Sensemaking Journalism
Hey beautiful friends,
I hope you are well. :)
Events this weekend:
Metagame Mastermind w/ Daniel Kazandjian.Every Saturday @ 6:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
Freestyling Through a Pandemic w/ Tyson Wagner. Every Saturday @ 8:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
Stoic Breath w/ Steve Beattie.Every Sunday @ 10:00 AM ET. RSVP here.
The Good, the True, and the Beautiful w/ Jared Janes. Every Sunday @ 12:30 PM ET. RSVP here.
Mediation Campfire w/ Jason Snyder and Jared Janes. Every Sunday @ 3:30 PM ET. RSVP here.*
Oxytocin Party w/ Raya Sun. Every Sunday @ 8:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
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May 15, 2020
There is a sluggish quality to me right now. One that desires to be intense, so I can write something inspired and escape this sluggish state. I do not desire to engage in a more rational type of writing today, where I soberly explore my ideas at the knife's edge of my thinking. So I am stuck with being a slug, longing for a different state of being. But let's not get too cocky about thinking this report on my state is true. I am aggressively sipping on this espresso after all, and listening to late 90’s post-grunge rock that is slowly bringing out my monster side.
I do not feel like writing anything inspired, but I am afraid I will lose you if I do not try. There is a story in my head that I am doing something awesome here. This story is supported by supportive comments I have been receiving about these journals, and by the feeling I get when I finish each one, which is a feeling of daemonic rightness. But this desire is probably encouraged by my ego, which wants to be awesome for its own sake.
I want to be awesome in front of you. I want to live like I am burning all the time. I know how I operated in the old world, and there was a deadness to it. A “what am I doing with my life” feel, coupled with a constant shame to be something better. I do not have any of that anymore, since COVID happened, since the Stoa opened for spiritual business, and since I started writing like a rockstar. I am afraid I will fall back into that uninspired normie reality. Normies gotta norm, but I do not want to settle on any norms. Not yet and not right now.
I am starting to get pissed off at this sluggishness, and I am going to make myself another espresso, and I am open to having another one after that. Also, this post-grunge is getting more aggressive. My ever-increasing libido is a constant challenge, and is forcing me to be vigilant. I notice more cute, pretty, and beautiful women are finding their way into my life. There is a pretense of innocence in these interactions, but I am very attracted, and I am at the knife's edge of indulgence.
I am trying to be a man of virtue, and I am being completely transparent with Camille about my desires, my weaknesses, and my insatiable monstrous appetite. We are having an inspired relationship right now. A part of me wants to go into the dirty details, but sharing would probably be out of a desire to brag. Yeah, this man who is trying to be virtuous still has the desire to brag. Maybe this is pathetic, it feels pathetic, but if you want to keep your eyes on this spiritual striptease you're going to see my ugly parts as well.
Yesterday Rebel Wisdom released the conversation David Fuller and I had about his difficulties in being a journalist in the liminal war. Besides my shitty technical set-up and my overuse of the word delicious, I felt it was a really good conversation. I appreciate Fuller’s willingness to wade into the conspiratorial front in the liminal war with such nuance. Now that is a dangerous game to be playing.
Given our past private conversations, I seem to be more open to behind-the-scenes parapolitical machinations than he is, but that might change, for both of us. I am up for grabs and you cannot play good metagame if you are not up for grabs. I desire to help Rebel Wisdom out, because they are well positioned to inspire a new form of journalism.
I get excited at imagining the emergence of nuanced sensemaking journalists. Who, like wise Socrates, are in the right relationship with unknowingness, and who venture into our noosphere wilderness in order to make sense. Maybe we need war correspondents for the liminal war. That is something I can get behind.
In response to this video, my friend and kindred spirit, Richard Bartlett tweeted the following: I notice my and Peter's profiles growing as we become more authentic and vulnerable. At what size audience should I expect a backlash?
I did not like how his question was framed, because there seems to be a self-fulfilling prophecy to it. Maybe this is extremely naive on my part, but I do not think a backlash will always be the case. Or maybe if one embodies the amor fati principle completely, all backlash can be quickly transmuted into something beautiful.
I do not know, but being a good Stoic you need to prepare for both the good and bad, and seeing what happened to my former therapist, and so quickly, I should not proceed with only naivety. I sense that listening to the daemon, while being radically truthful in a public way, will bring wanted and unwanted attention.
I have a desire to kill my avatar in the spectacle. I want to be prepared to delete everything at a moment's notice: Twitter account, YouTube channel, these journals, etc. I do not want to be enmeshed to my image, and I want to sacrifice it for the greater good if I ever become incapacitated by it. A good Stoic is ready to let his image die.
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