Crossroads Dispatches

the future of us = wonder year(s) and experiments in imaginal science

"The Wonder Year project is an invitation to imagine what lies beyond the apparent boundary of 2012, not as a rigidy imposed concept or prediction, but as an adventure." - The Wonder Year

I adore invitations and adventure, so this The Wonder Year (via Spaziale blog) caught my eye today; I'm still investigating it for myself.

Two days ago, I conceived of a mini-adventure inspired by a book's premise that I'd like to share.

In The Future of Us, teenage protagonists Josh and Emma live in 1996, and find out that Emma's computer can mysteriously access Facebook fifteen years in the future. Facebook doesn't exist in linear time, yet inadvertently or not, they're reading their own future-self Facebook statuses. They begin to piece together a puzzle of their lives as grown-ups.

In 1996, taking the best educated guess I could at the time, I'd be starkly wrong about the ride into 2011 on almost every single front I'd hazard a guess.  Rather than 15 years fast-forward, even 10-year-sprees are daunting: I was pretty much the same person with same worldview in 1996 as in 1986 so extrapolation sort of works for that time span. But 2006? That was night-and-day from 1996.

Eight years and exactly one day ago today, I published my first post here at Crossroads Dispatches. (Previous blog lasted a few months.) Could I predict I'd still be writing right here same bat-channel eight years later?

I'm startled myself how skimming (I didn't read it through as it's more suited to YA) The Future of Us got me going on this theme about how we believe we can or ought to predict or shape destiny. Notions such as there is a singular optimum destiny and we must finagle to get there. Or fearsome other destinies we must avoid. It opens up a ball of wax to play with.

I just didn't know what I didn't know back then, and actually couldn't conceive of many of the events and insights that have occurred (and I've left out a lot of juicy, weird parts). Mind and spirit may not be static. Maybe we aren't confined by our 17-year-old beliefs, or even yesterdays'.

"Many times I imagined myself here--at the threshold of the palace. But I always thought I would be here as a conqueror, instead we are the Earth king's personal guests here to serve him tea. Destiny is a funny thing." - unnamed character in Avatar: The Last Airbender

Destiny is a funny thing.

"Now, we have to do something. It doesn't have to be huge, but something we weren't going to do before playing this game."

"Emma, I'm not messing with the future. Not as part of a game."

"Then don't call it a game!" she snaps. "Think of it as an award-winning science experiment."

Emma picks up the thin blue vase from her dresser. Earlier this week, it held the dying roses Graham gave her for prom. Emma slowly tips the vase until water begins dribbling onto her white carpet.

"What are you doing?" I ask. But I know the answer. She's making a small change in the present to see how it affects the future. If I grab the vase from her now, it wouldn't matter because that wouldn't have happened before either. - The Future of Us, by Jay Asher and Carolyn Macker

In the book, Emma and Josh started to notice that things they'd decide in the present would ripple into the future each time they hit refresh on Facebook--sometimes affecting the name of their spouse,  the town where they reside, who's on their Friends list and who isn't and other factors.

The Invitation and Adventure. Try on this experiment in imaginal science. Less manipulating the future, more an exercise in imagination, at least for me--but play it as you will.

What did you do today that rippled into the future? As Emma notes, "It doesn't have to be huge, but something we weren't going to do before playing this game."

I like the ring of "hindsight is 20/20" so I'm setting my future statuses for the year 2020. Oh, and I'm not necessarily going to stay within the realm of "the feasible."

Add yours in Comments section below if you want to play too. (You can also invent the present-day statuses, if you like.) I'll play for about 10 or 11 days through February 19th--adding my statuses to the Comments. In a few days, I'll add yet another twist to the game inspired from the book, The Future of Us. Here's an example:

Yesterday: For the past year, nearly every day I walk 1 and 1/2 hours in pretty much the southerly direction in the same neighborhood. Today I walked a new northern route (I'd explored pieces of it years ago; today, I went further). And found a biking trail I didn't know about. It gave me a vantage point to see palatial 'star' homes that are often obscured by gates and walls.

In 2020: Jaunt through forests near Mogollon Rim. Built a fire for the evening. I'll travel again at dawn. (The unspoken, implied part is totally comfortable with wilderness survival in winter.) Photo attached with status update: Mongollan Rim and the Verde River.

ART CREDITS: Illustration by Katsuhiro Otomo via darksilenceinsuburbia; Bâtiment (Building) Installation, by Leandro Erlich, grants super-powers to passersby -- scale a building in Paris through March (a vertical mirror reflects a horizontal building facade) via MyModernMet.

what can be explained is not poetry - w. b. yeats

“Publishing a volume of poetry is like dropping a rose petal down the Grand Canyon and waiting for the echo,” said author Don Marquis, speaking from experience. Something you’re considering, Leo, may seem to fit that description, too. It’s a project or action or gift that you’d feel good about offering, but you also wonder whether it will generate the same buzz as that rose petal floating down into the Grand Canyon. Here’s what I think: To the degree that you shed your attachment to making an impact, you will make the exact impact that matters most. Give yourself without any expectations.” - Rob Brezsny

I'm not a Leo per se, yet that truly spoke to me. And poetry is more than lyrics and lines, more fathomless in category as W.B. Yeats says, “What can be explained is not poetry.”

My last post here was back in October. Once I was locked out from updating (I hadn't paid my monthly fees), it didn't take long to see that I could appreciate a respite.

Recently, I picked up the Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon series on DVD at the local library (no spoilers, I'm only 2/3 through). It begins in an alternate world with its own cosmology. This world is divided into four elements, with their attendant lands and kings. They are in the midst of a hundred-year war instigated by the Fire Nation wiping out many of the people and cultures in their world, including the Air Nomads and their temple.

A small tribe of Water people are deciding whether or not to banish a new-comer: a twelve-year-old named Aang whom might just be the Avatar (by balancing the four elements within himself, the Avatar can restore balance outside, ending the war). The debate ensues around whether he is too reckless to be among their serious warriors.

This is the dialogue that spoke to me, and I might just make it my mantra (internally) going forward:

Kitara: Don't you see? Aang's brought us something we haven't had in a long time. Fun.
Sokka: Fun? We can't fight Firebenders with fun!
Aang, the Avatar (smiling earnestly): You should try it sometime.

I can see some of you rolling your eyes at this point. Does it seem like fun = frivolous, or is it fun = harmonizing the imbalances in the world while having fun in the process? Fun = inventing and inspiring joyous ways of living?

This is where the line in the opening of the post: "It’s a project or action or gift that you’d feel good about offering, but you also wonder whether it will generate the same buzz as that rose petal floating down into the Grand Canyon" resounds. This blog, Crossroads Dispatches, celebrates it's 8th anniversary on February 6th. It's time for a shift that's closer to my gift: Less explaining, more exploring. To that end, I'm focusing on experiments in imagination and improvisation and fun; starting off easy and going into the more far-fetched and revolutionary as we go. That doesn't mean explaining shall never occur, but yeah, I'm aiming for exploratory, adventurous, experiential.

A glimpse of EXPLAINING:

"Today, the sci-fi novels of the sixties feel like artifacts from a distant age. "One way you can describe the collapse of the idea of the future is the collapse of science fiction," Thiel said. "Now it's either about technology that doesn't work or about technology that's used in bad ways. The anthology of the top twenty-five sci-fi stories of 1970 was, like, "Me and my friend the robot went for a walk on the moon,' and in 2008 it was, like, 'The galaxy is run by a fundamentalist Islamic confedereracy, and there are people who are hunting planets and killing them for fun."

[Peter] Thiel's venture-capital firm, Founders Fund, has an online manifesto about the future that begins with a complaint: "We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters." He believes that this failure of imagination explains many of the country's problems--from the collapse in manufacturing to wage stagnation to the swelling of the financial sector. As he puts it, "You have dizzying change where there's no progress."" - "No Death, No Taxes," The New Yorker, November 28, 2011

I don't relegate the dynamic of unfolding change to technology alone. I am more interested in questioning and stretching the horizons of the possible. Sometimes that is a simple shift of perception that affects identity, culture, and society.

Here's a glimpse of EXPLORING:

Speaking of sugared petals, here's an exercise:

imagine you are host to a 101-course meal (I believe Senia gave me this seed idea originally in NYC 2006 after an adventure in the Whitney Museum).

What might you serve?

Well, here's an actual 100-course meal conceived of by artist Mitchell Dose, held at West Bank Social Center, a  laboratory for social engagement in Minneapolis.

Spring roll, raisin, red pepper, Mung bean, tomato preserve,
pancake and mini pancake, maple syrup, kombucha, polenta rounds with basil and tomato, red Russian kale, thistle flower coffee, guava juice, blackberry, jalapeno, red currant, Morbier cheese, fennel seed were among the 100 bites of art offered.

Now imagine like the boys in Peter Pan that you too can be fed by the energy of envisioned food.

Or as Robert Irwin puts it, “It’s strange. With food, for instance, people seem able to understand what’s involved: you savor the taste rather than just feed the body. But people have a hard time understanding that it should be the same way with visual experience.”  Actually, I'd omit visual and broaden to "the same way with experience."

So now what might you serve that nourishes the senses, spirit and soul as well?

I'd have sugared rose petals.

And pinecone, an hourglass, peanut butter on a sterling silver spoon, a jar of royal blue moist tempura paint, match tea powder (unsteeped), a haiku printed on cloth, confetti, a pincushion stuck with pins with colorful threads through them, cottonball, typewriter ribbon, swim goggles, leaf, lit tealight candle, shower curtain ring, Pocky (Japanese snack), an ice cube... and on and on.

What would you serve?

p.s. Essence of exploration: The venue above, the West Bank Social Center’s tagline is 'UNPREDICTABLE THINGS ARE HAPPENING.'

p.p.s. Although I was not active on this blog, I have been on Tumblr. I have a free Tumblr blog on public space, public art, placemaking, reuse of empty spaces by the community, cities as software, urban interventions and improvisations. Also, it is very inspiring to follow certain search terms if you have an account on Tumblr, in particular "installation" is consistently amazing.

Photo credits: Deer Creek Canyon in Grand Canyon National Park panafoot on Flickr; sugared petals via encoreuneminute.tumblr.com

game-changing, or how to turn economic recovery into a multi-player game experience

"Game-changing."

You hear that term bandied about in innovation circles. In application, it isn't that frequent as "game-changer" implies something that leapfrogs one out of the lock of a current system, institution, industry, regime, paradigm and defines its own brand-new game. 

I hadn't connected the dots with the synchronicity of hints and winks that life is a grand "game" until recently.

I sat down to eat lunch the other day, and absentmindly (well, could almost replace instinctually or spontaneously with "absentmindedly") pick up the top magazine in my Mom's pile to browse through for eye-candy. (Not typical for me; if I am going to read while eating it would be the Internet.)

I open up her recent Elle to the story of Jane McGonigal. The article profiles her life and her purpose: fleshing out her childhood joy into a profession, announcing her new game company, showing how she got into real-world gaming (differs from video games in that it interleaves real-world issues and real-life experiences with game mechanics), and the head injury that instigated her latest game: one that helped her regain her joie de vivre and her health.

So I thought: what if we were to repurpose Jane's concept of "how to turn recovery into a multi-player experience" into "how to turn economic recovery into a multi-player experience?" And I don't mean recovery as in return to the past or status quo. Perhaps dynamically better than yesterday: I like what Umair Haque says here about the classic Greek principle of eudaimonia: "Eudaimonic prosperity, in contrast, is about mastering a new set of habits: igniting the art of living meaningfully well. An active conception of prosperity, it's concerned not with what one has, but what one is capable of."

I'd been thinking that economics and money touches just about everyone's life--okay, nix that for fairies, elves and dragons. But humans are fairly enthralled (dare I say, seduced) by this whole game of exchange of gifts that includes bits of colored paper and tinkling coinage.

"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." - Bucky Fuller

Backtrack a bit to May 2009, I was working on a grant proposal that tied into New Orleans' "Creative Recovery." (For context, "Creative Recovery" grants were through Transforma Projects mini-grants: "The Creative Recovery Mini-Grant program supported work produced at the intersection of art, social justice, and recovery in New Orleans. It fueled the recovery process with the energy of the local creative community by supporting the vibrant activity on the ground level.")

I realized after I'd dreamed it and written it up (then, reading the fine print) that I disqualified for applying for the grant as I was no longer a permanent resident (however, I was in New Orleans at the time). The seed of the idea kept tugging at me, so I wrote it up as a real-world game concept in February 2011. Here's the original Kickstarter project proposal here (unfunded); although, the concept has evolved considerably.

"The "next Google" is unlikely to be a search engine, however, just as the "next Microsoft" was not a desktop software company. I used competing directly with Google as an example of a problem with maximum difficulty, not maximum payoff. Maximum payoff is more likely to come from making Google irrelevant than from replacing it. How exactly? I have no more than vague ideas about that. I wouldn't expect to be able to figure out the right answer, just as I wouldn't have expected anyone to figure out in 1990 what would make Microsoft irrelevant. " - Paul Graham, entrepreneur, angel investor, and founder of the tech start-up incubator and education program, Y Combinator

At this point in my musing, I'm reacquainted with an old blogging buddy in his private Google+ circle last week, and he linked to the article below. (Worth reading the whole she-bang for context and inspiration.) My friend asks his circle how we might use Google+ to correspond with each other and take action towards life-enhancing visions of the world (or what I also call a Renaissance). That's when things get intriguing...

The article my Google+ buddy shared to kick off the private circle discussion:

"Put what, why, and who you love ahead of what, why, and who you don't, and your roadmap will begin to write itself.

Now, my little principle might cause those with hand-made suits and beancounterly tendencies to leap out of their chairs and hit me with the tarantallegra jinx. But even the cynics might be willing to admit: given a mysteriously non-recovering "recovery" for a global economy perpetually poised on the brink of perma-crisis, the status quo's out of ideas, out of options, and running out of time.

In an economy dedicated to the pursuit of more, bigger, faster, cheaper, nastier, the greatest hidden cost and unintended consequence is that something vital, enduring, resonant, and animating has gone missing from our lives — and it might just be the biggest thing: meaning in what we do, and why we're here." - Umair Haque, "A Roadmap to a Life that Matters," Harvard Business Review blog, July 13, 2011

I was surprised to see this article in the Harvard Business Review blog--it's a bit warm and fuzzy for HBR (at least the HBR that I recall from years ago)... although a great sign... sign... signal, design... as the article lays out a design intention as in William McDonough's mantra: "Design is the first signal of human intention."

Linked in the above post is Umair's post on eudaimonia, Greek philosophy of "a deeply fulfilled life", where Umair contrasts the trajectory we are on with what we may prefer to set into motion, into design. In my own blog (see purpose paragraph under the headline, Crossroads Dispatches), what he calls eudaimonia I've encapsulated as:

"A neo-renaissance, eco-epicurean savors, curates and shares slices from the surf's edge on the inspiration, imagination, the art of living, the living of art - and anything that screams Life."

"In short, I see an outcomes gap: a yawning chasm the size of the Grand Canyon between what our economy produces and what you might call a meaningfully well-lived life, what the ancient Greeks called eudaimonia.

The economy we have today will let you chow down on a supersize McBurger, check derivative prices on your latest smartphone, and drive your giant SUV down the block to buy a McMansion on hypercredit. It's a vision of the good life that I call (a tiny gnat standing on the shoulders of the great Amartya Sen) hedonic opulence. And it's a conception built in and for the industrial age: about having more. Now consider a different vision: maybe crafting a fine meal, to be accompanied by local, award-winning microbrewed beer your friends have brought over, and then walking back to the studio where you're designing a building whose goal is nothing less than rivaling the Sagrada Familia. That's an alternate vision, one I call eudaimonic prosperity, and it's about living meaningfully well. Its purpose is not merely passive, slack-jawed "consuming" but living: doing, achieving, fulfilling, becoming, inspiring, transcending, creating, accomplishing — all the stuff that matters the most.

. . . .  Though it harks back to antiquity, eudaimonia's a smarter, sharper, wiser, wholer, well, richer conception of prosperity. And deep down, while it might be hard to admit, I'd bet we all know that our current habits are leaving us — have left us — not merely financially and fiscally broken, but, if not intellectually, physically, emotionally, relationally, and spiritually empty, then, well, probably at least just a little bit unhealthy. Eudaimonic prosperity, in contrast, is about mastering a new set of habits: igniting the art of living meaningfully well. An active conception of prosperity, it's concerned not with what one has, but what one is capable of." - Umair Haque, " Is a Well-Lived Life Worth Living?," Harvard Business Review blog, May 12, 2011

So this is a backstory on the genesis of the game. I've a few ideas for an enchanting real-world game that'd be worthwhile for each of us individually--and widening the circle, collectively. I think the "economic" recovery is a matter of re-imagining our present and future as to what we would truly desire no holds barred, rather than constantly extrapolating scenarios of the past onto the future.

To tie this in all together to the present day, Google+ could be an effective way to communicate with our "allies" (i.e. us) on a near-daily basis to play a game I'm formulating. (I'll admit this is much simpler if you already use Gmail as your hub, as I do, then it's integrated into your Internet experience.)

Allies is the multi-player aspect of the Super Better game that Jane used day to day to recover from her injury and post-concussion syndrome; so it is not a game of solitaire ;)

Please let me know if you need an invite to Google+ by August 1st (I may not check comments at this post later).

   

The economic thriving game is unfurling in a baby step next week. [Above is Derek Sivers' video "Start Now. No Funding Needed." Derek founded CDBaby in 1997.]

If you have game suggestions, or other suggestions, please let me know in comments or over at Google+. And, please note, if you go over to check Google+ out, you are viewing the public posts. The way Google+ works is you have to be in my circle to view the super secret ones ;).

p.s. Jane McGonigal's new company, Social Chocolate, initially starts an online verson of her Super Better concept game that she used to recover from her own head injury; she's extended the game for any type of injury and/or illness (yet to be released, forthcoming). I've been thinking of what game-changing means in terms of healthcare and other fields too--but that's another story.

p.p.s. I'm well aware of the "this is a first-world problem" argument. We start where we are ourselves and branch out inclusively from there; it's not advocacy on public policy. This engages people to people. The game is meant to be something you can personally participate in.

ART CREDITS: Cy Twombly's Camino Real; iron hoop trundling was popular in the 1960s and 1970s in China; hoop trundling boys circa 1830 in New York City via Funny Emails; an American Indian hoop game via Buffalo Post.

You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life? - Rumi

"It is far more delightful to be fond of the world because it has thousands of aspects and is different everywhere. . .  for every divergence deserves to be cherished, simply because it widens the bounds of life." - Karel Capek

Are there times you're just not riveted by your desires and visions? Can't do anything to prop them up to be enjoyable to play out? There are certainly lots of reasons for that, including existential. Also it's easy to get caught up in cultural spells of what we should do, want, have, be so that the vision isn't even ours, so we can't truly align with it.

For me, I have had to keep expanding any vision that pops into my mind into ever-widening circles to be more inclusive and more encompassing of the world-at-large until it was compelling and adventurous enough to intice me. Otherwise, I'm just fine sipping lemonade on the porch.

Row row row your boat gently down the stream... merrily merrily merrily, merrily, life is but a dream.

Two days ago I read Joe Vitale's blog where he said someone offered to invest in any of his encompassing ideas, “If you can put people to work, turn water into fuel, or anything else that’s considered humanitarian on a grand scale, they can make it happen.” Joe continues in his post:

My mind recalled all the wild ideas I’ve ever had. I ran one or two by my lunch partner.

“That’s not big enough,” he said.  - Joe Vitale, Lunch With God

That's how I talk myself out of my own ideas lately. "That's not big enough." And I mean talk myself out of in the best possible way as it behooves me to be devoted to an idea that's compelling.

(Guess what, I learned that words compassion and encompass have similar etymological roots.)

I'm currently car-free in a city (Las Vegas) that doesn't really make it easy in 107+ degree sunny weather to tool around. On my private blog, I'd been playing a game where I receive an imaginary check each day (the amount increases by $1000 each day) and I have to put it into play right away (no hoarding). Although, I've quit said game and approach it now from "What project do I want to do next?" assuming "money is no object."

For the first week, I used the money to do projects--perhaps a public art installation, or arrange a Hunch Hub retreat or Salon with other folks. As I've already said, I enjoy producing things much much more than consuming things. I find that if I think about paying the rent, or buying a croissant in a cafe, or getting an iPhone and much of the desires I'm advertised to suppose to have--that they fairly boring to me. But if I think broadly "bigger than me," it gets interesting again.

Day 8 into the game, muse: "I really ought to get a car." Although in my heart of hearts I'm not THAT excited about a car.

Why is that? I ask myself. Why don't I want a car? Why do I want a car? I kept on with Why questions in my head. Even that exercise barely helped... sure, I want mobility to have the freedom to go from A to B, true. That wasn't juicy enough, and I can't fake enthusiasm.

This is what I wrote down (slightly edited) in a private blog post:

Going to settle for a VW Beetle, or something practical like an FJ-Cruiser--too bored to even pretend to want them. Rather, my mind keeps being flooded with blue or silver-blue convertibles, so I'm going with it.

So while searching for VW beetle photos... found this gem!--from a car forum: "is essentially a low-cost alternative to the Porsche Boxster."

"If all goes well and the [Volkswagen] BlueSport Roadster receives the final green light for production, the first cars could arrive at VW showrooms around late 2012."

Yeah, it's def more than $8000, but more checks will be arriving. This is my deposit ;)

Still.... I couldn't muster sustaining interest in any car--not even the all-electric Tesla, although at the same time I am in a city with dismal public transit, and a severe lack of sidewalks for pedestrians, etc. And did I mention how hot the asphalt gets in triple digit weather?

I thought about it and saw what I truly want is the about freedom of movement. Car being one of thousands of ways to achieve that end. That could be Zipcar combined with good city public transit, or so many other ways And also, I want to not only flourish myself, but have freedom of movement available to All.

Not so much impose my 'vision' on everyone but add options... something for everyone--walking, biking, anti-gravity propulsion capsules, flying saucers, rockets, flying, teleporting, bilocating, Zipcars, public transit--oh i love those Japanese bullet trains! More stuff like Eurorail (Amtrack, er, so-so). Then, there's that cool guy that runs the super-cheap $30 shuttles to LA from Vegas... more shuttles, limos, flying carpets, Segways, etc.

Monorails, light rails, people-movers, cablecars, gondolas, flying porpoises, Blimps, steampunk airships, hotair balloons, kite trios, caravans of camels, Mary Poppins umbrellas, whatever floats your boat... just get me/you/us from point A to B. Car is NOT the sole way.

Why not make those train cars more aesthetic, fun, spacious, maybe interactive theater with costumes for all to wear and make-believe in the cars?

Just read this tonight [at the time of writing] at bookstore on teleportation, and walking on water. Explains my vast respect for the East:

In 1894, Baird T. Spalding was on an expedition that he wrote up in a tome, Life and Teachings of the Masters of the Far East. They came to a swift river and many in the expedition party wanted to pay a visit to a neighbor on the other side. The stream was about "two thousand feet wide, running bank-full, and the current was at least ten miles per hour."

"When Jast [one of the guides] rejoined the group the twelve fully dressed, walked to the bank of the stream, and with the utmost composure stepped on the water, not into it... I held my breath, expecting, of course, to see them plunge beneath and disappear.... I think each of us held his breath, until they were all past midstream, so astonished were we to see these twelve men walking calmly across the surface of the stream... and not sinking below the soles of their sandals." - Spalding

Spalding was too afraid to try this himself although Jast and Neprow insisted he could do the same and be safe.Jast instead that none of the folks that crossed over were special. "They do not have one atom more power than you were created with." Spaulding also mentioned that he had witnessed Jast materialize and dematerialize his body at will and be at two places at once.

"How is it, a few are able to do the things we have seen accomplished, that all men cannot accomplish the same things? How is it that man is content to crawl, and not only content to crawl but is obliged to do so?" - Spalding

If my guide insists that I can walk across a raging river--no bridges, other the 'bridge' to spirit--just as gracefully as he, would I? Would you? Now, that, my friends is what I want. To expand our view of what is possible, and to walk the talk.

p.s, What is this beautiful old-school convertible? Found during my car search. Lovely (via Honestly WTF).

p.p.s. This post was originally posted in my private for-my-eyes-only blog, then re-edited for Encanto circle members. The me-only blog is basically a place to sift and discern what I want to create apart from the many voices in the fray and explore project ideas before they're fully crystallized.

ART CREDITS: Amy Sol "To You From My View" via Design Milk; flying hovercraft in comic The Storm by artist Donald Lawrence via fan-tas-tic.com; magic carpet painting/illustration unknown; 2004 Detroit peoplemover photo via DetroitYes!; photo of gondola navigating narrow street in Venice by MorBCN; Dokshum iron bridge in Bhutan, a 500-year-old chain link bridge built by Thangtong Gyalpo, a 15th century monk via OneWorld.net

companions on the journey. . . of enchantment

I was re-reminded of my purpose (for want of a better term) while reading this via Time magazine about J.K. Rowling's new online venture, Pottermore:

"When Rowling does what she does best, it's the closest thing to magic available in our mundane, Mugglish world. And I say that as both a Harry Potter fan and the father of a Harry Potter fan." - "Is Pottermore Good for Harry?", TIME, June 23, 2011

Sadly the reporter admits they don't perceive miracle and magic abounding. But hey I've been there too.

Even as recently as a few months ago, the world seemed confining, and confounding. Now, suspending belief and lies, a boundless radiance is present.

BTW, that purpose I'd nearly forgotten... it's called ENCHANTMENT.

Let me back up a bit, okay way back.

When I was starting a freelance consulting business in 1995, I went it alone for a year (this was before the virtual watercooler now known as Twitter existed). It's not that I absolutely needed peers, but there was an undeniable desire to have playmates to chat and bounce ideas with that might understand what I was navigating too.

Most of my buddies had jobs, and couldn't relate (nor care) to the uncertainty and other rewards and challenges of free agents. Also, I was starting an online magazine at the time (long gone now, it was called AwesomeWomen.net) and hired a part-time researcher/writer to help me with that side-gig too. To make a long story short, that's how I became actively engaged with the local Women's Business Center and National Association for Women Business Owners (NAWBO).

For many years, those were my peers--we had diverse businesses, yet fundamentally a common journey that isn't necessarily a mainstream journey forged deep bonds between us.

Another time I created a peer network rather than seeking a ready-made group. About two to three months after surviving one of the largest natural disasters of the last century-- Indian Ocean tsunami, I roped my housemates at the time into co-creating a weekly group that met at our home on Sunday evenings called Daring to Live an Authentic Life. Among the messages (many others as well--outside scope of this post) that I grokked through that experience was one that insisted, "Don't settle." Steve Jobs summed up that message a few months after Daring to Live an Authentic Life group sprouted:

"Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart." - Steve Jobs, commencment speech at Stanford University, June 14, 2005

At that time, I was yearning to have some mutual support in applying spiritual principles and simply being true to myself in a world that seemed (to my perception at that moment in personal history) not to necessarily reinforce a natural, unique direction of being.

"Living is my job and my art." - Michel De Montaigne

That hints at why fairly recently I began forging a virtual roundtable called Encanto.

It's not Hogswarts--as that'd be a bit more of the old-school-lecture do-as-I-say-model. Hogswarts however does provide, in my opinion, a way for Harry to have even more fun (and mischief) with playmates Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger than he may have had in a hermitage. My intent is to lean more towards King Arthur's Roundtable where we're surrounded with fellow peers on a common journey of self-mastery (and I'll dare say self-wizardry).

Blogs, as most websites do, tend (certainly not universal, just tendency) to invite skimming more than diving. Also blogs, being public websites available at a click of a mouse to anyone that can rustle time on a computer anywhere anytime in the world, tend to invite passersby through on their way to another destination. I know loads of people alight on Crossroads Dispatches looking for an image of stardust chess, faerie truffles, a diagram of a medieval alchemical crucibles, an essay on an essayist, or an article on Google's internal product development process--and then, poof! move along on their merry way.

Alas, as much as I'd adore public blogs (as a format), they don't match my wish for depth, intimacy, delving, diving--they aren't designed as a prime vehicle for a circle, or a roundtable, of explorers delving into the magical realms of infinite existence itself.

Encanto's intention is to be a vital, lived, engaged experience rather than a passive, drive-through experience. This Friday, July 1 midnight ends the introductory pricing ($25/month) to the Encanto circle. Then an entirely new chapter in delving into the magic of life begins ($58/month unless I hear a whisper from a griffin that it ought be otherwise). The number of magicians at any one time enchanting and engaging is capped at 25 to sustain its intimate Roundtable look and feel (there may be ebb-and-flow and circulation of members).

As always, the public blog shall continue its own unique expression, and I am honored that you are part of that journey as well, whether this is a stepping-stone from a Google search or you are a long-time confidant.

ART CREDITS: Thought of Judy Chicago's Dinner Party since a roundtable need not be round;  illustration "Knights of the Round Table Summoned to the Quest by the Strange Damsel" by Edward Burne Jones (via The Textile Blog: Edward Burne-Jones 'Quest for the Holy Grail' Tapestries--they're all beautiful); a still of the Hogwarts dining hall from first movie with Harry Potter's companions on the journey--Ron and Hermione

when an archer is shooting for fun he has all his skill - chuang tzu

When an archer is shooting for fun 

He has all his skill – Chuang Tzu

I enjoy checking in on Kickstarter creative projects to (a) support other artists and (b) for inspiration.

At Karakasa Games' website, there's a video where indie game developer Wiley Wiggins mentions how the current game industry caters (for profit's sake) to the lowest common denominator with the result being "a lot of beautiful games--a huge spectacle--but are kind of soulless."

I've spent effort to dilute the spark of my ideas to appeal to executives' conceptions of what is blockbuster!! mass! appeal! No more! So I'm very encouraged by these indie trends. Congrats to Wiley and his team for raising $24, 221 for their game.

Anyway, you may also enjoy scouring Kickstarter projects for allies, inspiration, and fun yourselves.

p.s. I also adore the story-telling game Do! The Pilgrims of the Flying Temple. They raised $24, 383 for their whimsical storytelling for children project (updates here):

"Premise: There are hundreds small worlds orbiting a flying temple. Like islands, these small worlds often have strange cultures and unique problems. Whenever the people have a conflict that cannot be resolved on their own, they send letters to the temple requesting assistance. The temple sends young monks on a pilgrimage across the universe responding to a stack of letters one at a time. Their goal is to leave each world with less trouble than when they arrived." - Daniel Solis

They ask backers to collaborate and write make-believe letters to the "pilgrims" (i.e. future players of the story-telling game) for an imaginative, yet simple [i.e. NO computer necessary] game. This game also appealed to me, as serendipity would have it, it has some common elements to one of my projects, too.

the creative act is primitive - steven pressfield

"Have you seen this great New Yorker cartoon:

A perplexed person stands before two doors. One door says HEAVEN. The other door says BOOKS ABOUT HEAVEN.

What makes us laugh, I suspect, is that all of us feel the pull to pick BOOKS ABOUT HEAVEN.

Are we that timid? Are our huevos that pocito?

When we're offered a chance at heaven, what diabolically craven force makes us want to back off--just for now, we promise ourselves--and choose instead heaven's pale reflection?" - Do the Work, by Steven Pressfield (free Kindle version available through May 20, 2011)

Having spent a week in Los Angeles in deep observation (far from my first visit in LA), I realized the town is set up in a rock-star-and-million-fans model for sheer survival's sake. In order to have enough reach to rake in the advertising dollars, which pays the bills, stories have rote mass market blockbuster hit appeal (code for "least common denominator"). Sure, I also met many indie folks, but that was the exception, not the rule. For instance, one indie transmedia/locative-cinema producer said, "I want to serve the story, not the P&L."

While walking in Venice one day, I came across this book, "One Buddha is Not Enough," named after a retreat in August 2009 to be led by Thich Nhất Hạnh:

"Did we come to a retreat to see Thay the way we'd go to a rock concert to see Madonna or to a basketball game to see the star center? If the rock star or sports hero doesn't show up, we're entitled to a full refund."

"The book is dedicated to the idea that awakening is a collective process, and that we and our community are our own most important teachers."

In the perfect and oft ironic Way of the universe, the Infinite saw to it that Thay (as he is affectionately known by his students) was bedridden in a Boston hospital and could not attend the retreat in Estes Park. People were "heartbroken and angry," and feeling gipped--even though sixty of his closest monks still were in attendance. It is a testament to the capacity of the sangha to perceive the actual intent of a retreat entitled, "One Buddha is Not Enough," that only eight out of a thousand walked out.

Someone else must be the guru, someone else knows, someone else has access we don't, someone else is the expert, someone else is that Buddha-nature, the Infinite is out there--you know, out there in the Heavens, or anywhere... certainly not here, not now, not us. Heaven is for special people like Thay. We? We're not worthy. Old scripts re-written for contemporary times. We'll just take the book about Heaven, thank you.

"A perplexed person stands before two doors. One door says HEAVEN. The other door says BOOKS ABOUT HEAVEN."

Rick Carter, production designer for Avatar and Jurassic Park, at the UCLA symposium, Transmedia, Hollywood 2, told the story of his grandmother, born in 1882, laughing with her sorority sisters at the turn of the 20th century at the absurdity that anything heavier than air could fly. Guffaws at the gall of anyone to conceive of such silly scenarios.

Of course, his grandmother would eat her words as she lived long enough to see heavier-than-air ships land on the moon and stepped onto airplanes herself. Jules Verne had already introduced the conception of a flying ship made of metal into the public consciousness in his fiction. I believe Leonardo da Vinci may have preceded him. Verne's visioneering planted seeds that would spur inventors seventeen years later to build the prototype for the perplexing metallic sculpture I boarded to get myself to Los Angeles (and pay only $29 plus tax one-way!).

When Rick told that story, I instantly grokked that I was like Jules Verne, and never ever would I be the practical tinkerers like the Wright Brothers. Simple, really, in retrospect, yet have I spent so much of my lifetime berating myself for having fantastical ideas that I don't know how to implement on my own. So I plant seeds of possibility--they may or may not take hold in physical reality, but to each his own gifts.

Some other intriguing parts of Do the Work: (Btw, I don't completely buy into the idea of any ongoing war as even resisting Resistance reinforces a false sense of duality.)

"Next to Resistance, rational thought is the artist or entrepreneur's worst enemy.

Bad things happen when we employ rational thought, because rational thought comes from the ego.

Instead, we want to work from the Self, that is, from instinct and intuition, from the unconscious.

Homer began both The Iliad and The Odyssey with a prayer to the Muse. The Greeks' greatest poet understood that genius did not reside within his fallible, mortal self--but came to him instead from some source that he could neither command nor control, only invoke.

When an artist says, "Trust the soup," she means let go of the need to control (which we don't do anyway) and put your faith instead in the Source, the Mystery, the Quantum Soup.

The deepr the source we work from, the better our stuff will be--and the more transformative it will be for us and for those we share it with."

---

"Don't prepare. Begin.

Remember, our enemy is not lack of preparation; it's not the difficulty of the project or the state of the marketplace or the emptiness of our bank account.

The enemy is Resistance."

---
"The creative act is primitive.

Babies are born in blood and chaos; stars and galaxies come into being amid the release of massive primordial cataclysms."

p.s. The current work that I'm resisting is facetiously code-named (just a working title) after Revelations 21, http://bit.ly/revel21

p.p.s. If you also gravitate toward the interactive and intimate model in lieu of a blockbuster rock-star model (even 1000 fans is too broad and "fans" way too fourth wall for me), you might be interested in this free online magazine by In Treehouses on reaching your 1000 True Fans.

ART CREDITS: Your handy-dandy Green Muse via Magpie's Nest so there is no excuse for "My Muse hasn't shown up yet"; according to this site, fictional characters Frank Reade Jr. and his daugher Kate Reade envisioned helicopter airships a few years before Jules Verne's "Albatross." I like it: Fiction begets more fiction begets 'real' airships.

The most important question a person can ask is, "Is the Universe a friendly place?" - Albert Einstein

"Einstein said that the most important question that a human being could ask is, Is the universe friendly?" I pause to let that question sink in. Whether for my benefit or his, I'm not sure.

"I don't know what the answer to that question is," I continue, "yet I'm going to live as if the answer is Yes."

He looks up from his perch on the tawny Indian motif rug. He stops petting our golden lab, Taz.

"I can see how that might work for you," he replies, "but I can't do that." That's the turning point instant when I knew that the separation he instigated was going to be a divorce.

"This is a journey to be taken, not studied." - Jed McKenna

Fast forward from that scene in summer 2002 to autumn 2003: I'm on the phone with someone coordinating an upcoming Miguel Ruiz workshop. "Great news," she says. "You're no longer on the waiting list. Do you still want to go to Teotihuacan with us?"

I stammer, "Yes!" It's only 15 days away. I have no plane ticket to Mexico. Not to mention, I have no way lined up to pay for said airline fare, nor the additional roughly $1500 for the workshop fees.

"I'll be sending you the details in the mail. There's not much there. Don Miguel doesn't tell participants what's involved in the workshop, nor outline any itinerary. The whole point is to be learn to be comfortable going into the Unknown," she explains. Perhaps appropriate for a place on Earth that the Toltec shamans call, "the place where men become Gods."

"There doesn't have to be a someone on the journey for the journey to continue." - Adyashanti

It had never occurred to me that there was no synopsis of the workshop on Miguel's website. I'd just read Beyond Fear (which interestingly enough is not listed on Don Miguel's home page collection of books right now...), and immediately searched for his website, saw the workshop--and knew inside that this was what I wanted. I jumped at the chance too as I had hunch that Miguel himself would not be leading any more of these excursions, which has proved to be true as he's handed the baton to his sons in the ensuing years.

All that excitement... all to find out that I was too late. The workshop was sold out. I was placed on a long waiting list, and promptly forgot about it--until the phone call from out of the blue (see above).

"There are two emotions that inform and animate the human animal; fear and a gratitude-love-awe mix that might best be called agape. As fear goes out, agape comes in. More accurately, a pure white light of consciousness hits the prism of self and splits outward to become the universe as we experience it. If the prism of self is gray and murky with ignorance, choked with fear, contaminated with ego, then so becomes the universe that radiates out from it. It's that simple. As the prism becomes free of such flaws, then the whole universe changes with it. It resolves into clarity, becomes brighter, more playful and magical. Because we are the lens through which it is projected, we are participants in its shape and motion; co-creators of our own universe."- Jed McKenna, Spiritual Warfare

INVITATION: Having observed online behavior for twenty years (not an exaggeration, just been part of the Internet from early on), I think blogs are best suited for skimming. For those eager to take a plunge a couple of octaves richer, I'm sharing a new private newsletter called, Encanto. (It's more of an interior, vertical journey than may be implied.) There will be 12-20 issues per month. I'm being purposefully vague as your own radar can discern for you your decision whether to embark with us.

UPDATE 01-27-10: I've a new hunch (sharing soon) on how to share this new project, and still keep it in public view on the Web, rather than a private newsletter.

p.s. Of course, I did go on Miguel's trip, after all. In fact, I ended up extending the journey for another six weeks and wended my way through Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras solo (well, I started solo... as these type of journeys do gather up fellow voyagers along the way).

p.p.s. Maybe I'm just being chicken-shit and should have posted the photo into this post. Link may or may not be "safe" for workplaces. Depends. Anyhow, beautiful artwork I found titled "Duet-Incanto" (you'll have to click to fourth photo in the lineup--the azure and flesh one) by Kim Joon.

art credits: NY artist Erika Somogyi's watercolor and gouache The Mirror, The Hourglass, and the Prism via Vigorously Lazy blog (wow you ought to check out Erika Somogyi's other works too); ancient Teotihuacan mural / graffiti art via James O. Jacobs; artwork from the game Sanitarium

make our destiny -- it's in the cards

Starting this coming Monday, October 11, 2010--excluding weekends--for 54 days, we're going to collectively contribute to a group "notebook" (it's NOT this blog).

Our group notebook will provide a space and impetus to roam in the arena of "the world I want," something most of us don't always give time and attention to comparatively. The bonus is the act of fleshing out details in writing or drawing crystallizes our visualizations into a pre-reality. As I mentioned, let's use the example of Leornardo da Vinci's stetchbooks of fantastical and visionary inventions and events for our own.

"Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active." - Leonardo da Vinci

This notebook will be easy to post to. Include your wildest imaginings and aspirations for a beautiful future written in present tense (be specific as possible), and any accompanying photos via email to [email protected]. Everything is anonymous unless you specify your name in a signature at the end of your email.

"There are lots of people who mistake their imagination for their memory." - Josh Billings

Because this is new, I'll give you a hint of what to expect for Monday. We're going to be cycling through the 54 cards in the Loteria deck since they are simple, concrete rather than abstract symbols. There really is no rhyme or reason to the selection of the Loteria cards. There is a story, however. But the story can wait.

Monday the card theme is La Campana, or The Bell. (Because it's a US holiday, submissions may start on Sunday.) The card will change daily.

If you're a writer, consider the card simply as a writing prompt. You need not be held to the literal symbol in your daydreaming. Use the Bell simply as a catalyst or starting point.

Perhaps it takes you off into a vision of using sound and vibration to lift raw materials, such as stone block, for the construction of buildings ala the Great Pyramids. Or perhaps you it reminds you of a friend whom wanted to install bell towers all through New Orleans and synchronicize the music. Or perhaps you remember a bell ringing everyday in Oaxaca and that reminds you of how much you adore town squares and plazas. So you write about town squares and common areas. Who knows?

"Impossibility is only the figment of an insufficient imagination." - Phil Duncan

You may also submit sketches, collages, etc and never write a single word in a language if you wish, or even create your own language. I'll investigate if and how we can post music and video (only original or remixed, please) onto the notebook.

"Live out of your imagination, not your history." - Stephen Covey

The guidelines are:

1. Truly desire what you are writing, imagining, concocting, conjuring, sketching for yourself. If it's just so-so for you or just seems like something you should want, consider what a friend told me: a 99% yes is still a no. Why settle? The notebook is meant to be liberating! Go for it! If it's not ringing true, keep going deeper and perhaps use your first draft as a springboard to delve deeper or sideways or simplify or be bolder with your vision. It's easy with pervasive media to get caught up in second-hand dreams that aren't necessarily yours. This 54-day process will help us sift through these dreams streaming through us, separating the pure from the dross, the inspired from the expired.

2. Write or draw in present tense. Describe or draw it as if it is happening. One viewpoint is to even consider time as "simultaneous," so that we don't get caught up in past, present, future tense at all. (For instance, consider time as a river. From an eagle's perspective it may view the entirety of it; from a piece of flotsam floating in the river it feels more linear.)

3. Write in the positive. For instance, "The world is without disease and decay" can be phrased "It's a world of perfect health and regeneration. " (For the notebook, I'm aiming for more specific and fleshed-out images and narratives than generalities such as above.)

You can also use other folks' daydreams as a springboard to your own sketches and writing, as well. In fact, that's pretty much the fun part of having this be a group project. More on why this is a group project, I could have simply done the notebook solo, in future posts.

Join us, and spread the notebook to your soul kin: Make our destiny--it's in the cards. Send submissions to [email protected] from October 11, 2010 to December 23, 2010. (You can start on October 10, 2010 for The Bell.)

p.s. The notebook is definitely NOT this blog, so if you subscribe via email your inbox won't be deluged. This blog will be focused on topics related to inspiration, imagination, innovation, and infinite possibilities.

You can view contributions to the group notebook by visiting http://loteria.posterous.com

ART CREDITS: One re-imagining of da Vinci's notebook (not an actual spread from da Vinci works) by Dreimond; a page from Brion Gysin and William Burroughs' Third Mind cut-up notebook (I was blessed to see this great exhibition); the Bell loteria card; this one is an actual page from a Leonardo da Vinci notebook