There is, at the moment, in philosophy, a resurgence of realism, after centuries of idealism. And yet these new realist philosophers still only think the real – think its primacy over mind. Our task, as real philosophers, philosophers of the real, is to live reality through the intensity of our spirit bound to body, and show that mind – the imaginative mind, the imagination – so conjured, is just as real. It is only when the mind slows down, as spirit dissipates, and starts to turn around itself like the last dregs of bath water going down the drain, a process we call thinking, that it all starts to go flat then sour. Reality cannot be thought (about). It can only be lived with spirit (by definition) and then, at a later date, maybe, recollected with the self same spirit.

Find a way not to get in the way (of the natural process).

Your real teachers are those you teach.

Find a work that brings out the best in you. This is only apparent after the event. Seek a haruspex to point the way.

The Tao always provides what’s needed, by definition.

Give what you can and take what comes.

“In Art, something comes out of a wound and a love in a creative equilibrium.”

A working process; a work in process.

The artist struggles – systematically, explicitly, heroically – to be free of ego in order to create something that takes her completely by surprise. This is the magic we all secretly yearn for, the magic of the creative process which life should be.

Ignorantia juris non excusat.

Attune to the undercurrents. We are always forewarned. And forewarned is forearmed.

bodies groping their way

Use all that come your way but abuse none. And it's a fine line, a very fine line.

Come rain or shine.

Feeling bad? Don’t worry, it'll pass. Feeling good? Don’t settle, it'll pass.

When I meet 'spiritual people' nowadays, which, mercifully, I don't do too often, the word I hear most is Me. The mistake they make is to think that this life revolves around them, and the reason for this is lack of practice, because practice, if you do it, regularly and sincerely, always brings you to the same place, a place where you are reduced to next to nothing.

Happy New Year.