The Fakir had cultivated the venom of his winged cobra with such care and erudition that connoisseurs of the ecstatic delights gained from poison came from all corners of the kingdom to sample its bite. As is frequently the case among addicts there were those who overestimated their resilience to tolerate the effects of the reptilian substance. Feeling the pinch of the Uraeus at the base of the spine and subsequent flooding of the sensorium with inexplicable tinglings, sensing the emanations of the stars, was known, in some, to cause madness and death.
So the Fakir Srikanth was never surprised when his assistant Legrange, a dirty French emigre, had to drag another casualty down to the bone yards alongside the river. The first time a corpse came back, blackened but not burned, revivified, breathing, intact, it did surprise him. It was a strong venom indeed which took a man so deep into a coma as to resembled death. Of these cases, and there were only a few, the celebrant of the serpentine mysteries often reported such vivid encounters in the supernal realms as to defy even the the Fakir’s ratiocination. With supreme dread and fear he reluctantly sent the poisoned back out into the world. They had been torn apart and were in need of healing. Yet he was no healer. His hand was not for mending. They walked away from his shack, back into the desert, wounds gaping wide. He rued that word from these few fortunate unfortunates would somehow spread, and the respect he had earned for genetically engineering such fine specimens as the winged snake would be ruined. Only the opposite was true, and those who had been so close to becoming ash came back to test once again their temper and strength against the fire of the serpents venom. And they brought with them devotees eager to submit themselves to the hand of chance, people fervent to partake of the miracle themselves. So it was that many pilgrims began slithering to the Fakir’s once humble dwelling. And so his pride began to swell as did his purse with gifts received from the many petitioners desirous of the ineffable poison. Indeed, his now frequent visits to the brothel, his commanding swagger and sway among the people of the nearby village who feared his art, all combined to attract the attentions of the Heresiarch. The electric chair of the inquisitors had been sitting dry for many a year as the populace had finally succumbed to his lashings. Yet the Heresiarch was eager for the high he got when he made another man taste the juice. There was nothing quite like watching eyeballs boil to a blister in the socket. When he want to the Fakir’s dwelling he hadn’t counted on being taken in by the strange rhythms of the circle of snake charmers whose somnolent pipings now attended the increasingly elaborate services of the Fakir. Soon he was among them, the sweating poor and merchants alike, among the warriors and converted priests, among the flying reptiles amidst the celebrants. All burned with violent inebriation. The snakes were hungry and ready to pounce.
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Sometimes I eat books in my sleep. It’s a side effect from frequent visits to the Great Inner Library. During a weekend nap in late April I was browsing the Three Hands Press website. In my dream I found a book that isn’t a part of their physical catalog. It was called Healing Techniques of Ancient Ireland. I put this book into my stomach. Non-physical books have a different gestation rate than the ones we read with our eyes, but the thing about them is the whole body & soul ends up absorbing this knowledge, which later trickles, or floods as the case may be, into waking life.
The next week at my day job in the library I felt an intuitive nudge to have a look at some of the works of Rosalie K. Fry, most famous for her book The Secret of Ron Mor Skerry, later adapted for the screen by John Sayles into the charming and magical The Secret of Roan Inish. I’d always wanted to read it, but as it turned out the institution I work for didn’t have a copy. Yet it still pays to go digging in the stacks for Children’s books & novels which are no longer popular. The book I ended up borrowing from the stacks by Fry was Whistler In the Mist, first published in 1968. The language is simple. The story is set in Wales, in the valleys and hills around the Black Mountain. It takes us deep into the folklore surrounding faery contacts, their interaction with humans, and the founding of an ancestral line who become the guardians of a body of herbal lore, some eventually to become doctors. Such a story has put me to ponder on the ways humans have often received knowledge and guidance from Otherworld beings, how certain arts and sciences seem to be bestowed on humanity, and into certain family lineages and traditions. It also makes me think about how many people in the world have strains of Otherworld blood in them? How many people have that streak of the fey coursing through their veins? Of course in asking such a question, I would in no way be promoting any of the racist shenanigans perpetrated by some esoteric groups who are better left unnamed. Besides, the role of herbs in healing was greater for all of our ancestors, no matter an individuals specific genetic descent. It’s only been since the advent of industrial culture that medicines have moved further away from their original sources, from ns, forests, glens, and gardens to become chemical composites of strange unpronounceable names manufactured in factories. Part of the back story in Whistler In the Mist is that the young heroines ancient ancestor on her mom’s side was actually the Lady in the Lake. This story is based on a traditional tale associated with the Llyn y Fan Fach, one of two lakes folded into the Black Mountain. The son of a widow from the nearby town of Blaen Sawdde agreed to marry a beautiful girl who arose from the lake. As is typical of Faery stories a stipulation is laid upon him, that if he hits the lady three times she will return to the lake. This eventually happens, as he strikes her in admonishment for things such as laughing at a funeral and crying at a wedding. The faery’s think and feel differently than us and the Lady of the Lake was not accustomed to our learned social behaviors. By the time the widows son had hit her three times she had already born him children. So it is with sadness she returns to the lake. From time to time her kids to go to the lake and she instructs them in herbal lore (among other things), and one son in particular, Rhiwallon. He, with his brothers, eventually went on to the court of Rhys Gryg where they became the famous Physicians of Myddfai beginning a tradition of handing down this knowledge from one generation to another. A number of their herbal recipes and medical formulas were preserved in The Red Book of Hergest. I knew about none of this before reading The Whistler in the Mist. With regards to my dream about Healing Techniques of Ancient Ireland, I had begun searching around on the internets and in library search engines for material on this subject. In doing so I came across a fascinating article by Rosari Kingston, An Overview of the Irish Herbal Tradition: The Thread That Could Not Be Broken. One section of Rosari’s essay is devoted to Irish Medical Families. The passing on of skills in doctoring was hereditary in nature. Each of the four counties of Ireland had a number of doctoring families. She writes, “Ó hÍceadha (Hickey) and Ó Leighin (Lane) mean literally healer and leech respectively. [A “leech” was a traditional title given to some Irish doctors -from their practice of using leeches to bleed patients.] How many people with the above names today, realize that they are descendants of the great Irish hereditary medical families?” And it makes me wonder in particular if the Irish medical families have any surviving stories involving the impartation of knowledge from the Otherworld? Specifically stories of the intermarriage of Faery and Human, as in the Welsh example? Whatever the case may be, there is one thing we can be certain of. Stories have the power to preserve in memory the vital knowledge of healing with plants. In connecting with the plant powers we may also deepen our relationship to the Land in general, and by connecting further to the Land I believe it is possible to make contact with some of the Faery beings who also make a home here -partially in this world, partially in the Other. In remedying ourselves with herbal treatments we can also remedy our relationship to the wide world of plants and begin to explore those spectrum’s of consciousness existing beyond the human. One of the books I’ve been reading is Nigel Pennick‘s The Celtic Sacred Landscape. Near the beginning it had this quote from the British Triads that struck me and stuck me about the three principle endeavours of a Bard:
“The Three Principle Endeavours of a A Bard: One is to learn and collect sciences; the second is to teach; and the third is to make peace and put an end to all injury; for to do contrary to these things is usual or becoming to a Bard.” I feel this is such a powerful statement of what a Bard should do and be, and what a person setting out to embody the way of the Bard should aspire to, that it would make a good subject for meditation. So I meditated on each in turn, using the discursive method of meditation. A Bard is to learn and collect sciences. I started by contemplating some of the sciences I am collecting myself. I thought about each of the seven liberal arts and how they are useful not only to a Bard, but to the community a Bard is in service to. I also felt, while meditating, that learning discursive meditation will help my public speaking skills -public speaking in turn being affected by knowledge of rhetoric and grammar. Ecology, permaculture, and design-science will also be useful in my Bardic toolkit. I thought of Magic as one of the main sciences of the Bard. A Bard is a teacher. In my meditation on the Bard as a teacher, I mused on how a Bard must not only be a keeper of sacred memory and lore, but a transmitter of it as well. Knowledge is not to be hoarded, but used and shared. Stories, songs and poems all can be used as containers for sacred knowledge, and can affect a person on many levels. They are also one of the best ways to teach people, because a good story, song, or poem engages a person on all levels of being. It can effect them emotionally, intellectually, spiritually which in turn can have physical effects on the body. By encoding the keys to the Inner worlds in the artifacts of culture, these keys will be preserved forever, opening the doorways to those worlds for successive generations. It’s strange to think of SF author and digital activist Cory Doctorow in terms of Bardism, but I do love his storytelling. One of the things I enjoy the most about reading Cory’s fiction books, is how much I learn about a whole plethora of subjects by reading a wonderful story. Those of us storytellers who are also occultists and practitioners of magic can do the same thing: teach people about magic in the guise of a grand story. A Bard makes peace and puts an end to all injury. One of the thing Bard’s used to do -in societies and cultures that still upheld this role- was to commemorate the good deeds of leaders and satirize the failings of those who did wrong to clan and troth. We see the satirists at work today as comedians who often have some of the most insightful views on politics. I don’t keep up too much with stand up comedy, but the late George Carlin and Bill Hicks are prime examples of this in action. I’m not sure if they created peace per se, but with precision they pointed out the glaring hypocrisies at work in our industrial culture. This needs to be done, and humor is one tool to combat the darkness. By bringing levity in to ourselves, and sharing it with others, we give ourselves strength to face the many injustices of the world. A Bard, through her or his eloquence, can also be a peacekeeper through the magical act of goodly speech. Through words they can act as mediators between two hostile camps -whether they be political parties, fundamentalist religious groups, gangs, or a married couple in the heat of a dispute. These are some of the areas a contemporary may be called upon to work in as a peace maker and mediator. A Bard is very much a mediator in many ways, transferring energy from the Innerworlds to this Worlds-Realm as needed, working in unconditional service. Education in the true sense, of course, is an enablement to serve-both the living human community in its natural household or neighborhood and the precious cultural possessions that the living community inherits or should inherit. To educate is, literally, to ‘bring up,’ to bring young people to a responsible maturity, to help them to be charitable toward fellow creatures. Such an education is obviously pleasant and useful to have; that a sizable number of humans should have it is probably also one of the necessities of human life in this world. And if this education is to be used well, it is obvious that it must be used some where; it must be used where one lives, where one intends to continue to live; it must be brought home.” –Wendell Berry, Higher Education and Home Defense, in Home Economics
Begin from the Hearth Stone The idea of developing the seven liberal arts within myself has come about in a response to a need to correct imbalances within the development of my intellect and skill set. It has arisen as a keen need to create a greater sense of harmonious proportion within me, and from a desire to develop myself more fully as an individual. In doing so I can play on my strengths and use them to firm up my weaknesses. In a traditional classical education the idea was to create a well-rounded life. Immense personal satisfaction can be enjoyed by bringing forth the abilities that lie dormant within all of us. If doing this is in turn approached from a sense of making yourself more available to give back and be of service to the world, all the better. The planet is in need of individuals and groups of individuals who are engaged with the arts and sciences to help re-enchant the world. Pursuing this goal should not be looked at as a task separate from the rest of life. Often times in our divided world it does feel this way. These splits between work life, home life, hobbies, and other “extra-curricular” activities are part of what needs to be healed. The fine lines humans make between our pursuits do not exist as such in the greater world of nature, but are rather part of an ecological web. Personal development in the seven liberal arts or any other system can be approached first by centering them in the home economy. Home Economics is the foundation stone from which the seven liberal arts will emerge. The home also provides a reason to learn the seven liberal arts in the first place. They can be employed to defend this earth home, and to enrich the experience of life. To learn the seven liberal arts it has become necessary to make them a part of my household budget. An Ecological Budget The thing about making a budget is you work to keep it balanced and out of the red. Just as the planet is a whole system built up out of finite resources, a person exists within a web of relationships, responsibilities, and resources. As humans our bodies are systems of cells and organs. The body lives in the system of a home, itself a made up of multiple people, whether a nuclear or blended and extended family. The family draws on resources and energy inputs from both near and abroad. In the contemporary American setting the majority of households act like leaches, sponging off the planet around them, while outputting little of value. The scales are out of balance. This can be redressed by relearning the traditional skills associated with husbandry and homemaking –or the more romantic appellation, hearthkeeping. We can began to produce things at home for own immediate benefit once again. When the household ecology is strong and bountiful enough we may find we even have a surplus to share, barter or sell within the circle of community. Homes that do so will become nodes of resilience, strong points in the web, patches that have been rebuilt and restored. A regenerative home will be able to help strengthen connections throughout the web of life. The model of a regenerative household, based on ecological thinking and informed by the principles of permaculture or other systems-based natural philosophies is a microcosm for learning about the larger universe. The front door of a house opens inwards and outwards on the world. A comfortable home invites guests, but also from time to time requires departures, pilgrimages to learn in the greater collegium of the bioregion, country and world. On the return from the voyage the home is replenished by gifts, whether goods from abroad or the enrichment of a soul broadened by exposure to foreign lands and culture. Yet I can think of no other place as neglected in these times as the home. It can be argued that a culture that embraces the pleasures and politics of place is reemerging, as much from dissatisfaction with the status quo as from the increasing ecological and economic necessity. They remain on the fringe and in the minority. That minority will expand as the pressures of survival in a crumbling American empire build, as jobs in the so-called service industry disappear (what service are fast food restaurants and big box stores doing except creating a populace afraid to use their own minds and hands?). At the same time there are still many people who believe in the myth of American progress and a national dream whose realization has depended on slavery, sweat shops, the exploitation of animals, non-renewable resources, and the desecration of life in general. I don’t believe in the efficacy of mass movements, of protesting what the corporations and centralized government are doing wrong when we aren’t willing to change ourselves. They have their place as a tool among an engaged citizenship. Protest movements such as the recent Occupy hullaballoo fall flat when the so-called resistors of hegemony continue to embrace a lifestyle predicated on imperial tribute. They can do much better by taking visible steps to commit to the values they espouse. Furthermore a positive self-reliance has long been an American value. It has seen much neglect in our willingness to outsource jobs and tasks once done inside the comforting walls of a home. By reengaging the home economy, people can begin the process detaching our fangs from the bloating corpse of the Earth. Instead of living purely as predators, parasite and competitors, we can shift towards cultivating a personal strength that will then branch outwards to mutualism. Any meaningful change must begin with ourselves in the place where we find ourselves now. This is why I am distrustful of the upward mobility encouraged by careerist universities and the businesses and corporations they cater to who would shuffle people around the country and across the planet in a way that discourages them from ever putting down roots. Rootlessness destroys the soil and leads to stem rot. When you don’t have a stake in the long term well-being of a plot of land, whether it be a house on a street in a neighborhood of a city, or a farm bounded by hedges, fences, and stone walls in a large watershed, it won’t hurt you personally to see a stand of trees chopped down to make room for another Walmart. It is upsetting to hear so many talented people leave a place to seek out real or imagined opportunities elsewhere. This has been referred to as “the great American brain drain” where the educated classes move from their places of origin to cities where jobs in the information economy exist, for the time being. When a person is unsettled they are more unwilling to make strong connections to people, because it is harder to drift away to the next place when heart strings have formed attachments. By contrast, when a person commits to living in one place for life they develop a sense of protection and identity that fuses with the land. From this they may be called to do work to heal imbalances and damage to the land and to do service work in family and community. This negligent rootlessness is mirrored in the way people treat marriage and relationships. People, like places, become mere products. If they do not give a suitable return, or if our pleasure in them goes through a difficult phase, they are discarded. Products are replaceable. The unfortunate side effect is that we never develop the enduring love which can be built from working, living and being in a place with the people who are already there. This is not to denigrate respectful travel and pilgrimage across the Earth, or to belittle the needful development of friendships in fields of interest where those who could learn and share much with each other are distant geographically. Rather it is to approach life and what we pursue in it from a home base, restored both in honor and in function. I just finished listening to Hood by Stephen R. Lawhead today. I feel it was important for me to listen to this first installment of the King Raven trilogy to fully absorb through the ears the bardic transmission it embodies. Lawhead is a true bard, and in this retelling of the classic tale, he peels back through layers of historical accumulation to reveal the mighty power at the heart of the greenwood.
One of the things that I love about Lawhead’s Pendragon Cycle was that he was adept at mixing in tales from the Mabinogion, as told by a bard in the story as often as not, into the larger tale he was telling. It’s a great way to encounter the stories for the first time or again if you are already familiar with them. It is also simply an excellent practice in storytelling, to weave the tale-within-a-tale. Embroidering his novels with these tales of the Otherworld gives the retelling of the stories, whether of Taliesin, Merlin and King Arthur, or Robin Hood added heft. The main character of Hood, Bran ap Brychan, heir to the throne of Elfael, becomes something of an avatar of Bran the Blessed, swooping down on unsuspecting Norman invaders in his cloak of raven black feathers after he is driven into hiding, taken for dead. The first volume of the series shows his transformation from a king unwilling to take on the responsibility of ruling his Land, of someone who wants to flee because the invaders are out for his life, into a person who ultimately gives himself over to being of service to the people of the cantref he was heir to. This transformation begins within himself but is brought to fruition through the sometimes gentle, sometimes stern and blunt ministrations of Angharad, an old crone of the forest whom we later learn is the Banfaith of Elfael or True Bard of Britain. It is when she sings to him the story of Bran the Blessed, while he recovers from a serious injury in her cave, that the stirrings in his soul eventually make the lead of his unformed nature into a torc of gold fit to inspire and uphold the people so that they may work together to reclaim their usurped land. And for the person who is open to the power of this book it can exact a change in them as well. Not only do I feel a renewed connection to the wonder and beauty of Welsh lore, but a deepening sense of commitment in connecting to the Land and kindred. The next book in the trilogy, Scarlet, seems like it will up the ante of long bow guerilla warfare action, and I can’t wait to get into it. There is a lot of good information about archery and the long bow encoded into this book. It speaks to me now on many levels as I’ve been working with the images of the Wildwood Tarot. (The suits of Swords and Wands have been replaced with Bows and Arrows.) While listening to this book I couldn’t help but recall with fondness a recent post by Gordon about the Folk Saint Dwynwen. She isn’t mentioned in the book, but the story does unfold in a time when as Gordon wrote in his post describing this period in Wales, “stories of elves and sunken cities, pagan pantheism and otherworlds mixed with the pre-hellfire civilising mission of early Christianity like milk into coffee… when Jesus’s mission was still radical and civilising on an individual level, when it slipped into an indigenous cosmology of magic, reincarnation and wandering rune masters.” Over the course of listening to this while at work for a week and a half, an hour or two here, an hour or two there, I had a dream visitation from an ancient Welsh monk. It got me thinking about the concept of an Ecostery again. Two quotes from the website of The Ecostery Foundation suggest what this form of monastic life might become. “Ecosteries are loved places where ecological values, knowledge and wisdom are learned, practiced and shared. They are sacred, respected and honored dwelling places.” & “The ecostery and land trust are two examples of social organizations worth investments of time, energy and contributions. Both…empower participants in their daily lives…. The ecostery concept derives its origin from monastic forms of land based communities…. Monastic form has possibilities for decentralized, more or less self-sustaining communities, committed to work on bioregional restoration over long periods of time, without demand for profits or centralized power.” Having read of Welsh monks in the work of Lawhead -as well as in the lovable Brother Cadfael series of whodunnits- I can foresee the development of Ecosteries working to rebuild distraught bioregions -informed by the magic of the Druid Revival, the awakening of Witchblood, and other esoteric knowledge. The work of the Bard is to help quicken us into action, inspire noble deeds, and heal severed connections through the power of story. As a former student of Antioch, and as an initiate into the mysteries of Thelema, I had always been struck by the name of Antioch’s first president, Horace Mann, as if it were prescient about the influx of energies represented by the Thelemic concept of the Aeon of Horus. The names Horus and Horace have the same phonetic sound, a rather flimsy board to build a proposition on, and yet to me it seemed like a clue to a deeper relationship.
In Egyptian mythology Horus is the Child God and in the religious philosophy of Thelema the Aeon of Horus is seen to be a time when humanity will reach a stage of self-actualization. Self-actualization depends on self-realization, or the inner understanding of an authentic self, to a large degree. A well designed education enables a person to draw out this authentic self, and can perhaps even assist an individual to discover their True Will. It’s about growing up to our true potential. The Aeon of Horus represents that time when humanity begins the process of growing up, en masse. Awakening human potential is the task of all great teachers. Aleister Crowley’s dream, despite what else one might think of his personality, was to see humanity embrace the potential each of us had when born as a child. Horace Mann shared a similar dream and his life as a teacher was dedicated to the cause of education reform. It was his hope to bring children of all social classes together in the classroom. Through his work in establishing the Common School movement, he helped America build one of the finest public school systems in the world. In 1838 he founded The Common School Journal in which he critiqued the than extant public schools and the issues they had. To bring about the reforms he had in mind Horace laid out six main principles to guide schools, teachers and public opinion in this regard. He argued, “(1) the public should no longer remain ignorant; (2) that such education should be paid for, controlled, and sustained by an interested public; (3) that this education will be best provided in schools that embrace children from a variety of backgrounds; (4) that this education must be non-sectarian; (5) that this education must be taught by the spirit, methods, and discipline of a free society; and (6) that education should be provided by well-trained, professional teachers.” Mann also worked for more numerous and better equipped school houses, longer years of schooling (until 16 years old), a higher pay for teachers, and a wider curriculum. If a person looks at the process of education as a practice of gardening, with human potential as the cultivar, I wonder what Horace Mann would think of the beds he planted in their current state? The school system he helped put into place is now overgrown and in shambles, sprouting only the occasional flower. Higher education is in a situation just as bad, merely providing training for jobs that no longer exist, or that will cease to exist in the process of energy descent. With few exceptions, neither public schools or college and university are doing the work of helping people learn how to think. Meanwhile practical training in trades that will serve humanity down the long slope of empire fall and industrial decline have been scrapped in favor of courses whose abstract ruminations will do nothing to feed a cold and starving humanity. Furthermore the discontinuation of teaching Home Economics, either at school, or at home where it begins by example, is going to leave a lot of folks scrambling, as piece by piece, disaster by disaster, the empire crumbles. And isn’t rebuilt. In this environment self-directed education is a practical alternative. Where viable, the path of solitary learning can be augmented with one-on-one student/teacher and mentoring relationships (where some of the best learning takes place in both student and teacher), weekend workshops, correspondence courses, study groups, and when necessary single courses at existing schools. But why do any of this? In a world that has conjured up a unique shit storm of endemic crises, it remains much easier to numb oneself with the multiple diversions available, whether of the drug addled chemical variety, or non-stop commercial infotainment (but for how long?). Eventually the program will be over and as the buzz begins to wear off America is going to find itself with a massive hangover, the many signs of which have already appeared. We should have switched to water a couple of drinks back to save us from half a day of agony. There will still be painful situations to confront no matter what we do. The choice we have now is whether or not to face them with a clear head and with an armful of skills to stand us in good stead when a crisis erupts, as it will, or to keep on staring down the barrel of a gun, all the while pretending it is not loaded. We should work not only to awaken our human potential and learn skills that will serve us and our our own satisfaction when executed, but will be of service to our fellows and to the planet. As the American empire continues to fall, and as industrial culture worldwide goes down the jagged steps of decline, many of our present achievements are in danger of being lost. In order to take the best of what American and industrial culture in general, has done that is of positive value, forward into future generations requires individuals to take up the responsibility of becoming conscious vessels of memory and bearers of culture. At a time when generational thinking has been shunned in favor of instant gratification it will be necessary to shed the short sighted behaviors which have made a long term mess for the planet and its future inhabitants. This sense of accountability can be roused when we become aware of the spiritual aspects of our selves, and of the multidimensional ecology our world is a part of. The Downside of the Age of the Child In his Baccalaureate Address of 1857 Horace Mann wrote, “Every man has an animal nature, a lower tier of endowments, adapted to subordinate uses and gratifications. But all gratifications of this class are limited in their extent and short in their duration, and the universal law by which they are governed is that over-indulgence produces under-enjoyment. As we rise to the second order of faculties –the intellectual- the circuit or amplitude of gratifications is enlarged, their duration is prolonged, and the exquisiteness of enjoyment is enhanced. But it is only when a man becomes conscious of his divine capabilities; it is only when his moral and religious nature awakens or is awakened into activity that the area of his delights expands into boundlessness, that those delights become coextensive with eternity and brim to overflowing his ever-increasing capacities of rapture and ecstasy.” Horace Mann’s three orders of natural endowment have a rough parallel in Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Mann’s first tier corresponds to the first two levels on Maslow’s pyramid, the physiological needs for food, sex, sleep and excretion as well as the safety of body, health, property, the family, and employment. Because of the hyper affluence of industrial societies, the pervasive influences of media and advertising, and the ready availability for most of physiological and safety needs, we have come to be ruled by exacerbated passions. This plays out as over indulgence in food, drink, sex and entertainment; the last item mentioned so much so that many adults no longer have time to devote to hobbies, community service, personal development and continuing education, the second order of faculties represented by intellectual development or mastery of a trade. In Maslow’s hierarchy I would find parallels here with the need for love and belonging and the need for esteem. When so much of a life is devoted to gratification and passive consumption the activities which strengthen relationships and maintain community fall apart, especially in cases of extreme addiction. And while it is not popular to say so, many of the behaviors of an industrial society, both individual and collective can be characterized as addictions [See David Holmgren, Permaculture Principle#4: Apply Self-Regulation and Accept Feedback]. Devotion to continual education, refinement of skill in the sciences and arts, whether on an amateur or professional level, outside of what is necessary to hold on to a bill paying job falls by the wayside. Confidence wanes and dissipates. The higher faculties of man may never be developed. The pyramid has stopped being built because the base needs are satisfied, albeit in a dysfunctional holding pattern. It is like vast swathes of my generation stopped growing at a teenage level that has since extended into their twenties, thirties and beyond. What makes it all worse is the fact that these behaviors and addictions, when driven to the abnormal extremes made possible by the unprecedented access of energy characterized by this age of oil, have caused systemic pollution and perversion of the natural order. We need to relearn the words of Apollo, pan mestron aristron, or everything in moderation. For some of our vices moderation may not be enough, and quitting cold turkey is a better alternative. These are first steps towards a recovery marked by collective soul loss. Life experiences in this culture do take their toll. Set-backs, delays, and frustrations, if not walked past with determination and fortitude, may often leave a person feeling fragile and disheartened. When immense challenges are posed it may seem easier to back down into the self we have become comfortable with in fear of having those comforts stripped away. As energy descent unfolds many of our comforts will be stripped away. Resilence begins with the self. One way of becoming resilient, and of rebuilding self-confidence, of restoring soul, is to develop a system of self-education and practical work training, so we will be able to preserve those elements of culture we wish to see live on into the future. In the collection of essays, speeches and papers that make up the book Horace Mann at Antioch there was an article by Arthur Morgan, a later president of the school, entitled, “A Budget for Your Life”. In it Arthur gives an outline for continued education beyond college, looking to create a budget for a well-rounded life in the same way a household operates from a financial budget. To Arthur Morgan this included, “physical health; training for work; actual experience in work; a trained appreciation of social, religious, economic, and esthetic values; a sense of proportion; a well-grounded knowledge of history, literature, philosophy and science; and finally a life purpose.” He then goes on to detail in each one of these sections how further education and engagement with these areas can be incorporated into the daily living of an individual. My interest is not only in developing a well rounded life –and using my own personal path as an example of my own attempt to do so- but to think about how people might approach the acquisition of knowledge in a world with scarce resources. And while I have no doubt that centers of higher education will continue to exist in some form, at present they come with a hefty price tag and bill attached. The cost of college stops many young people from ever considering buying a home, as the debt incurred is often heftier than a small mortgage, let alone being able to pay off a mortgage and own a home outright. During the long emergency, as the existing social order collapses, other strategies for education must be pursued. The existing education system is already broke. However, within it there has been some good, and those scraps can be used to kindle the fires of future learning. In further posts I will be looking at how education begins in the home, as well as the trivium and quadrivium of the classical seven liberal arts, and the categories mentioned by Arthur Morgan in developing a budget for life. “Even the run-down nature of the high-rise was a model of the world into which the future was carrying them, a landscape beyond technology where everything was either derelict, or more ambiguously, recombined in unexpected but more meaningful ways.” -J.G. Ballard, High-rise
Even as empire crumbles and industrial civilization falls it remains possible to continue in the work of engineering a new culture. As creators, makers, and magicians we are left with the task of sorting out the rubble as the structure collapses. Sometimes the bricks and mortar fall into foreign territories, and it is in these places where new hybrids and syncretizations occur. While we could start from scratch, beginning with raw materials, there is something to be said for recycling and using what is already laying around. I think both methods are appropriate in the face of the many crises afflicting humanity. Here I want to focus on the combination of pre-existing materials. In Hermetic philosophy this is known as Ars Magna or the Ars Combinatoria, or the art of combinations. “The most creative design involves the promiscuous hybridisation of possibilities from apparently disconnected, or even discordant sources to create a new harmony.” –David Holmgren, Permaculture Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability MASHUPs Mash-up’s seem to be one of the most popular forms of consumable digital art these days, and it usually occurs in the realm of pop culture. With the plethora of music, video, pictures or text from popular media available alongside the tools to manipulate it, fans and artists create simple juxtapositions that are none-the-less aesthetically satisfying. They also often reveal humorous or “unconscious” aspects from within the source materials used, evoking new responses and thought processes in both creator and audience. For the purpose of the current argument I propose that Mash Up’s are just a matter of the addition of two different elements to create a third. Beat-matching the Zeitgeist While offbeat and dissonant arrangements can be quite pleasing to some people, a beat matched mashup can insinuate itself into existing culture as a reality changing pill, easily swallowed. Merging two potentially polarized views into a new synthesis can have healing qualities. It can allow for attitudes that might otherwise face death or persecution to not only live on, but rewire cultural transmission and receptor sites, so that further down the line, other more radical alterations can be made. An example from contemporary practice is the melding of Ceremonial Magick and Grimoire Traditions with the magical techniques of African Traditional Religions, most commonly, but by no means limited to, Voudon here in the States. Rather than looking at this process in terms of psychic colonization, it can be viewed in terms of mutual survival and enrichment of humanities spiritual topsoil. In a country like America, where racism has had such a long and inglorious history, the syncretization of traditions can also be used as a way to heal tensions and divides. If a person takes up the work of a path that is foreign to his culture with sincerity, eventually the spirits and ancestors of that tradition will respond. Those ancestors will then become part of the living persons heritage. Though she may not live to see it, the work that is done to bring the two streams together will have an effect. When they become an ancestor themselves they can act as a force for healing these deep splits. As with much magical work done in service, results aren’t something that can be lusted after, and the time lapse between the working and manifestation might be generational. Dmitry Orlov looks at the situation of racism in America with astute objectivity in his book Reinventing Collapse. “Over its formative years, there was no formal intermarriage between the Europeans and Africans or the Europeans and Indians. This stands in stark contrast to other American continent nations such as Brazil. To this day in the US there remains a disdainful attitude toward any other tribe than the Anglo-Saxon. Glazed over with a layer of political correctness, at least in polite society, it comes out when observing whom most such Anglo-Saxon people actually choose to marry or date.” Intermarriage has historically been a way to help create peace, or at least truce, between various ethnic groups. To those who have taken this route in Americas PC, but just-under the-surface-hostile environment, I say hat’s off. This wasn’t easy to do before the Civil Rights Movement, and while some strides have been made, its still such a long road to go for us. The marriage of traditions in magic is another way to work on this issue. It’s always a good idea to learn about other methods and systems in any case, if even just to expand your vocabulary. Having an increased vocabulary in turn, allows for greater possibilities of expression and communication. And when true communication occurs, true understanding might follow. And where humans are concerned, it is never a simple matter of combining two elements to create a third, but rather is a plethora of history, culture, and psychic influence coming together dynamically in a time of hard limits. Mutual aid and respect are worth working for. COLLAGE “The oldest and most authentic tradition in all of magic is the tradition of stealing anything that’s not nailed down, and bringing along a crowbar for use on the things that are.” -John Michael Greer, from Magical Education, a talk given at Pantheacon 11. Where a mash-up is the combination of two elements a collage can be seen as the scrambling or piecing together of three or more elements. Throw in some chance operations and the artist finds himself working from a palette fecund and diverse. The selection process is a function of memory, in which existing images, phrases, sounds, or systems are chosen as a way to synthesize, what before might have been discordant influences and uncertainty in the mind. Being exposed to the varied choices available in the waning days of the accelerated age serves up a lot of cognitive dissonance. One way to cope with the prospect of making a choice when “too many choices is no choice at all” is to throw them all into the mental stir-fry in your personal reality studio. Collage allows kernels of the original to remain. When speaking of a tradition, this is a way to make preserves, to store up the sunlight of winter in a can. When rigid orthodoxies and traditions become brittle, they are more easily broken. When a person or a collective or group allows for outside influences to stimulate them into new growth, it strengthens them. Even when influences may act as a poison, that poison, if not taken in a fatal dosage, becomes transformative. Maybe not a panacea for all the schizoid ills of the world, but an announcement about the potentialities for merging formerly dissociated content. This assembling of the broken and disassembled is a way of creating a continuum of culture, all the while transforming the banal spectacle of society, putting it to a new purpose and in a new framework. Beyond Collage is the concept of “Intermodulation”. This will be discussed in a future post. I dreamed of endless apartment complexes, of the stairways connecting them, of the plaster falling off ceilings in desperate need of repair, of feral children squatting in the abandoned boarded up rooms. And when I woke up from this dream I knew it was time for me to start reading J. G. Ballard’s High-Rise, a book that has been on my “to-read” list for quite awhile. This book is an in depth look into the psychology of the XVIth Tarot Trump, The Tower. This book holds mirror to our contemporary Babylon, as empires and civilizations are ready to crumble under the weight of their own excess. This book sniffs out the anal-territorial disputes between the lower, middle, and upper echelons of a divided society. The text shines a light into the cracked facade of contemporary civilized man and shows how people blind themselves to atrocity, and hole themselves up in a black iron prison of their own making. Even the most sacred of relationships become instances of separation instead of union. “Togetherness is beating up an empty elevator.” In such a world suicide (or was it murder?) become past-times, a way to fill the empty space. Life in the High-Rise is a lot like life on “the outside”, except the real world becomes increasingly less real the more time is spent on “the inside”. Apathy sets in. The only way to pass the day is to head down to the 10th floor, go to the hair salon, buy some groceries, a couple bottles of champagne and liquor, and of course some cubes of cheese to put on a stick for the parties that happen every night without fail. As the systems that keep the High-Rise functional begin to fail, the parties last longer, happen more frequently. They’ll drink until nothing is left and all they have to eat are Alsatian dogs. Tribes of air hostesses will fight against lawyers and doctors for a chance to stab one of the house cats and roast it on a balcony fire made from the wreckage of sitting room furniture. New forms of order emerge from the debris along the spiraling path of entropy. “In a sense life the high-rise had begun to resemble the world outside-there were the same ruthlesness and agression concealed within a set of polite conventions.” Life outside the High-Rise, outside the book, is a lot like life on the inside, in its pages. As long as we can still go to the grocery store, and more importantly the liquor store, we’ll throw parties and get tanked, as one by one another species dies. We won’t think about where the water is coming from until it is too foul to drink, our trash will accumulate in the stairwells, in the landfills, and our toxic waste will be buried or incinerated, still leeching all-the-while into the closed loop of the Earth’s ecosystem. The High-rise is a “sealed rectilinear planet”. Ballard’s novel inverts the quaint science-fiction trope of the generation ship. It’s tenants have not left the surface, and instead of the devolution happening over the long spanse of generations it takes place in a matter of weeks and months. As things are left unrepaired, as the lights no longer turn on, people submerge themselves in darkness where one can “become sufficiently obsessive” and “deliberately play on all one’s repressed instincts.” The higher up the building a person climbs “this free and degenerate behaviour became easier”. Careerists take note. The top topples first. The novel follows three distinct characters in a revolving sequence of chapters, terse in the lingo of psychiatric assessment. One of the characters is a man named Wilder, a philandering sportsman turned news journalist, who originally lived amid the lower class citizens of the fourth floor. It is his dream to ascend the tower, to master the building, to climb it and reach its roof. He is the archetype of martial force, and his ascent can be imagined as an occult pathworking of the path of Pe. Conquering by force and rising to the top of a rigid hierarchy. Or as rigid as any social status amidst feudal warlords ready at any moment for a coup de etat. He is with the other tenants when the violence and raids break out in full force, one floor against another. He clasps a camera in his hand, capturing it all on video for a proposed documentary he has thought of making. Other people are doing the same, projecting the films later on the big screens in the high-rise’s built in theaters. The violent projectiles they cast out of themselves are projected back as infotainment. In this way they become a complicit part of the spectacle, masturbators between mirrors reflecting a collective narcissism into an empty infinity. We capture video on our phones and upload it to youtube. We sit down in front of the computer to watch a live feed from a thousand miles away, or more. We are caught in the grips of a voyeur on the one end and an exhibitionist on the other, each deflating the soul by the elevation of the banal at the expense of the beautiful. Not that beauty and meaning can’t be found in every day things, but does all of it have to captured, recorded, uploaded, only to be dissected and scrutinized by the whims and ceaseless appetite of a hive mind grown cancerous from the consumption of its own shit? The internet is becoming a digital balkans under the cloak of a pirate utopia. Even Cypherpunk Julian Assange says, “The internet is a threat to human civilization.” The world of trees and animals is like that of our neglected Elders, sedated with pharmaceuticals and relegated to old folks homes, another type of ubiquitous high-rise in the West, where they are shown a modicum of care before they die. The needs of the Elder are resented. Can’t they just stick a tube in her and be done with it? Put her on automatic life support so that interaction with her can remain at a minimal premium. She eats up our time and our attention. Attention better spent navel gazing and self stroking. No affection for her. Yet somehow in Ballard’s High-rise it is Her who eventually becomes the ascendant, as spires fall in the sunset of civilization. It is women who regain the throne while children play with bones in a garden of blood. Viagra will no longer work for the phallic skyscrapers of empire. People like Wilder arrive as crowned and conquering babes from the skirmishes of war, waiting to be suckled by their new matrons. Not Babalon the voluptuous lover, but the terrible, with her war paint on. When I am thinking up specific set of songs to play on my radio show, On the Way to the Peak of Normal, I like to come up with a theme for the show on a subject I have an interest or passion for, or a magical effect I would like to produce, and find songs and other audio material that correspond to the intention.. Not all of my radio shows are like this. Some are “completely” improvised in terms of what songs I am going to play, selecting more or less at random from what I like. What I like musically is as broad and eclectic as what turns me on magically. When I am do sets of live mixing of songs this is also a magical process. Some shows where I do a whole lot of mixing are none-the-less organized around a theme, for instance the recent spat of shows celebrating John Cage’s centennial. The theme acts as a locus of intention -even though the specific order of songs played, and how they got mixed together are left open to the play of the moment, and/or chance operations.
A specific playlist, created with intent can have a magical effect. I am of course not the first person to conceive of a playlist as having magical properties. This can be traced back at the very least to the work of Harry Smith and his Anthology of American Folk Music. DJ Spooky, in his essay In the Realms of the Imagination: Harry Smith, American Media Artists says of Smith, “I like to think of him as America’s original underground DJ.” At least with regards to pre-recorded music. Harry Smith was many things, among them a practicing magician. On the cover of the Anthology he put together in the 50′s you can see a divine hand tuning a monochord. This is part of the intentionality of his “tuning”. Harry Smith made his Anthology all from 78 records made before the Great Depression. When it was released in 1952 it proceeded to have a huge influence on the Folk Revival that burgeoned in the 60′s through the likes of Bob Dylan and Joan Baez… hence his six record compilation can be seen from a magical point of view as having a continued influence on culture. (Among his more traditional magical achievements he can be credited with another compilation, this a concordance of the Enochian language that he made with the help of Khem Caigan. He was also an Ecclesiastical member of the O.T.O and had been in contact with Frater Achad and Karl Germer in the 1940’s.) While the anthology may be the first “magical playlist” of recorded music, the arrangement of a certain grouping of songs in a certain order can be traced back to Bardic traditions of the Celtic Isles and to the the traditional song and lore keepers of other lands. The order that they played and performed their repertoire was most likely done with deliberation. Because these poets and musicians were also part of the oral tradition this material was memorized. Thus a specific ballad, with all of its incantatory properties, could be summoned up at will for the proper effect. It should be obvious that if you are also a musician, when you create an album, the arrangement and order of the songs can be done to create a specific magical effect. The same can be true if you are a poet when you arrange your poems into a certain order for a chapbook or to give a reading. In creating a magical playlist, first think of the overall intention behind the set. I have specific associations with certain types of music: noise, such as the work of Merzbow, to me has a “banishing” feel as does certain heavy metal. Folk songs and singer-songwriter type material where the focus is on the lyrics can be more invocational or evocational, drones are used for meditation or background music in ritual, etc. You’ll come up with your own associations and correspondences. My first experiments with creating a magical set-list were most likely the ubiquitous cassette tapes of the 1990’s. No doubt my cunning was in the form of a love spell to get a cute girl to perhaps make out with me. Even though I wasn’t thinking of the tape in terms of a spell, I was still hoping to cast my influence and have my intentions felt through the choice of songs. My most recent experiments with creating magical set lists were done in conjunction with other ritual activities based on and inspired by R.J. Stewart‘s excellent work The UnderWorld Initiation. In this fascinating book Stewart explores the way traditional ballads, many from Scotland such as the famous Tam Lin, are part of an oral tradition that nourishes the roots of the Western Mystery Tradition. Many of the ballads he explores in the book came over to America alongside the immigrants. Some, like The House Carpenter, ended up in Smith’s Anthology. Stewart also explicates on what he calls “the secret way across the abyss” through the UnderWorld. In putting my two programs together, Murder Ballads and Ghost Songs, and Ballads of the UnderWorld, I looked towards the knowledge Stewart provided in choosing particular pieces he wrote about, as well as others that I intuitively felt fit into the tradition. CAVEAT Today’s digital nomad, equipped with an MP3 player and the entirety of the internet to use as a music catalog, can make a magical playlist to be used for many conceivable purposes. Even though I do radio and make podcasts of the original broadcast available online, pre-recorded music has its limitations. John Cage didn’t own a record collection. He felt that listening to recorded music often had a dogmatic effect. It made the listener want any live performance they heard to conform to the sound on the record. I’ve felt and seen this in myself when going to listen to bands or the symphony. As mentioned above, traditional musicians, and today’s practicing musicians require a vast amount of memory. Certainly a music fan can develop a sophisticated memory of bands, albums, and the like. It still makes me wonder if the memory is as good as the lore keepers who passed on the ballads from one generation to another. Albums do have their good points as well. I’ve been immeasurably enriched by many a Nurse With Wound album, and though Steve Stapleton has brought his take on audio surrealism out to live audiences more recently those performances have been far afield from my home. Recorded music, outside of composed pieces written down on staff paper, is still young. Even so, there is a lot of it to utilize. I try to balance the listening with long periods of not listening to recorded music and with practical methods for developing my own memory. Just because I dropped out of traditional college, in as much as Antioch was traditional, it doesn’t mean I haven’t taken any additional training. For me, though, most of that additional training has been in the realm of dreams and magic. What follows is a summary of some of my previous and current coursework for my own self-education.
DREAMS I first encountered the work of Robert Moss in my early twenties. I listened to his audio course Dreamgates: A Journey Into Active Dreaming. It was important to listen to Robert before reading his books, even if only a cassette, because there is something vital that is transmitted from one person to another through the power of breath, through the power of voice (perhaps that’s why I’m such a fan of radio). Afterwards my dream journal practice became much more Sirius, I read as many of his books as I could, and when I had the chance I took a daylong workshop, than two years later a weekend long workshop, and after that participated in his online community (sadly, no longer around in that incarnation) for more than a year and a half. All of this cost me much less than traditional school and I was more engaged than I would have been in a college where I had to take certain classes just to meet requirements -not because I had any actual interest or need for them. All of this immersion into Robert’s approach to dreaming was an immense education for me. Dreams are perhaps one of the best forms of education available to a person. They come every night, whether you remember them or not, and they are free. Learning to work and play with dreams has enriched my life immeasurably. Awaken to their power! I’m reminded of William S. Burroughs last book, My Education. In his dream diary, as he approached the end of his life, he was being prepared to join with those who had gone before him into the Land of the Dead. That sounds like a good education to me. I’ll want to be prepared when my time comes to journey into the Western Lands. THE PROCESS OF MAGIC Speaking of Ancestors… today is Hallow’een (if you go by the Full Moon). The end of the year is approaching. Whether you consider the end to be October 31st or December 31st endings are also ripe times for beginnings. This year as a birthday present to myself I enrolled in Taylor Ellwood’s Process of Magic correspondence course. I decided to take this class after many years of magical practice and study as a way to reboot my work. I’ve been involved with a few traditions. I’m a current member of Horus-Maat Lodge and The HermAphroditic ChaOrder of the Silver Dusk and was an initiate in H.O.O.R. a group I quickly fled. Though I have a background in Thelema and the Current streaming out of the Aeon of Maat I have generally been very eclectic in my approach to magic. In my view eclecticism is a strength if you can find a way to synthesize all of those disparate takes on the path. Taylor has stripped away most of the window dressings associated with magic. Instead of focusing on style and aesthetics he focuses on the roots of practice and the processes underlying them. For those who are already involved in magic but are wondering how to weave together the rich variety of strands available to us in the 21st century, examining the processes that underly all magic, no matter the flavor, this course is an excellent place to start. For newcomers and beginners these lessons will help you quickly move beyond the 101 stage and help you start getting your hands dirty with practical magic. This class has been very good for me. By looking at the processes behind magic I’m thinking up all kinds of new ways I can do rituals and work on my Multidimensional Art Projects. It’s been very helpful. If you do sign up please mention my name to Taylor. The next round begins on Hallow’een. DRUIDRY Though I am by no means a reconstructionist my dreams have called me to explore the Celtic Mysteries, particularly the Druidic Revival and the path of the Bard. I believe in taking what is best from the past, and honoring tradition, but I also believe in innovation. In looking into the wealth of material out there in this are I particularly resonated with the work that both the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids are doing, as well as the Ancient Order of Druids in America. The funny thing is, when I started pursuing this knowledge my dreams shifted and I began working, again, with the Egyptian pantheon. For the previous few years many of my dreams had been in Scotch-Irish realms. What I like most however about these two groups and others working in this vein is their emphasis on being in tune with your bioregion and the Land. I find ecological consciousness to be very strong within the Druidic Revival to a larger degree than in other Western magical groups. I had thought about joining the A.O.D.A. because I really like their curriculum. I’m also a regular reader of John Michael Greer’s blog and am in accord with his thoughts on the end of industrial society. I decided however, that instead of joining another magical group, I would do the work of the A.O.D.A. curriculum on my own for a year. If I still wish to join at the end of that year, around the beginning of June in 2013 at this point, I may still do so. I will be blogging about some of my work with the A.O.D.A. curriculum. I like their curricula better than that of O.B.O.D. because it is much more self-guided and directed, yet still has enough of a structure to give you a good grounding in your Land and in basic Druidic principles. I should perhaps mention that when I was a teenager first coming into magic it was Druidry I first felt a call to. When I discovered the Qabalah and Thelema it was a game changer, and I went down those roads first. Now I feel like I’m circling back to some earlier inspirations. POETRY AND THE BARDIC ARTS In December of 2011 I had a dream where I was working at the Mercantile Library with Gertrude Stein as my supervisor. I awoke from this dream with a sense of urgency. I knew I needed to become a member of the Mercantile Library in part because of some of things I had written about in my talk The Library Angel & It’s Oracle. I started looking at their website. I then saw that there was an interest group for poetry at the library , the Walnut Street Poetry Society, that met once a month on my lunch hour. The Mercantile is just a few blocks from my own library workplace. For 2012 the group has been discussing Irish poetry all year, as the Nobel Prize winner Seamus Heaney was going to give the 25th annual Niehoff Lecture that year at the library. So I became a member and joined the Walnut Street Poetry Society. A number of synchronicities followed the first dream of the Mercantile (I’ve since had others). This again has been incredible for me. Poet and professor Norman Finkelstein who teaches at Xavier University moderates the group. Starting off we had two sessions on W.B. Yeats and talked quite a lot about Yeats occult activities and his involvements with Florence Farr and Maude Gonne. We’ve since gone on and covered Patrick Kavanagh again with two sessions, then Paul Muldoon (whom I really came to love), and two sessions on Heaney. (There was a two month break over the summer). Besides the connection Irish poets have to the traditional role of the Bard, this immersion in reading and discussing poetry has really uncorked my own creative bottle of wine. Poetry has been flowing out of me more this year than it has since I was in high school and at Antioch. As a writer I was a poet first. Prose came at a very close second. Next year the Walnut Street Poetry Society will be looking into Long Poems by American Poets. I’m excited to explore this realm and hope we have a chance to delve into Gary Snyder‘s Mountains and Rivers Without End. Gary Snyder’s body of work and thought have been of singular importance to me over the past three years. Through all of these activities I have quite a course load, but at the fraction of the cost of traditional school, and I’m learning and doing the things that are important to me. Through similar methods you can design your own curriculum. I’ll be talking about some other aspects of how I am teaching myself what I need and want to learn in future posts. My job as a basic kind of clerk in a library is very important in all of this. When approaching magic and the arts I feel it is important to have a “right livelihood”. And while I do aspire to a situation where I can put most of my efforts into my Arts, at the moment my job is supportive of me for where I am at. I have no moral qualms with my job. It is rewarding and causes little stress. Finding such a job and doing that work is an important part of doing the Real Work and the Great Work. |
Justin Patrick MooreAuthor of The Radio Phonics Laboratory: Telecommunications, Speech Synthesis, and the Birth of Electronic Music. Archives
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