THE NEW PARADIGM

"DON'T TRY" is written on the tombstone of Charles Bukowski.  This phrase is the mission statement of my blogging process. So many blogs are purely informational you drown in text, drown in the seething squiggles of irrelevance.  This blog is different. as Lorca says in his lecture on Duende "....it rejects all the sweet geometry one has learned, that it breaks with all styles...." 

A massive fire is needed to facilitate the shift into the new paradigm; the fire of life, apocalyptic uprising of a new value, the drums in your chest leading you like the horse of Don Quixote where you are most afraid and most willing to go; your deepest purpose, your deepest vision, your life the way you have only dreamed it to be.  Don't try! Let your heart-horse lead you.  Get out of the way of yourself. Tune in with a deadly seriousness to the quiet river that is purring in your chest and be a savage stalking your own destiny, completely alert, alive with the fear of the unknown, walking in faith, in confidence, in the electric downstream momentum, established in the terror and bliss of the moment with a melted heart. 

Tim Britton told me the story of this Sakahatchi Flute Master who after having finished a concert responded to a young man who came up to him and said, to paraphrase, "Wow you are totally amazing. It must have taken years and years of hard work to be able to play like that." The flute master said "easy work."  It is going to be work, but what is the foundation of this work? What quality are we going to offer to the environment that will we then inhabit together?

Humanity perpetually on the brink of self destruction must NOW band together and form a collective based in letting go, which means to allow. We must allow our fearless egoless hearts to lead us.  Joseph Campell in the The Hero with a Thousand Faces says "FOLLOW YOUR BLISS" This is not some care-free easter egg hunt. It is running through your internal jungle at three in the morning with a knife ready to revise anything that is not truth.

This blog is about empowerment, about passion, about artists coming together. It certainly cannot be false or compelled because I trust myself, and I trust people.  It certainly cannot be superficial or purely informational because there is an infinite amount of information that means nothing without an illuminated HEART.  It is time to listen, respond, collaborate and form a collective of peaceful warriors ready to facilitate the paradigm shift. To start living y(our) values rather than just believing them, to start doing the things that are deepest in your heart.  

Recently I had the pleasure of meeting and collaborating with the guys at the 1 second film who have started the collaboration foundation. We drove around Los Angeles in a renovated bio diesel bus with iJustine and my band the Evangenitals rallying votes for grant money for a contest on ideablob.  The concept of the 1second film speaks to the power of numbers, the power of collaboration and art making, bringing people together.  It costs $1 to become a producer of the 1 second film and so far they have 8900 producers and the amount is growing everyday.  It is a non profit organization committed to bringing people together in the name of art.

This togetherness, this community and collective vision is what people are craving.  We are living in a society that is more and more isolated and yet more and more connected with all the social networks and modes of communication available through the internet and technology.  The dramatic evidence of this is YOU TUBE.  A video of Gary Brolsma lip syncing got over nineteen millions views. A video of a baby laughing has over sixty million views.  We start to see that it is community and connectedness, MORE THAN CONTENT, is what people are craving.  A community based in authenticity and the individual.

You tube, the internet, the personal computer has opened up access to the global community like never before.  Just a couple of weeks ago I was chatting with a friend in Iceland and a friend in California at the same time without having to leave the kitchen in Hollywood.   This connectivity in isolation is a metaphor for the requirement for the relationships of the new paradigm; Know yourself. It is most critical that one knows oneself.  It is of utmost importance that you are paying attention to your deepest desire, the thing that is fueling your life.  What is the voice that remains when all others fall away?  What is the voice that is yours, deeper than the voice of your mother and father, deeper than the voice of your family and especially your friends, the voice that is deeper than the seasons and entropy of the universe, the voice that is guiding you to realize your dreams, to actually live the life that you want?  The age of mass media euphemisms and brainwashing is over. The new paradigm is an era of community based on authentic self realized individuals.

This is the credo of the artist: Know Yourself and Follow Your Bliss. It's a walk of life that is brutal, following the heart in the face of ridicule and rejection and potential disaster around every corner.  Pat Matheny's article on Kenny G is what comes to mind. the kind of risk and monetary challenges that one must face as a professional musician. I moved to Los Angeles from a small town in Iowa and I can tell you first hand that the monetary issues for musicians are daunting especially with the cost of living as it is.

Now with technology and the evolution of the internet, music is available for free. When it rains it pours right? Now professional musicians are not only held hostage by record labels but now the blood sweat and tears of the artists, the work, the product, the music is all free.  This is the crux of the new paradigm.  The old ways are slipping away and within this is the opportunity for musicians and artists to forge ahead with a new resilient kind of creativity making use of the power of music, of the craving for community.

Music connects us all. It is the language that is beyond language.  If you go to a concert in India and a musician sings a raga in Hindi you still feel it regardless if you understand the words or not.   That is the power of music is that it is in the field of feeling.  Music has the power to make you weep in a movie. It has the power to electrify your memories. It has the power to melt hearts, to influence the weather, facilitate healing, to signify a wedding, to commemorate a life.  Music is a language that connects us all from the drumming of our mother's hearts in utero, to the stuff you listen to today. 

Take the song "GET LIKE ME" by David Banner for example:

Have you ever seen a chevy with the butterfly doors,
stuntin (stuntin) is a habit, get like me,
Have you ever seen a chevy with a - (get) get like me
Have you ever seen a chevy with a - get like me
Have you ever seen a chevy with the butterfly doors,
stuntin (stuntin) is a habit,
put it in the air,
stuntin (stuntin) is a habit,
put it in the air,
stuntin (stuntin) is a habit,
put it in the air,
Have you ever seen a chevy with the butterfly doors,
stuntin (stuntin) is a habit

This song is all over the radio. I hear it practically everyday.  It is striking a universal chord in the collective consciousness.  Now I have no idea what the hell he is talking about or why, but I LOVE THE SONG. The power of music is WAY BEYOND CONTENT.

Henry Miller said in Sexus "There were plenty of writers who could drag a thing out to the end without letting go of the reins: what we needed was a man, like myself for instance, who didn't give a fuck what happened. Dostoevski hadn't gone quite far enough. I was for straight gibberish. One should go cuckoo! People have had enough of plot and character. Plot and character don't make life. Life isn't in the upper storey: life is here now, any time you say the word, any time you let rip. Life is four hundred and forty horsepower in a two-cylinder engine...."

The New Paradigm is NOW.  Let's work together, effortlessly and with illuminated hearts.