2019 June 14 Journal

2019 June 14 Journal

I’m going to put myself on a 3 week countdown to be ready to hit the road. What this means:

  • Finances are in place to be sustained on the road indefinitely
  • Bike travel accessories are obtained
  • My person is ready – new glasses, motorcycle endorsement on my license
  • Podcast – 8 weeks in the can, ready to produce on the road, publishing platforms & workflows road ready
  • Travel itinerary: waypoints established 
  • Road Interviews penciled in

God. It seems like so much work, but I can do it. I must do it. This is the thing. This is the portal. Life will never be the same after this.  This is the culmination of a vision I’ve had for a very long time…. And what’s awesome is to know that my other visions will also come to pass. 

*****

This is a letter to the fellas:

I’ve been thinking about art and women a lot this week, as I’ve had some awesome encounters with each recently. 

The brilliant musician Devin Townsend shared an insight into his creative process, noting that for him, creation has to occur in a vacuum, detached from the penetrating opinions of others, who constantly strive to reduce his work into a formula of explicable reasons. 

In speaking with one of my models, she explained that while co-creating images with me, she never thinks about how the photographs will be received by the viewer, and to do so would ruin the process. 

Initially, I found her answer unsatisfying until I realized that I made the oldest mistake in the book: I assumed her to think like me. 

that she never thinks about how her images will be received. She 

Work that is calculated to elicit praise or money is not art – it is craft or pornography. 

We ascend toward our own divinity through the feminine. 

This is not to say that all feminine beings are perfect themselves by virtue of their chromosomes – 

They have their own crosses to bear that you or I know nothing of. 

As for our journey as masculine beings –  

– to encounter her, to befriend her, to love her, to abide with her over the long run – 

Requires us to hold space for uncertainty. 

As masculine beings, we find comfort in concrete, steel and right angles that are perfectly square. 

These are the things we build the world with. 

The feminine exists in folds, shadows, curves, ebbs and flows. 

She is what we are not. 

It is so tempting to reduce her to formulas, principles and predictability – 

To do so is to make her a man. 

To tarry over the long term with a single feminine being requires and fosters our ability 

to coexist with uncertainty. 

We are called to create a cauldron,

To hold space for the mystery.

Few things call us up to overcome addiction to certainty as does the feminine and the creation of art. 

The feminine is the mother of all living – an inherently creative force. 

It should come as no surprise that creating art is akin to loving a woman. 

Creating art is being open to uncertainty, receptive, and masterful with one’s tools of creation. 

Beethoven said, 

Don’t only practice your art, but force your way into it’s secrets – for it and knowledge can raise men to the Divine. 

to hold space for them in such a way that we can abide with them –

And not just many, 

But one – 

For the long run – 

This requires and fosters one’s ability

To abide the mystery

To coexist with uncertainty

To receive gifts with gratitude

To release attachments

For to do any of these things, 

Is to force a the feminine into a masculine box

to attempt to remake her in our own image

Which may look like arrogance on the surface – 

But it is only fear of the unknown

A lack of trust in one’s self, one’s ability to navigate uncharted waters.

I’ve had two conversations this week that really have my mind going.

The brilliant musician Devin Townsend shared an insight into his creative process noting that for him, creation has to occur in a vacuum, detached from the penetrating opinions of others, who constantly strive to reduce his work into a formula of explicable reasons. 

When I was interviewing musician Devin Townsend this week, he pointed out something interesting about his creative process: that he has to just let things flow, without considering how they will be received by the listener.  That seemed pretty legit and pure – after all, he’s a world famous artist! 

I recently had a dialogue with one of my models about her part of the process of creating images together:

“Do you ever think about how these images are going to be received while we are in the process of making them?” 

“No. I never do. To think about that would ruin the process, and after they are done, I am unconcerned with how they are viewed. I didn’t do it for them, I did it for me.” 

Gentlemen, I’m just going to speak to you for a moment:

The Feminine is the portal to 

I realized a couple of things:

  1. Creative inspiration is a feminine process: Just as the feminine being is made of curves, folds, shaddows, hidden secrets… I can’t force ideas. They just…. Come. All I can do is hold space for them. In practical terms, for me that means always having a means to take notes immediately. Pen, paper, iPhone, always in my pocket.  It also means showing up at my desk at the same time, every day, and holding open a blank page and ready keyboard in order that I can receive ideas should they grace me.  As it turns out – the Muse comes, nearly every day.  She has learned to trust my consistency. 
  2. Creative execution is a masculine process: My job is to hold a space for the Muse when she does arrive, and to be skilled with my creative tools so that I can faithfully recreate the thing I have been shown. 
  3. so that I can construct a three dimensional version of the higher dimensional inspiration.  In practical terms, this means having a pen, paper, and camera with me at all times.  Always be ready to document an idea when it arrives. The Muse knocks once, and then moves on. 

The feminine is a portal to divinity for the masculine:

So often I’ve wanted to reduce her curves, shadows, folds, ebbs and flows into concretes, forms, and right angles-

magick was never meant to be science.  

To abide with the feminine is to release attachments to certainty. 

To know that I AM, and that She IS:

The mother of all creation  of life, love, and art- 

which the masculine holds space for. 

Coming into partnership with that which we feared most, 

The masculine is made a God. 

*****

The girl at Taco Bell drive thru is really cute. She smiles at me a lot. What I’m trying to say is I go there a lot. And I wonder if she judges me? 

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