How Does It Feel To Burn?

I’m full. Overfull, in fact… I feel as if I contain every emotion that it’s possible to feel, all at the same time. I’ve spent a lot of the last day or so in a free hotel room, writing and journaling and moving with some concentration to make some kind of relative sense out of everything that’s happening, has happened, and is about to happen.

I Need a Project

I don’t mean that I need a specific one, right now; I mean, in general. I need a project towards which to focus my never-ending stream of energy.

Because, if I don’t have something specific to lock-on to at any given time, then I notice something: I tend to lock and focus my energy on to whatever is around at the time. That sometimes means I focus-in on projects that I don’t really own——projects that belong to other people; and, as much as I try not to, I make overtures to usurping their authority… perhaps because I have, momentarily, lost the sense of my authority within my own life, for lack of a project.

Or, I might focus too much on projects that are actually very small. I allow myself to get caught up in activities that really have little meaning or scope, and I end up creating more and more minute (and ultimately inconsequential) details to make the project balloon out into something bigger than it really is, just to occupy my restless soul.

The lesson here is that I need substantial things to be going on in my life. Things to sink my hungry teeth into, transform, create and re-create… and preferably as part of a team. I’ll say “fuck you, I’ll do it myself” if I believe I have to, but I’d still rather combine forces and collaborate.

It also means that if I join a project that belongs to someone else, I’d better have my own things going on besides. In total honesty, I *LOVE* being a part of realising and manifesting someone else’s dreams and visions. I just have to make sure I have the ownership of the project straight within myself.

Very basically, my base-need is for a Channel, through which to offer my service. I need to Give Things to this world and to the people I share it with. I need to feel like I am an active, positively contributing part of Life. I also notice that when I have a couple of lists and plans and can set things further out in time & space, then I can relax in the here and now. When I falter in my organisation is when I begin to get anxious, and then start to search around for something, some idea, some project to grab hold of, and tame like a wild mustang.

I am the Project Mercenary.

I Weep

Today is Remembrance Day in the USA and Canada, including where I now live in Vancouver. The day is a holiday in most of the country, allowing time and space for us to reflect upon the sacrifices of those fallen in battle during World Wars I and II, and other conflicts in recent history. Today is Armistice Day, the date in 1918 when war was declared to be over in Europe, heralding the close of four years of ceaseless killing of young men in muddy trenches.

This morning, along with a few friends, I attended the public service given in Vancouver’s Victory Square, where the city’s cenotaph stands.

In New Zealand, where I’m from, we take the 25th of April every year—ANZAC Day—as our day of remembrance. It marks the day in 1915 when Australian and New Zealand Army Corps forces were landed at Gallipoli, in the Dardanelles of Turkey, and suffered horrific losses in a catastrophic tactical blunder, before finally being evacuated later that year.

There are a couple of things that never fail to squeeze a few tears out of me. Human triumph against all odds or conventionality is one; the other is the sadness elicited within me by our loss of human life in armed conflict.

Neither Remembrance Day nor ANZAC Day are occasions to glorify war and death; they are times to cease fire, reflect, and remember the dead, and the reasons why we have, in their thousands upon thousands, sent them to die.

You know you’re a burner if…

• You start planning for Burning Man during Exodus
• The day tickets go on sale, you’re on the website repeatedly clicking “refresh” until sales opens
• You have a little vial of playa dust hung around your neck (as if you didn’t have enough of it stashed in film canisters already)
• Every time someone says “fire” or “dust” your eyes go out of focus and you sigh
• Every time someone tells you what time it is your eyes go out of focus, you sigh and mentally calculate how long it will take you to bike back to your camp from there
• You look on the web for photos taken at Burning Man hoping you’ll see a picture either of yourself or that boy/girl/ram/pixie with whom you missed a playa date
• Blinking fairy lights make you think of Burning Man before you think “Christmas”
• Your non-burner friends begin to slap you when you start telling a Burning Man story
• You’re reading this list
• You spend some time making a list like this

Good Grief

A man walks down the street, hands in his pockets. He is aware of all the other people, his brothers and sisters, sharing with him the pavement and the oxygen and the light. He recognises his connection to all things and people and animals and plants—his connection to the whole world.

He looks ahead, his eyes instinctively navigating the sidewalk, while his concentration is far away in space and time, thinking, sensing, analysing his own feelings and responses and comparing them to the responses and apparent feelings of others, seeing how they fit together and relate to each other. Slowly, he begins to find order in the apparent chaos. He finds many possibilities and probabilities, and allows them all to have validity. He also knows that none of them may end up as the reality, and none of the outcomes he predicts may come true at all, and he accepts that, too. He simply feels better about having given things some conscious attention.

He runs again through his shopping list to see if there is anything he may have forgotten. There is a momentary turn of fear in his belly as he imagines forgetting a key ingredient for tomorrow’s dinner. Then he reminds himself that if he forgets something, then he is creative enough to cover it up. In fact, it may just turn out to be an opportunity to create something new and interesting. He comforts himself by this coverage of all the possibilities.

He turns a corner onto a busier street with a wider sidewalk, and a strong wind catches his breath in his mouth, making him swallow. He thinks about things he has done in the past, and what he has learned from those experiences, and what he will do better in future. He thinks about neglected opportunities and poor choices, and he chides himself for his moments of meandering stupidity or laziness. Momentarily, he frowns at himself. On the street, perhaps someone sees him and wonders at the frown; perhaps not.

He remembers that his mistakes and neglected chances are not just his; they are everyone’s. The opportunities he misses to create and give something to the world are a net-loss. There is a pang of shame and guilt at this thought, and a resultant fear of future chances being missed due to his oversight, distraction or inaction. Really, he fears not having the courage to recognise good opportunities when they present themselves, and to act decisively upon them. This is a fear that dogs him, and has done for his whole life, despite that life being filled with many decisive actions and boundless creativity. And somehow he believes it is not enough; that he is not good enough. He feels as if he has lacked any solid direction, and even as he has done and seen and been part of many wonderous things, that he has not yet Mastered anything and created something Worthy of that. He demands more from himself, and steels his resolve to take more chances; to be alert to more opportunities; to give more to the world… and to feel worthy. Worthy of what? Worthy of love, of course. Worthy of recognition, and acceptance.

A Commitment to Better Living

I’m over it, man.

Once my current debts are paid off, that’s it. I’m never getting into debt again. Imaginary money just doesn’t turn me on at all; and nor, for that matter, does the imaginary credit-system that supports it.

I’m just really tired of going around in circles, creating and paying off debts everywhere; I want to move forward. And on top of that, it makes me feel physically nauseous when I think of consciously choosing to enslave myself to repayments and exorbitant interest rates. My fair flesh is worth more than that, dammit.

I owe $3,000 on my personal loan – that’s first to go. Once that’s paid, the $30,000 student loan is next on the block. With the way I plan to do this, what would take eight more years at the current rate of repayments will take a few months in the Yukon in next year’s northern summer, picking morel mushrooms at roughly CA$100 per dry pound:

Morel Mushroom from the Yukon

…Or something like that. Basically I am committed to just grafting as hard as I can by doing difficult and/or remote jobs for short stretches, in order to get all this cleared, so I can put it behind me and move the fuck on. Once these two debts are gone, that’s it – I’m free & clear.