What's validity? Okay, yeah, just as most intellectual concepts, "valid" has all manner of subjective values that rearrange between subjects, which in themselves remain just as amorphous as the aforementioned adjective. As far as English goes, I feel more likely to hear "valid assessment" than "valid gardening trowel". That said, could I then come to a notion that "valid" represents the structural integrity of an experience or idea, and thus possessing an oxymoronic nature, as ideas have less physical presence than a neutrino in our sensory observance?
So, with this in mind, I popped onto the Online Etymology Dictionary, which gave the definition of "supported by facts or authority." However, as far as authority goes, the Orson Welles movie F for Fake has elaborately ruined that concept for me.
Yet... in our presentation of ideas and concepts, for the populace that operates in the realm of words, symbols, concepts, philosophies, religion, magic, spirit and persuasion, "Validity" is not unlike the Holy Grail bearing Bran's severed head and the Lapis Philosophorum. Somehow, the idea has no merit if not repeated to another source, be it in singular perspective or in multitude, and if that source mentions a confluence of perspective with that idea, the Ideomancer steps a little closer to finding the Big Prophecy- and Abundance-Barfing Head on a Plate. What do I hope that Validity will offer? What power does it manifest in our social sphere?
I've more found that Validity acts not as a giver of power, but as a means to stave off Thanatoic fear. "If I have people who have heard my ideas and agree with them, and those people either have merit through either number or status, then I have made a worthwhile contribution to humanity, and my existence has been useful. If my existence bears utility, then my experiences of life were not wasted and I need not fear mortality." In my case, this feeds into massive social phobias and ambitions. Will Grant Morrison come across my thoughts and feel moved to see his own effect on a human being? Will I convince Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to forgo anti-Semitism with a comic book? Will I dazzle a member of the desired sex with my intellectual might so that I can appease my lizard-brain's incessant screams for carnal experience? What if I'm not making enough money to meet these people? What if I'm not relaxing in the right way to formulate the Most Impressive Idea in the World? What if I miss the opportunity to Meet Validating Ideomancer/Dazzling Soulmate/Perfect Audience? How do I find these people on the way to finding the Most Impressive Idea in the World?
Ha! Ha ha ha!!!
But... what do we chase when the windmills stop looking like dragons?
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Carbon lattice, electrified fence.
Last night I was having dinner at my friend's, and she'd invited over some aging New Agey sorts, if we're going to go about categorizing. Everything seemed to be going okay, and the night started to progress while the one fellow had busted out these pendant-things made of tree resin with bits of some crystal inside. It looked like some sort of opal, but I'm not a geologist. Either way, the shared experience was nice, but the demand and insistence surrounding these was distressing.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a sucker for stones and crystals. I pick up resonance with ease, to the point that it distracts from, well, most everything else going on around me. However, I recognize that the majority of the populace has other things to worry about, whether narrated by flickering TV screens or through sensible, fundamental instincts like family care and community. It was a comment mentioned through one of the folks going through word-association that really set things in motion: "It gives people what they need..." That kind of thing... terrifies me, especially when considering the recent heebie-jeebies surrounding consumerism as of late. It reminded me of a regular customer when I used to work at Stellar Coffee who would go on paranoid jags, discussing how human consciousness was some fabrication by a crystalline intelligence to reposition their placement around the world to create some new resonance. The way the metaphysical community, myself included, reacts and practically worships crystals, I begin to ponder the validity of this.
With that strong resonance in mind, how much transphysical essence bullies us around into these pockets? Why do so many folks in the metaphysical community sound like the same person? Why is it so often about "joining" and where do we draw the line between community and cult-like idol worshippers? Why do we flock to find objects that will mean something to us when, deep down, these objects have little or no meaning outside of our own associations? How do you point a person past the fascination with the object and toward the individual interaction with it that provides a simple signpost for what non-physical consciousness/wavelengths want to communicate (and this may or may not be anthropically-oriented. We're talking Nature, here.)?
I spent that night sitting on my bed, looking at the wall of collages before me, a swirling expanse of faces and words, and felt like I was sitting on a precipice overlooking the Abyss, like in the Neverending Story. I wonder how many people would fall screaming into it, and how many found a way to climb back into the world, found a way to get back Home; not the regressive home where responsibility is nil and life stagnates into a parody of itself, but that area where we could explore safely, without feeling exposed or self-conscious. I've been adventuring too long in my own wilderness. It's time to get back.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a sucker for stones and crystals. I pick up resonance with ease, to the point that it distracts from, well, most everything else going on around me. However, I recognize that the majority of the populace has other things to worry about, whether narrated by flickering TV screens or through sensible, fundamental instincts like family care and community. It was a comment mentioned through one of the folks going through word-association that really set things in motion: "It gives people what they need..." That kind of thing... terrifies me, especially when considering the recent heebie-jeebies surrounding consumerism as of late. It reminded me of a regular customer when I used to work at Stellar Coffee who would go on paranoid jags, discussing how human consciousness was some fabrication by a crystalline intelligence to reposition their placement around the world to create some new resonance. The way the metaphysical community, myself included, reacts and practically worships crystals, I begin to ponder the validity of this.
With that strong resonance in mind, how much transphysical essence bullies us around into these pockets? Why do so many folks in the metaphysical community sound like the same person? Why is it so often about "joining" and where do we draw the line between community and cult-like idol worshippers? Why do we flock to find objects that will mean something to us when, deep down, these objects have little or no meaning outside of our own associations? How do you point a person past the fascination with the object and toward the individual interaction with it that provides a simple signpost for what non-physical consciousness/wavelengths want to communicate (and this may or may not be anthropically-oriented. We're talking Nature, here.)?
I spent that night sitting on my bed, looking at the wall of collages before me, a swirling expanse of faces and words, and felt like I was sitting on a precipice overlooking the Abyss, like in the Neverending Story. I wonder how many people would fall screaming into it, and how many found a way to climb back into the world, found a way to get back Home; not the regressive home where responsibility is nil and life stagnates into a parody of itself, but that area where we could explore safely, without feeling exposed or self-conscious. I've been adventuring too long in my own wilderness. It's time to get back.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Metropolis vs. Transylvania: a Guidebook to Modern dreck
Yup. Feeling a lot better, today. Just like any cycle, the uncomfortable skin has been shed and new eyes look outward into the opened system until it finds the closure, and newer eyes manifest. Yay Lunar Churning!
"America: Fuck yeah."- Team America theme.
"Are you being sarcastic?" "I don't know any more." -Simpsons "Hullabalooza" episode in the '90s.
Today's been all Superman and Vampires; Final Crisis in a nutshell, I guess.
I wish people could see the Evil Empire in themselves, and I'm not talking about just the Suits and gelled-hair yuppies; I'm talking every person who involves themselves in this mess. If we attempt to push it away, we end up the "enemy" of the Evil Empire, raising flags in opposition and presenting them with a target as much as we ourselves have painted one on "them," with the presumption of an Us vs. Them scenario. It's been exploited too damned much.
See, that's something we forget about Superman: he doesn't give a flying fuck what Lex Luthor does in his spare time unless it fucks with people. He doesn't hate Lex, since Lex is just the opposite end of the Superman spectrum of amplified humanity. Lex's brilliance is all geared toward reflection and validation, where Superman's actions are, in his mind, just what he does. He places no more importance on moving the Earth in and out of orbit than he does saving that kitten from a tree. He doesn't agonize over what he can't do, but enjoys what he does. To put in simply, Lex is the separation of self from collective, and Superman is in unity.
I guess when we're considering the Sun and Superman, we can get into vampires as well. I'm a bad blogger cuz I forgot the link, but someone put down that vampires fear the notion of self-sacrifice that the Cross embodies. The idea that someone chooses to avoid a predator/prey relationship, to avoid victimization for one's own benefit, makes the Vampiric essence go cross-eyed. The lack of a reflection represents just that: lack of reflection. The Vampire, despite being a night creature, has a remarkable lack of self-awareness. The instinct and Will to Power override all higher cognitive aspects. It's the sociopathic aspect of the animal instinct and solitary non-mammalian critter. The coldness and deadness are remarkably reptilian (If I hear any bollocks about Lizard People I am going to fucking scream). Warmth has a metaphor in human language as reciprocity, and the lack of it displays that inner Void so well. There's no way to fake Dead Body Cold. It's too chilly and squamous to pass off as bad circulation. The wooden stake, fire, and sunlight represent pretty much the same thing: Life. The stake was cut from a living entity and will eventually decompose. Fire is a chemical reaction with remarkably life-like characteristics. The Sun, our relative position to it, etc. is that reductionist source of Life. All three act like Wilhelm Reich muscle memory to send the frozen essence back into the living cycle of elements. Garlic seems so basic that it's confounding. It's a bulb, it's living potential, it promotes circulation, it's an overwhelming spice... it just seems the opposite end of the vampiric spectrum of Subterranean Entities.
Vampires, to me, feel more Saturnian than anything else, and getting acquainted with that sort of energy in oneself's pretty daunting, but useful. Vampires have gone from Apotropaic funerary ritual to modern Frost Giant, calcified elements of human nature that require recirculation when left unaware. Like Frost Giants, their position is ambivalent instead of purely pernicious, not unlike the "Asura" in Hindu literature. The key comes to getting that Vampiric part to see itself in the mirror, to enact that self-recognition that accompanies a cognition of one's soul. (I'm of the idea that everything condemned to existence has a soul, but self-awareness and sentience have the unique prerogative to examine it.)
When we consider the Killer of Monsters, from the Winchesters, to Buffy Summers, to Batman, to Thor, we consider the symbolic utilization of destructive instincts for the cause of Life. Sam Winchester flirts with his possession of demon blood, Batman toes the line of power-mad and oppressive Hades, and Thor's brutality and characteristics make him almost indistinguishable from the Giants he bludgeons to death. That said, all have romantic ties, for good or for ill, to members of their quarry. Sam and Ruby, Dean and Anna the Angel, Buffy with both Angel and Spike, Batman to Thalia al-Ghul and Catwoman, and Thor to Jarnsaxa.
In conclusion, to be effective in counteracting the demons which we feel compelled to spit upon and villify, we must understand sacrifice without power-over, we must understand the deed as villainous instead of the perpetrator, and we must, in some way, romance that evil in order to combat it effectively. Love is what conquers all of it, and in the end the poles shall collapse on themselves and become distinct from their previous nature, just to find new oppositions and repeat the process. (Thor and Jormundgand annihilate each other, and find reconciliation in Magni and Modi, a dual-divinity at Rangarok.)
"America: Fuck yeah."- Team America theme.
"Are you being sarcastic?" "I don't know any more." -Simpsons "Hullabalooza" episode in the '90s.
Today's been all Superman and Vampires; Final Crisis in a nutshell, I guess.
I wish people could see the Evil Empire in themselves, and I'm not talking about just the Suits and gelled-hair yuppies; I'm talking every person who involves themselves in this mess. If we attempt to push it away, we end up the "enemy" of the Evil Empire, raising flags in opposition and presenting them with a target as much as we ourselves have painted one on "them," with the presumption of an Us vs. Them scenario. It's been exploited too damned much.
See, that's something we forget about Superman: he doesn't give a flying fuck what Lex Luthor does in his spare time unless it fucks with people. He doesn't hate Lex, since Lex is just the opposite end of the Superman spectrum of amplified humanity. Lex's brilliance is all geared toward reflection and validation, where Superman's actions are, in his mind, just what he does. He places no more importance on moving the Earth in and out of orbit than he does saving that kitten from a tree. He doesn't agonize over what he can't do, but enjoys what he does. To put in simply, Lex is the separation of self from collective, and Superman is in unity.
I guess when we're considering the Sun and Superman, we can get into vampires as well. I'm a bad blogger cuz I forgot the link, but someone put down that vampires fear the notion of self-sacrifice that the Cross embodies. The idea that someone chooses to avoid a predator/prey relationship, to avoid victimization for one's own benefit, makes the Vampiric essence go cross-eyed. The lack of a reflection represents just that: lack of reflection. The Vampire, despite being a night creature, has a remarkable lack of self-awareness. The instinct and Will to Power override all higher cognitive aspects. It's the sociopathic aspect of the animal instinct and solitary non-mammalian critter. The coldness and deadness are remarkably reptilian (If I hear any bollocks about Lizard People I am going to fucking scream). Warmth has a metaphor in human language as reciprocity, and the lack of it displays that inner Void so well. There's no way to fake Dead Body Cold. It's too chilly and squamous to pass off as bad circulation. The wooden stake, fire, and sunlight represent pretty much the same thing: Life. The stake was cut from a living entity and will eventually decompose. Fire is a chemical reaction with remarkably life-like characteristics. The Sun, our relative position to it, etc. is that reductionist source of Life. All three act like Wilhelm Reich muscle memory to send the frozen essence back into the living cycle of elements. Garlic seems so basic that it's confounding. It's a bulb, it's living potential, it promotes circulation, it's an overwhelming spice... it just seems the opposite end of the vampiric spectrum of Subterranean Entities.
Vampires, to me, feel more Saturnian than anything else, and getting acquainted with that sort of energy in oneself's pretty daunting, but useful. Vampires have gone from Apotropaic funerary ritual to modern Frost Giant, calcified elements of human nature that require recirculation when left unaware. Like Frost Giants, their position is ambivalent instead of purely pernicious, not unlike the "Asura" in Hindu literature. The key comes to getting that Vampiric part to see itself in the mirror, to enact that self-recognition that accompanies a cognition of one's soul. (I'm of the idea that everything condemned to existence has a soul, but self-awareness and sentience have the unique prerogative to examine it.)
When we consider the Killer of Monsters, from the Winchesters, to Buffy Summers, to Batman, to Thor, we consider the symbolic utilization of destructive instincts for the cause of Life. Sam Winchester flirts with his possession of demon blood, Batman toes the line of power-mad and oppressive Hades, and Thor's brutality and characteristics make him almost indistinguishable from the Giants he bludgeons to death. That said, all have romantic ties, for good or for ill, to members of their quarry. Sam and Ruby, Dean and Anna the Angel, Buffy with both Angel and Spike, Batman to Thalia al-Ghul and Catwoman, and Thor to Jarnsaxa.
In conclusion, to be effective in counteracting the demons which we feel compelled to spit upon and villify, we must understand sacrifice without power-over, we must understand the deed as villainous instead of the perpetrator, and we must, in some way, romance that evil in order to combat it effectively. Love is what conquers all of it, and in the end the poles shall collapse on themselves and become distinct from their previous nature, just to find new oppositions and repeat the process. (Thor and Jormundgand annihilate each other, and find reconciliation in Magni and Modi, a dual-divinity at Rangarok.)
Sunday, September 6, 2009
In the cold light of the Hyperborean sun.
The past week has been rough. A chill wind from the winter had hidden in a drawer and escaped while I folded laundry. I stared at my e-mail inbox, with another open-ended rejection, reinforcing my belief that I'd be better off a castrated hermit living on the side of a mountain, subsisting on dirt and prayer, or covering my face in lacerations so that all of the middle-aged hausfraus who tell me I'm beautiful can shut the fuck up and stop imagining me in poses designed for Harlequin book covers. Once more I feel better off as the King of Jerusalem, the hideous leper in a gold mask, sexlessly meandering the halls and appreciating beauty like a eunuch, because God forbid that I seek romantic love or display an active sex drive, that I display the level of rancor I have toward the general ignorance of the world, and the smug superiority of those who stare down their nose at those who lack their particular insecure quality of banner-waving, that I seriously do not care about the useless details that fill the air with banal, soul-crushing chatter.
However, it's the easy, stupid way out to spit bile and justify the emotional defensiveness of the world. It's too easy to release all of this on some poor, unsuspecting individual set on their path in life, thus becoming that smug sense of superiority so despised. The cycle continues: showing oneself causes the other to recoil or misunderstand, and thus retreat digs one further back, propelled in reverse like a nautilus from a hungry octopus, further and further back until an unrecognizable speck in the sea, even more inscrutable and dismissable than before, to begin the cycle again. Those who care stop looking at the person and instead begin smothering, selfishly throwing themselves into realms of admiration and guilt, shrieking for approval and validation for inconsequential acts from a source that finds the whole affair sickening, coddling and crushing it like a lapdog.
I wouldn't feel this much vituperation if I didn't have an equal amount of veneration. The two extremes seem irreconcilable. Perhaps it's from a lack of self-cultivation, a lack of socialization or just because I'm a hypocritical douchebag, but I still find myself alienated from just about everyone. In every circle I've attempted to join, I've felt disinterest in the internal secret handshakes and the pursuit of their social cues, left out in discussions that revolve around experiences shared by core members and unconsciously yet persistently marginalized and invalidated, especially by those who claim friendship (a repeating pattern). Much as I enjoy the individual company of many people, the larger body, the clique, the banner will, by the devices of myself or another, cast me into the outskirts and render me irrelevant.
The human animal is, by nature, a social one. We're formed too awkwardly and too weakly to subsist on an individual agenda, and thus we seek collective clustering to form a superorganism, which have applications as irrelevant and diverse as computer usage, political inclination, genetic heritage, athletic inclination, stylistic/aesthetic inclination, and so on. Competition has greatest strength when intercollective, with intracollective or individual competition serving to excise weak/sick elements from the collective. A human being can take only so much rejection of the collective, initiated by self or other, before pondering the relevance of its being.
In the mire of all of these conflictions, I began to question: why don't I want to die? Why do I want to stay alive? Why can I not fathom leaping in front of an oncoming vehicle like I used to? Why can't I shut myself out from the prospect of the pain and madness I'd cause my father? Do I have some other reason to stay around than simple financial obligation? If so, why don't the people closest to me seem to want me around? Why do I have to rely on a mentally ill person to provide me with the facsimile a familial setting that each day reminds me more and more of my actual familial setting in which I spent endless amounts of time taking care of my physically ill mother whose death was a tempest of guilt and relief? If I seek acceptance and independence, why do I put only nominal amounts of energy into finding a more substantial form of employment? Why do I avoid the idea of taking medication? Why do I worry about the time that I spent living instead of carving myself into pieces to achieve some basic form of credibility, when I really, really don't give a flying fuck how many degrees a person has? If, somehow, all of my decisions and inclinations are valid, then why can't I see the point of my existence? Why can't I get some kind of reward, some kind of kick-back or signpost to let me know what I'm doing right or doing wrong in the cosmic scheme of things? I mean, even Peter Parker, who has a shitty life, gets to be Spider-Man at the end of the day. Where's my reason to be here?
I felt okay, this morning. My emotions were level, and I was happy to see the cats, and as far as I can tell, they were happy to see me. Cats, especially those belonging to someone else, are a pretty poor barometer. They'll forget you exist when you leave the building, and it won't have much consequence on their life if you disappear. Either way, I can make a cat genuinely happy through my actions and observe it, and that brings some validation. I went through my ritual of heading to the coffee shop to do... whatever it is I've decided to do there while guzzling stimulants. Today saw me nestled into research, where I came across some astrological articles of Dana Gerhardt's regarding Venus and the Moon. Maybe it was the subject matter, the music playing at the time (The Rapture's "Been Down for So Long"), the caffeine, or that my brain chemistry reached a breaking point, but I remembered how I felt reading All-Star Superman. Somehow, that story got it into my head that whatever it is that Superman represents, the working-class superhero, the avatar of Vishnu, or any other thing that doesn't matter, that symbol, that primary-colored farmboy from space believes in us. It's the same feeling I got as a kid when I thought about Santa Claus. Much as people would say that Santa had a naughty/nice list or wouldn't give presents to non-believers or some exclusionist hateful shit like that, the real spirit behind both Superman and Santa Claus is that if we let them, if we just, for a minute, drop the skepticism and the snide barriers we've set up to be a rebellious teenager, we're fully permitted to think that there's something out there that believes in whatever we do, that believes we can be great, that loves every single one of us even when we turn our noses up at the red briefs or the jingle-bells. Don't get me wrong: I still hate most Christmas music with a fire that could completely sublimate the polar ice caps into perennial storm clouds, but with the Fortress at the South Pole and Workshop at the North, I'd rather ignore them entirely and learn to just do what I do with the full belief that something bigger than anyone I know, anything I can conceive believes in me, and has wished a happy ending for all of us if we'll have it. If we won't, it still believes we know what we're doing. Ha.
However, it's the easy, stupid way out to spit bile and justify the emotional defensiveness of the world. It's too easy to release all of this on some poor, unsuspecting individual set on their path in life, thus becoming that smug sense of superiority so despised. The cycle continues: showing oneself causes the other to recoil or misunderstand, and thus retreat digs one further back, propelled in reverse like a nautilus from a hungry octopus, further and further back until an unrecognizable speck in the sea, even more inscrutable and dismissable than before, to begin the cycle again. Those who care stop looking at the person and instead begin smothering, selfishly throwing themselves into realms of admiration and guilt, shrieking for approval and validation for inconsequential acts from a source that finds the whole affair sickening, coddling and crushing it like a lapdog.
I wouldn't feel this much vituperation if I didn't have an equal amount of veneration. The two extremes seem irreconcilable. Perhaps it's from a lack of self-cultivation, a lack of socialization or just because I'm a hypocritical douchebag, but I still find myself alienated from just about everyone. In every circle I've attempted to join, I've felt disinterest in the internal secret handshakes and the pursuit of their social cues, left out in discussions that revolve around experiences shared by core members and unconsciously yet persistently marginalized and invalidated, especially by those who claim friendship (a repeating pattern). Much as I enjoy the individual company of many people, the larger body, the clique, the banner will, by the devices of myself or another, cast me into the outskirts and render me irrelevant.
The human animal is, by nature, a social one. We're formed too awkwardly and too weakly to subsist on an individual agenda, and thus we seek collective clustering to form a superorganism, which have applications as irrelevant and diverse as computer usage, political inclination, genetic heritage, athletic inclination, stylistic/aesthetic inclination, and so on. Competition has greatest strength when intercollective, with intracollective or individual competition serving to excise weak/sick elements from the collective. A human being can take only so much rejection of the collective, initiated by self or other, before pondering the relevance of its being.
In the mire of all of these conflictions, I began to question: why don't I want to die? Why do I want to stay alive? Why can I not fathom leaping in front of an oncoming vehicle like I used to? Why can't I shut myself out from the prospect of the pain and madness I'd cause my father? Do I have some other reason to stay around than simple financial obligation? If so, why don't the people closest to me seem to want me around? Why do I have to rely on a mentally ill person to provide me with the facsimile a familial setting that each day reminds me more and more of my actual familial setting in which I spent endless amounts of time taking care of my physically ill mother whose death was a tempest of guilt and relief? If I seek acceptance and independence, why do I put only nominal amounts of energy into finding a more substantial form of employment? Why do I avoid the idea of taking medication? Why do I worry about the time that I spent living instead of carving myself into pieces to achieve some basic form of credibility, when I really, really don't give a flying fuck how many degrees a person has? If, somehow, all of my decisions and inclinations are valid, then why can't I see the point of my existence? Why can't I get some kind of reward, some kind of kick-back or signpost to let me know what I'm doing right or doing wrong in the cosmic scheme of things? I mean, even Peter Parker, who has a shitty life, gets to be Spider-Man at the end of the day. Where's my reason to be here?
I felt okay, this morning. My emotions were level, and I was happy to see the cats, and as far as I can tell, they were happy to see me. Cats, especially those belonging to someone else, are a pretty poor barometer. They'll forget you exist when you leave the building, and it won't have much consequence on their life if you disappear. Either way, I can make a cat genuinely happy through my actions and observe it, and that brings some validation. I went through my ritual of heading to the coffee shop to do... whatever it is I've decided to do there while guzzling stimulants. Today saw me nestled into research, where I came across some astrological articles of Dana Gerhardt's regarding Venus and the Moon. Maybe it was the subject matter, the music playing at the time (The Rapture's "Been Down for So Long"), the caffeine, or that my brain chemistry reached a breaking point, but I remembered how I felt reading All-Star Superman. Somehow, that story got it into my head that whatever it is that Superman represents, the working-class superhero, the avatar of Vishnu, or any other thing that doesn't matter, that symbol, that primary-colored farmboy from space believes in us. It's the same feeling I got as a kid when I thought about Santa Claus. Much as people would say that Santa had a naughty/nice list or wouldn't give presents to non-believers or some exclusionist hateful shit like that, the real spirit behind both Superman and Santa Claus is that if we let them, if we just, for a minute, drop the skepticism and the snide barriers we've set up to be a rebellious teenager, we're fully permitted to think that there's something out there that believes in whatever we do, that believes we can be great, that loves every single one of us even when we turn our noses up at the red briefs or the jingle-bells. Don't get me wrong: I still hate most Christmas music with a fire that could completely sublimate the polar ice caps into perennial storm clouds, but with the Fortress at the South Pole and Workshop at the North, I'd rather ignore them entirely and learn to just do what I do with the full belief that something bigger than anyone I know, anything I can conceive believes in me, and has wished a happy ending for all of us if we'll have it. If we won't, it still believes we know what we're doing. Ha.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
That thing we found out in the cornfield...
Y'know, for some reason the "gotta be in a relationship" bug's hit me hard. I'll be fine with it for a while, and then I'll see some young lady who either I didn't have the guts to talk to or who shot me down stuck on some fellow with a beard who seems content and approachable, if dull. It'd be one thing if I felt like an alien who wants to be like everyone else and relate to them, but I don't want that. I want to be whatever it is that I am, and reconciling whatever that is with the social structure of humanity feels nearly impossible. It just seems like any time I got into a relationship before, it was either some fateful crossing engineered by God or a very unfortunate alignment of hormones, aesthetics and availability.
Rationalist thought-modes would be gleeful on the anthropological ideas of group dynamics, with stability and security versus variability and irrational behavior. I have a lot of difficulty with jobs and monetary ambition. I justify it with an anarchist philosophy that I must admit I feel strongly about, but those philosophies definitely came after difficulties with fitting into the given model. I mean, ever since I was 7 I was the kid in the "smartypants motherfucker" program that wouldn't turn in homework. According to that given model, I "wasn't living up to my potential," and I had no clue what to make of it or what to do about it, until hearing the idea that maybe the values expressed in our educational/consumerist/capitalist/industrial system weren't anywhere near my own and that I might not need to care about it.
Unfortunately, I still do. I still find myself terrified of working creatively, and despite my aversion to paperwork and most of the way that modern government really operates, I can't bring myself to live on the rails, join a monastery or find a commune.
I keep going back to my family while I'm writing this. I can sum up my childhood and family life with the following scenario: My first bicycle was just a tad too big for me to pedal comfortably, and the rationale was that I would grow into the bike while learning on it at whatever size I was at the time. It took a tempest on my part to point out that the pedals left my feet as I tried to ride. I received neither comfort nor apology, but instead, "Look! It's a smaller bike! Aren't you excited?" No admittance of damage, no apology for not believing me, and no willingness to communicate on any levels aside from small talk and tantrum. It was so strange. The only phenomenon that I can think to describe it is the very uncomfortable feeling of centripetal force on a roller coaster or train making a turn. I wasn't mad about the bike as much as I was mad that they didn't believe me, they didn't trust me, and they didn't care that I was hurt. I was loved, sure. It wasn't an abusive household (although I to recall times when my dad would hit me, scream at me or elbow me, which would generate years of patricidal fantasies that eventually subsided as I got into adulthood), and I wasn't physically neglected, but I received absolutely no attempts on my parent's part to understand my motivations. During my mom's illness, expressions of affection became thinly-masked calls for death, rage, and blame, and I think that, especially after my father remarried to a very ambitious woman, he just got tired of me, and I completely lack that sense of safety that a lot of other people have with the familial ideal. I watch the other "Boomerang Generation" folks dress and act like a long, terrible joke while trying to formulate the punchline as they go along, and just stumbling into some new idiotic quote or bit of kitsch to keep the damned thing limping along, secure that their parents have their back, confident that they have the support they need to get through whatever they're going through in this period. Much as I feel like their appearances and actions are absolutely ludicrous, I'm envious of the support more than anything else.
I don't want to end this with feeling scared and alone. I have support out there: it's unconventional, it gets a little suffocating sometimes and it has just about the same bank account issues that I do. I suppose that sense of alienation has some very strong fundamental roots, but it's just a sense, not a rule of existence.
Rationalist thought-modes would be gleeful on the anthropological ideas of group dynamics, with stability and security versus variability and irrational behavior. I have a lot of difficulty with jobs and monetary ambition. I justify it with an anarchist philosophy that I must admit I feel strongly about, but those philosophies definitely came after difficulties with fitting into the given model. I mean, ever since I was 7 I was the kid in the "smartypants motherfucker" program that wouldn't turn in homework. According to that given model, I "wasn't living up to my potential," and I had no clue what to make of it or what to do about it, until hearing the idea that maybe the values expressed in our educational/consumerist/capitalist/industrial system weren't anywhere near my own and that I might not need to care about it.
Unfortunately, I still do. I still find myself terrified of working creatively, and despite my aversion to paperwork and most of the way that modern government really operates, I can't bring myself to live on the rails, join a monastery or find a commune.
I keep going back to my family while I'm writing this. I can sum up my childhood and family life with the following scenario: My first bicycle was just a tad too big for me to pedal comfortably, and the rationale was that I would grow into the bike while learning on it at whatever size I was at the time. It took a tempest on my part to point out that the pedals left my feet as I tried to ride. I received neither comfort nor apology, but instead, "Look! It's a smaller bike! Aren't you excited?" No admittance of damage, no apology for not believing me, and no willingness to communicate on any levels aside from small talk and tantrum. It was so strange. The only phenomenon that I can think to describe it is the very uncomfortable feeling of centripetal force on a roller coaster or train making a turn. I wasn't mad about the bike as much as I was mad that they didn't believe me, they didn't trust me, and they didn't care that I was hurt. I was loved, sure. It wasn't an abusive household (although I to recall times when my dad would hit me, scream at me or elbow me, which would generate years of patricidal fantasies that eventually subsided as I got into adulthood), and I wasn't physically neglected, but I received absolutely no attempts on my parent's part to understand my motivations. During my mom's illness, expressions of affection became thinly-masked calls for death, rage, and blame, and I think that, especially after my father remarried to a very ambitious woman, he just got tired of me, and I completely lack that sense of safety that a lot of other people have with the familial ideal. I watch the other "Boomerang Generation" folks dress and act like a long, terrible joke while trying to formulate the punchline as they go along, and just stumbling into some new idiotic quote or bit of kitsch to keep the damned thing limping along, secure that their parents have their back, confident that they have the support they need to get through whatever they're going through in this period. Much as I feel like their appearances and actions are absolutely ludicrous, I'm envious of the support more than anything else.
I don't want to end this with feeling scared and alone. I have support out there: it's unconventional, it gets a little suffocating sometimes and it has just about the same bank account issues that I do. I suppose that sense of alienation has some very strong fundamental roots, but it's just a sense, not a rule of existence.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
"We have evolved beyond the need for asses!"
Restricted Site! Your computer is infected. Turn on your anti-virus software, which is useless anyway. "Fhaaaaaaack. Mmkay, I'll try it again." Restricted Site! "Gads you putrescent tumors that pass from the diseased womb and black jizz of the Monster God Ymir! WHY must you make viruses?? WHAT is your fucking damage and why can't you direct it in a less puerile fashion? I hope rabid dogs rape you in your sleep! Okay, now, again." Restricted Site! "PISS!"
This, folks, is the daily internet ritual of the Benjamin. Somehow I have this idea that "Restricted Site" could be a stupid, obvious pun. Saturn wants to try his hand at being clever, and it just generates groans and takes the life from the party. What makes it frustrating is that the restriction encloses communications, primarily. It could be worse, I suppose.
The urge to find the Ultimate Novelty follows when approaching the internet. Endless, endless itineraries and changes in emotion catalogued, with neither purpose nor resolution. Where can a person find that source of infinite wisdom that pours out knowledge in an increasing rate? Why does the information never seem to be enough? How far can we distance ourselves from the people in our lives by having little electric paper dolls of them to replace sincerity, and how pretty can we make our own out of fear that no one will want to talk to our little idol? When did we think that anyone seriously gave a fuck that it was raining, outside of travel complications or the possible cancellation of a physical congregation? How many people have you counted as a friend on an internet site with whom you find yourself willing to talk after doing so? Are you disappointed that few pictures of you exist on these sites, or even so far as few flattering pictures? Have you entertained the idea of a person far longer than was healthy while utilizing Facebook or Google? Have you distanced yourself from someone due to their page content? Have you sent innumerable, inane messages to someone over the internet, or been the recipient of the same? Have you permitted an application on MySpace or Facebook only to spare the feelings of someone you barely know? How far do our emotions extend through this communicative medium?
Well, ladies and gents, someone beat us to the Age of Aquarius and turned the concept of friendship into a fur-trapper's paradise for the Brand. "Why do you dislike this ad? Let us know so that we can better market to you. Be independent: Drink Sprite." Let's not forget our favorite new brand, Eschatology! How much information can we put out there on our impending doom? Can you imagine the internet in the age of The Bomb? Exchange science for anthropology and metaphysics, and well... here we are. Our ideas are eating us alive.
This, folks, is the daily internet ritual of the Benjamin. Somehow I have this idea that "Restricted Site" could be a stupid, obvious pun. Saturn wants to try his hand at being clever, and it just generates groans and takes the life from the party. What makes it frustrating is that the restriction encloses communications, primarily. It could be worse, I suppose.
The urge to find the Ultimate Novelty follows when approaching the internet. Endless, endless itineraries and changes in emotion catalogued, with neither purpose nor resolution. Where can a person find that source of infinite wisdom that pours out knowledge in an increasing rate? Why does the information never seem to be enough? How far can we distance ourselves from the people in our lives by having little electric paper dolls of them to replace sincerity, and how pretty can we make our own out of fear that no one will want to talk to our little idol? When did we think that anyone seriously gave a fuck that it was raining, outside of travel complications or the possible cancellation of a physical congregation? How many people have you counted as a friend on an internet site with whom you find yourself willing to talk after doing so? Are you disappointed that few pictures of you exist on these sites, or even so far as few flattering pictures? Have you entertained the idea of a person far longer than was healthy while utilizing Facebook or Google? Have you distanced yourself from someone due to their page content? Have you sent innumerable, inane messages to someone over the internet, or been the recipient of the same? Have you permitted an application on MySpace or Facebook only to spare the feelings of someone you barely know? How far do our emotions extend through this communicative medium?
Well, ladies and gents, someone beat us to the Age of Aquarius and turned the concept of friendship into a fur-trapper's paradise for the Brand. "Why do you dislike this ad? Let us know so that we can better market to you. Be independent: Drink Sprite." Let's not forget our favorite new brand, Eschatology! How much information can we put out there on our impending doom? Can you imagine the internet in the age of The Bomb? Exchange science for anthropology and metaphysics, and well... here we are. Our ideas are eating us alive.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Stellar Dialectic on the De-Tuned Radio
Great. The caffeine's kicked in and my mind's racing a mile a minute. There're days I wish I worked harder at writing as a profession so that I could spend more time on it instead of getting into a groove just before running off to work.
I was trying to research Alice Bailey's esoteric astrology, specifically the esoteric and hierarchical rulers of the signs. The problem is, just about everywhere I try to find information and assertions as to "why" these associations are in place, I find nothing but birdchatter and nonsensical self-interested dithering, to say nothing of rampant metagenetic philosophy. Somehow in the course of this, the relatively simplistic method of calculus as a philosophical template has been confounded in discussions of seven Rays (Bradbury, Park, Stanz, Tampa Bay, Liotta, and Charles) and a strange dismissal of the Moon as "obscuring" a much cooler and more eldritch luminary. The whole things seems to act toward complicating rather than revealing understanding.
Tables of correspondence run rampant, so dismissing this as a search for easy cookbook astrology has left my head. No one can seem to say "Mercury as the hierarchical ruler of Scorpio makes sense because--" and any searches seem to bring up people who will spend much time discussing a lot of nothing.
On another related astrology note, aside from a few allusions to Hellenic creation myths and surprisingly in the book Sextrology, I've seen very few astute discussions of the Aquarian sun. A lot of it seems to be caught up with the idea of causes, and so far all of the Aquarians I know could not give a shit about joining something. We're inherently mistrustful of marketing, and often end up the Martian Manhunter in terms of "superheroic" associations: Just as wonder-oriented and idealistic as Superman, but ultimately as pessimistic and intellectual as Batman, preferring to hide within and unite a drastically different and yet like-minded group while pursuing individual interests that others find extremely obscure, obtuse, or possibly dull. Aquarians tend toward hypersensitivity and neurological problems, and the characteristic stubbornness comes from attempting to handle the onslaught of information screeching through the conscious mind. Aquarians seem more like cavemen than spacemen, or more accurately the arc of Terrence McKenna: beginning as scientific-minded futurists and developing into Archaic Revivalists after objective models prove fallacious or incongruous to a subjective existence. One might see this as the transition from the Saturn/Uranus mundane ruler to the Jupiter esoteric ruler, seeing wonder in data and theory instead of just ideas with no romance or affection. Somehow, as the Aquarian sign moves up in vibration, it moves closer to the Earth, not quite making it, but still affecting tides and emotions in some fashion. That characteristic aloofness and coldness seems at home on the Moon, yet still waters run deep.
Well, there we go. It's time to head out.
I was trying to research Alice Bailey's esoteric astrology, specifically the esoteric and hierarchical rulers of the signs. The problem is, just about everywhere I try to find information and assertions as to "why" these associations are in place, I find nothing but birdchatter and nonsensical self-interested dithering, to say nothing of rampant metagenetic philosophy. Somehow in the course of this, the relatively simplistic method of calculus as a philosophical template has been confounded in discussions of seven Rays (Bradbury, Park, Stanz, Tampa Bay, Liotta, and Charles) and a strange dismissal of the Moon as "obscuring" a much cooler and more eldritch luminary. The whole things seems to act toward complicating rather than revealing understanding.
Tables of correspondence run rampant, so dismissing this as a search for easy cookbook astrology has left my head. No one can seem to say "Mercury as the hierarchical ruler of Scorpio makes sense because--" and any searches seem to bring up people who will spend much time discussing a lot of nothing.
On another related astrology note, aside from a few allusions to Hellenic creation myths and surprisingly in the book Sextrology, I've seen very few astute discussions of the Aquarian sun. A lot of it seems to be caught up with the idea of causes, and so far all of the Aquarians I know could not give a shit about joining something. We're inherently mistrustful of marketing, and often end up the Martian Manhunter in terms of "superheroic" associations: Just as wonder-oriented and idealistic as Superman, but ultimately as pessimistic and intellectual as Batman, preferring to hide within and unite a drastically different and yet like-minded group while pursuing individual interests that others find extremely obscure, obtuse, or possibly dull. Aquarians tend toward hypersensitivity and neurological problems, and the characteristic stubbornness comes from attempting to handle the onslaught of information screeching through the conscious mind. Aquarians seem more like cavemen than spacemen, or more accurately the arc of Terrence McKenna: beginning as scientific-minded futurists and developing into Archaic Revivalists after objective models prove fallacious or incongruous to a subjective existence. One might see this as the transition from the Saturn/Uranus mundane ruler to the Jupiter esoteric ruler, seeing wonder in data and theory instead of just ideas with no romance or affection. Somehow, as the Aquarian sign moves up in vibration, it moves closer to the Earth, not quite making it, but still affecting tides and emotions in some fashion. That characteristic aloofness and coldness seems at home on the Moon, yet still waters run deep.
Well, there we go. It's time to head out.
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