What that means is that *We Are In Control Of Our Own Destiny*
We hold the responsibility for deciding for ourselves what democracy looks like, for us, in our immediate context.
We decide on what terms we will engage with existing economic and political structures.
http://media.citytv.topscms.com
At the same time, we are a small part of a massive, increasingly intricate, and strengthening global network with a horizontal nature. This is inherently collaborative, and the scope for knowledge and experience sharing is almost unlimited. That’s a lot of solidarity and strength upon which to draw, and it makes us powerful. The very nature of participatory democracy that we have formed over the last few weeks in our own cities and squares throughout the world in our General Assemblies, and our various nascent workgroups, is being reflected in hundreds of other cities, by hundreds of thousands of friends and allies, throughout the entire Occupy Network.
We do, truly, Occupy Together.
What we need to realise, on a deep and personal level, is that we are on to something new and important, here.
I want you to consider this for a moment. I want you to realise this fact—the fact that What You Are Doing Is Important.
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’m without a job right now, and I’m just about to head down Commercial Drive to canvass the local cafés for work. I only need two or three days a week to cover everything, and really that’s all I need and want, so hopefully it won’t be too difficult. I’ve also signed-up at an office temping agency, so hopefully that will yield a few days work.
Without boring you with too much detail, things in Vancouver (as far as the basics like accommodation and employment go) have not been very successful, ever since I arrived in September last year. It feels like I’m constantly trying to dig sideways and clear a path up to solid ground, and every few feet I get shoved deeper into this hole. In sum, it seems like Vancouver and I are just not resonating very well with each other, at this point in time. I am, simply, not feeling settled at all.
It’s not all bullshit, though—not by any stretch. I have made some amazing friends, plus I’ve been spending quite a lot of high-quality time with an intelligent, gorgeous and delightful woman, who, brilliantly, is named Randi. And, this continuous ‘digging’ has also led me into yet another re-evaluation of where I’m going and what I’m doing with my Life; basically, after feeling kind of stagnant for the last few months, I am once again feeling re-invigorated. Again, without boring you with the introspective details of how I got here, let me break it down for you…
[Cue thoughtful background string music, with montage of biological cellular growth and division]
The other day I was out on-site for work with Matakana assisting Rusty, one of the scaffies, to erect an 18x8ft cantilever platform eight floors above 2nd Avenue. This involved jamming six uprights between the floor and ceiling in a rectangle, then attaching three diagonally placed supports out into open space, connecting them with horizontal bars, and then placing plywood & aluminIum decks between those horizontals, creating the platform. (We were, of course, tethered to the structure for the duration by lanyards that can take 5000 pounds of weight.)
Having erected the platform, we were up there zap-strapping some capture-netting to the handrails to finish things off, when Rusty turned and said to me, “by the way mate, I s’pose this is as good a time as any to tell ya: this is the first time I’ve done a cantilever platform, eh.” He then emphasized his smiling pride in his handiwork by stomping loudly a couple of times on the platform with both feet, eight floors above six lanes of fast-moving traffic, and punctuating this demonstration of self-belief by stating rhetorically, with a wide grin, “pretty good job though, eh?”
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Just before we’d suspended ourselves out there in the chill winter afternoon air, I had taken my wallet out of my back pocket so that I could put on my harness and lanyard. If I’d kept it in my pocket, there was a good chance I would have lost it to that six lanes of traffic. I swear to the world that I chucked it into my backpack, well inside the building, but bugger me six times sideways if it isn’t bloody there now. While I didn’t lose any cash or credit cards, that wallet did contain my NZ driver’s licence, my Canadian social insurance card, and my NZ and Canadian bank cards. More of a hindrance than a catastrophe; still a pain in ze azz. Last time I lost a wallet was about ten years ago, when it got stolen while in D.C.
Anyway, earlier today on Sunday afternoon, I pulled on my grey wool jacket and turned the collar up. I put some polypropylene leggings on under my jeans, and fired a new DJ mix across to my mp3 player. I laced up my shoes and locked the door behind me, setting off down West 1st avenue to Clark Drive, turning south in the direction of Vancouver Community College, back towards the site where I last saw my wallet.
I noticed something as I rounded to corner onto Clark Drive, and the tall glass and steel and concrete monoliths of Vancouver piled proudly on the landscape before me, mantled majestically by snow-smeared, cedar-dotted mountains just a few miles north—strong ramparts about the keep. As I looked up to the iconic East Van Cross standing in the bright, crisp slanted sunlight, and watched the breath condense before my face in the cool air while the sounds of Alex Levin’s smooth, deep breakbeat warmed my ears and stimulated my senses under my chunky headphones, I felt something new—Something fresh. I stalked with hunched shoulders across the Skytrain overpass as two Millennium Line trains crossed paths beneath me, and as the padded bass pumped confidently in my brain, the steel bars in the bridge sidings made the sunlight strobe judderingly over me at a low angle and a high frequency… and I noticed that I was smiling to myself. I noticed that I am feeling Good.
Burning Man encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on his or her inner resources. Participants are expected to provide for their own food, water, clothing, shelter and other needs during the week in the desert. What you pack-in, you are expected to pack-out.
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What if we all practice Radical Inclusion?
Everyone may be a part of Burning Man. We welcome and respect the stranger. No prerequisites exist for participation in our community. Participants are obliged to find a place for others who wish honestly to participate.
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What if we all hold Gifting to be the highest form of sharing?
Burning Man is devoted to acts of gift-giving. The value of a gift is unconditional. Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value. You may be offered a gift of anything by anyone at any time, and likewise may you gift anything.
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What if we all practice Decommodification?
In order to preserve the spirit of Gifting, our community seeks to create social environments that are un-mediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising. We stand ready to protect our culture from such exploitation. We resist the substitution of consumption for participatory experience.
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What if Radical Self-Expression is encouraged?
Radical Self-Expression arises from the unique gifts of the individual. No one other than the individual or a collaborating group can determine its content; It is offered and shared as a gift to others.
In this spirit, the giver is expected to respect the rights and liberties of the recipients.
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What if we all help in the Communal Effort?
Our community values creative cooperation and collaboration. We strive to produce, promote and protect social networks, public spaces, works of art, and methods of communication that support such interaction.
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What if we all live up to our Civic Responsibility?
We value civil society. Community members who organise events should assume responsibility for public welfare and endeavour to communicate civic responsibilities to participants. They must also assume responsibility for conducting events in accordance with local, state and federal laws.
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What if we all Leave No Trace?
Our community respects and aims for a symbiotic relationship with the environment. We are committed to leaving no physical trace of our activities wherever we gather. We clean up after ourselves and endeavour, wherever possible, to steward and leave places in a better state than we found them.
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What if we all Participate?
Burning Man is about participation, not simply attendance. Our community is committed to a radically participatory ethic. We believe that transformative change, whether in the individual or in society, can occur only through the medium of deeply personal participation. We achieve being through doing. Everyone is invited to work in their own capacity. Everyone is invited to play wherever they find space. We make the world work through actions that open the heart.
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What if you didn’t hesitate? Immediacy.
Immediate and spontaneous experience is, in many ways, the most important touchstone of value in our culture. We seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves, the realities and perceptions of those around us, participation in society, and contact with a natural world exceeding human powers. No idea or imagining can substitute this experience.
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.
