instinct future self answered those questions. Until then—

Holy shit Past Marc!! There’s something you absolutely HAVE to know!!!

What!!??

Ha ha. Nothing man, just keeping you on yer toes.

Well, I guess I’m glad to see I won’t lose my trade-marc inappropriate sense of humor in the next three months.

Still in tact. Jeeze, I’m so glad I’m not you with those freaking content edit fixes you gotta do coming up!

Shut up or I’ll draw something on my face in permanent marker!

You wouldn’t!

Yeah, you’re right. I guess you know me too well. Anyway, it’s time to sign off…

Sounds good.

May your inner spark grow to light your way,

Marc(s)

*New People:

If you aren’t familiar with the story, here’s a brief synopsis:

The Layman’s Answers To Everything is a spiritual comedy (or spiromedy) about an unlucky guy who believes he’s meant to do something amazing, but has no idea what it is. After experiencing many challenges and meeting a bizarre cast of characters, he stumbles upon secret messages hidden in TV, movies, and music that are aimed at guiding humanity. Using these messages, he starts a new religion which changes his life, and ultimately, the world. This is so much more than just a story though, because throughout the journey, we learn how to discover and fulfill our own destiny using the clues of the universe that are all around us.

I truly feel this book is going to make a real impact on the world, and set into motion a spiritual domino effect that’ll help change it for the better. And judging from the way the world is heading, I’m thinking that changing the way we’re heading would be a good thing, no? If you don’t agree, or would just prefer not to get any further emails from me, just let me know, and I’ll take you off the list—no hard feelings. Of course, I can’t promise that my book won’t track you down and find you anyway, but you have a while yet to worry about that.

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**The LOST book is called, The Myth of LOST: Solving the Mysteries and Understanding the Wisdom. It not only reveals a solution that explains all the mysteries of the show, it also explains how the show’s wisdom can be applied to our real lives.