Reflections on 2018

In the days leading up to the new year, I saw a lot of myth, religion, and spirituality on the twitter timeline. It seems that for you, like me, myth is on the mind at the end of the year. It is impossible to conduct cultural analysis without thinking about myth; the corollary is that it is impossible to consider how meaning works without discovering spirituality. 

One learning from 2018 is: I have the capacity for spiritual experience.

One learning from 2018 is: it enriches my life to cultivate my own relationship to myth and ritual, in connection with others.

From conversations I've had this year, and conversations I've witnessed, I know that these thoughts and feelings are not mine alone. I see many others my age questioning assumptions about their a-gnosticism or a-theism, and even more foundational, their cynicism. On Twitter, I see people asking themselves: "should I return to my Catholicism [or other religious upbringing]?" It's clear that these thoughts are not ironic pretensions towards a baroque capital aesthetic, but genuine wonderings-out-loud. Or wanderings-out-of-the-wild. Like lost termites finding their way back to the colony, millennials are returning from the unlimited desert of perfect cynicism they were born into. I wrote about authenticity and irony this year, but these developments leave me wondering more than ever: what was the reason for the great ironic moment? What great cultural trauma forced the West to repress its desire for loving connection, its need for a meaning greater than self-determination?

We all know that defense mechanisms are adaptive, of course. But they outgrow their usefulness. This cultural moment demands new (or old) myths, new visions for the self, and I am both glad and relieved to be uncovering/recovering/discovering some together with you, my close friends, my professional collaborators, my readers, my mutuals, may all these categories mix. But as we consider myth and new mythmaking we must keep in mind consequences, incentives, power.

One learning from 2018 is: if you have the opportunity and skill to create a new myth people can believe in, a new sacredness, it is your responsibility to not fuck it up.

One learning I learned again in 2018 is: those with the skill to create myths are often the people who locate themselves at a myth's center and abuse that position. Be in the business of reassessing your idols.

In 2019, we have no time for manipulators, deceivers, abusers, and cult leaders. The best way to deal with this type of individual is to listen to our intuition, share information, and confirm with others. We evolved "bad vibes" radar for a reason. Listen to it. Know that there is something twisted about any culture that demands your suffering yet denies it, rationalizes it. In 2019, I will speak more openly about suffering and about my own abuse, and make a commitment of availability, of empathic listening, to anyone suffering directly or indirectly from abusive myths and cult leaders at any scale — from relationships, to conspiracy cults, to widespread myths. 

This year I am especially interested in male pain and in new visions for masculinity. This year I am especially interested in spaces for meaningful experiences and connection to others. This year I am especially interested in strengthening relationships. This year I am especially interested in cooking dinner together. This year I am especially interested in the contributions I make to groups and spaces I'm part of. This year I am especially interested in learning more about the biosphere. This year I am especially interested in deepening psychological knowledge. This year I am especially interested in initiation ceremonies. And, this year, I am especially interested in narratives and mythologies that link us together from our our past to our present through the seventh generation, and which seed the desert with the possibility of new life. We each must care for new green and we each must hold the torch.

Sending loving thoughts to all you gardeners, all you firekeepers.

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Updates

This was a transformative year for the research and writing practice at Subpixel Space. Ideas I've been thinking about on almost two years came alive, manifesting as: 
- Three essays
- One talk
- One podcast interview
This year's essays are the most widely read pieces we've published so far. About half of you have never received a newsletter before; welcome. After Authenticity managed to reach Kottke and Marginal Revolution. The Diminishing Marginal Value of Aesthetics resonated among designers and artists, and led me to meeting a host of insightful thinkers and new friends, including the kind folks at New Models. In 2019 there will be more writing and perhaps more speaking, but as usual, I will make no promises as to when and what. 

In other logistical news, since February of this year, Subpixel Space has had a holding company: a new corporate entity I formed together with Darren Kong. Under this new formation, Other Internet, we undertook several projects—ventures both original and with partners. In one way or another, our product and market strategies in the blockchain space this year have probably crossed your timeline. Our dedicated research program is currently incubating a theory of cryptographic digital goods, which we can share more about soon.
 
Fundamentally, Other Internet is researching novel models of computing and infrastructure.
Strategy and research
Applying emerging technologies to large problems
Cooking dinner for our friends
Sharing our dreams
Exploring genuine collaboration
Navigating reality and fiction
Facilitating workshops
Some speaking
and writing
and traveling
Cult deprogramming
Workshopping myths and futures

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Closing Remarks

At the twilight of this year I found myself one of 15 individuals, some strangers, breathing, reading, thinking aloud, sitting in circles, star-gazing stream-splashing dream-sharing, dish-washing together. It amazes me how much one can find to love in only a few days time. I could not have imagined better rituals to end a year, nor a better beginning to one I know will be about connection, service, and growth. I find that when I set my intentions, know my motivations, and act purposefully, people appear at the right time in my life. In last year's retrospective, themed around vulnerability, I invited readers to email me directly. I want to open up that opportunity once more. I'm genuinely curious to learn about your interests, ideas, and projects, your own personal mythologies, your own benevolent cults. Even if only one of you hits the reply button, trustingly sharing yourself and your time and energy with me, this will be a good year for the both of us.

Until next time.