This is a chilling mirror of our digital lives. We spend hours in the “Live View” of screens—Instagram, TikTok, X—where the axis of reality is deliberately broken. A friend is happy, then devastated, then wealthy, then destitute, all in 15 seconds. The algorithm thrives on axis drift because disorientation increases engagement (the user keeps scrolling to find stable ground).

Without a fixed axis—a core principle, a moral north, or a stable identity—the observer becomes nauseated by the flow. We scroll endlessly, but we do not navigate. We see everything, but we comprehend nothing because our point of view shifts with every new post.

So, ask yourself: In the live view of your life today, which axis is fixed? Is it your integrity? Your curiosity? Your love for someone? If the answer is “none,” do not be surprised if the picture is too shaky to bear.

To fix an axis is to choose a primary lens. An artist might fix the aesthetic axis (beauty as the constant) while allowing ethics and logic to be variable. A scientist fixes the empirical axis (data as the constant) while allowing beauty to be incidental. The error of our age is the belief that we should keep all axes loose to be “open-minded.” In truth, a mind without a fixed axis is not open; it is shattered. However, the command “Axis Fix” is not gentle. It implies force. To fix an axis is to resist the natural drift of entropy. In relationships, to fix the axis of loyalty means you remain oriented toward a partner even when the “Live View” of the relationship shows difficulty or boredom. In politics, to fix the axis of human dignity means you oppose cruelty even when the “Live View” of public opinion shifts toward vengeance.

This requires a kind of beautiful rigidity. The danger, of course, is rigor mortis. A fixed axis that never recalibrates is a tyranny. The gyroscope is useless if it is welded in place; it must be allowed to precess (shift slowly) in response to the Earth’s rotation.