A Midsummer Dream

Hello July!

I have been asked where am I, what is going on, and will there be more stories? To which the answer is I have been everywhere, and nowhere, and just right here… being observant, still, reflective and regenerative. Like the planets, I have been a human in retrograde. Did you know when planets “go retrograde” they don’t actually move backwards? Planets don’t actually slow down, stop or change direction. It’s just the orbit speed and distance from the earth gives the temporary appearance of being stationary or moving backwards. In actuality the planets are always moving in the direction they need to, at its appropriate pace and unique rhythm.

Summer arrived and so did scorching heat. It is hot. I am hot. And I wondered why must we be productive in such heat? I find it so unbecoming. Is it not possible to take a month off to frolic by the water’s edge? So I did. And in my leisure, I nestled into a brief season of questioning the way we make things matter. I looked at how we long for summertime just to be outside and do “summer things”. Things which for some reason we reckon cannot be enjoyed throughout the year, but only for a brief moment, in a regulated space and time, for a specific cause … because that’s when we make it mean something important.

I observed how much of our meaning is given to us. Pre-determined, pre-packaged and delivered so fast and furiously there is hardly any room to decipher for ourselves. I noticed how we try to focus on some things but media will almost insist we focus on the story they want to tell. And if you change the channel, well it’s the same story just told in a different way.

Whew… it’s exhausting!

Things I noticed in June.

(1) Celebrity is dying.

Spotify dumped Meghan and Harry’s podcast Archetypes after just one season. A laughable vindication to some who decided long ago they are committed to hating them. I know there’s an unhealthy media obsession with the Sussex’s and I am now contributing to that (sorry). I’ve also been very expressive when it comes to the British royal family (whom you may assume I detest, but I don’t). I strongly resist the legacy of empire and any institution built on corruption, rape, pillage and theft, but the individuals themselves I don’t know personally… they’re probably nice people who feel suffocated they can’t live a life of their own choosing … who knows?

And that’s the thing, Archetypes was a $20 million celebrity podcast deal meant to inspire us. An insane amount of money that could never actually return the investment. There’s an over-saturation of celebrity podcasts but they kind of work because we get to see our obsessions in candid form, being just like us - we get to feel them in “real life”… because what we collectively crave is authenticity. Unfortunately, Archetypes was never about authenticity, it was about “inspiration” (at least that’s how it was marketed and sold). And Meghan and Harry wanted the focus off of their personal life. But you know what’s actually authentic? Their real life, which is (sadly) runaway pawns in the dynastic game of a British monarchy. Just using celebrity as a polished brand positioning isn’t working anymore.

We want real, because we like messy.

(2) Extreme wealth can be a dangerous thing, so is poverty.

Last month two maritime vessels were lost. The media only cared about one. The whole media coverage of the imploded Titan submersible was really odd and intense. It’s like nothing else existed for that week which was eerie, especially when at the same time, a migrant ship of 750 humans seeking a better life capsized in the presence of a single Greek coast guard ship because a rescue mission was never initiated. The Adriana circled for over 6 hours while officials stood by and watched, losing 600 souls, and the political jumprope that’s currently going on is … sad. Yet, media was inundated with the $1.5 million USD search and rescue mission for the Titanic watchers. (This is a conservative estimate that doesn’t include Canada and France who joined the rescue mission).

I don’t really know why anyone would challenge the ocean. Maybe because I am an island girl who grew up on the beach and knows what riptide can do to even the strongest of swimmers like myself. Deep sea diving is not a casual thing, and certainly it is not aligned with a $250,000 perusal of the Titanic, but somehow the narratives we are fed is an unequal amount of focus on wealth and the wealthy, and how that subliminally means it’s more worthy of our attention, our compassion and our time.

We are not truly ready for moral inclusive strategic leadership, but we desperately need it.

(3) Run your algorithm or it will run you.

I put good effort into switching up my social media algorithm - unfollowed old things, followed new things, deleted, trashed and emptied the cache. Didn’t post all month long. Hoping for wholeness. Longing for freshness. And still, there are traces of an old awareness seeping into my vortex. Slowly it’s recalibrating, but it’s very very very slow, which reveals to me how significant this monopoly of our mindfulness is.

There is so much dialogue about this chatGPT and I haven’t cared too much because I’m tapped into my own stream of consciousness. What I know to be true is that your own natural rhythm can never be replaced because you’re one of one - but the more you fear, the more it will consume you. If you make it mean something more powerful, more capable than you, that’s what it will be. It seems to be a big fear about what jobs it will take and how we will survive, because we have given work and survival the meaning of being alive.

We are longing for purpose in this life, and we survive on a faulty belief system that we cannot simply exist if our social ways were re-imagined.

Something to consider in the week: if you retrograde momentarily (that is if you slow down long enough to change your speed and distance from the things around you)… what faulty meanings have you been living by? What can you finally see only when you stand still long enough to understand that it never really mattered?

Next week I’ll be back with regular stories, going deeper into how we can shape presence and shift culture.

with love…. musings from a human in retrograde.

Zoya

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I explore the question “how do we overcome the barriers to existing fully as ourselves?” An inquiry into self, culture, the arts and social change. If you enjoyed this consider subscribing to receive more.