[jasonwentcrazy.]

I like to drive and think of it as a frequently visited tool for meditation and I take frequent road trips with that in mind. Music is a huge part of this and there are very, very few artists I can allow into these trips. 

So far I can say the following are important for achieving successful road trip results: 

LCD Soundsystem

Golden BooTs

Modest Mouse

Avett Brothers

M.I.A.

Gorillaz

Whitey

Eels

Fishbone

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Mothers Milk + Uplift Mofo Party Plan

Sigue Sigue Sputnik

New Order

Some people are immediately inclined to cite example after example of cops doing cool shit to help people as some sort of response to others posting their shock over what happened to Philando Castile and Alton Sterling. I had been reading some recent posts from a few friends explaining why saying Black Lives Matter doesn’t mean that White Lives Don’t Matter. Of course this is true. I responded saying that those White Lives Matter sort of people were just fucking morons. It seemed that simple. But I was wrong in saying that. It’s never that simple. 

It's definitely beyond absurd for for them to want to insert themselves into the conversation in this way. And it also proves that they are so far detached from the issue of a militarized police force weaned on racism and living under the protection of a legal system that surrounds the cops in such a way as to ensure they are immune from the laws they claim to be protecting. They live inside a bubble where their world view is retarded and limited and subject to blinders and so it's not worth the time trying to point out anything beyond their scope of schism.

My friend Kirk says it better than I might in a recent Facebook post:

To advocate that a community which is systematically discriminated against and victimised matters is NOT coterminous with asserting that those who who are already invested with privilege and power in society don't matter. That's the politicised function of advocacy: it testifies support to those who need it.

Professing that Black Lives Matter does not nullify or delegitimise the value of other lives; it calls to attention the violently self-apparent reality that the currency of black lives has depreciated wholesale in communities where those who don't suffer the same apparatus of persecution get to reinforce their privilege and power, to a point where only protesting this systemic brute antagonism against black lives affords them their protection.

It's akin to how we all are so entrenched in our thinking based on living in a three dimensional world that it boggles our minds to try and comprehend the 4th and 5th [and 11th] dimension. In so many respects we're ignorant. And willfully so too. Because to forego our long-held beliefs for something outside of ourselves means starting over. It means that if one thing we believed for so long has been shown to be incorrect then we're left facing the question of what else are we thinking that we got wrong?

I get it. It's like learning that you've been spelling it 'segway' for so many years and realizing it's actually spelled 'segue'. You cringe at how many times you spelled it incorrectly in the past. It's like pronouncing the Ed Ruscha's last name as Rooska or Roosha but realizing it's actually Roo-shay. It's understandable that you'd feel like a dumbass and cringe over how people might have thought you were some idiot. The response of not wanting to hear the truth is one way to prevent feeling like an idiot but I personally feel like it's best to just acknowledge you had it wrong and feel better for having learned something new. Something true.

I did this same thing in the time I made this post. I changed my mind and I rescind my statement that the White Lives Matter folks are morons. They’re not. They are misguided and fearful and this is their way of feeling safe and feeling right. They don’t want the status quo to change and they prefer the comfort of the familiar.

It's the same as staying in a miserable relationship because at least it's something and plus you don't want to have to divide your friends or your silverware. It's laziness and apathy as much as it is denial. Nobody wants to start over. It sucks when you're faced with the idea that you need to start over to find someone new then go through the whole process of getting past the point where you're both able to be comfortable enough to not worry if you fart loudly enough that the other person hears it.

Feeling safe is something we all want. Some people find that sense of safety from living in denial or from the walls they hide behind or from building more and more barricades to keep everyone else that doesn't look/think/act like them as far away as possible.

Look, it’s really not a complicated issue and the very simplest way to explain it came from a Twitter post from someone I don’t know:

The Fourth Amendment’s exclusionary rule is officially sunk and we’re all seriously jammed up for the rest of our lives. It’s that serious. The rule’s rationale is fairly straightforward: If cops and prosecutors can still benefit from unlawful searches, what motivation would there be to not perform them? Well, thanks to a ruling from the US Supreme Court the cops can use the evidence obtained in illegal searches.

As I develop the awakening mind I praise the Buddhas as they shine I bow before you as I travel my path To join your ranks, I make my full-time task For the sake of all beings I seek The enlightened mind that I know I'll reap Respect to Shantideva and all the others Who brought down the Dharma for the sisters and brothers I give thanks for this world as a place to learn And for this human body that I know I've earned And my deepest thanks to all sentient beings For without them, there would be no place to learn what I'm seeing There's nothing here that's not been said before But I put it down now so that I'll be sure To solidify my own views And I'll be glad if it helps anyone else out too

If others disrespect me or give me flak I'll stop and think before I react Knowing that they're going through insecure stages I'll take the opportunity to exercise patience I'll see it as a chance to help the other person Nip it in the bud before it can worsen A chance for me to be strong and sure As I think on the Buddhas who have come before As I praise and respect the good they've done Knowing love can conquer hate in every situation We need other people in order to create The circumstances for the learning that we're here to generate Situations that bring up our deepest fears So we can work to release them until they're cleared Therefore, it only makes sense To thank our enemies despite their intent

The Bodhisattva path is one of power and strength A strength from within to go the length Seeing others are as important as myself I strive for a happiness of mental wealth With the interconnectedness that we share as one Every action that we take affects everyone So in deciding for what a situation calls There is a path for the good for all I try to make my every action for that highest good With the altruistic wish to achieve Buddhahood So I pledge here before everyone who's listening To try to make my every action for the good of all beings For the rest of my lifetimes and even beyond I vow to do my best, to do no harm And in times of doubt, I can think on the Dharma And the Enlightened Ones who've graduated Samsara

[Posting whatever was languishing in my drafts folder.]

Our brains are wired to be greedy for things to think about and when we don’t have anything to process we’ll hallucinate in order to have things to think about. Whether it’s in the context of solitary confinement in a prison or in some sensory deprivation chamber when there isn’t anything to do or see or feel or think about our brains will make things up to have something to do. 

This notion is made even more interesting when you consider that from the perspective of evolutionary psychology we are wired to have the most immediate access to our ‘negative file’ as the primary source of material our brain uses when conjuring up these new ideas and thoughts.

The negative file is this instantly accessible folder of things that can kill us. Things like poisonous snakes, for example, that we need to get away from and fast so we don’t die. We don't have time to think about what type of snake it is and if it’s within striking range or anything like that. We just need to immediately jump out of the way of any harm and this information needs to be at the forefront of our minds so we can access it in a millisecond.

So when we don’t have anything to think about and our brains are starved for new things to work on it conjures up images and ideas and thoughts to keep itself occupied. And that material is the negative stuff as it’s so readily available. 

I’ve always been in love with found photographs and a couple of months ago I’d been working out some exhibition to show some of the best ones I’ve collected over the years. I had been up early and was in that in-between, liminal place where I needed to go to sleep or just power through and wake up. My phone rang and it was an old friend I hadn't seen in a while. She just wanted to talk and catch up. We talked for a while and when the conversation came around to found photos I was glad to have been reminded of an old photo album I found a long time ago.

I was excited to be reminded of this and asked my friend if it was okay if I recorded the call. I use Google Voice and it allows you to record phone calls and it saves the audio for you and it even attempts to transcribe it. It’s good for interviews and stuff like that and I am glad to have this little conversation with my friend. 

I just found out she is dead and I don’t know what to say really other than I feel selfishly happy that I immediately got in touch with her the moment she reached out. 

People don’t do that until it’s too late and to paraphrase Bukowski, ‘there is nothing worse than too late’.

This is the file and it’s pretty terrific that I have it and there is so much to this conversation that says a whole lot about my friend. I’m sure that she wouldn’t mind if you listened to it. I don’t mind for sure.

A liquor store in the midwest had the idea of offering their customers the value added service of cashing their paychecks. They offered this convenient service by opening auxiliary check-cashing business inside of the liquor store and it was a big hit. In order to expedite the check-cashing process they implemented a membership database that consisted of a Polaroid instant photo of each customer. They stapled an index card with the name and address and contact information of each client and that was stapled to the photos. 

Years later the liquor store changed owners and the check-cashing part of the business was closed. The photos ended up in some box and were destined for the trash when they were saved and these are some of those photos. Most of them share the same backdrop of a door with electricians tape marking, I imagine, the height of the person standing there, There are some that are taken with different views of the shop itself or the check-cashing window but mostly they are the same.

All told there are hundreds and hundreds of these things and I think they are just incredible. 

I’ve been thinking about The Little Prince a lot after just recently really reading it for the first time. I mean, I’ve assumed I’d read it plenty but that wasn’t totally true. I just knew enough about it in context to have some small conversations about it but I really never knew the story before at all.

It’s pretty amazing and I really like the bit about the fox part the best.

As soon as the Little Prince sees the fox he says “You are very pretty to look at”. [Which it would have to be cute as shit since they are in the Sahara Desert and the foxes that live there are Fennic foxes and if you don’t know what they look like, well, here you go:

Right?! Holy crap. Super cute. But the fox doesn’t care about how cute it is and comes back with the classic line of, “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye”.

When the fox and the little prince meet for the first time, the fox asks the prince to “tame” him. When the prince asks him what “tame” means, the fox says it means “to establish ties”. Through the process of “taming,” he explains, they will come to mean something to one another and they will need each other. Without “taming,” the fox says, the prince will be “nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys”. And to the prince, the fox is “nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes”. They’ll be lost in the crowd and they won’t mean anything to one another.

But after the fox is tamed, the prince and the fox will become unique for each other. They will hold a special and meaningful place for one another.

What the fox means by “tame” is to “make friends” or “to establish a relationship.” According to the fox, unless you build a relationship with a person and get to really understand them, that person will remain indistinguishable for you from the hundreds of thousands of people in the world—and you, too, will not be “unique” or special to them. You’ve got to make a connection with another person and that takes time and trust and patience.

My favorite bit is this when the fox is trying to explain why the little prince should commit to taming the fox:

“I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the colour of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat..."

And how does the prince tame the fox? He sits down on the grass at a little distance from the fox and says nothing because, as the fox tells him, “Words are the source of misunderstandings”. The fox looks at him out of the corner of his eye and every day, at the same time, the prince arrives at their designated spot and sits a little closer to the fox.

This is a process that requires enormous amounts of time and patience. You’ve got to be dedicated to this idea and according to the fox that’s the whole point. Building relationships and deep connections with people is hard work. The fox remarks: “One only understands the things that one tames….Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends anymore.”

After the fox is tamed, it is time for the prince to leave, and the fox is about to cry. Because of this, the prince worries that the taming has hardly done any good. But the fox says it has done him good “because of the color of the wheat fields”. The golden wheat will remind the fox of the prince’s golden hair, which will make the wheat fields a source of happiness to the fox – until he was tamed, the wheat fields meant nothing to him. According to the fox, it is our relationships that make the world around us significant and meaningful.

I mean, the fox doesn’t even eat bread but he says, “And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat..."

Hoooo!

[I’ve pasted the fox chapter just below the read more break.]