Realms. How we position.

“How we position.” Seems to call for an object, “What?” before we can get into wondering about “how;” or even, who “we” are; we want to know what.

The Space We Need

Art school was where I learned that success was a trap. How limited my teachers were. Experts. Hemmed in by reduction. It would take thirty-five years for this to sink in. Not surprising if you consider the trajectory of the intervening decades, beginning with the height of their positions at the time. The accumulated authority

Awe and Wonder

It’s customary to link awe with shock these days. “Shock & Awe!” Followed by that grimacing grin primates and dogs instinctively make when something that pleases them also uncovers a deep well of shame. The look we came to identify with W…. Shock & Awe would come to be the signature spell of the late

Uncertainty and Cause & Effect

There’s something tickling out there at the confluence of our refusal to accept uncertainty and our belief in cause & effect. Even here, as I ponder these two concepts, I’m falling into the expectation that relation equals cause. I was about to say that we refuse uncertainty – vehemently, violently, with suicidal insistence – because

The Proprioception of Power

Finding what needs to be said is a challenge. In large part it requires letting go of reacting to things and getting caught-up in complaining. Chasing disappointment… It requires allowing the force of what is not being said to make itself felt. This is a combination of internal listening with sampling what comes to us

Coherent Action, from unintended consequences to catalytic response.

We struggle with unintended consequences. In frustration we turn to chasing after power to force our will to prevail. We enter a spiral of increasing suffering and greater dislocation as the violence this process unleashes destroys every remaining scrap of coherent life. Blinded to our delusion by delusion, we increase our efforts. We twist and

A Space for Community

Art, even more so than craft, cannot be contained by technique. If you think, “I know what I’m doing!” You’re either mistaken or you are killing whatever art you might have been capable of creating. Hampered your capacity to enter an involvement in an act of creation. An artist’s materials can be a useful medium

“Why Is It Important for You That History Have a Direction?”

This question is asked by John Michael Greer in a reply to a comment on his most recent post. He has been slogging through the log-jam of our cultural resistance to abandoning the bi-polar insistence that we are bound either to Heaven or Hell, Utopia or dystopia. That if we cannot have our heart’s desire

After Comfort

We have resigned ourselves to accept that life’s purpose is to chase after comfort. This leaves us in a very uncomfortable position. We begin to prod and peer to see what might come after comfort…. Money, power, agreement, advantage; these all promise comfort. The key here is in promise. In our appetite for comfort we

The Urge to Start Over

What I’m asking… * What I’m asking… is to fulfill the frustrated need I had as a child, to be able to trust, and receive without doubt, guidance and direction. Guidance and direction I could accept as being in my best interest. This is probably the most important request I have after a childhood need

What is innocence?

It seems we consider innocence to be a state of ignorance, held at no fault of our own, in which we are not acting out a power-play, or negotiating within the bounds of a power struggle; but acting out of a clean regard. We consider innocence to be an immature quality, but one we look

Notes On Ritual

Some years ago, a dozen? Maybe more, I had an insight regarding ritual. I was thinking about the way Norse boatbuilders carved intricate designs on their craft. They were almost proto modern in so many other ways, creating boats that are still marvels when approached along our common notions of form following function. The Norse