Birthday
Tomorrow’s events:
Collective Journaling w/ Peter Limberg and Co-Hosts. Daily @ 8:00 AM ET. Patreon event. 90 mins.
Origins of the Self: An Integrated Model w/ Bonnitta Roy. October 27th @ 12:00 PM ET. Beyond Self-Discipline and The Pop-Up School event. 90 mins.
Newly posted events:
The Way Forward Beyond the Dysfunctions of Modern Culture w/ Robert Gilman. November 9th, 16th, 23rd, 30th @ 12:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
Becoming a Weirdtrepreneur w/ Joe Edelman. November 11th @ 12:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
Polarity Management w/ Barry Johnson. November 15th @ 11:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
Moneywork w/ Peter Koenig. November 17th @ 12:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
Building the Wisdom Age w/ Rhys Lindmark, Sara Cadena, and Jamie Daudon. November 18th @ 12:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
G.W.F. Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit w/ Cadell Last. November 29th @ 12:00 PM ET. RSVP here.
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October 26th, 2021
Joe Edelman just sent me an article he wrote with the following message…
I was thinking of you earlier today while writing this because I think you’re a weird-trepreneur.
Weird-trepreneur. I feel so seen. Joe contrasts the weird-trepreneur to the dominant type of entrepreneurship, the same-preneur…
[A]n entrepreneur who's job is to get many people doing the same thing. Same-preneurs try to send many people down one funnel, and drive transactions of a certain type.
Same-preneurs want you to play the same game, the game that they are playing…
Instead of helping people find their own games, it reduces them to a player in the entrepreneurs game. Funnels have a simplifying effect, emphasizing people's sameness rather than their uniqueness. And transactions keep people isolated, interacting only in a pre-designed way.
Weird-trepreneurs are not in the sameness game. They want you to discover your own game...
The opposite of a same-preneur is a weird-trepreneur. Instead of funnels and transactions, the weird-trepreneur builds playgrounds and open-ended explorations in which each person does their own thing and comes out weirder on the other side, and where their interactions are unpredictable and lasting, rather than "transactional".
Joe ends the piece with the following...
Same-preneurship is the root of waste and depression in our society. And weird-trepreneurs will create new kinds of communities, venues, and organizations that will stop that waste and bring us alive again.
What an honor to have Joe think of me as a weird-trepreneur. It does resonate. The liminal ventures of The Stoa and Beyond Self-Discipline are gangways with rabbit holes abound, to meta-playgrounds where meeting the sense of aliveness is a happenstance away.
A new Stoan recently tweeted the following: The Stoa is a park with the most amazing rabbit holes I've ever found. I hear this often. Daniel also texted me this yesterday: How do you find all this cool shit. Once you become a rabbit hole connoisseur, you become a rabbit hole yourself. As Joe mentions, being a rabbit hole opens up the possibility space for others. They begin to see how they can play life differently. Becoming a rabbit hole helps others play Game In-Between.
I have received many comments from people thanking me for stewarding The Stoa, saying how it has transformed them. Hearing this always fills me with a joyous sense of warmth that my mind translates to something like this: I am on the right path. I am also left confused though, as the word “transformation” seems like a strong word to use here.
The comments could be kind hyperbole of course. But maybe they are not. We experience so many mind-numbing advertisements on a daily basis, brainwashing us to play one game - a game that tricks us to think that the sense of aliveness is around the corner. It always ends up disappointing us though.
I want to create spaces that do not just have one rabbit hole, but a cornucopia of rabbit holes. These rabbit holes give glimpses of new games. These games, if you choose to play, open up new tunnels of possibility. I do not know what tunnel is best for you. I am not smart or wise enough to know this. I am not clever enough to pretend to know this either.
Choice. This is about inspiring choice, ideally effective ones. It does feel like my spiritual sensitivities are getting upgraded these days. My sensory mechanism is different now, better attuned or something. I can sense into more than one possibility tunnel. Some are hellish, some are heavenly.
Every moment feels like it has a configuration of the multiverse and each choice creates a new configuration. Choosing from fear, hate, and shame encourages a “reciprocal narrowing,” making the delicious diversity of tunnels less salient. Choosing from love creates a “reciprocal opening,” revealing more tunnels. You begin to “see” them in front of you.
I suppose this is what having a “vision” is all about. I heard the music, being graced with a taste of heaven, revealing real beauty. I am forever orientated towards beauty now. On that day I wrote: We have vision, because we are able to see with our hearts. Seeing with our hearts - this is how we navigate between the games. Do you see now?
If not, that is okay. Just breathe. Sense into the endless rational machinations of the monkey mind. Go a little lower now and feel beneath them. Feel the fear and all of those unpleasant emotions. Feed them some love. These emotions mean you well, they are just malnourished; you have not been taking care of them.
Stuff them up with some good lovin’. Pour so much love into them. Those rational machinations will soon burn like deadwood. Sense the options in front of you - there are so many. You are not a prisoner anymore. You can take your life wherever you like. Start listening to something different here, something you may be feeling underneath these words right now.
Choose from here. Today is your birthday after all.
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