Confessions After Listening To The Conspirituality Podcast

 

[According to their own description, what is the Conspirituality podcast:

“A weekly study of converging right-wing conspiracy theories and faux-progressive wellness utopianism. At best, the conspirituality movement attacks public health efforts in times of crisis. At worst, it fronts and recruits for the fever-dream of QAnon. As the alt-right and New Age horseshoe toward each other in a blur of disinformation, clear discourse and good intentions get smothered. Charismatic influencers exploit their followers by co-opting conspiracy theories on a spectrum of intensity ranging from vaccines to child trafficking. In the process, spiritual beliefs that have nurtured creativity and meaning are transforming into memes of a quickly-globalizing paranoia. Conspirituality Podcast attempts to bring understanding to this landscape. A journalist, a cult researcher, and a philosophical skeptic discuss the stories, cognitive dissonances, and cultic dynamics tearing through the yoga, wellness, and new spirituality worlds. Mainstream outlets have noticed the problem. We crowd-source, research, analyze, and dream answers to it.”] https://conspirituality.net

Preface

The following attempt at an epic poem comes in response to the mentally shattering experiences I had while listening to the Conspiritualiy podcast, explained above. Though I am now several episodes into my re-acquaintance with this excellent podcast (which started but was abandoned right after 1-6-21), the shaking shock first occurred with episode #86: “Charles Eisenstein, New Age Q.” 

This callout & takedown on Charles Eisenstein was so needed & done with clarity & compassion. 

Eisenstein seems to have some ideas adjacent to thought that I had previously found helpful, such as Zerzan, Sahlins, Daniel Quinn, Graeber, etc, but it is actually something else entirely. Heck, we all like good origin stories.

Just as I have seen Russell Brand completely derailed in the last couple years, as the podcast shows, Eisenstein has fallen into the Q-friendly anti-vax bromance of the too white influencer world. 

Friends, just because we sometimes feel the grumbles of spirit deep within, just because our intuition sometimes feels like a direct line to the divine, let's all always be willing to take a deep breath, to take a step back, to vet our visions with fellow travelers of good conscience. There is no magic pill!

Now as I write, I am listening to podcaster Matthew Remski deconstruct a white slam poet, & I feel a little too seen, perhaps a little bit shamed, but I want to confess this before I confess more, I have been writing poetry stuff like that for 30 years. But I certainly don’t share the Instagram-influencer, well-funded, self-help vibe of the person that Remski exposes.

Since we are all vulnerable, broken, in need of sustenance at this interval of pandemic fatigue &  social unrest, I certainly understand the underlying cravings that prompt people to seek these curated “peak experiences,” pricey they might be. Why not let them do their thing, like you with your books, records, & unquenchable live music habit? 

Beneath it all, I see something vapid & probably worse, the platforming of people who appear to expect their spiritual bypassing to protect them from Covid. The insidious intersection of this drift --from the apparently harmless hobbies of the hot-rich-professionals to something sickening & harmful in its oblivious proximity to the far-right conspiracy crowd. 

I know I need to develop & maintain a personal spiritual practice, communal connections with friends & comrades, & a direct tap to whatever source offers compassion, engaged activism but also detachment, radical empathy, & unconditional love. 

It’s been more than 18 months since I left a job as a rural Presbyterian pastor. Deconstructing from Christianity has been difficult enough, but now I realize that I never properly deconstructed from two decades of neopaganism & new age stuff that immediately preceded my reconversion to Christianity some 13 years ago. Perhaps it’s my jam to move from spiritual bypassing to spiritual bypassing. 

“Trust your feelings” - Obi Wan Kenobi

you are sitting in morning meditation

grateful for the time to breathe but 

fully present to the stinking thinking 

constant thoughts that chase 

your mindfulness deep into the 

nagging annoying unhealthy parts 

of your mind 

you are lost in the 

presence of the 

ever present one 

to keep look look looking 

for what you will never find

you remember the long car ride 

where you could not pay attention

you could not get out 

you had to listen to what seemed 

like days but was probably only 

hours or minutes of a lilting lecture 

about an advanced race of human-like 

extraterrestrials called the Anunnaki 

from Nibiru who are the missing link 

to humanity & our true evolution

but this didn’t end with the long car ride

you remember being handed books

blogs videos & more by one of the 

world’s leading proponents of a

global counter-cultural movement 

that combines New World Order conspiracy 

the truther movement & anti-globalization

with an extraterrestrial conspiracy subculture

you remember the marijuana-induced

freakouts about the light beings that 

lived outside your realm or the real

you recall the deep long listens to 

TOOL albums or Bill Hicks standups or

late sleepless nights listening 

to DIY DVDs you had ordered about

the supposed real story behind 9-11

you even published your own

pro-conspiracy rants in a 

legitimate publication & if you are

completely honest you are still very 

concerned about the deaths

of Martin Luther King 

Thomas Merton

Paul Wellstone to

name just a few

admit it

you have tarried in every variety

of treehugger apocalyptic

accelerationist catastrophist 

green pessimism that you could find

you don’t like modern medicine

you gobble garlic & honey 

whenever you have a cold 

you were anti-vax until this virus

what else do I need to confess

you remember that time 

more than twenty years ago

the student complained that 

you might be a gay lush witch

the letters that were written to the dean

the wording so desperate

the tone so mean

how many doors or portals were

passed through just looking for the real you

from cradle Christian to eclectic pagan

drifting down the theological cafeteria line

a plate heaping with delicacies that 

were once only accessible to royals

yet the alienation & anxiety & addiction

that fueled ever-yet more intense searches

or purges or puck-like urges something

deep down in your bones lacked 

sufficient purchase to keep you on one path

how many days or years did you stay 

you have always had a hard time with math

how many times 

were you sure 

that you saw

god when really 

that was just the moment

when the drugs finally kicked in 

you put your hands in some soil

declared that you were home

even moved into a dome

built by an old man named Owl

but the 13 years there proved for you

something finally unsatisfying or foul

when the contract was signed 

a tenant was evicted which 

you rationalized mainly because 

you learned they were shitting 

in the creek you were not the meek

to inherit this parcel of earth you

just had the downpayment asked

never explained to the seller

a local farmer who had been there

for years what all your dreams

were of decadent festivals on the back 40

when the techno sounds allegedly

carried to the next town over 

every time you tried to park too

many cars on this tight gravel road

named after pumpkins not solar toads

you bought land from somebody

who bought land from somebody

who bought land back then

when they just took the land

had slaves work the land 

it just wasn’t that long ago &

you know what you know

every book you read about 

why the hippies failed was

only part of the story because

some of those hippies were still there

yet within yourself you turned

a blind eye to the rural gentrification

that hip white people with bank 

& gas in the tank can come take

it’s optional if they even give thanks

a fine line between sustainability 

or trashing the land a fine line

between permaculture & a

permanent outpost for 

another version of white culture

don’t pretend it is not true

as you watch the vulture feast on

the remains of a mantra that 

you borrowed from the east 

you are not descended from ascended masters

you are not a shaman or a priest 

you are not part of anything

but a broken lineage

of screaming protest 

on the counterculture sidelines

of what used to be the 

antiauthoritarian left &

yet lest we forget 

from a disillusioned 

modernist

middle class

point of view 

you are nothing but 

poet bum or rubber tramp with 

a mortgage & a pension 

& a Subaru covered in stickers

so you can stand out in any 

traffic jam or parking lot

let me make a list of my 

own limits & imperfections 

the hyper-privileged online

self-appointed prophets

are talking about 

cages for the unvaccinated 

& government conspiracies

& you cannot help but wonder

if he ever worried about the 

government cages that 

already exist for the poor

the black & brown 

the unemployed & the addicted 

or about the military industrial 

war machine

the out of control copaganda

always already aimed at 

communities of color

they are not really

preaching bodily autonomy 

about a poke when they constantly

make an insult out of the word woke

they ran from yoga class to fitness class

to get your meal prep package off the porch

the first world cliches of every meme or joke

they are not autonomous just white

just a new age automaton of bodies

preaching narcissism from the digital 

glorification of blonde & toned & beach-ready

boutique experiences for the spiritually alone  

who must travel to Mexico or other exotic 

locations they learned about on Instagram

while staring into the abyss of their iPhones

you were almost them

admit it 

confess it

say it

own it

before your sobriety or conversion you 

were drunk on climate catastrophe insanities 

dropout escapist post-utopian fantasies

these peak experiences of 

fire festival fever dreams

tripping them dipping 

then into exotic visions in 

a capsule or some fungus 

then the angels 

climbed out of your anus or your navel to

spin you back 

into that magical caravan tent

where you were some kind of 

magical imaginary king

no just take me to the shop 

where I can buy

some more imported hippy bling 

all the feathers & facepaint & feeling your

feelings when the medicine will do

what the medicine will do

but no amount of psilocybin MDMA LSD

the medicine is not you

that was just a cloud not the face

of an old testament prophet in a cloud

remember what they keep teaching you

in those darn twelve step classes

you are not your thoughts

you are not your feelings

it takes a special kind of private

perfect privilege to constantly promote

every minor epiphany to the level

of substack scripture for your subscription base

because you have convinced them

that you are part of the anointed 

carefully called & chosen truth-tellers

when you are just as imperfect as anyone else

crawling around for joy 

pebbles on the ground

of a cave 

just grateful to be breathing

inside your hairless meat costume

of accidental consciousness on this

blue green ball of great mysteries

to be clear 

these people are driving me crazy 

because like them 

I have too much free time

I too have been drunk on

every passing spiritual fashion 

of woo woo

doo doo 

on my shoe shoe 

to share with

you & my crew phew 

to be clear now eww

if I had not had the Conspirituality podcast hosts

to do a close deconstructive reading of 

the latest Eisenstein animated video 

I too might have been swept away again

shared it favorably on my page 

& then what or

what then

because you see 

like many millions of others

I watched the video for the Coronation 

in the spring of 2020 when my intuition tweaked

my feelings were felt like oceans of mountains

of volcanoes of hurricanes of feelings everything

off the charts my dreams & sleep like downloads

from god the whole thing was real for sure

this was earth’s moment 

to wake up 

to shut up 

to shut down 

all the shit 

that is killing us &

yet within a few months 

find us finally living in 

the long-awaited 

carbon-neutral 

fair-trade

free-world 

without child-slavery 

or sex-trafficking

or anything else the highly selective moral compass

of hip white bloggers have deemed really bad this week

why did I order all of his books that day &

from an independent store even 

& not Amazon either

had to wait more than a week for them to arrive

started to read them 

never finished them 

now listening 

to this podcast almost two years later 

I am so glad

I never read them 

now I just moved them to 

the box to take to the used bookstore

because damn this is just some diluted John Zerzan

some warmed up leftovers from Hakim Bey

perhaps a sprinkle of David Graeber but only if 

David Graeber were merely just a smarter version of Joe Rogan 

& spiced generously with a word you stole from Thich Nhat Hanh

may he rest in peace & power

I am sorry I bought your books Charles Eisenstein but

I am not sorry I listened to Conspirituality the other day

now back to 2020 please

keep this clear because 

of the murders of 

Ahmaud Arbery

Breonna Taylor 

& George Floyd 

something snapped 

this pandemic thread

in my sabbath head

 

that it was really only 

just about the climate

just about

you know the wildfires 

extreme ice storms 

the rising polluted sea waters 

& not about the police the cops

who are militarized to the nines

an occupying army for the rich

& not about the poison of the 

prisons in Mississippi where 

the inmates might accidentally

eat a rat that got cooked 

in the cornbread that day

there are more choices between

climat-denier & covid-denier

there are more choices

you can still be a nonviolent anarchist

& not be coerced by some Twitter troll

to apologize for voting for Democrats

to defeat Trump & his citizens army

of red hats like brown shirts with blue flags

declaring fealty to a family name

even though in your regional municipality

he is far from defeated but holding

almost every 

county city or state 

government hostage all set 

to giving more civil rights 

to unborn zygotes than

to women 

immigrants 

blacks 

or queers   

if this is our zeitgeist it is actually

much worse than my worst fears 

so there is not a manual on 

how to follow empathy or solidarity 

or compassion or clarity

or courage into the daily drama 

the beautiful but broken barrage

especially when without church or cadre

you do not have a coherent entourage

with whom to climb the barricades

so you are constantly blogging 

tweeting posting praying playing

now whether I am consulting 

Situationists or Surrealists or Socrates

Buddha or Bonhoeffer or Boxcar Bertha

Jesus Christ or Jack Kerouac or James Cone

we need a forever discerning eye

of fellow travelers & friends 

with ears to the ground with a forward

glance to see past the bend in

this winding dangerous switchback road

that surely looks like our collective end

P.S.

you bounce from spiritual bypassing 

to spiritual bypassing

guru generalists who are really

narcissists don’t care 

they just take the dare

to steal from whatever source is there

that makes them feel of course

to be fair 

there is no perfect perpetuity 

not even that elusive imperfect perfection

not prepackaged poetic tradition

not a thing to calm intrinsic sedition

just because we have made a 

temporary pact with the social

refusing to push it all off the cliff

refusal to murder neighbors in 

the light of day

does not necessarily mean we

have somehow made peace

with the managers with the

planners who themselves don’t

have a plan except their 

escape pods

all these temporary nods to a 

noble egalitarianism are not to

be taken seriously until 

the hostages have been freed

yet some goodness or gratitude

are the total sum of these vast

spiritual travels & incessant dabbling

just don’t claim authenticity that

is not mine or a rigid doctrine 

not validated by love or reality 

Video:
Preface -
https://youtu.be/iURbDHXTQ44
Poem - 
https://youtu.be/VhWwC4XCio0