I’m glad you’re expanding your explorations to the “margins” as @Martin Shaw says in an interview from 2017:
“Stories with weight to them have what C.G. Jung terms ‘the lament of the dead’, which in our frenetic culture we can no longer have time to hear. Most indigenous cultures will tell you that this world belongs to the dead, that’s where we’re headed. So mythology for me involves a conversation with the dead, with what you might call ancestors.
Whatever we are facing now we need to have a root system embedded in weather patterns, the presences of animals, our dreams, and the ones who came before us. Myth is insistent that when there is a crisis, genius lives on the margins not the centre. If we are constantly using the language of politics to combat the language of politics at some point the soul grows weary and turns its head away because we are not allowing it into the conversation, and by denying soul we are ignoring what the Mexicans call the river beneath the river. We’re not listening to the thoughts of the world. We’re only listening to our own neurosis and our own anxiety.”
You’ve put into words something many of us have felt but struggled to name. The visible failures of our systems are not aberrations; they are what happens when human life presses up against structures built for speed, scale, and extraction rather than care, durability, or participation. What I appreciate most is your steadfast refusal to frame these cracks as either catastrophe or nostalgia. The argument isn’t that we should return to some imagined past, nor that collapse itself is somehow virtuous.
Instead, these cracks should signal to us that certain assumptions have reached their maximum limits. We see this now across nearly every institution in life; technology, media, finance, entertainment, news, and politics. These systems have grown to become pathological and increasingly detached from the people expected to have trust in them. For many of us, that trust is already long gone.
This perspective overlaps strongly with themes I’ve been exploring in my own recent writing, particularly around technology and how tools we once owned gradually became systems we comply with. The pattern is relatively consistent: once scale and extraction become the primary goals, human agency becomes collateral damage. The cracks matter because they reveal where alternative futures might take root. Smaller systems, local repair, technologies that can be understood, modified, and trusted. Business models that prioritize long-term relationships over short-term extraction. None of this requires abandoning modern technology; but it does require us to reimagine how we develop, deploy, and live with it.
The task ahead, as you suggest, isn’t to patch every crack and pour in more concrete. It’s to pay attention to where those cracks appear and ask what kind of world we could build if we stopped treating them like defects and started seeing them as opportunities to create a new tomorrow.
I’ve been enjoying watching you get weirder and weirder. A sane voice amidst the fear and chaos, a call to our humanity—which is so much weirder than we allow ourselves to contemplate. I say you’re not weird enough yet. Keep going. I’m in for the ride!
Very true. Permaculture tells us - Use the edges and value the margins. The interface between things is where the most interesting events take place. These are often the most valuable, diverse and productive elements in the system.
Also known as ecotones.
We are nature. This is not another curious distraction but a source of wisdom.
Somewhat related is monoculture thinking.
It's like we live in a field full of a single crop. Wander to the edges and see what's happening in the hedgerow.
It's anarchy and it's beautiful. Full individual expression arising from allowing the natural order.
Actually these 'marginal' aspects of being human are among the oldest and most lasting of our ways of understanding reality, which is so much more complex than our current paradigms encompass. And on an even more obvious level, 'you never can tell'--in a system as complex as this cosmos, what the future holds. Stay weird.
The truth won’t be found in all the old tools, but just diving head first into esoterica isn’t a plan either. There are certain core principles that emerge from the paradigm shift, which mustn’t be occult or obscure if they are to be genuinely meaningful.
What would a rough list of core principles include?
The people that have problems with the weird are missing the point, and here’s why. part of the crisis we are facing is spiritual poverty. Being weird is not only more fun, it’s more fulfilling ( the etymology of the word weird comes from wyrd, an old term to describe interconnection)
Great article, and I think maybe that's why I've been veering towards exploring these topics lately too. I was obsessed with following every little thing during Trump's first term... But this go around, I dunno, I'm spending less time following every little nuance and I feel better. I can't do anything about most of the things going on.
I think part of it is also that we in the west have become so materialistically minded, even so-called religious people don't actually believe in anything supernatural. I recently read Jules Evan's book "The Art of Losing Control: A Guide to Ecstatic Experience" which you may find interesting, it's in a similar vein to this post and I think this type of thinking is much needed now.
I also wish we had more access to psychedelics in legal and safe ways without having to be very well off. The book I mentioned and Aldous Huxley's writing are inspirational and I think that might be the only good thing about RFK Jr, is that he has mentioned wanting to legalize those sort of things. You basically can't do these things unless you have enough money to travel somewhere where it's legal or risk getting a felony for growing your own.
I hear you. I live in Oregon where psilocybin therapy is legal. There are at least 2 clinics in the town where I live, yet the cost for a high-dose session with a licensed sitter is utterly prohibitive for 99.9% of the people living here and interested in exploring the healing benefits of psilocybin (and integration afterwards) in a safe and supported setting. It’s so dispiriting!
I would like to read this 1000 more times and tattoo it to my brain. As we near the end of the year, it’s a lot of what I’ve been thinking we might just be able to whisper into existence in 2026. If you want to get even weirder: this is what the astrology of the next few years looks like (if you tilt your head as you analyze it).
I’m glad you’re expanding your explorations to the “margins” as @Martin Shaw says in an interview from 2017:
“Stories with weight to them have what C.G. Jung terms ‘the lament of the dead’, which in our frenetic culture we can no longer have time to hear. Most indigenous cultures will tell you that this world belongs to the dead, that’s where we’re headed. So mythology for me involves a conversation with the dead, with what you might call ancestors.
Whatever we are facing now we need to have a root system embedded in weather patterns, the presences of animals, our dreams, and the ones who came before us. Myth is insistent that when there is a crisis, genius lives on the margins not the centre. If we are constantly using the language of politics to combat the language of politics at some point the soul grows weary and turns its head away because we are not allowing it into the conversation, and by denying soul we are ignoring what the Mexicans call the river beneath the river. We’re not listening to the thoughts of the world. We’re only listening to our own neurosis and our own anxiety.”
Fantastic essay, Douglas. So chock full of ‘cracks in everything’ it’d make Leonard Cohen proud.
You’ve put into words something many of us have felt but struggled to name. The visible failures of our systems are not aberrations; they are what happens when human life presses up against structures built for speed, scale, and extraction rather than care, durability, or participation. What I appreciate most is your steadfast refusal to frame these cracks as either catastrophe or nostalgia. The argument isn’t that we should return to some imagined past, nor that collapse itself is somehow virtuous.
Instead, these cracks should signal to us that certain assumptions have reached their maximum limits. We see this now across nearly every institution in life; technology, media, finance, entertainment, news, and politics. These systems have grown to become pathological and increasingly detached from the people expected to have trust in them. For many of us, that trust is already long gone.
This perspective overlaps strongly with themes I’ve been exploring in my own recent writing, particularly around technology and how tools we once owned gradually became systems we comply with. The pattern is relatively consistent: once scale and extraction become the primary goals, human agency becomes collateral damage. The cracks matter because they reveal where alternative futures might take root. Smaller systems, local repair, technologies that can be understood, modified, and trusted. Business models that prioritize long-term relationships over short-term extraction. None of this requires abandoning modern technology; but it does require us to reimagine how we develop, deploy, and live with it.
The task ahead, as you suggest, isn’t to patch every crack and pour in more concrete. It’s to pay attention to where those cracks appear and ask what kind of world we could build if we stopped treating them like defects and started seeing them as opportunities to create a new tomorrow.
Part 1: The Post Bullshit World:
https://kennetheharrell.substack.com/p/the-post-bullshit-world
Part 2: Escaping Our Immaculate Dystopia:
https://kennetheharrell.substack.com/p/escaping-our-immaculate-dystopia
Part 3: A New Tomorrow:
https://kennetheharrell.substack.com/p/a-new-tomorrow
I’ve been enjoying watching you get weirder and weirder. A sane voice amidst the fear and chaos, a call to our humanity—which is so much weirder than we allow ourselves to contemplate. I say you’re not weird enough yet. Keep going. I’m in for the ride!
"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."
—Hunter S. Thompson
Very true. Permaculture tells us - Use the edges and value the margins. The interface between things is where the most interesting events take place. These are often the most valuable, diverse and productive elements in the system.
Also known as ecotones.
We are nature. This is not another curious distraction but a source of wisdom.
Somewhat related is monoculture thinking.
It's like we live in a field full of a single crop. Wander to the edges and see what's happening in the hedgerow.
It's anarchy and it's beautiful. Full individual expression arising from allowing the natural order.
Thanks for the opportunity Douglas.
The Dean of Engineering told me as a student, "nothing interesting happens in steady-state. All the good stuff happens in the transitions".
Just basic animism with a side order of nonduality. No dualistic materialism or spiritual bypassing necessary.
That was beautiful (and wildly, subversively accurate). THANKS!!!
Actually these 'marginal' aspects of being human are among the oldest and most lasting of our ways of understanding reality, which is so much more complex than our current paradigms encompass. And on an even more obvious level, 'you never can tell'--in a system as complex as this cosmos, what the future holds. Stay weird.
YES
“Keep the lasagna flying!”
Robert Anton Wilson
I believe RAW would approve of this message.
The truth won’t be found in all the old tools, but just diving head first into esoterica isn’t a plan either. There are certain core principles that emerge from the paradigm shift, which mustn’t be occult or obscure if they are to be genuinely meaningful.
What would a rough list of core principles include?
The people that have problems with the weird are missing the point, and here’s why. part of the crisis we are facing is spiritual poverty. Being weird is not only more fun, it’s more fulfilling ( the etymology of the word weird comes from wyrd, an old term to describe interconnection)
Great article, and I think maybe that's why I've been veering towards exploring these topics lately too. I was obsessed with following every little thing during Trump's first term... But this go around, I dunno, I'm spending less time following every little nuance and I feel better. I can't do anything about most of the things going on.
I think part of it is also that we in the west have become so materialistically minded, even so-called religious people don't actually believe in anything supernatural. I recently read Jules Evan's book "The Art of Losing Control: A Guide to Ecstatic Experience" which you may find interesting, it's in a similar vein to this post and I think this type of thinking is much needed now.
I also wish we had more access to psychedelics in legal and safe ways without having to be very well off. The book I mentioned and Aldous Huxley's writing are inspirational and I think that might be the only good thing about RFK Jr, is that he has mentioned wanting to legalize those sort of things. You basically can't do these things unless you have enough money to travel somewhere where it's legal or risk getting a felony for growing your own.
I hear you. I live in Oregon where psilocybin therapy is legal. There are at least 2 clinics in the town where I live, yet the cost for a high-dose session with a licensed sitter is utterly prohibitive for 99.9% of the people living here and interested in exploring the healing benefits of psilocybin (and integration afterwards) in a safe and supported setting. It’s so dispiriting!
I would like to read this 1000 more times and tattoo it to my brain. As we near the end of the year, it’s a lot of what I’ve been thinking we might just be able to whisper into existence in 2026. If you want to get even weirder: this is what the astrology of the next few years looks like (if you tilt your head as you analyze it).
Wow yeah. Absolutely articulates where my mind and heart went after accepting collapse.