the thing

Nothing and no one can stop you from doing what you want, but we place so much importance on other people's response to what we do that we feel like we can't do things unless we're going to make money from them or be critically acclaimed. 

So, the actual activity becomes secondary, and the most important thing is the response, which is crazy. Doing that thing ought to be what it's all about. 

now for something else.

Andy Warhol said: "Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art."

I love that quote and I think it applies to writing as well. I obsess over my writing, wanting to include all the right points in the right order, but I've learnt to just get it done and then move onto the next thing. There are so many things I want to write about, so I end up trying to include a lot of things in each piece, when it's better to express something that embodies the tension between the fullness of the idea and the limits of time and corporality, and complete it and then move on to something else. 

The end of this post but not this blog. 

gimme shelter

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits and live! They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. - Hebrews 12: 7 - 11

The most trying challenges are the ones that you can't see the end of. You can't see a good end. For me it's depression and anxiety. I fall into these nasty vicious cycles. For example, not being able to sleep and depression, and they fuel each other. Earlier in my taper I could say that I was going through this particular challenge because I'm still tapering, and that's probably true. Then, as I continued to taper - once I got down to around 2 x 2 mg of Valium a week - my sleep dramatically improved, and it was so good. But then, a couple of weeks ago, I started having trouble sleeping again, and I'm back in that cycle again. It seems unrelenting. Night after night after night, for weeks, having disturbed sleep and waking up already exhausted and feeling dizzy and disoriented and heavily fatigued all day. 

What I want is relief, but I've learnt that relief is not the answer. The way forward is to achieve a kind of battle-hardenedness, where you're going through all the challenges but you do what you need to do anyway. Your joy returns. Your strength returns. It feels good because your challenges aren't on top of you. You are on top of them. 

scientific fact

The biggest ant is the LFant. 

essense

We have this idea that we're so fragile and under immense pressure and on the verge of breaking, and that's all just a story that we tell ourselves. Your inner self, your soul, your spirit is not just strong, it's unbreakable, unquenchable. 

As Emerson wrote, The soul will not know either deformity or pain.

a kind of hangover

I'm used to building sandcastles right on the edge of the surf and they just get washed away completely, but lately something endures. 

ebb and flow

The past seems more real and tangible. We think of the past as leading us to where we are now, but because the future hasn't happened yet, we don't think of it as having any substance. The truth is that it's probably as real as the past, and as much as our will, decisions, experiences from the past push us forward, our future pulls us forward into itself. 

making a mark

With the best writers, you feel like something is being depicted beyond what they are depicting. It's like how an artist can give an impression of a highly expressive face or gesture with just a few squiggly lines. 

the voice

I appreciate that books don't audibly speak. They speak in other ways, but they don't have an audible voice. They just wait. They don't compete with each other or try to sell themselves, and yet, when you choose one to read, it will give you all it has. Then, if you decide not to read further, it's not resentful. It won't complain or take things personally or be passive aggressive or self-pitying or sabotage your reading by holding back important information.

would you fight for my love

It's surprisingly hard to put down the weight that is crushing your spirit, because you think that if you let go it will crush you for sure. 

deferrance satisfied

The first book I read by James Fenimore Cooper, the main impression I had was how boring it was. It was very earthy and basic, like a cabin in the woods. 

I didn't finish that book even though I had to read it for a course I was doing. Then, later I felt differently about his work. I recognized something of value in it, even if my initial feeling was that it was boring. 

I collect books that I haven't really enjoyed, because of their literary merit. Like Ulysses by James Joyce, and Samuel Beckett's trilogy of novels, and The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil, and Proust's In Search of Lost Time, and many others. That sense of literary merit independent of enjoyment or even appreciation, is a value shared by a lot of my books. Sometimes, of course, there's both - enjoyment and literary merit, and I find that literary merit feeds into enjoyment, although not always directly. 

different reactions

Going to the Kinokuniya bookshop in Sydney, and looking in the 'literary criticism' and 'essays' sections often makes me want to write. No other section has that effect, and no other bookstore either. 

At the start of Anna Karenina, Tolstoy tells us that happy families are all the same but unhappy families are all different. They're unhappy 'in their own way' he tells us. I would say that, with bookshops, it's the opposite. All the really good bookshops I know are very distinctive. They have their own flavor. 

Somehow, they don't even have the same books. You would think they would - that being good bookshops they would have the good books - but it seems like there are so many good books out there that each good bookshop can stock a different selection of good books. 

new eyes

When I first read The Catcher in the Rye, I didn't really get it. I didn't understand the symbolism or see the artistry in Salinger's work. If I read it now, I would probably have a better sense of those things. 

ig

I sometimes forget that Instagram is used for things other than art. 

the key of change

I remember when I was studying English at uni and I was really getting into literature. I read and studied Frankenstein, Wuthering Heights, Middlemarch, Portrait of a Lady, Passage to India, and lots of other great literature. Some film versions of Frankenstein and Wuthering Heights came out and I was so excited to see them. I imagined that they would do justice to these great novels. Again and again I was disappointed, until I came to the conclusion that it can't be done - you just can't make a great film of these great novels. 

I still think there's some truth to that. You can't really do justice to a novel in film or a TV show, at least in the way that I once thought. A film is never going to do justice to what I find in these novels. What I've discovered through watching some really good shows that are based on some great novels, is that you have to change the story radically in order to do justice to it. 

You have to make something of it - something new. For example, at the center of the TV show, The Man in the High Castle, is a subversive film but at the center of the book, is a book. In the TV show, Brave New World, pretty much everything - at least all the action of the story - is different from the novel. Some key things are the same, like the names of some characters, but more importantly, what is the same between the two is the issues and the context, the dilemmas, the human story. In order to tell that same story in a TV show and in our era, you have to change it. You have to get the idea - or your own sense of the idea - and then make a TV show about that idea. 

hold fast

Another reason we don't perceive the speeds we're actually going at is because they remain consistent. It's like when you're in a car or a train that's travelling at 80 kmh. You can read or play a game or eat. You can sleep even though you're moving at 80 kmh. But if the vehicle were to suddenly stop completely, you would fly forward and get injured. 

perspective

At the equator, the earth is spinning at 1,040 miles per hour. The earth moves through space at 67,000 miles per hour. Our solar system spins around the galaxy at 490, 000 miles per hour.

The reason we don't perceive those immense speeds is because of the magnitude - the size - of the earth and space. 

sin tax

I would maintain a certain rhythm and then bring in a different rhythm superimposed on the earlier one, so that both were going at the same time, and there was an element of spontaneity. Once you've got the two rhythms going on their respective levels, there becomes a third rhythm made up of the other two, so you're just playing one rhythm. 

æsthetic

What interests me about Andy Warhol and some other artists is the creative audacity they manifest. They do something real and interesting in the artistic realm. 

just

Subtle effects can have major consequences, especially when it comes to the mind and things that affect the mind. That's something I've really come to appreciate anew as I have tapered off benzos. 

I'm down to less than 2 x 2 mg of Valium a week now, most weeks. Most days I take .25 x 2 mg, which works out to 1.75 x 2 mg a week. So, you'd think that the amount of Valium in my system would mean that I don't really need it anymore and it wouldn't affect me much anymore, but no, that's not the case. I'm getting close to the end. As of this month - September 2026 - I started to have some days when I didn't take any Valium at all. Passing through that barrier was exciting. For the first two weeks of this month, I had 2 days each week of no Valium, but then, towards the end of those 2 weeks, it hit me really hard. It wreaked havoc with my sleep and mental health, and I still haven't recovered - still struggling. So, I've gone back to .25 x 2 mg a day, for the moment, and when I've stabilized, which should be soon I think, I'll have another go at some zero days. 

I've also rediscovered the effects of caffeine. For a long time I only drank decaf, but then lately I've been experiencing a really oppressive kind of fatigue. The combination of being so exhausted and not being able to sleep is exquisite torture. So, I had the idea of trying a decaffeinated coffee, maybe 2 or 3 times a day. I wasn't sure if it would work, but I wanted to give it a go, and it turned out to be really effective. I don't know if it was just psychosomatic, but the first sip I felt a difference, felt re-energized. Just having that little extra bit of control again, is very encouraging. It's intoxicating, but in a good way. 

path taken

The first time I went to university was in 1986. I was doing a combined commerce/ law degree, but I didn't end up finishing it. I chose commerce because I really liked economics when I studied it in high school, but I bombed out of commerce. I failed all 3 of my commerce subjects in that first semester. The kind of economics I liked was macroeconomics but none of the courses in first year commerce were about that. There was accounting, microeconomics and quantitative methods. 

So, after that I transferred to doing a combined Jurisprudence/ Law degree, which was basically a lot of law, with a minor stream of some other subject of my choice. I ended up choosing economic history.

That first time, I got through 2 years of studying full-time but then ended up doing some other things - working, travelling, etc. Then, in 1996 I went back to uni and this time I was doing a combined Arts and Education degree majoring in English and History. Again, it didn't work exactly as planned and I didn't finish the education degree but I did finish the Arts degree. 

I still worked in education. I did a lot of English tutoring, and in 2009 I did my Certificate IV in Training and Assessment, then I worked in vocational education as a trainer and developer for around 7 years. 

book to screen

Some of the TV shows I've enjoyed the most recently have been based on books...The man in the high castle, Brave New World, Mr Mercedes. That seems to be what all the best shows, in my view, have in common. I notice though, that they depart very dramatically from the book, but they do that to be faithful to the spirit of the book.

for knowledge to count

Why is it that, when I have ideas about something, if I don't express that view to anyone, I feel like it doesn't count? It's not enough for me to know. I have to tell other people. 

The stronger the view and the more thought and work I've put into it, the more I feel like that. If I don't 'use' my knowledge by expressing it, I feel like it's wasted. 

forgive

Expression is the opposite of depression. 

It's funny how wielding this instrument instills life in you. It's weird because you're not taking something in, you're giving out, and yet that action gives you life, brings yourself back. 

modern media

I love how so many people, including serious journalists and media organizations, but all kinds of people with all kinds of interests, have started substacks now. It seems like a really healthy development. 

unhappy returns

One of the challenges of tapering off benzos is the separate issues that were there pre-benzos and reassert themselves as you heal from benzos. As David Powers says, benzos aren't like antibiotics. They don't treat anxiety and depression. So, as you become less reliant on them, and you heal in that way, your mental health issues seem to reappear. 

This is really relevant towards the end of your taper, and beyond that. Early on, you're going through hell but it's benzo hell. Then, as you heal and you expect to feel so much better, suddenly you're struggling worse than ever. Before, the challenges of benzo withdrawal were more immediate, but now, as those challenges recede, your pre-existing issues come into play again. It doesn't mean you're not healing and making progress. 

do it

I have this mindset when I'm really struggling with sleep and mental health issues, that today is kind of wasted, but there's no preventing that. I can't do anything meaningful today. Maybe tomorrow if I'm able to sleep better tonight. But I've been learning to not think like that - to instead, actually do stuff - to engage in actually living rather than going round and round in my head.

breaking barriers

The good thing about change is that it goes one way. Something remains. Progress is made. 

My taper is an example of that. Yes, my dose goes up and down from day to day and week to week, but the overall trend is downwards, and once I make a cut to the amount I pick up each week from the pharmacy, that's it - I will never again get more than that each week. Now I'm down to 2 x 2 mg a week. That seemed impossible not that long ago, but just taking a step at a time, and continuing to push, that's where I am. 

For the last few months, most weeks my weekly dose has been 1.75 x 2 mg, because I take .25 a day. I remember when I was pushing to get down to .25, then I did it one day and after that I did it more days until it became the norm. It's always a barrier that seems really difficult to cross. Taking less than 2 tablets was a barrier, then taking less than 1.75, then taking less than 1.5, and so on. Now that I'm down to .25 a day, to go lower I have to go to zero because it's not practical to break the tablets into smaller than quarters. In any case, how small is a quarter of a 2 mg tablet? Even if I take a full 2 mg these days, I barely feel anything. 

For me, Valium long ago ceased to be about dealing with anxiety. It was more about dealing with the symptoms which it itself was manifesting. Taking it was mostly about my need for it. 

This month - actually, the very first day of September, I had my first day of no Valium. Then, in the following couple of weeks, I had a few more days of zero. But then I started to really struggle again with sleep and mental health issues. There's always a delayed effect with Valium. After I make a cut I only really feel it a week or two later and sometimes it hits hard. I think that the last few months of 1.25 a week and then cutting down to zero some days, started to take a toll. So, I've been sticking to .25 a night in recent days, but hey - now that I've passed the barrier of having no Valium days, that will soon be the norm. 

the anxiety in the anxiety of influence

I was watching a video that tried to explain Harold Bloom's 'the anxiety of influence'. I was interested in how someone would explain the theory in a short video. 

I noticed a couple of problems with the explanation. One of them was that, when the presenter was talking about how, in Bloom's theory, writers have precursors who are their biggest influence and about whom they experience the 'anxiety of influence'. That's fine but then the presenter talked about how we could think of that relationship as being one where the affinity arises from the choice of subject. So, the precursor writes about some theme or subject and the writer being influenced wants to write about that subject as well. Bloom explicitly states that that isn't what he means by influence. It's not about writing about similar ideas or subjects. The issue is aesthetic power - the ability to write well. The writer looks at his or her precursors and realizes that the situation is hopeless - they can never write that well. That's the anxiety. 

bird set free

Looking at and making art reminds me of our ability to break out of the bounds of space and time. 

Mental health issues combined with other restraints can be a net that immobilizes you and pins you in place. 

Through art and creativity, you can get beyond that and soar. 

dialectical croonings

In the Faces' rendition of Maybe I'm Amazed, Ronnie Lane sings the first part and he's like a voice in the wilderness proclaiming, 'prepare a way for Rod Stewart' and then Rod comes in and owns the song, making, not just Ronnie Lane but everyone who has ever sung anything, look lackluster. How can his voice be so rough and so smooth at the same time? 

refuse

Part of depression is that you learn to take refuge in the very things that fuel your depression. 

reason to believe

Especially in the early days of my taper, I used to find it encouraging looking up websites for information about the benzo withdrawal timeline. They were all inaccurate but at least it was something. For all I knew, they weren't inaccurate and I could look forward to the measures of healing described. Even if the timing was out, they still described healing, which is something. 

what is modernism?

Modernism can be used to refer to 2 different historical developments. It's mainly used to talk about the period in the early 20th century when writers, artists and other creative people were experimenting with different ways of creating. A chair needn't have four legs and a back. 

It can also refer to the emergence of modern thought, beginning in the 16th century, with the scientific revolution. 

give

As I've written before, the more you react and struggle against anxiety and depression, the worse they become, but the answer is not to do the opposite and embrace them. That also makes things worse because the more you give them, the more they take. They are unreasonable. You can give your whole life to them, and they will take it and want more. 

the harder the better

People who are naturally good at what they do are not as inspiring as people who don't have the same natural ability but they work hard, persevere, and practice, and by doing so they achieve success. Or even if they don't achieve success, they are more inspiring. 

knife behind back

Shaun Tan has a new book coming out soon - Hometown. Actually, the hardcover version is already out, as of 4 days ago. Shaun Tan really elevates the picture book to a fine art. 

Shaun Tan is a technically great artist, but I don't think you need to be technically great to be a great artist. Consider Yoshitomo Nara. His art is quite simplistic on the face of it, but it conveys depths of authentic strangeness, and also, his art sells for millions. 

the power of apathy

With depression and anxiety, the more you react to them, the more imposing they become. You have to learn to say, yes, I feel this way, but it's OK, and also, over time, I will feel better. There's no way you can feel better immediately, but you can work on thinking in a healthier way, and in time, your feelings will follow. 

What happens is that we get distressed about how we feel, and we dwell on it and our fear and aversion of how we feel, and the way that we feel trapped with it, makes something out of it. For example, say you get pins and needles and a feeling of numbness in your hand when you get anxious. That's actually something I have experienced. So, I notice that my hand feels numb, and I'm like, oh no, here comes a panic attack. That anxiety and the fact that I'm hyper focused on the symptom makes the symptom worse, or seem worse at least, and then other symptoms pop up, which causes more anxiety which causes more symptoms which causes more anxiety, and it just spirals. 

One of the main things that helped me get my panic attacks under control was learning not to react. Panic attacks rely on your fear. They're so horrible that, at the first sign of one, you freak out and your system is flooded with adrenalin, which fuels the panic attack, but as you begin to get your anxiety under control, you learn that you don't need to fear panic attacks. So, when you feel one coming on you say, ok, I'm going to slow down my breathing (which is another powerful way of treating anxiety) and I'm just going to push through it. The first couple of times may still be difficult, but if you keep practicing this you will overcome panic attacks. Basically, when you feel a panic attack coming on but it's not a big deal anymore, it's not a panic attack. 

AI use and abuse

People were pretty critical and mocking of the segment on CNN where the presenter interviewed an actual AI actor/ person, through a screen. It's easy to make a joke of it or say it's 'cringe' but there's a more serious critique to be made about AI replacing people and replacing thinking. Just with education, I can't think of any good use for AI. Every use of it seems to be about cutting corners and avoiding the challenge of thinking and learning. 

At the same time, I'm pretty impressed with what AI can do. It's really useful for some research tasks and also, it's really good for clarifying legal, financial, tax, business issues. I think the best approach to take is to use it for tasks that you could do yourself but that would be laborious and time-consuming but never use it to think for you. Don't ask it to analyze, summarize or reword. 

genius working holiday

I've only read one of D H Lawrence's books. He was absolutely a genius. The book of his that I read is Kangaroo, which is regarded as an Australian classic even though Lawrence wasn't Australian. That tells you how good it is. It's such a masterful evocation of Australia, and more specifically, Australia in the 1920s. I read it for a course on Australian modernism. 

It's all the more impressive considering how he wrote it. He wrote it in Australia. He completed the first draft in 6 weeks while staying in Thirroul, on the south coast of NSW, and then revised it over a few months. A lot of the reflections on the Australian landscape in the book are fueled by Lawrence's experience of the landscape in Thirroul and the more political elements of human interaction come from conversations and interactions Lawrence had with people in Sydney. 

being mean

You can change the meaning of your thoughts and experiences by recontextualizing them. 

telling the truth

Is there a kind of writing that is more suitable than others for expressing the truth? Wordsworth probably would have said poetry meets that standard. In his 'Preface to Lyrical Ballads', he wrote:

The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude: the Poet, singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science.

I wonder if anyone still thinks like that. I think a more modern view would be that the novel is the best way to express the truth, or maybe creative non-fiction. 

their own language

Out of all the different theoretical approaches we learnt about in first year English, the one that interested me most was post-colonial theory. Later on, I had other interests....Harold Bloom and the psychoanalytic approach, Bakhtin and his ideas about discourse, structuralism, post-structuralism and semiotics. 

The unit we did about Marxism was interesting. It wasn't what I expected. By saying that everything is political it eschewed any discussion of political ideology - in other words, any discussion of Marxism. The idea was that all of our interactions involve power dynamics. 

What interested me about post-colonial theory was the idea that power is at the margins not at the center, and then it was also fascinating learning about creole languages and how they represent the subversion of power. To write serious literature, the colonized have to write in the language of the colonizer, but informally, a creole language develops which is a fusion of the two languages. Then, at some point, people begin to write literature in the creole language, which is empowering because they are writing in their own language rather than someone else's. 

progress goals

My time in detox coincided with a realization about my need to change. Not just change in ways that related directly to my addictions but changing the way I went about my life - changing from withdrawal, rumination, and catering to/cultivating my anxiety, to engagement, activity and cultivation of my life. 

One of the first things I did was to start making a list of goals. These were a different type of goals to any I had made before. They were extremely achievable, but they represented the choice of engagement and activity over withdrawal and rumination. They were a way of moving in the direction that I wanted to go. 

apprecisation

Recently I bought a copy of Samuel Beckett's three novels, in one volume - Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable. He originally wrote them in French and later translated them into English, and they were hugely influential over later literature, both French and English. 

I kind of just wanted to have a copy of the novels because of their standing as literature. It's a separate thing from my appreciation for the text itself. 

aesthetics

For me the plot isn't as important as the quality of the writing, the atmosphere developed, the ideas conveyed. Take The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James, for example. Those opening pages are so impressive, but what actually happens? They have a picnic on the grass and then they go inside and look at paintings, but it's so much more meaningful than just the action. 

science fiction

There's a mistake that is often made where people think that, because someone has expertise in one area, their views about other issues should carry more weight. This often happens with writers. When someone is a successful novelist, they will often start commenting on different cultural and social issues, and they're taken very seriously. 

A similar thing happens with technology. The views of people who have been in upper-level management of tech companies or who were involved in the development of cutting-edge technologies, about anything related to those technologies, are taken very seriously, when actually, about those particular issues, they aren't any more knowledgeable than anyone else. There was that case where someone who worked closely with AI thought that it had developed consciousness, and people took his view seriously because of his real expertise in AI. 

Then, recently, there have been experts predicting that AI will kill off humanity within a few years unless regulations are put in place to curtail its development. I'm not saying that there aren't issues there. I'm saying that, just because someone has worked closely with AI, doesn't mean they know what's going to happen in the future. This has always happened around technology. There's always a fear of what could happen, but is putting the brakes on development because the technology could be misused, the solution? I don't think so. 

More importantly, the idea that there is something malevolent at the heart of technology that we need to nip in the bud before it gets too powerful and there's not stopping it...that narrative is not new at all. At least since the 19th century there has been that fear of the unknown potential of science and technology and there have been stories and views about the threat they represent, and with progress, those fears proved unfounded. Fear is never going to tell you the truth. 

between a rock and an art place

I don't like art that is purely abstract all that much. I prefer works where there is a tension between realism and abstraction. 

through a glass darkly

Often, I think about the past with a sense of regret - like, why didn't I do this instead of that? Things would have gone much better if I had done 'this'. Such thoughts are pointless. 

This morning I thought of something different. I thought that, if it was possible to make any change at all to the past, I would be kinder, more understanding, more considerate. I can think of a number of situations that came up where that would have made a real difference. 

In some ways I'm just talking about maturity, so, in a way, being like that wasn't open to me at that time because I wasn't mature yet. 

kri8iv writing

It's a mystery to me why I can't write a story. I once told a friend that it's because I have to write what is true. I can't just make something up. Doing that is not just hard, it's not possible for me. I can write something experimental or poetic though. So, I could write in the style of Samuel Beckett or Virginia Woolf, but not Henry James or George Eliot.