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Here Today -- Gone Tomorrow

Now that I have a permanent address again, able to receive both mail and visitors; it is well time to consider where to travel next. With that in mind I did some bookings for Las Vegas last night. Buddies in the poker media will notice that I managed to schedule two trips in the next several months yet still managed to miss all of the World Series. I really am done with poker, besides they turned me down for a media credential, seems I don't have enough experience.  


I will be in Vegas in early May to do a little business and some research on a future book. In addition, my co-author Amy Calistri will be there spinning her wisdom for the investment minded at the Mirage. So Amy and I and another buddy will be spending some quality time at our olde haunts, which may include a casino or two but mostly the cultural and gustatorial highlights of the city. 


I also booked the discount deal at the Monte Carlo for mid-July, post-WSOP, for the annual Boyz poker trip. For the first time in several years I will not be the local host but merely one of the attendees. We expect a full turnout this summer with the obvious exception of he who shall not be harassed. Both of the Las Vegas trips will be around a week long. 


There is another more substantial vacation on the horizon. Vacation as a derivative of "vacate." At some point in the May-June-July period, there is a nascent plan to remodel the Berkeley apartment where I am currently resting my head. The remodel is so extensive as to require a complete vacating of both me and all the stuff in the place. Furniture, clothes, computers, kitchen all of it has to move out so the transformation can be done in some reasonable mediation of labor and time. At that point I am probably going to head up to Mt. Shasta to visit my good friends. We might even coordinate my vacating with one of their trips and wound two avians with one rock. 


All of this running about leads to a potential big trip in August. I guess I don't want to talk about this one too much quite yet. Just leave it for now that it does involve my passport, I don't speak the language and I have never been before. More on this one later.

For now, all my bags are unpacked but not stored away quite yet.
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art credit: Golden Sunset by Lauren Luna


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March Madness



I'm just trying to make a smudge on the collective unconscious.
-- David Letterman.

I am currently struggling with a decision that quite frankly does not have a completely satisfying answer. The question is simple: what do I write next? The more precise question is: which of several proposals do I complete, edit, polish and re-edit before sending it off to be shopped about the world of publishing by my literary agent?

Let me first apologize to any and all aspiring writers out there who know just how difficult it is to be in the position to even have an agent. I am privileged as a result of the Matusow book to have a very good representative, who is interested in my current work and eager to receive my next project.

The problem, of course, is the age old dichotomy between money and art. Although in my case the distinction is not completely neat and crisp. The book I want to work on isn't quite ready to be finished; which is to say that the entire story has not yet unfolded and it will not be rushed. So I am left with deciding which of the several other projects will be most profitable and/or will do the most for my reputation as a writer.

Unlike the great suffering literary giants of yore, I am not saddled with the crushing burden of artistic purity. I have no problem selling my words for profit. I do, however, want my work to make a difference beyond merely entertaining my readers. I want what I write to be such that someone might use my words, my stories, my insight to change their life or the lives of those around them. I want to inspire, to illuminate and to encourage.

For that to happen, it is clear I must produce profitable products for the publisher, in order for them to have faith in what I am producing on a more esoteric level in the books I really want to write. So I think the answer to my question is that I must for the present be more commercial, so that in the not too distant future and publisher will say to me -- "and we would like to see your next work . . . " For that to happen I need a name and a resume, so my current decision has several competing commercial and artistic aspects that I am grappling with.

The immediate goal is to deliver a completed book proposal by the end of April and to immediately begin work on a second. Nothing would be better then having two deadlines. I truly enjoy the demands of writing. My current wish is that such pressures came with valuation attached. Give me liberty or give me a big advance.

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photo credit: redbubble.com
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Big Man

About five weeks ago I wrote a post titled Big Week. With that post I used a photo of an art work titled Big Man.


I added the following credit to that post: Ron Mueck (Australian, b. 1958). Big Man, 2000. Mixed media, 80 x 47 1/2 x 80 1/2 in. (203.2 x 120.7 x 204.5 cm). Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

But that was clearly not enough. I get a lot of comments about the images I use on this blog but the Big Man generated a small but powerful wave of communication from many places.

Yes he does look like me or I like he, whichever. So here are more views of the Big Man, including a short video, if you are interested.

And yes, I am using that first picture, the face and hand only, as my look-alike on Facebook.

This last one conveys the feeling I get sometimes when I go looking for companionship, partnership or perhaps love via an online dating service. I call it: Naked Scrutiny.
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Out My Window

Images from week one in the new apartment. Again I promise from this point on, only utterly spectacular shots or anything a visiting telephoto lens might capture.



The daylight shots really don't do the reality justice. The view of San Francisco is overwhelmingly distracting.



You can click on any of these for a truly spectacular view.
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photo credits: me
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Conference Review

I'm not sure what to say about the 2010 Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness conference just ended. As the onsite coordinator I worked a lot more than I listened, which meant I missed many of the papers or heard them from "just outside the door." In addition, much of my interaction with presenters was from a practical point of view, dealing with last minute presentation requests, reasonable and otherwise. As with any group, there is always a prima donna or three and I tend to find them tedious. Within this group those demanding individuals also stand in stark contrast to the equanimity of the community as a whole, which makes them even more annoying to me.

My role as site coordinator also meant that I missed spending quality time with some olde friends and colleagues, which is generally seen my most as the high point of the conference. And a bit of a cold & fever also meant I was harboring my energy by sleeping rather than engaging in late night conversations.

I guess I haven't fully processed my own feelings to this year's conference. I do know that next year Jeff will be running the event in Portland and I am already planning to head up to Oregon, but as an conference participant only. No side duties, maybe not even a paper to present. I do know that I missed the play time this year. I won't do that again.

Oh, in response to several emails. Yes, those were the real titles of the conference presentations I posted over the past four days.. And yes, it is true that academics love to use colons in the titles for their projects, but really those were the papers. You can't judge quality nor content by the length of the labels and big words do not intelligence make.
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photo credit: friendsofirony.org
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Saturday Conference Schedule

Saturday, March 20

Faculty Club UC Berkeley Campus

9:00 – 11:45 Perspectives on Ayahuasca Healing, Part 1 Chair: Evgenia Fotiou

9:00 – 9:15 Ayahuasca and the Construction of a Healing Tradition. Erik Davis

9:15 – 9:30 Ethnomedical Tourism in the Amazon: More than Drugs and Desperation? Francis Jervis

9:30 – 9:45 Working with “La Medicina”: Elements of Healing in Contemporary Ayahuasca Rituals. Evgenia Fotiou

9:45 – 10:00 Intimacy in the Healing Function of Ayahuasca Icaros. Susana Bustos

9:45 – 10:00 Q & A, Discussion


10:00 – 11:15 Part 2: Therapeutic Potential of Ayahuasca in a Global Environment

10:00 – 10:15 Healing With Plant Intelligence: A Report from Ayahuasca. Richard Doyle

10:15 – 10:30 Out of the Jungle and Onto the Couch: Integrating Ayahuasca into Psychoanalytic Treatment. Stephen Trichter

10:30 – 10:45 The Translation of Ayahuasca into a Depression and Anxiety Therapy. Brian Anderson

10:45 – 11:15 The Dynamics of Healing and Creativity during Ayahuasca Shamanic Journeys: Toward A Neuroscience – Human Sciences Model. Frank Echenhofer

11:15 – 11:30 Q & A, Discussion Discussants: Stephen Beyer & Frank Echenhofer

11:30 – 12:30 Lunch

12:30 – 1:00 SAC Open Business Meeting

1:00 – 1:15 Break


1:15 – 3:00 Stories of Healing and Transformation Chair: Alison Easter

1:15 – 1:30 The Origins of Carlos Castaneda’s 'Anthropology': Evidence from Personal Letters and a Memoir. Robert Cripe

1:30 – 1:45 Modern-Day Sacred Initiation into the Ancient Western Mystery Tradition in the Great Pyramid of Egypt. Ron Bugaj

1:45 – 2:00 The Ancient Bard as Shaman. Robert Tindall

2:00 – 2:15 Break


2:15 – 2:30 Healing, Meaning, and Efficacy. Jong Hwan Park

2:30 – 2:45 The Experience of Healing in Sri Lanka: An Investigation Using Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis. Alison Easter

2:45 – 3:00 Q & A, Discussion


3:00 – 3:15 Break


3:15 – 6:00 Language, Healing, and Consciousness Chair: Matthew C. Bronson

3:15 – 3:30 From Shaman to Messiah – Take Two – Healing? Mira Z. Amiras

3:30 – 3:45 Time and the Evolution of Consciousness. Glenn Parry

3:45 – 4:00 “We Ain’t Got No Wildlife in Marin City”: The Use of Epistemological Story in Teaching Ecoliteracy. Tina R. Fields

4:00 – 4:15 Pulling the Plug on Grandma: Language and Framing in the Health Care Debates. Matthew C. Bronson

4:15 – 4:30 Q & A, Discussion


4:30 – 4:45 Break


4:45 – 5:00 Dangerous Labels: Breaking the Cycle of Abuse by Shifting the Lexicon of Sexual Violence. Chimine Arfuso

5:00 – 5:15 The Language of Mental Health in America. Leslie Gray

5:15 – 5:30 Re-Languaging a Life. Tim Lavalli

5:30 – 5:45 From James to Jaynes, or, The Mind Turned Itself On(line). Roberto Gonzalez-Plaza

5:45 – 6:00 Q & A, Discussion. Discussant: Jeff MacDonald

6:00 – 7:15 Dinner


7:30 – 9:30 Enchantment – Employing Song to Shift Consciousness. Tina Fields (Experiential Workshop)


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Friday Conference Schedule

Friday, March 19

Location: Faculty Club - UC Berkeley Campus

8:30 – 11:45 Models and Traditions of Healing Chair: Steven Glazier

8:30-8:45 The Gift of Life: Death as a Teacher. Rochelle Suri

8:45 – 9:00 They’re Baaack: Return of Life-After-Death Accounts in the Age of Neurobiology. Meg Jordan

9:00 – 9:15 Cultural Diversity as a Resource in Schizophrenia: An Example from Cross-Cultural Communal Psychiatry for the Mapuche People in Chile. Markus Wiencke

9:15 – 9:25 Q & A, Discussion


9:25 – 9:35 Break


9:35 – 9:50 The Effects of Sufi Healing Ripple Outward. Cheryl Ritenbaugh

9:50 – 10:05 Path of the Heart: Integrating the Wisdom of Classical Sufism into Modern Psychology. Rahima Schmall

10:05 – 10:20 Retrocausality and Real Life Miraculous Reality Shift Healing Stories. Cynthia Sue Larson

10:20 – 10:30 Q & A, Discussion

10:30 – 10:45 Break

10:45 – 11:00 A Health Event: A Journey through Illness, Treatment, and Recovery. M. Diane Hardgrave

11:00 – 11:15 CAM (Complementary and Alternative Medicine) Going Mainstream. Claudia Weiner

11:15 – 11:30 ‘Cryptic Potency’: Divination and Healing in Trinidad. Stephen Glazier

11:30 – 11:45 Q & A, Discussion


11:45 – 1:00 Lunch (SAC Board Meeting)


1:00 – 3:45 Ecological Healing: How to Practice as if the Earth Mattered.

Leslie Gray (Experiential Workshop, $25/$15)


3:45 – 4:00 Break


4:00 – 5:00 Invited Keynote Address: Edith L.B. Turner Communitas and Merging with Another: What is Happening in Healing?

5:00 – 6:30 “So What? Now What? The Anthropology of Consciousness Responds to a World In Crisis” Book Launch, and SAC’s 30th Anniversary Party


6:30 – 7:30 Dinner


7:30 – 9:30 Experiential Workshop: Healing through the Heart: The Sufi Path of Love. Cheryl Ritenbaugh ($25/10)

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photo: jacket cover of new SAC published book


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