I am sitting in a food court of a Vancouver shopping centre and I planned to draw but I forgot my Apple Pencil so here I am with a quick missive.
What about the stop doing list, and why don’t we talk about that more?
We love our to-do lists, they give us a feeling of accomplishment. What about the power of restraint? What about the power in holding back, in refraining from? I don’t mean avoidance. I mean deliberate acts to stop doing a thing. We rarely talk about this and we should do, since this is the essence of Ramadan, which we are in right now.
We find ourselves in a social era punctuated by clever and sophisticated manipulative coercion—narcissism receives reward/reinforcement and progressives weaponise morality to exert control/punish and destroy dissenters and we are seeing young people with a unprecedented lack of social abilities or problem solving or conflict resolution abilities. Uncertainty seems to beg for tyrannical authority and see freedom and choice as threatening. It’s quite stunning, really, to observe a woke Lord of the Flies or an Animal Farm mentality fuel nearly everyone under the age of 30. How did we get here? I would suggest forgetting manners, which really is the recognition of the boundaries of others and self.
Now suddenly boundaries are somehow egregious or a manifestation of bigotry—like, I can’t have my own clear definitions that exclude you and I can’t say fcuk you no I won’t validate your bullsh1t or let you control me becuz you’re bored and need to stir sh1t get a hobby seriously. Also, when did you progressive fake bleeding hearts decide me or anyone else were responsible for your happiness? Seriously that’s egocentric horsesh1t. Why are we so wont to just give such power away to others? Do not demand that I burn myself at the flipping stake to warm your ass!
Stop playing other people’s games—stop giving your power away. Energy vampires will suck you dry do not let those fukkers deplete you.
Bismillah means fierceness. It means validate yourself, show the fcuk up for sh1t. It means understand instead of judge. It means you cannot run from yourself, yo. No one who’s on the run will ever have the power of joy inside them. Avoidance can’t make you happy, duh. Face yourself. Joy is an inside job.
The Arabic word for mercy shares it’s root with the Arabic root for womb. The womb is a flashpoint and a source and a temple for transformation, transformation is destruction and creation both together and any women beyond menarche can tell you about the power and profoundness and cyclical complexity of the uterus.
A seed splits itself open to germinate. That is nature and we are part of that nature, so expect no less of yourself than you expect of the seeds you may now be trying to grow. How can you demand that nature sustain and feed you when you refuse to break yourself for nature?
Mercy will burn you clean. It will probably feel uncomfortable. fyi.