This has been the most confronting chapter to me so far. I haven't listened to the podcast yet, but her prophetic sense around reaching for outer space and in increasing technological reliance from an experience of distress in one's own self is profound. It makes the truth around going inward to make peace with our limits, shadows, etc, to forgive ourselves for what we have been complicit in and what we cannot influence even more necessary.
I find myself going inside and trying to practice a kind of self forgiveness when I think about the moral injury that systems of modernity in which we are complicit are inflicting on us now and on future generations. It occurs to me that some Indigenous cultures that I am familiar with have practices for this kind of prayer or "being with" one's self while also seeking the presence, or the energy, of creation.
you have captured that really beautifully Madeline. I especially like (the link I make) the presence or energy of creation, which doesn't align with futuristic technological 'advances'. not sure I am expressing myself well, but I am feeling stuff
I am finding that I have to feel the weight of it all, in both its horror and the bits of glory that come with being returned to my humanity, and just deeply reverence what it means to be here, alive in this world. Creation teaches that, I think. There is so much to learn about ourselves and about creation from the force that animates creation in all its beauty and in its wildness.
This podcast episode came at exactly the right time for me, I wouldn’t say it gave me any solace- but the emotional reinforcement it gave my moral compass was appreciated.
I’m so worried for the freedom of Australians at this point in history. We are looking at the US, pointing fingers and asking how they could be so stupid to reelect trump while also being so disturbingly apathetic about our own government, political landscape and the rise of authoritarianism here.
Social media, lies, contradictory “truths” and bullshit spread by the media with the intention of confusing, and overwhelming an already over-worked, over-stimulated and emotionally tapped out population has produced a level of apathy here that means political dissent doesn’t exist beyond having a whinge in the comment section of a news.com.au social media post.
People who dare try to protest are ridiculed by the people around them, often arrested, and their voice and cause suppressed.
A combination of tall poppy syndrome and a weird cultural hatred of protesters (because they’re “annoying” and “inconvenient” ) means we have become frogs slowly boiling in a proverbial pot of control. Even the free thinkers who raised my generation seem to have lost the will to fight it (maybe because they’ve benefited from the system greatly for the last 30 years), or have forgotten the importance of rebellion and the community voice in maintaining freedom and balance in a democracy.
I’m horrified watching the government covertly erode freedoms hidden behind issues that are truely harms to society that do need addressing. Perhaps not addressing with more laws, but need addressing none the less.
When I try to talk to people about this it either falls on deaf ears and “yeah it sucks but what can we do” - or immediately I’m pinned as “she must be a sov cit cooker”.
I understand this is collapse. I understand that we are in it, it’s happening right now, and this shitfuckery I’m describing is just another sign of it. But god damn it am I terrified that the people around me are paying more attention to feeling morally superior to the flashy shit show in the US, than the literal sewer they are standing in here not realising that world leaders learn from each others playbooks. By the time they look down, it is going to be too late and the zone will be flooded with shit here too.
You would really love Lyndsey's book. She goes into Arendt's belief we must support the political system...to keep it accountable. We must preserve democracy through engagement. Keep speaking up, keep fighting for democracy...as Arendt says, we have to live with our silence and complicity.
“Oh, tomorrow—some fool will start the Machine again, tomorrow.
Never, said Kuno, never. Humanity has learnt its lesson”
Maybe we will never learn, but we must continue to do the work - self reflection, personal development, speaking up, raising awareness, joining a community like this - Not only for the outcome, but for the sake of our own sanity, and to find our tribe. ultimately yes, for our own liberty. But more importantly just to be the defiance. It’s uncomfortable but we need to push through the discomfort. Otherwise what is life? It’s not just fancy products and nice houses and BBQ’s whilst there is injustice in the word.
We must speak truth to power, and therein is the mission, how it lands is almost not important as pushing through our own body’s discomfort (I sure have felt it all my life, the butterflies in my stomach and heart racing and knot in my throat) and speaking up!
For me the observation that thinking itself is dangerous is most resonant. Our social conditioning, focus on productivity, achievement, busyness create a time poor over extended mass of people with little time to think. Solitude is required to think (as noted in your podcast) and loneliness, disconnection, alienation creates a society afraid of solitude and overextended disconnected individuals busy busy working. People distracted or deluded into thinking connection and a sense of belonging is possible on social media platforms… occasional texts and What’s app updates. People attempting to connect with others but actually disconnecting with self, ideas, critical thinking.. (And I’m aware as I write that I’m generalising and is not true everywhere .. but certainly it is the case with my colleagues, friends, family members and in my city, country and other Western countries). wTonight I chatted with a friend for 90 minutes. I began lamenting, expressing fear and anxiety from the fall out of Trumps picks in office (OMG!!!), that done, we began talking deeply, about our personal experiences beyond politics and calamity. I ended the call feeling connected, cared for, nourished. Time and conversing achieves that far more readily than social media updates or texts. It provides the sustenance I need for solitude, quiet, reflection… and thinking. My vow for this period is to avoid texting, touching base from a distance and to begin (again) talking, meeting, visiting… it renders the political strategy of alienation void and fills my heart and spirit with the fuel it needs to weather what comes next. It also enables me to sit quietly with my thoughts, make sense of the world, determine my response and not feel alone.
Hmmm. Thoughts can be really bad company! I’m obviously too verbose and confusing. 😂 More about our need for solitude disconnection from devices and busy ness, and connection with ourselves, and others to think deeply.
"... may end in the deadliest, most sterile passivity history has ever known.”
this is strong and quite stirring stuff. thanks for the podcast and quotes.
This certainly speaks to the collapse being an acceleration of shitification. and a niggling in my mind - that started with the earlier chapter. The quote about going out with a whimper rather than a a bang [... TS Elliot (doh), I admit I had to google it]: This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but a whimper.
and a couple of stray comments -
I am over 60, part of our form 4 English year at high school included critical or clear thinking. There was a book for it that we worked through. It challenged us to read all sorts of books, articles, and seriously challenge who wrote this and why. This we did before we graduated to Shakespeare and Austin, and learned to analyse them. I guess this is not taught now, in an age, and with (a) generation(s) who really need to sieve through all that is thrown at them.
I am interested that the world ending with a bang seems to be both a fear, and yet somehow better than the obviously pathetic 'whimper'. so emotive. But its again very binary and I don't think something at the whimper end of the spectrum is necessarily a bad thing. Especially if the billionaire boys club at jetting off to Mars (with the possibility of a bang) since I would rather connect with others staying behind.
Here in Australia art is often seen as something located around a subjective taste like a subjective preference for vegemite and lettuce or vegemite and cheese sandwiches
As someone who works in environment from practical through policy angles I have had the opportunity of late to design and construct with artists a number of open space art trails, one of particular note is an Aboriginal Open Space Art Trail in the town of Moree NSW, a place at the frontier of Aboriginal and environmental politics. Art offers a chance to navigate this space without too many words.
I was guided in my thinking in this sensitive terrain by Simon O'Sullivan's book "Art Encounters Deleuze and Guattari: Thought Beyond Representation".
Linked art installations resist their status as objects and demand the viewers participation for their completion.
Art is not binary it is 'and'
Art is both static and dynamic
Good art is both effective and affective
Art is both a representation and an encounter
Art is dissent and affirmation
Art is transitory and transformative
Art inspires the D&G thought concept for complexity, of rhizomes, rather than hierarchies.
Art is at the 'sweeping edge' between the existing state of affairs and a 'world yet to come'.
Thus art encompasses the notion of emergence but cautions a trajectory, hence the D&G thinking framework of rhizome
Open space art combines art processes, viewer and environment
Art inspires us to move beyond the familiar and into stage and unknown territories, with courage!
I would love to see their love letters and understand the relationship with her nazi sweetheart.
Relationship is designed in order to bring us both back to centre while also becoming more of who we are, while also simultaneously creating or rediscovering ourselves. Natures beautiful gift to us.
How did it end? Did he survive? Did they reconcile?
I have never noticed how destructive passivity has been in my own life until I read and thought about those words "deadliest, most sterile passivity". The biggest regrets in my life have been the result of being passive. Shit
Calling Trump and his followers Fascist maybe problematic
Just as problematic as the right leaners calling the left communists
I don’t think either side deserve either of these labels
I don’t think they have the necessary organisation, thought and discussion or the zeal to earn such labels
The woke delusions and victimhood , searching for evil underneath every rock or literary mistake or original thought. Engulfed in a holy quest for “rightness”, political correctness and “beige fairness”.
Vs the illusion of control , intelligence and superiority over nature , women or the world, grasped by the right leaning mind.
Both ideas, or what I would call escapes from reality, just as Hannah talked about.
This escape is just as accessible via the left or the right. Both are grasping for control over a life which if you do not take a hold of and love to pieces. In all of its beige mess, and all of its shining gold.
Can we change our language away from right or fascist or left and woke.
Can we just say , I do not accept being treated with contempt or control. If you try to ply me with an ideology. Or speak to me as if you are all knowing. Then that is not a conversation and I will not engage.
What I mean is he doesn’t deserve that mantle , at least Hitler put in the work. He had a vision, even though it was madness. And it was for more than just him (though it was all about him).
Trump is like the modern day capitalists, using Freud, Jung and the behavioural sciences against us. Along with Hitler and Goebbels play books.
I do not think you have Sarah, and I know that I go on and on about that 😅
I am most concerned about us turning against ourselves. Call someone a nasty word enough times, then they will become it, out of spite or out of desperation to connect and be included.
Binary has to be out, but the replacement needs to be just as simple. Rather than right and left, right and wrong, maybe that feels respectful and wise , vs that sounds demanding and short sighted.
I dunno
But yeah Hannah Arendt sounds quite metal. Loud and abashed and a bit too much, but having fun 🤩
I think I get what you are saying. Do you mean that when we put labels on people it can keep us stuck in an identity or ideology rather that being open to growth and change?
Exactly Kristy, Things need to be called what they are though. Because defining things once understood maintains clarity.
But part of the journey back from the edges of the left and right I feel is going to be being open to both the fascist within the communist and vice versa within ourselves. And also open to understanding and most importantly change.
Every time is get rigid , things break , every time I get too loose , people drift away , I drift away and things stagnate.
Trump will trump , and right now the world really really really wants to Trump. So let it trump.
And if anyone tries to trump with you , ask them politely to stop , and if they do not , then kick them in the nuts or the pussy. 🧐
I once saw all of this in a meditation, imagine two waves moving either together or at each other. The ones which collide will make the peak and the crash higher and more dramatic. The waves which move in the same direction and sync up in their wave form do not disrupt each other.
And then they both reach the shore upon which they wanted to arrive at. And order a Pina Colada 🍹
I think this is, or should be the start of every conversation. And the first question. Have I truly listened? Do I understand? Do I even need to say anything?
Is silence better?
To allow the truth or madness of a statement or a situation to just dissolve in the divinely awkward and naturally self correcting silence?
In that meditation is not the absence of thought , but the return to presence when you have identified with a thought.
How do we teach ourselves and our kids to be able to capture that moment when we become a cunt 😝 pardon my French. When our thinking is no longer thinking but has become instead an ideology. Where we are lost in the idea of a life, or lifestyle , rather than life itself.
Reflecting on my daughter’s misinterpretation of my words and my sometimes excessive level of judgment 😇🧐 and “righteousness”.
Anyone lonely, sad and very very angry , either 45 or 13 and full of hormones. Needs simple language, non labelling and more curiosity and questions.
Rather than answers or explanations or judgements.
Saying this , there are malicious actors in play also (entrepreneurial / scheming women and predatory men) on both sides. Which is different from the masses.
This is such a classic French Revolution scenario. The “elite” (aka middle class progressives) getting too big for their boots, and lost in self grandstanding, and consumption. While ignoring and judging the masses. Until the nasty leaders weaponise the masses.
Re the French Revolution - it was the upper middle class who rebelled, no? Same with Rome, same with in US - Much of the educated middle class voted for Trump
I am not educated enough in it to say accurately. But my understanding was that it was the dissatisfied Trumps of the day. The merchants who could not break through the cathedral or castle glass windows. And were limited in their ambition and achievements. Who then turned the masses against the monarchy and the powers that be.
Which maybe that is just the way it works?!?
Maybe Trump is the perfect bee 🐝
Who can smooze and entice but also brings immense pain?
Us in the upper middle class are soooo comfortable, we are challenged in our work and relationships, our material needs are met. So we don’t really dare to upset the apple cart. Or in so many cases the lenders tables.
We die by a thousand cuts and caramel lattes.
While Trump suffers emotionally and mentally immensely , and the poor get kicked in the guts daily? So they are the first to turn. Even though we all know shit ain’t smelling like roses. 🌹
I adore the conclusion that a way out of the mess is critical thinking. I think it also might be true that the way out of increasing alienation is practicing reconciliation. My thoughts go back to your chapter on forgiveness, Sarah. And how important that practice is. It is kind of scandalous, isn’t it? That the way out of it all is to think and to feel and to risk and to offer tenderness.
The bullshit definitely feeds the moloch. Why try , why believe , why not just snatch, grab and grasp for what ever is left? And what ever balms and snake oils are on offer?
Once this condition is seen for what it is , then we can choose another path. As we can see the abyss , and even start to guess at what lays at the bottom.
Excellent, quotes and i look forward to listening to the podcast . It’s good to remember when Hannah was writing and why it so relevant now, as the world turns to totalitarianism.
Have you read Parable of The Sower ?
Octavia E Butler’s fantastic book also predicts and tries to warn us…it’s even set in 2024.
I got so much out of this conversation. Gosh, I took actual notes to share with friends as we were going to see an exhibition here in Toronto of Lee Millers photography including those of the atrocities in Bruchenwald camp. It all tied in..have ordered Lyndsey’s book.
Oh, it’s a lot isn’t it? But the sense making is so important
This has been the most confronting chapter to me so far. I haven't listened to the podcast yet, but her prophetic sense around reaching for outer space and in increasing technological reliance from an experience of distress in one's own self is profound. It makes the truth around going inward to make peace with our limits, shadows, etc, to forgive ourselves for what we have been complicit in and what we cannot influence even more necessary.
I find myself going inside and trying to practice a kind of self forgiveness when I think about the moral injury that systems of modernity in which we are complicit are inflicting on us now and on future generations. It occurs to me that some Indigenous cultures that I am familiar with have practices for this kind of prayer or "being with" one's self while also seeking the presence, or the energy, of creation.
Anticipatory grief is very real, too. I'm getting to that in an upcoming chapter
It's actually not a chapter in the book...but, gosh, this book is EVERYTHING... x
you have captured that really beautifully Madeline. I especially like (the link I make) the presence or energy of creation, which doesn't align with futuristic technological 'advances'. not sure I am expressing myself well, but I am feeling stuff
I am finding that I have to feel the weight of it all, in both its horror and the bits of glory that come with being returned to my humanity, and just deeply reverence what it means to be here, alive in this world. Creation teaches that, I think. There is so much to learn about ourselves and about creation from the force that animates creation in all its beauty and in its wildness.
This podcast episode came at exactly the right time for me, I wouldn’t say it gave me any solace- but the emotional reinforcement it gave my moral compass was appreciated.
I’m so worried for the freedom of Australians at this point in history. We are looking at the US, pointing fingers and asking how they could be so stupid to reelect trump while also being so disturbingly apathetic about our own government, political landscape and the rise of authoritarianism here.
Social media, lies, contradictory “truths” and bullshit spread by the media with the intention of confusing, and overwhelming an already over-worked, over-stimulated and emotionally tapped out population has produced a level of apathy here that means political dissent doesn’t exist beyond having a whinge in the comment section of a news.com.au social media post.
People who dare try to protest are ridiculed by the people around them, often arrested, and their voice and cause suppressed.
A combination of tall poppy syndrome and a weird cultural hatred of protesters (because they’re “annoying” and “inconvenient” ) means we have become frogs slowly boiling in a proverbial pot of control. Even the free thinkers who raised my generation seem to have lost the will to fight it (maybe because they’ve benefited from the system greatly for the last 30 years), or have forgotten the importance of rebellion and the community voice in maintaining freedom and balance in a democracy.
I’m horrified watching the government covertly erode freedoms hidden behind issues that are truely harms to society that do need addressing. Perhaps not addressing with more laws, but need addressing none the less.
When I try to talk to people about this it either falls on deaf ears and “yeah it sucks but what can we do” - or immediately I’m pinned as “she must be a sov cit cooker”.
I understand this is collapse. I understand that we are in it, it’s happening right now, and this shitfuckery I’m describing is just another sign of it. But god damn it am I terrified that the people around me are paying more attention to feeling morally superior to the flashy shit show in the US, than the literal sewer they are standing in here not realising that world leaders learn from each others playbooks. By the time they look down, it is going to be too late and the zone will be flooded with shit here too.
You would really love Lyndsey's book. She goes into Arendt's belief we must support the political system...to keep it accountable. We must preserve democracy through engagement. Keep speaking up, keep fighting for democracy...as Arendt says, we have to live with our silence and complicity.
Last lines from The Machine Stops by E.M Forster:
“Oh, tomorrow—some fool will start the Machine again, tomorrow.
Never, said Kuno, never. Humanity has learnt its lesson”
Maybe we will never learn, but we must continue to do the work - self reflection, personal development, speaking up, raising awareness, joining a community like this - Not only for the outcome, but for the sake of our own sanity, and to find our tribe. ultimately yes, for our own liberty. But more importantly just to be the defiance. It’s uncomfortable but we need to push through the discomfort. Otherwise what is life? It’s not just fancy products and nice houses and BBQ’s whilst there is injustice in the word.
We must speak truth to power, and therein is the mission, how it lands is almost not important as pushing through our own body’s discomfort (I sure have felt it all my life, the butterflies in my stomach and heart racing and knot in my throat) and speaking up!
Like this from Jan_Fran … https://www.instagram.com/reel/DCSv4gSy5x3/?igsh=MXV1cmZ5YTU4bmE0aw==
For me the observation that thinking itself is dangerous is most resonant. Our social conditioning, focus on productivity, achievement, busyness create a time poor over extended mass of people with little time to think. Solitude is required to think (as noted in your podcast) and loneliness, disconnection, alienation creates a society afraid of solitude and overextended disconnected individuals busy busy working. People distracted or deluded into thinking connection and a sense of belonging is possible on social media platforms… occasional texts and What’s app updates. People attempting to connect with others but actually disconnecting with self, ideas, critical thinking.. (And I’m aware as I write that I’m generalising and is not true everywhere .. but certainly it is the case with my colleagues, friends, family members and in my city, country and other Western countries). wTonight I chatted with a friend for 90 minutes. I began lamenting, expressing fear and anxiety from the fall out of Trumps picks in office (OMG!!!), that done, we began talking deeply, about our personal experiences beyond politics and calamity. I ended the call feeling connected, cared for, nourished. Time and conversing achieves that far more readily than social media updates or texts. It provides the sustenance I need for solitude, quiet, reflection… and thinking. My vow for this period is to avoid texting, touching base from a distance and to begin (again) talking, meeting, visiting… it renders the political strategy of alienation void and fills my heart and spirit with the fuel it needs to weather what comes next. It also enables me to sit quietly with my thoughts, make sense of the world, determine my response and not feel alone.
Yes, thinking is a balm for loneliness if you can come to respect and enjoy your own special way of thinking
Hmmm. Thoughts can be really bad company! I’m obviously too verbose and confusing. 😂 More about our need for solitude disconnection from devices and busy ness, and connection with ourselves, and others to think deeply.
Beautifully said
"... may end in the deadliest, most sterile passivity history has ever known.”
this is strong and quite stirring stuff. thanks for the podcast and quotes.
This certainly speaks to the collapse being an acceleration of shitification. and a niggling in my mind - that started with the earlier chapter. The quote about going out with a whimper rather than a a bang [... TS Elliot (doh), I admit I had to google it]: This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but a whimper.
and a couple of stray comments -
I am over 60, part of our form 4 English year at high school included critical or clear thinking. There was a book for it that we worked through. It challenged us to read all sorts of books, articles, and seriously challenge who wrote this and why. This we did before we graduated to Shakespeare and Austin, and learned to analyse them. I guess this is not taught now, in an age, and with (a) generation(s) who really need to sieve through all that is thrown at them.
I am interested that the world ending with a bang seems to be both a fear, and yet somehow better than the obviously pathetic 'whimper'. so emotive. But its again very binary and I don't think something at the whimper end of the spectrum is necessarily a bad thing. Especially if the billionaire boys club at jetting off to Mars (with the possibility of a bang) since I would rather connect with others staying behind.
You are right - it's not taught now (critical thinking).
I just interviewed someone (comes out next week or one after) who believes it will be a bang....
Art is important in contemporary society
Here in Australia art is often seen as something located around a subjective taste like a subjective preference for vegemite and lettuce or vegemite and cheese sandwiches
As someone who works in environment from practical through policy angles I have had the opportunity of late to design and construct with artists a number of open space art trails, one of particular note is an Aboriginal Open Space Art Trail in the town of Moree NSW, a place at the frontier of Aboriginal and environmental politics. Art offers a chance to navigate this space without too many words.
I was guided in my thinking in this sensitive terrain by Simon O'Sullivan's book "Art Encounters Deleuze and Guattari: Thought Beyond Representation".
Linked art installations resist their status as objects and demand the viewers participation for their completion.
Art is not binary it is 'and'
Art is both static and dynamic
Good art is both effective and affective
Art is both a representation and an encounter
Art is dissent and affirmation
Art is transitory and transformative
Art inspires the D&G thought concept for complexity, of rhizomes, rather than hierarchies.
Art is at the 'sweeping edge' between the existing state of affairs and a 'world yet to come'.
Thus art encompasses the notion of emergence but cautions a trajectory, hence the D&G thinking framework of rhizome
Open space art combines art processes, viewer and environment
Art inspires us to move beyond the familiar and into stage and unknown territories, with courage!
Yes! Art takes us to the space between the things...where we have to develop our own take, we have to think!
I would love to see their love letters and understand the relationship with her nazi sweetheart.
Relationship is designed in order to bring us both back to centre while also becoming more of who we are, while also simultaneously creating or rediscovering ourselves. Natures beautiful gift to us.
How did it end? Did he survive? Did they reconcile?
They stayed in contact all their life, writing to each other.
Wow 🤩
That both scares me , that someone so intelligent could be so blind
But also hopeful, that hearts are obviously fucking colour blind and shitty at focusing. And can find a way past the bullshit.
There is hope for us all
🥰😂
I have never noticed how destructive passivity has been in my own life until I read and thought about those words "deadliest, most sterile passivity". The biggest regrets in my life have been the result of being passive. Shit
Ah Kristy, your searing, beautiful honest again. I honestly can't see you as passive...you write like a fired up engager!
I agree !
thanks for tipping Hannah Arendt (and Lyndsey's book) into my readings .. will reprioritise post haste!
great timing as others have commented (for this post and the podcast)
legendary AND metallic
it's a fun read. A little like Anna Funder's Wifedom. I find women biographers bring real life to their subjects.
Here is a question
Calling Trump and his followers Fascist maybe problematic
Just as problematic as the right leaners calling the left communists
I don’t think either side deserve either of these labels
I don’t think they have the necessary organisation, thought and discussion or the zeal to earn such labels
The woke delusions and victimhood , searching for evil underneath every rock or literary mistake or original thought. Engulfed in a holy quest for “rightness”, political correctness and “beige fairness”.
Vs the illusion of control , intelligence and superiority over nature , women or the world, grasped by the right leaning mind.
Both ideas, or what I would call escapes from reality, just as Hannah talked about.
This escape is just as accessible via the left or the right. Both are grasping for control over a life which if you do not take a hold of and love to pieces. In all of its beige mess, and all of its shining gold.
Can we change our language away from right or fascist or left and woke.
Can we just say , I do not accept being treated with contempt or control. If you try to ply me with an ideology. Or speak to me as if you are all knowing. Then that is not a conversation and I will not engage.
Maybe we need more silence?
I think this it
The antidote to bullshit is silence
In that echo chamber we can all start to smell it
I think we can call Trump fascist. Definitely not his followers, though. Have I done this? i hope not.
What I mean is he doesn’t deserve that mantle , at least Hitler put in the work. He had a vision, even though it was madness. And it was for more than just him (though it was all about him).
Trump is like the modern day capitalists, using Freud, Jung and the behavioural sciences against us. Along with Hitler and Goebbels play books.
I do not think you have Sarah, and I know that I go on and on about that 😅
I am most concerned about us turning against ourselves. Call someone a nasty word enough times, then they will become it, out of spite or out of desperation to connect and be included.
Binary has to be out, but the replacement needs to be just as simple. Rather than right and left, right and wrong, maybe that feels respectful and wise , vs that sounds demanding and short sighted.
I dunno
But yeah Hannah Arendt sounds quite metal. Loud and abashed and a bit too much, but having fun 🤩
I think I get what you are saying. Do you mean that when we put labels on people it can keep us stuck in an identity or ideology rather that being open to growth and change?
I call my ex a narcissist and a bother. Which she is , as I am. All to different degrees and at different times.
And at the same time we are both not. We are both human and are capable of peace and love.
The moment I try and stick that post it note on her with a thumb tack. Is the moment that we both bleed.
It is the same with all relating, political, or parental or sexual.
It is not a silver bullet , and I might be really fucked in the head and wrong. But the narcissist in me says that I am right 😇🤓🤪✌🏼🥸🐝
Exactly Kristy, Things need to be called what they are though. Because defining things once understood maintains clarity.
But part of the journey back from the edges of the left and right I feel is going to be being open to both the fascist within the communist and vice versa within ourselves. And also open to understanding and most importantly change.
Every time is get rigid , things break , every time I get too loose , people drift away , I drift away and things stagnate.
Trump will trump , and right now the world really really really wants to Trump. So let it trump.
And if anyone tries to trump with you , ask them politely to stop , and if they do not , then kick them in the nuts or the pussy. 🧐
I once saw all of this in a meditation, imagine two waves moving either together or at each other. The ones which collide will make the peak and the crash higher and more dramatic. The waves which move in the same direction and sync up in their wave form do not disrupt each other.
And then they both reach the shore upon which they wanted to arrive at. And order a Pina Colada 🍹
Maybe it is in silence where we meet ourselves, so that we can truly be in relationship with others.
I think this is, or should be the start of every conversation. And the first question. Have I truly listened? Do I understand? Do I even need to say anything?
Is silence better?
To allow the truth or madness of a statement or a situation to just dissolve in the divinely awkward and naturally self correcting silence?
And her approach to thinking 😍
Which is more akin to meditation
In that meditation is not the absence of thought , but the return to presence when you have identified with a thought.
How do we teach ourselves and our kids to be able to capture that moment when we become a cunt 😝 pardon my French. When our thinking is no longer thinking but has become instead an ideology. Where we are lost in the idea of a life, or lifestyle , rather than life itself.
Can we increase the loneliness ?
While also creating clear boundaries for ourselves. While also teaching ourselves how to communicate better and thus others around us.
4B tshirts and gaffa taped lips
Reflecting on my daughter’s misinterpretation of my words and my sometimes excessive level of judgment 😇🧐 and “righteousness”.
Anyone lonely, sad and very very angry , either 45 or 13 and full of hormones. Needs simple language, non labelling and more curiosity and questions.
Rather than answers or explanations or judgements.
Saying this , there are malicious actors in play also (entrepreneurial / scheming women and predatory men) on both sides. Which is different from the masses.
This is such a classic French Revolution scenario. The “elite” (aka middle class progressives) getting too big for their boots, and lost in self grandstanding, and consumption. While ignoring and judging the masses. Until the nasty leaders weaponise the masses.
Re the French Revolution - it was the upper middle class who rebelled, no? Same with Rome, same with in US - Much of the educated middle class voted for Trump
I am not educated enough in it to say accurately. But my understanding was that it was the dissatisfied Trumps of the day. The merchants who could not break through the cathedral or castle glass windows. And were limited in their ambition and achievements. Who then turned the masses against the monarchy and the powers that be.
Which maybe that is just the way it works?!?
Maybe Trump is the perfect bee 🐝
Who can smooze and entice but also brings immense pain?
Us in the upper middle class are soooo comfortable, we are challenged in our work and relationships, our material needs are met. So we don’t really dare to upset the apple cart. Or in so many cases the lenders tables.
We die by a thousand cuts and caramel lattes.
While Trump suffers emotionally and mentally immensely , and the poor get kicked in the guts daily? So they are the first to turn. Even though we all know shit ain’t smelling like roses. 🌹
I adore the conclusion that a way out of the mess is critical thinking. I think it also might be true that the way out of increasing alienation is practicing reconciliation. My thoughts go back to your chapter on forgiveness, Sarah. And how important that practice is. It is kind of scandalous, isn’t it? That the way out of it all is to think and to feel and to risk and to offer tenderness.
All the VERY right-brain things. I keep thinking of Iain MacGilchrist's work - the world has become too left-brain dominant.
The bullshit definitely feeds the moloch. Why try , why believe , why not just snatch, grab and grasp for what ever is left? And what ever balms and snake oils are on offer?
Once this condition is seen for what it is , then we can choose another path. As we can see the abyss , and even start to guess at what lays at the bottom.
Imagine Sarah and Hannah Arendt on a podcast episode together 😬 How captivating would that be !!
Oh that would be terrifying and... wonderful. I reckon she'd be fun and kind and generous.
Excellent, quotes and i look forward to listening to the podcast . It’s good to remember when Hannah was writing and why it so relevant now, as the world turns to totalitarianism.
Have you read Parable of The Sower ?
Octavia E Butler’s fantastic book also predicts and tries to warn us…it’s even set in 2024.
I'm going to try get it here at one of the English speaking bookshops
There is also a wonderful podcast by Adrienne Maree Brown to accompany the book.
https://www.readingoctavia.com/episodes/sower-e1
I highly recommend , also the follow up Parable of The Talents, not for the faint hearted but very rewarding.
I got so much out of this conversation. Gosh, I took actual notes to share with friends as we were going to see an exhibition here in Toronto of Lee Millers photography including those of the atrocities in Bruchenwald camp. It all tied in..have ordered Lyndsey’s book.
Oh, it’s a lot isn’t it? But the sense making is so important