I wrote and self published my first novel in 2013, and realized that no one reads. I swore never to do it again. My ideas of magic realism and stream of conscious influenced by the likes of Kundera, Allende, Joyce and Noon felt irrelevant. So it was back to making music, a seventh album in which I could be abstract, pastiche and irreverent. No fucks given. No audience in mind.

 

A change in life perspective came after my dad died in 2017. When I was identifying his body before the funeral, I looked down at him and recognized a boy. His skin was as smooth as an infant, and he looked peaceful like an angel. I realized that we are all children here on Earth. We are all babes and few know what to do with this blessing of life. We forget, it gets confusing and we slip into versions of the past repeating until we die.

 

After my dad’s passing, I spent a year probing - reading and YouTubing - absorbing wisdom from a hundred years ago from heroes like Krishnamurti, Steiner and Crowley. I found new teachers like Le Guin, Wilbur and White who synthesize knowledge into new arrangements and offer new vistas. Twenty years into Aquarius, and access to the secrets of the few are now available to all. You just have to go out to the crossroads and find out for yourself. As if by some magic, knowledge is now at our fingertips, within grasp for those that want to meet half way. 

 

While I was reprocessing my world, an expression started to metabolize and I began to write this manuscript. I was inspired to write a text for my eighteen-year-old daughter, who might not read the same books that I like, so that she can begin to approach various understandings of reality and deftly create her own. I aimed to reveal some simple truths that swell in full view in front of our eyes, but also hide behind the ivory towers of university professors, the sanitized labs of scientists and the dusty pulpits of religious dogma. I sought to dilute old ideas and new ideas into simple form, eliminating rhetoric, and committing to not taking sides as to which philosophy, theory or school of thought got it right. Remixed into Twitter speak and quotable snippets, this is a simple reminder of a way to approach a simple relationship with everything. Nothing new here. This stuff goes by a hundred different names.

 

This manuscript was written quickly in December 2018, but was just the beginning of creating this book. Then the music experiments began – songs with many influences that touched on truth. Hebrew, Sanskrit, Hindu and phonetic English. Indian, Mexican and Chinese instruments digitally reprocessed. Lots of sci-fi soundtrack synthesis and bass and beat mangling. No rules. Borrowing and stealing at will. Taking small things and making them big. Breaking things apart and putting them back together differently. In the summer of 2019, in the midst of musical experimentation, my friend Padma Aon, a wisdom teacher and music collaborator, suggested merging the words of the manuscript with the music. More experiments took shape in the form of studio recordings, live projection at events, and video production. New combinations were bred and the project evolved non-conventionally, allowing creativity to lead the way. Where trusting and exploring through collaboration brought us here.

 

There was another nagging incentive, the quest for creating off-limits experiences outside FAANG and other digital monopolies like Spotify. Our attention has suffered during the twenty-year crossfade from Pisces to Aquarius, and we need antidotes. It is time for crucial information to be remixed and rewired, and transmitted differently in a way that only I can – by  merging my passions, interests and abilities into an 18-song album of original music that sounds like a DJ mixed tape released as a book. Lick a page. Cut your tongue. Bleed into another mouth. Suck it until it heals itself. 

 

I believed I had written this book for my daughter, but upon reflection, I wrote it for myself. A re(mind)er to tap the imaginal, probe the anima and be one with a loving animate universe that only knows you if you want to know it. To also be forthright and responsible in appreciating that we are participating with greater creative agents, which like to play and make change happen both fast and slow. To be open to k(now)ing them.

 

For those realists who picked up the book and are reading the foreword wondering what this nonsense is all about; for those who believe that materialism, logic or corporations won’t shred us – take a lesson from the casinos, where the odds are always in favor of the house. My wish is that this book can provide a micro-decimal advantage in any 50/50 scenario, in which you are the deciding factor. 

 

I understand that when you light a candle, you also cast a shadow. Sometimes a dot. Sometimes a God. No one's going to save us, but ourselves. So, turn off the screens and take all the time you need to get to know yourself and connect with others. May we all move towards living more meaningful lives.