Tabula Rasa, the Predictive Brain, and the Intelligence of Choosing Comfort
This album didn’t come from confusion.
It came from clarity.
On the Tabula Rasa tour—living simply, moving slowly, treating the RV as a kind of rolling ashram—I started noticing something the brain does with remarkable consistency and care.
It doesn’t chase truth first.
It chases safety.
The predictive brain is designed to reduce surprise. Surprise is expensive. Too much of it drains energy, raises stress, and leaves no room to imagine, create, or connect. So the brain makes a practical decision:
It tells itself stories.
On purpose.
Neuroscience sometimes calls these stories hallucinations. I don’t hear that as an insult. I hear it as admiration. These aren’t random errors. They’re intentional constructions—ways the mind softens reality just enough to stay functional, flexible, and human.
Hope.
Love.
Ritual.
Music.
Fate.
None of these are strict truths.
All of them are useful.
This album is not about exposing those lies.
It’s about respecting them.
Because once the nervous system feels safe—once surprise is lowered, and free energy is conserved—the mind does what it does best: it plays, it wonders, it sings.
Lies We Tell Ourselves On Purpose is a record about that choice.
Not denial.
Not delusion.
But consideration.
We don’t lie because we’re weak.
We lie because we’re wise enough to know timing matters.
🎶 How Each Track Fits the Journey
1. I Can Sing This Town – is the doorway into this album.
During my Tabula Rasa tour—living simply, treating the road as a kind of moving ashram—I came to understand something deeply freeing about the predictive brain. The mind is not a passive observer of reality. It actively constructs what is from past experience, body signals, and allostatic alignment. Its goal is safety. Its reward is peace.
That understanding changed everything.
When the brain feels safe—when surprise is reduced, and free energy is lowered—the mind becomes playful. Creative. Expressive. Unafraid to enter new rooms.
That’s what this song announces.
Frankly Spunk could walk into any arena—music, conversation, neuroscience, ethics, ETUNC, academia—and feel grounded, because the values remain intact. The coat could change. The style could shift. The truth underneath stays steady.
That steadiness produced my highest value: peace of mind.
And from peace comes hope.
This track opens the album by declaring that freedom.
Not bravado. Not performance.
But the calm confidence that comes from knowing who you are.
Which is why it closes with purpose:
Frankly… we don’t sing to fit in.
We sing so the room remembers itself.
2. Luck Is a Lady (Because Chaos Behaves Better with a Name)
When uncertainty gets a personality, it becomes less frightening.
Anthropomorphizing chaos is how the brain turns fear into flirtation—and trembling into motion.
3. Wishful Thinking Is the Cheapest Generator in the Room
When facts raise the rent, hope keeps the lights on.
Not truth—just enough glow to last the night and let the nervous system settle.
4. Superstition Is Pocket-Sized Confidence
Knock on wood. Wear the socks. Cross your heart.
Tiny rituals aren’t ignorance—they’re low-cost ways to tell the body it’s safe.
5. Love Is a Necessary Overstatement
“Forever” isn’t naïve—it’s catalytic.
Love often begins with exaggeration, so the body dares to invest before certainty arrives.
6. Stories Wear Better Than Statistics
The brain can’t live inside probabilities.
Stories compress uncertainty into something wearable—something human.
7. Music Is a Sanctioned Hallucination
Rhythm is the one illusion we agree to share.
Music synchronizes bodies, lowers stress, and lets us feel safe together without explanation.
8. Romance Beats Reality (Admission Required)
We overpredict joy on purpose.
Without romance, nothing starts. Reality corrects later—but only after motion.
9. It’ll Work Out (A Neural Ceasefire)
Not belief. Not certainty.
A truce—where error checking pauses and the body is allowed to rest.
10. Fate Is Cognitive Tailoring (Meant to Be)
“Meant to be” isn’t destiny—it’s compression.
Fewer branches. Less noise. A story the mind can carry forward.
11. The Gentle Lie That Saves the Day
Some lies don’t deceive.
They escort us—holding our hand until the truth is safe to hear.