JUMP

Matt Weatherall
Jul 27, 2017 · 2 min read

‘L’appel du vide’ is a French saying that describes the urge to throw yourself off the edge. I don’t speak French but Google tells me that the phrase translates literally to ‘call of the void’ and that gives me the willies.

I’m standing at the edge of my learning question.

How can I, we, and the planet live beautifully by deviating from norms?

ICYMI: I have a learning question because Enrol Yourself

I’ve found three edges. My learning question is a triangle. For now.

Each edge represents the boundary of a norm that is no longer serving us, beyond which a more beautiful world is possible but not promised.

At the edge: a choice.

Edge no1. Have fewer children

According to science, having one less kid is the best thing you can do to fight climate change. If I’m fortunate enough to be granted the gift of having children, and I hope that I am, perhaps I’ll stop at 11. After all, 11 children is enough for a football team, or a small battalion to defend my old and thirsty body in the water riots of dystopia.

Edge no2. Sleep more

You can’t fuck the world while you sleep. Stay woke. Take naps.

Edge no3. Take psychedelics

In his book ‘The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible’, Charles Eisenstein writes that ‘Utopia is a collective shift of perception away… the sky starts where the ground ends; we need only look with different eyes to realise we are already there’. Are psychedelic drugs the shortcut we need to look with different eyes? In 1965, a chemist called Tim Scully thought so and hatched a plan to save the world by making as much LSD as possible and giving it away to anyone who wanted it.

L’appel du vide.

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