First up, "Minds trapped in rusted gears—beliefs sold as truth." What I’m getting at here is that a lot of people’s thinking isn’t really theirs. It’s old. Rusty. Outdated. Like gears from some ancient machine that’s been grinding away forever. And the problem is, these old beliefs—about life, success, power, whatever—get handed to us as if they’re the truth, no questions asked. You grow up inside the machine, and after a while, you forget you’re even stuck in it.

Then, "They mistook chains for compasses." This one’s kind of heartbreaking. It’s about how people take the things that actually limit them—like fear, obedience, shallow ambitions—and treat them like they’re guiding lights. Like, "This is how you succeed. This is what life’s about." But really, those things are just chains dressed up to look like tools for finding your way.

And then, "Systems aren’t cages until you polish the bars yourself." This is the kicker. Systems—society, politics, education, whatever—they're not automatically prisons. Until you start worshiping them, defending them without thinking, investing all your hope and identity into them. That’s when the cage locks shut. When you polish the bars—when you buy into the illusion and make the prison yours—that’s when you’re really trapped.

So yeah, the whole thing is basically me saying: most of the prisons we’re in are ones we help build, often without even realizing it. But the flip side? That also means we can break out—if we’re willing to see it.