I'm in the dark.
Going through the photos from my weekend that started early last Tuesday. My working vacation greenlit by a corporate overlord at the grocery store I work at and I rocketed towards Austin. From Thursday through Sunday I worked without even realizing it. Hours of setting up and tearing down, rigging, and painting flashed by as Voice & Exit unfolded at the AFS cinema. All throughout the process I got a look behind the curtain of large conference events where I discovered drama but also inspiring examples of values consistency.
Wednesday night I was honored to sit in on a volunteer team leaders' meeting where I got to meet one of the founders Seth Blaustein. When I met Seth we were all gathered around a standing table in his one bedroom apartment overlooking a greenspace and he invited everyone to share their current emotional state and any concerns they had about the upcoming event. Everyone had something to be concerned about, including me, but his responses exuded a serene energy that was focused on finding out what the individual needed at that moment and collaborating on a solution. In my experience that kind of sensitivity and willingness to collaborate even when the pressure is on to produce is very rare. Unicorn rare, in fact, but Seth proved that the message and intention of the event was also what he truly believed during that meeting. Not everyone was receptive to his style though.
Frankly, I'm still a little bit confused as to how this person, we'll call Fey, was accepted to become a volunteer for a conference like V&E let alone a team leader. From the moment Fey opened their mouth at the team meeting it was a stream of negativity. Everything they were put in charge of was too hard or too much work despite the tools, resources, support and financing given to them to provide simple meals for the volunteer staff. Fey's attitude and leadership style were authoritarian at best which didn't fit with the theme of the event. Eventually they were dismissed and someone else was allowed to step in to not just feed but nourish hungry volunteers. @kennyskitchen
The following days are a blur of activity and conversations with various kind of people of myriad opinions and backgrounds. Truly I was a single star in a universe of bright and powerful people that not only were well read on philosophy but walked the walk. Working side by side with other anarchists, or an-comms, or an-whatever label people may choose or have forced upon them assured me that the ideals of personal freedom and sovereignty are moral and practical. This weekend I found a society where these ideals work even when some may not agree and are tolerated, even learned from. The backdrop to all of this was this conference about educating and exposing people to ways of changing the world in a peaceful way by using technology, conversations, and entrepreneurship. There was, of course, a crypto sponsor, Dash, to present blockchain technology and give people their potentially first taste of non-fiat currency. We heard from doctors about new ways of preventative self care based on old understandings,a professor from an Ivy League school promoting renegade education at a fraction of current tuition costs, from a market analyst laying out how to use the current system to grow decentralization and so much more.
Body paint hexagons for the Blooms Festival
Saturday night was the Blooms Festival and it was definitely a creation experience. There were all kinds of things to see: gymnasts, live music, tea ceremonies, a new kind of collaborative card game being played live on stage, even a VR booth. After exploring so many new and radical ideas for shaping our world it was the perfect way to celebrate all of the new possibilities that were discovered. Many pictures were taken, words were shared, and memories were made that night.
After staying up all night looking through pictures and memories of everything that happened this weekend my mind is lit up even though I'm still in the dark.