What kind of reality do people want to live in? This question surely rests in an increasing number of minds.
Relative to culture production, the advent of new systems permitting or butressing stews of cultural values calls a critique, or at least, an examination of how ideas and visions play out in reality. I should rather call this: Reality Therapy.
Starting from the end, is usually where I like to begin, and work backwards. This is different from brain storming, and allows forms to emerge, to be chiseled and critiqued instead of the liberous ways I had been instructed to try: just make a lot of work or work hard which may or may not be working…the jury really is out on that one.
That kind of process had its virtues and follies: experimentation costs, not only money as well as a lot of time. The Golem-like painted word art popular in our present time has drawn the frequency of production to a still-pool, feeling like a dead-halt to me now, evidenced by the frequency of the Le Lapin publications.
There’s a different kind of work to be done which relies on knowing people- which has revealed in truth even people I thought I knew well after 10 or 12 years, showed the condition of their mind to be absolutely different than I had percepted. This means those near me had to bear the eye-rolling agony of watching a grown woman cry, time after time. The blessing being in a new cultural perspective: it’s human to cry, and it’s good for the body for the eyes to flood when pain is received. The idea that one is more wise and clever for having no emotions seems to invoke a robotic or zombie-like existence about as appealing (to me) as:
First, I had to really sift through a great number of experiences to see how I had done in them, and quite often tolerate behavior that I think is intolerable and find grace and forgiveness, as it’s absolutely proven true that bitter water can sour a heart, evidenced by the dry-eyed Stoic or the shoulder shrug of apathetic indifference.
Experimenting with feeling, which is our most easily bio-hacked system, is what I have dedicated myself to through the feeling of images, then water, then stones, and other materials. Turns out…caring is cool, way cooler than playing cool.
I imagine water as the first closest record (of truth) due to the types of density water exists in various forms, including geological formations. While the impossibility of knowing everything produces irrational and followed actions, evidenced by the collective curiosity of A.I.’s sparkle, the experience of being surrounded by water, gave a physical embodied experience of what is necessary for life - making me realize the source of the anxiety and fear I used to have was based on another idea gifted to me: a man will protect and provide. This is justified and rationalized by the labor a woman has in life: often unpaid. The measure of charity and gratitude for getting to be alive puts males at a difficult intersection with their Y chromosome. The internal genetic structure of humanity showing a transit in form indicates the human is changing, and is this the kind of change we want to see? Or can we adapt new or older ideas based on the evidence we have gained from previous generations' ideas, now?
Grief as an experience in life has often been formed by an idea and certainly by attachment, which I find to be something not to discard but learn to navigate. Other times, expectations, and a few scenarios bewilderment at painful behavior, I received. As a therapist said, and I do believe in active cognitive behavior therapy approaches, even if I have found the direct feedback from friends more solidifying: why did I think it was necessary to tolerate intolerable behavior?
The answer took years to find through a slow examination of my contextual upbringing to reveal the root of ideas, or beliefs, I had previously (unconsciously) held onto -which are what we can call culture…that which is permitted or not permitted.
This meaning of ‘background’ is that which can be called natural in tolerating the emergence of form (or results in real life/real time).
In the abstract, which would be a formative expression of relational pigments and forms to see before the eyes, that which is happening within the psyche provides an image that has taken several years to contend with. The tragic (dark) comedy of the story coming to closure spans back 32 years to asking ‘God’ what the purpose of my life was, and the idea at that time, around 8, that came to mind, was: let go. The context of that answer is just as important as the answer, but I won’t go into that story now.
Ideas and beliefs are what I approach with caution and skepticism now. I am pretty damn tired of the experiments I’ve made as I question where things are going (in the broader context) and where my job and construction of life is headed. Amidst the glorification of the process of heavy artwork and cultural production, which I had rationalized to point directly toward the person creating towards validation for their person-hood and thought process, which was something I had supported them on- I realized I was absolutely wrong. While there is very little new under the sun, there still is the possibility to create something interesting and useful. That’s what keeps me going when I would otherwise quit. Instead of throwing in the towel, I’m going to wash, dry and try again.
Each day these last years has felt like a trial. And this kind of approach to life has benefited me compared to the gamified approach I find myself interfacing with others in. I have to watch myself closely, even if tempted to play a role cast by others, which is immensely difficult because of my relationship to the concept of Identity.
The truth of finding out what someone is, goes back to the question of essence, the invisible, and doing that inner work to find out. Authenticity, or the real deal, or the real thing…means finding out what one is not. And though I have adapted to several roles, I still do not really know who or what I am, aside from being absolutely sure I am a woman. Then looking around to see reality, it seems like I am a hermetic woman, who has a lot of images, designs, and plans which to work with others to carry out. This is not the reality I had imagined for myself right now (probably relatable, which is the idea here). Each and every single one of us has these imaginations for ourselves and the question of letting go and finding out what we are with or without those imaginations seems to be the very thing running against the brainwashing I subjected myself to with meditation and yoga.
The cultural stew I found through discussion in various contexts throughout the globe has called me to quite literally to step outside, a lot. Pushing the body and the field of imagination to its limits while witnessing the death and decline around amidst the newly built grey environments in Oslo seems to signal a ship about to depart a port. The same ships that bring with them a lot of garbage.
This kind of closure is made after a great deal of time learning the way I was allowed myself to be lied to for the promise, which was a fantasy of a man who really took my life for a spin. And I let it happen, even in the face of reality, because it was so close and around me, that the consequence of loving unconditionally was an absolutely horrific choice- a wrong choice that taught me everything I had wanted to learn about the world.
I had been warned by my family, graduate professors, friends, and therapists, who also encouraged me to go for it though. The cost of my naivety was nearly my life, and so I get to live, then I want others to get to tell their story and share their thoughts and ideas too. Because I know I’m not alone in what I went through.
That’s what Le Lapin can be from now on. You are invited to share if you wish to. This is not a publication just about my life, but how my life is a lot like everyone else’s who is surely going to die to realize a dream, as we all do.
So again, what kind of reality do you want to collectively dream?
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