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Hello and welcome to episode eleven of Creative Adventures, an accidental podcast.
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And it's spring, it's daylight outside, it's evening and it's sort of warmish.
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But what's really exciting me about spring is I bought a window box like October or November last year because I want to grow a wildflower meadow so I can get some bees and insects and stuff hanging around outside the flat.
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And I've got three windows here in the flat, and two of them are dedicated to the birds, so there's a window that the crows tend to come to, then there's the other window where the jackdaws come to, and also where little guy, the tiny wagtail, goes there as well.
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And it's not as delineated as that, but that tends to be where it is.
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And I've had this third window sill, and I thought I don't really want to spend any more money on bird food and have another bird feeder to fill up because it costs me as much as my dog used to in terms of food and things like that.
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So I got this window box and I thought I'll grow some wildflowers in it, and then there can be like a little ecosystem, so there'll be bees and bugs and then they'll pollinate and then maybe the birds can eat the bugs and I don't know, that they'll all interact in that way.
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And I bought the window box at exactly the wrong time of year to plant wildflower seeds.
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So I've been waiting and waiting and waiting throughout the winter to get to the start of April when I can plant them and they'll stand a chance of growing.
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And they are.
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It's amazing.
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I can see them from where I'm recording now.
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At this point in time, there's just loads and loads of green shoots, which is amazing.
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I mean I know seeds grow, but I don't remember planting seeds before.
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Maybe planting watercress at school or something.
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But planting seeds and then seeing them start to emerge has been amazing.
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But it's been a bit of a battle with my my ecosystem so far because the slugs also come up at night to clean the bird feeders.
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So I had to put like a slug net over the top of the window box just to give the seeds and the green shoots a chance.
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And then after about a week or so, I noticed there were lots of beak-shaped holes in the net.
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And I mean I think I know who did that, and it wasn't the little guy that wagged out.
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So I then had to go and buy some chicken wire and build like a cage around it, and then put the slug net over the top.
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So this whole thing has just become so much more expensive and complicated than I thought.
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But now they're growing.
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I am so excited, and the speed at which they're growing, like each morning I come and have a look, and it's more and more and more.
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So I don't think I've ever been that patient in my life as waiting from October to now.
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But hopefully I'll be rewarded with this little window ecosystem of birds and bugs and bees and butterflies and what else begins with B.
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I'm on the first floor, so I don't think I'll get badgers.
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Bats, maybe.
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Who knows?
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And thanks as always for all of your lovely messages and responses and sharing and ratings for the last episode.
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It really means a lot and I appreciate every single one of them.
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So anything you can do to spread the word, share this podcast with someone that will like it or rate it, or I don't know, whatever else you want to do.
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Maybe if you're a town crier, you can incorporate it into your daily crying.
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But whatever it is, I really, really appreciate it.
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And one of the things I really, really love about doing this podcast is when people get in touch and they send me things, and that's often in the form of like a message or a DM on social media, like sharing an interesting fact or a bizarre story.
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And because so much of what I speak about centres around my various creaturely obsessions, a lot of the messages that I get reflect that.
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And I've learned a lot about Jays and where to find them from someone who's an expert, because I don't know, Jays just don't feature in my life, and I know they live around here somewhere, and they're a member of the Corvid family that they're just a bit alien to me.
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So I've really appreciated that.
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And I get sent a load of crab facts and photos of crabs that people around the world have found and encountered.
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But recently I was also sent a physical book that I now treasure as a kind of sacred object for a number of different reasons.
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And the book is an old children's book called Strongwing, and it's a story about rooks, but that's only one of the reasons that I love it.
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The cover is fascinating, especially for a children's book.
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The rook on the front of it looks terrifying, and it's a weird mix of colours.
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It's sort of brown and blue and purple, and it looks like it's swooping down to terrify a community with a massive wide open beak.
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And that's just the cover.
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And inside the book the artwork carries on with some odd black and white illustrations where some look normal and then some look just a bit weird.
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And it also has the largest font size that I've ever seen, which I really appreciated because it made it really easy to read, but it means you get about three sentences per page.
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But what I love most is how the life of the book itself seems to tell a parallel story.
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And inside the cover there's a really old sticker that reads London County Council, awarded to John O'Neill, St Mary's Boys' School for Progress in Reading, July 1953.
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And that just makes this book a time capsule.
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Because somebody's carefully coloured in all the strange black and white illustrations using coloured pencils.
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And I've no idea if that was John O'Neill or a subsequent owner of the book, which makes me wonder how many hands has this book passed through in the 73 years since it was presented as an award.
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And then I can't help wonder if the award was handed out in a school assembly or in a classroom or privately to John O'Neill, or how John felt to receive it and whether maybe he was a nature nerd who loved it and thought the book was incredible, or maybe he thought it was a bit rubbish and embarrassing and worried it might ruin his tough guy image.
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And the book itself is a fascinating read.
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I mean rooks are one of my favourite birds, as I've said before, so I'm invested in the storyline, whatever happens.
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But what I found most interesting is how this book offers a glimpse into 1950's life and what it probably reveals about the culture of the UK at that time.
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There's a lot of subtle messages woven throughout the story about strength and status and a sense of aspiring to be better than others and rising to the top and becoming admired by all is what every child should aim for.
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And then there's some really interesting gender dynamics, even in the Corvid world.
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Strongwing is the main character in it, and then he meets a female rook called Glossy, and some of the interactions between them are amazing.
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So I'll read a little bit of one of them.
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This is Strongwing talking to Glossy.
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Uh and Glossy is wanting to go up a tree and look for food.
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This is Strongwing.
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Oh dear! You must this is how I imagine Strongwing talks.
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Oh dear, you must be careful, because you are not as strong as me.
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The wind could not blow me off the tree.
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I am much too strong.
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And there are so many incidents like that.
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And Glossy, who who I imagine talks like this, just always responds.
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Oh Strongwing, you're so strong.
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I'm glad you're here to protect me.
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I couldn't be as strong as you And I mean it's a children's book, but Strongwing seems like a bit of a dick by the end of it.
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And those themes continue throughout about the importance of rising to be a leader and these rather awkward feeling stereotypes.
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And it made me wonder how much of this was intentional and how much simply reflects the culture at the time that's seeped into the way the book was written.
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But either way it feels like there are layers here in this book that extend far beyond the simple children's story.
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And I was I was so excited to get it.
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It's one of my most treasured possessions, so thank you so much to the person that sent it to me.
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But it was another recent gift that captivated me and led me down a creaturely rabbit hole.
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And it was a message from someone that said the number one animal fact in their household was that crows are actually rainbow coloured.
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And my immediate thought was no, that's not true.
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And I assumed it was like a child's vivid imagination at work.
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But there's something about it that intrigued me because having spent a lot of time feeding crow by the river, so crow being the crow that I know that comes and sits on my lap, and I'd noticed flashes of purple and blue on her feathers when the sun hits them at a certain angle.
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So I thought maybe there's some truth to this, and I looked into it and discovered that it is in fact somewhat true.
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And it all starts with the fact that birds have a different set of colour receptors.
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Like we have cones in our eyes, and so do birds.
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We have cones that detect red, green, and blue.
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And the combination of light coming through those cones creates the palette of colours that we experience.
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But most birds, on the other hand, have four cones that detect red, green, and blue, but also ultraviolet.
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And that means that they can see colours that we don't even know exist.
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And that's, I mean, it's been a long known thing, I remember, maybe even learning about it in school.
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That's one of the reasons why birds of prey hang about above motorways, because they're looking for the ultraviolet trails left by, I don't know, voles and mice and stuff against the concrete of the motorway because it stands out better than like you know, in a woodland or something.
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But I found out that not only the birds have this extra cone, which means they see a colour palette that we can't possibly perceive, they also have oil droplets in their eyes that sit in front of each cone and it filters the light to make it an even more precise colour.
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So the colours may appear even more distinctive and even more vivid.
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And the downside of these oil droplets, and probably one of the reasons why we don't have them, is it gives birds such a vivid colour definition in daylight but gives them poor vision at night.
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And if that wasn't enough, I discovered some birds also have light sensitive proteins in their eyes called cryptochromes, which biologists think responds to light influenced by magnetic fields, which potentially gives them like a kind of satnav overlay on top of this already brilliantly pimped up vision that is so different to ours.
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So taking all of that into account, while we obviously can't ever know what a crow actually sees when it looks at another crow, it's likely that they appear far more colourful to each other than they do to us.
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Or they at least can see some definitions and shades and hues that we just can't detect.
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And that makes me wonder if the strange bluey purple hue of Strongwing on the cover of the book wasn't an accident but a wise choice.
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And then that makes me wonder if maybe there's a whole different hidden storyline in the book itself that's only visible to Corvids, which is why it appears slightly odd to me.
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And maybe that's also true of the everyday story we find ourselves in, that we're moving for a world that is far more vivid than we're able to perceive with our limited human perception.
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So I thought I'd study Crow a bit more closely the next time I saw her, but as it's spring, her and lightning have disappeared again, and this happened this time last year, because I guess it's nesting season and egg season, and last year they disappeared for a while.
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So maybe I'm not gonna see her again until the autumn, which I mean is I don't take it personally, I don't think I did anything to offend them, it's just what crows do.
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So I guess the last time that I saw her I didn't know would be the last time, and I don't know when the when the next time would be.
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So like last year it sort of feels like a sudden, inevitable but unexpected ending.
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And I've been thinking about endings a lot recently.
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And in the last episode of this podcast I spoke about not wanting to mark the tenth episode in any special way, and that got me wondering, I wonder how many episodes I'll actually end up doing.
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I remember recording the first two or three and then thinking, would I actually stick with it long enough to get to ten?
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And now I'm realising that there's so many different things I want to explore each month that it'll probably keep going for at least another ten or twenty or thirty episodes.
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I even spent some time working out when episode one hundred would come out, and if you're wondering, the answer is Friday the 19th of February 2033.
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So make sure you mark that in your diary.
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And part of the reason I've started reflecting on all of this is that a really important part of my creative practice and something I feel I've become good at over time, is knowing when to kill a project.
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And I like paying particular attention to endings, because even though they're inevitable, I can easily develop a pattern of avoiding them.
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But when it comes to my creative work, I seem to have found a somewhat stoic approach to endings.
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And my earliest memories of these types of endings were saying goodbye to family pets as they left for their final trip to the vet.
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I remember being about nine years old and sitting up all night with my cat Sally the night before she died.
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And the same was true of my rabbit Skippy.
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I I named Skippy, my parents named Sally.
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And both of those were really sad occasions, and I felt a lot.
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But when it came to say goodbye, I felt ready.
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I felt like I'd done the work that I needed to do, and there was just a very brave goodbye that had to happen.
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On the other hand, my parents had my beloved dog Toby put down while I was away on a school trip, and that made that ending much more difficult.
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So this relationship with endings and recognising when something needs to come to a close is carried through into many areas of my life, and like I said in my creative work, it's become really important for me to give as much attention to endings as I do to every other part of a project.
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The cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker wrote a fascinating book called The Denial of Death that I read many years ago, and it still influences my thinking to this day.
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And Becker suggests that because human beings are aware that they're alive and that they will die, we have the unique capacity to experience existential anxiety.
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And this existential anxiety that results from that creates a tension that can manifest as a simultaneous fear of insignificance and impermanence, meaning that we're caught between fearing both life and fearing death, like fearing the impermanence of death, but also fearing that we're insignificant in life.
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And Becker goes on to suggest that to cope with this, we create what he calls immortality projects.
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Ways of making our existence feel meaningful by leaving a mark that at least symbolically transcends death.
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And many things can take this form.
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An immortality project could be a career or a project or a family or status or creative work.
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Anything that often at a level outside of our conscious awareness says I matter and this will continue in some way.
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And Becker acknowledges himself that the writing of the book that he's writing all of this in is an immortality project.
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And that culture itself is simply a system of shared immortality projects.
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This podcast is an immortality project.
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But the important thing here is Becker suggests that immortality projects as he's defining them aren't optional, but they're psychologically necessary for us to function as a creature that is aware of its own mortality.
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So he's not suggesting this is something we should or even could avoid.
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Only that it's an important pattern in our human experience to become aware of and to be mindful of.
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And I find this exploration of existential awareness really exciting.
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I've never found it depressing at all.
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And I think it's that that makes impermanence such an important part of my work.
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And I have a rule of thumb for any new project that it must end intentionally, end well and end at a peak.
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So before I even recorded the first episode of the Sound of Silence podcast many years back, I publicly announced that there would only ever be one hundred episodes.
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And for my experimental in expert conference in 2018, I made it very clear before we'd even done it, that it would only ever happen once.
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And for my What the February Instagram project, I declared that the fourth year would be the final one ever, despite thousands of people around the world now taking part in this strange annual tradition.
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And whilst it feels important to me to do these things, these advanced declarations end up being quite challenging, especially when a project turns out to be something I really enjoy or that really takes off.
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Towards the end of the Sound of Silence podcast, each episode was getting between 8,000 and 10,000 downloads, which are enviable stats compared to this podcast that I actually put so much more work into.
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And the inexpert conference proved to be an utterly exhilarating and groundbreaking experiment, and many people got in touch asking when the next one would be.
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And what the February was not only attracting more and more participants each year, but was growing my Instagram following exponentially, which in turn increased sales in my shop.
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So even despite endings being that important to me, the pull towards a common sense and perhaps very capitalist instinct to repeat, scale up and grow was very, very strong.
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But I knew in my heart that not killing these projects would be driven by my own attachment to success, rather than an acceptance of the impermanence of all things.
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And one of the dangers that Ernest Becker warns about is that if immortality projects remain unchecked, they can become dangerously entangled with our sense of identity.
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Like the project shifts from something that we do to something we are, and that means that any threat or challenge to the project begins to feel like a threat to our very existence.
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It can tap into our fear of insignificance and impermanence.
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And given that everything eventually fades and dissolves and ends, failing to end a project at a peak can result in our sense of identity and self-esteem slowly slipping away.
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I didn't want to identify solely as the silent podcast guy or the curator of the weird annual anti-conference, or the artist who dares people to do stuff around the world in February.
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And don't get me wrong, it was incredibly tempting to anchor my sense of self-worth and success in these projects and hoping that they would just grow and grow, but I knew at some point that they would fade, or I'd simply get bored with them, and if I was too entangled with them, that could lead to a significant psychological crash for me.
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And I also have to admit at the same time that whilst this can sound like a bold, philosophical, existential move, I just also get a kick out of doing the opposite of common sense and doing the opposite of what everyone says that you should do.
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So there's something that I really like about ending a project at the very moment society would advise the opposite.
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In 1988, musician and artist Fred Deakin co-founded a creative agency called Airside.
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And Airside went on to produce some amazing groundbreaking designs and interactive art installations for the likes of the Victorian Albert Museum, the Big Chill and Best of all, and they won dozens of awards from places like DAD and Design Week and the BAFTAs.
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And then in 2012, at the pinnacle of their success, they decided to stop and close down the agency.
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And Fred's a friend of mine, and I remember him telling me about this years ago.
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So I got in touch with him again recently and said, Could he tell me the story of how the ending of Airside happened?
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And here's what Fred said.
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We'd just done an MBA at London Business School, and all they said to us was, What's the exit strategy for Airside?
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Buy, sell or merge?
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Do you want to buy another company and get bigger?
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Sell the company and cash in or merge, which is a kind of halfway house.
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We thought, no, we're not going to do any of those, so screw you.
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We're going to have a really big party and go out with a bang, just like all the best bands.
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I've seen many friends running similar ventures, and at the end of their cycle they say, okay, time to sell.
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Then stay for another three to five years with the golden handcuffs, watching the beautiful thing they created being slowly tarnished by hack-handed corporates.
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It's a common fate, I think, to feel that slow death.
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But life is too short to spend years doing things you don't feel drawn to.
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There's that classic Zen analogy you have to be like a surfer, knowing the wave will inevitably crash.
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And it's the art of falling off the surfboard that's the key, not trying to stay on the wave to the very end.
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That's Fred Deakin talking about the intentional ending of the highly successful award-winning design studio Airside at the peak of its success.
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And the music that I put underneath that was by Fred.
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Fred was one half of an amazing Mercury-nominated band called Lemon Jelly.
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So check out Lemon Jelly.
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And that was a piece of music that Fred has allowed me to use.
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It's not lemon jelly, because if I did use the brilliant work of Lemon Jelly, it would just get taken down automatically by the algorithm.
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But the thing that I'm pondering is I'm still unsure about this podcast.
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Why am I not thinking about endings?
00:22:40.319 --> 00:22:45.920
Why haven't I said there's only going to be 20 episodes or 50 episodes?
00:22:46.240 --> 00:22:52.799
And I think that's because it feels different to these other projects, and I don't really feel the need to think about when it'll end.
00:22:53.279 --> 00:23:02.160
And one of the reasons is that I'm still enjoying watching how it grows and it connects me with people around the world and people send me weird facts and books about rooks.
00:23:03.200 --> 00:23:07.039
And another thing might be that the whole thing started by accident.
00:23:07.279 --> 00:23:15.359
If you you go back to episode one, you'll hear me say, I just wanted to record an accessible version of my Substack and accidentally created a podcast.
00:23:15.599 --> 00:23:21.200
So it sort of became a thing before I even had a chance to think about impermanence.
00:23:21.440 --> 00:23:31.920
But when I reflect more deeply, I realize that the main difference between writing and recording this podcast every four weeks is it isn't a project.
00:23:32.160 --> 00:23:33.680
It's a practice.
00:23:34.160 --> 00:23:51.119
It's a practice that's just for me and alongside practices such as running or meditation or sitting by the Thames observing nature, they help me maintain a sense of well being, physically, mentally, and maybe even spiritually.
00:23:51.599 --> 00:23:55.519
So I don't feel the need to predetermine an endpoint for any of these practices.
00:23:55.680 --> 00:23:59.680
They they're just part of my day-to-day life.
00:24:00.079 --> 00:24:05.519
So I think that's why I don't feel the need to define an endpoint for this podcast.
00:24:05.839 --> 00:24:07.759
Because it isn't really a project.
00:24:08.000 --> 00:24:11.920
And I find that distinction between project and practice really helpful.
00:24:12.160 --> 00:24:15.279
For me, a project is an impermanent expression of something.
00:24:15.759 --> 00:24:19.279
Bound within the time boundaries of a start and an end.
00:24:19.440 --> 00:24:23.599
And that's it separate from my underlying and ongoing sense of self.
00:24:23.839 --> 00:24:30.319
It isn't who I am, but just a fleeting expression that comes from who I am at any particular moment.
00:24:31.039 --> 00:24:33.599
Whereas the practice is something entirely different.
00:24:33.759 --> 00:24:47.759
It's like an unending tuning into my moment by moment experience, a process that gradually reveals deeper layers of the mystery of who I am and what this bizarre human experience is and what I can learn from it.
00:24:48.079 --> 00:24:54.559
And even though these practices will also one day come to an end, I don't feel the need to decide exactly when that is.
00:24:54.880 --> 00:25:01.119
I mentioned the phrase just for nice many episodes ago, so these practices are just for nice.
00:25:01.200 --> 00:25:02.559
They don't need any other reason.
00:25:02.720 --> 00:25:04.720
But I would always kill a project.
00:25:04.960 --> 00:25:12.799
One of the new things that I've really enjoyed doing have been these long River Thames walks.
00:25:12.960 --> 00:25:17.839
And I started a recent one of those at Batsea Power Station and walked back to Kingston.
00:25:18.079 --> 00:25:24.559
And one of the reasons for starting at Battersea was just that there's a tube station there, so it made it a convenient start point.
00:25:24.799 --> 00:25:28.960
But also Batsey Power Station has always fascinated me.
00:25:29.200 --> 00:25:43.359
I remember passing it on the train as a child many times or seeing it on TV and being struck not only by its size but its solid art deco, ridiculously massive industrial form.
00:25:43.519 --> 00:25:46.000
And I always wondered what it would be like to go inside.
00:25:46.400 --> 00:25:58.000
I've got a vague memory of recurring dreams from childhood, maybe on the borderline of nightmares, about vast brick structures, like big industrial brick structures.
00:25:58.240 --> 00:26:03.200
So there's something about Battersea Power Station that both fascinated me and unsettled me.
00:26:03.599 --> 00:26:09.519
I could imagine going in there and being simultaneously awe inspired and overwhelmed.
00:26:09.759 --> 00:26:13.759
And the power station's been there for a long time, it has a rich history.
00:26:13.920 --> 00:26:27.759
The first part of it was built in 1929 with Station B, the second part was finished in the mid fifties, and each station added two chimneys to it, and it gives it that iconic four chimney structure that we now know.
00:26:27.920 --> 00:26:35.599
And at the time it was one of the largest coal-fired power stations in Europe, and its peak it supplied around 20% of London's electricity.
00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:49.680
But then after over 50 years of operation, it closed in 1983 just because of the viability of coal-fired power stations becoming very inefficient and far more polluting than other alternatives.
00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:53.519
So it closed and just sat there, falling apart.
00:26:53.680 --> 00:26:55.599
And it's a grade two listed building.
00:26:55.759 --> 00:27:03.839
So it got into a bit of a bind where you can't do anything with it, but because you can't do anything with it really, it was just falling apart.
00:27:04.079 --> 00:27:10.880
But eventually it was bought and redeveloped by a Malaysian Development Corporation and it reopened to the public in 2022.
00:27:11.279 --> 00:27:15.759
And even though I've passed it quite regularly, I've never actually been in since it reopened.
00:27:15.839 --> 00:27:21.039
So when I got out of the tube at Battersea, I thought, oh, I could just pop in here finally and have a look.
00:27:21.279 --> 00:27:23.200
And I was really excited by this.
00:27:23.359 --> 00:27:29.200
I imagined walking in this cavernous, eccentric Art Deco turbine hall.
00:27:29.359 --> 00:27:32.319
I mean they had marble floors in a power station.
00:27:32.400 --> 00:27:35.759
It's like eccentric art deco design.
00:27:36.000 --> 00:27:42.880
And I'd read that these big halls evoked the experience of being in a cathedral of power.
00:27:43.119 --> 00:27:48.960
But as I walked through the doors for the first time, I experienced the opposite of that.
00:27:49.440 --> 00:27:57.039
I just experienced a massive sense of disappointment and sadness because I found myself in a shopping mall.
00:27:57.119 --> 00:28:01.279
And it was a shopping mall that looked like a shopping mall anywhere else in the world.
00:28:01.599 --> 00:28:12.160
Like low ceilings, fluorescent lights and generic stores, and very clean and uniform, and you could win like a Ferrari in the middle of the floor.
00:28:12.240 --> 00:28:14.720
And I was thinking, where where are all these high ceilings?
00:28:14.960 --> 00:28:18.720
Where's all this Art Deco industrial brick?
00:28:18.960 --> 00:28:21.599
And I thought maybe this is just one part of it.
00:28:21.759 --> 00:28:25.200
And so I tried to get out, but I got trapped.
00:28:25.440 --> 00:28:28.559
It's like there's only one way in and one way out of this shopping mall.
00:28:28.720 --> 00:28:33.440
And so I asked some someone like how do you get out and realised I had to go back the way that I came.
00:28:33.680 --> 00:28:40.480
But by the time I got back outside, I was so discombobulated and disappointed by this experience, I decided to just head home.
00:28:40.720 --> 00:28:54.960
And the gap that I experienced between what I'd imagined for so many years and what I found felt like biting into a much anticipated exotic fruit, only to discover it had gone rotten in the middle.
00:28:55.119 --> 00:29:00.559
And I spent the next few hours on the walk home wondering why this had disturbed me in this way.
00:29:01.119 --> 00:29:23.839
And I've since found out there's some areas of the building that are a bit more reflective of the original space, but even those have had their openness broken up by new floors and mezzanines and escalators, and that original openness throughout the whole structure has been subdivided, and looking at photos of these areas just leaves me with a sense that something important has been lost here.
00:29:24.079 --> 00:29:26.400
And I recognise part of this reaction is personal.
00:29:26.480 --> 00:29:33.440
It's like I love the idea of big empty spaces and abandoned industrial structures.
00:29:33.599 --> 00:29:39.839
But the way the Battersea has been repurposed made me curious about what it says about modern society more broadly.
00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:49.920
Because it felt like the soul of the building had been carved up and packaged into bite-sized chunks of commercial modernity without sounding too pretentious.
00:29:50.160 --> 00:29:57.200
And it's true that the building was falling into disrepair, so arguably this redevelopment saved it, but at what cost?
00:29:57.680 --> 00:30:07.839
And what does it say about the current climate when the only way we can save something beautiful is by making it more like everything else and making it entirely commercial?
00:30:08.079 --> 00:30:17.839
The German philosopher Walter Benjamin wrote a lot about art and culture and modernity and how mass reproduction can change our relationship to meaning and experience.
00:30:18.079 --> 00:30:21.519
And one of his core ideas was what he called a loss of aura.
00:30:21.680 --> 00:30:30.640
And that's when something is reproduced or standardized to such an extent that it loses its unique and unrepeatable presence.
00:30:30.880 --> 00:30:38.960
And he describes aura as an object's presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be.
00:30:39.279 --> 00:30:48.480
And when that uniqueness is eroded through standardization and the norms of modern commercial design, that unique aura begins to fade.
00:30:48.799 --> 00:30:53.039
So through this lens, yeah, the building of Batsea Power Station remains.
00:30:53.279 --> 00:30:57.599
But what constituted its presence has been fundamentally changed.
00:30:57.839 --> 00:31:05.519
And that modernization and subdivision of the space means that the meaning we make of the building, it's changed forever.
00:31:05.839 --> 00:31:19.519
The place I imagined I would encounter with a sense of reverence and awe has been commoditized in a way that it comes with his own instructions about what meaning I should make of it, rather than leaving me to uncover it in my own way.
00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:26.960
The anthropologist Mark Orgay will probably describe the modern interior of Battersea Power Station as a non-place.
00:31:27.200 --> 00:31:33.759
And he talks about non-places as being a space that lacks identity, history, and meaningful human connection.
00:31:34.079 --> 00:31:41.359
And non-places seem to be an inevitable byproduct of capitalism, like airports, shopping malls, etc.
00:31:41.839 --> 00:31:51.759
Where the unique meaning of an empty space is flattened as it's turned into something that can be compartmentalized and replicated just to generate profit.
00:31:51.920 --> 00:31:54.799
And a similar pattern shows up in the natural world.
00:31:55.039 --> 00:31:59.200
Ecosystems thrive when they're allowed to remain messy and complex.
00:31:59.440 --> 00:32:07.119
And when human beings neaten them up and control them just for our consumption, they lose their natural diversity and vitality.
00:32:07.680 --> 00:32:18.960
And a number of years back I met the forester Jim Riley when we were recording the Glendire podcast, and he spoke about the art of forestry and the importance of forests being allowed to remain biologically untidy.
00:32:19.039 --> 00:32:23.440
And Jim made a distinction between that and what he called golf course forests.
00:32:23.680 --> 00:32:31.359
Golf course forests are forests that have been landscaped and artificially tidied up for the ease of human use.
00:32:31.759 --> 00:32:38.160
But in nature, messiness equals diversity, and that diversity and messiness equals resilience.
00:32:38.400 --> 00:32:42.799
But by contrast, there's a fragility to a golf course forest.
00:32:43.039 --> 00:32:48.640
It becomes more of a monoculture and it's much less able to adapt and respond to inevitable change.
00:32:48.880 --> 00:32:55.599
And for me, this is why our messy, biologically untidy, creative self-expression matters.
00:32:55.920 --> 00:33:01.519
There's a constant pull to tidy it up and make it more palatable and more easily consumed.
00:33:01.680 --> 00:33:05.359
But something essential and unique is lost in that process of doing so.
00:33:05.519 --> 00:33:22.480
And in the same way that monocultures reduce resilience in nature, a kind of human monoculture begins to emerge when we all start to move towards replicable golf course creativity, because it fits more comfortably within the structures of a capitalist algorithm driven society.
00:33:22.640 --> 00:33:32.160
It can prove more and more difficult to be creatively biologically untidy in a world where what's valued and prioritized is the opposite.
00:33:32.400 --> 00:33:41.119
What I experienced as absent in Battersea and what often feels absent in many modern spaces is that invitation to awe and mystery.
00:33:41.359 --> 00:33:50.480
That sense of encountering something I don't fully understand, and then I've got to make meaning of it through my own imagination because of its utter uniqueness.
00:33:50.720 --> 00:34:00.160
And whether that's a building or a forest or our own way of making a mark in the world, when everything becomes more uniform, something essential disappears.
00:34:00.480 --> 00:34:18.880
So it feels vital to resist the pull towards golf course creativity, and instead know that our messy, unique, imperfect and uncensored creative self-expression is really what makes us and society more resilient and fascinating and awe inspiring.
00:34:19.519 --> 00:34:20.639
It's dark now.
00:34:20.719 --> 00:34:22.159
I don't know how that happened.
00:34:22.320 --> 00:34:28.000
That felt like a rant, but hopefully it made sense and is of interest to you.
00:34:28.239 --> 00:34:31.199
And I need to stop there because we're up on time.
00:34:31.599 --> 00:34:39.599
Couple of things before I go, one of the other things that I've loved about doing this podcast is it's connected me with other podcasters around the world.
00:34:39.760 --> 00:34:44.239
I was on Jim the Podcast Shopper's podcastpics a couple of months back.
00:34:44.400 --> 00:34:54.480
And recently I met Heather who presents Creatively Eccentric, which she describes as a podcast about radically redefining what it means to be a creative in a world that still prefers conformity.
00:34:54.800 --> 00:34:59.119
So it feels very appropriate to all of the stuff I've just been talking about.
00:34:59.360 --> 00:35:10.960
Heather and I had a lovely meandering conversation about all things creative and the importance of messiness and the importance of moving towards our own natural-born weirdness.
00:35:11.199 --> 00:35:16.400
And the episode that we did together is called Why Being Misunderstood Might Be Your Creative Superpower.
00:35:16.639 --> 00:35:19.199
And I'll put a link to it in the podcast notes.
00:35:19.280 --> 00:35:25.519
So if you want to jump from here to Heather's podcast, there's loads of other episodes and guests on it, then please do.
00:35:25.679 --> 00:35:31.199
And if it's the kind of thing you do and have time to do it, then subscribe and rate and review Heather's podcast.
00:35:31.519 --> 00:35:37.360
Because that type of thing means a lot and it's vital to support independent podcasters.
00:35:37.760 --> 00:35:49.840
So independent podcasts that are just done because people are passionate about the subject don't get buried in this deluge of big budget corporate celebrity shows.
00:35:50.239 --> 00:35:52.000
And same goes for mine as well.
00:35:52.159 --> 00:35:57.360
If you want to rate and review and share, then it just helps not get too swamped.
00:35:57.920 --> 00:36:02.239
I have some open studios coming up in April and May.
00:36:02.320 --> 00:36:08.320
If you want to come and hang out in my brain for a bit in my studio, I'll put a link to those in the podcast notes.
00:36:08.400 --> 00:36:12.639
And then there's some workshops and stuff that I mention every episode.
00:36:12.800 --> 00:36:16.079
I'll put a link to them in the podcast notes as well.
00:36:16.400 --> 00:36:18.000
But thank you so much for joining me.
00:36:18.159 --> 00:36:21.679
Episode 12 will be out on the 15th of May.
00:36:21.840 --> 00:36:33.760
And hopefully I'll be recording episode 12 with the background sound of hundreds of bees and bugs and butterflies frolicking in my wildflower garden.
00:36:38.800 --> 00:36:40.079
But thank you so much for listening.
00:36:40.159 --> 00:36:41.280
I'll speak to you next time.
00:36:41.440 --> 00:36:42.480
Bye for now.
00:00:12.160 --> 00:00:18.079
Hello and welcome to episode eleven of Creative Adventures, an accidental podcast.
00:00:18.399 --> 00:00:25.199
And it's spring, it's daylight outside, it's evening and it's sort of warmish.
00:00:25.440 --> 00:00:42.719
But what's really exciting me about spring is I bought a window box like October or November last year because I want to grow a wildflower meadow so I can get some bees and insects and stuff hanging around outside the flat.
00:00:42.960 --> 00:00:58.159
And I've got three windows here in the flat, and two of them are dedicated to the birds, so there's a window that the crows tend to come to, then there's the other window where the jackdaws come to, and also where little guy, the tiny wagtail, goes there as well.
00:00:58.320 --> 00:01:01.759
And it's not as delineated as that, but that tends to be where it is.
00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:15.680
And I've had this third window sill, and I thought I don't really want to spend any more money on bird food and have another bird feeder to fill up because it costs me as much as my dog used to in terms of food and things like that.
00:01:15.840 --> 00:01:30.959
So I got this window box and I thought I'll grow some wildflowers in it, and then there can be like a little ecosystem, so there'll be bees and bugs and then they'll pollinate and then maybe the birds can eat the bugs and I don't know, that they'll all interact in that way.
00:01:31.359 --> 00:01:36.480
And I bought the window box at exactly the wrong time of year to plant wildflower seeds.
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So I've been waiting and waiting and waiting throughout the winter to get to the start of April when I can plant them and they'll stand a chance of growing.
00:01:46.799 --> 00:01:47.680
And they are.
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It's amazing.
00:01:48.560 --> 00:01:50.640
I can see them from where I'm recording now.
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At this point in time, there's just loads and loads of green shoots, which is amazing.
00:01:55.760 --> 00:01:59.920
I mean I know seeds grow, but I don't remember planting seeds before.
00:02:00.079 --> 00:02:02.799
Maybe planting watercress at school or something.
00:02:02.959 --> 00:02:07.519
But planting seeds and then seeing them start to emerge has been amazing.
00:02:07.840 --> 00:02:15.759
But it's been a bit of a battle with my my ecosystem so far because the slugs also come up at night to clean the bird feeders.
00:02:15.919 --> 00:02:24.400
So I had to put like a slug net over the top of the window box just to give the seeds and the green shoots a chance.
00:02:24.800 --> 00:02:31.039
And then after about a week or so, I noticed there were lots of beak-shaped holes in the net.
00:02:31.280 --> 00:02:35.919
And I mean I think I know who did that, and it wasn't the little guy that wagged out.
00:02:36.159 --> 00:02:43.439
So I then had to go and buy some chicken wire and build like a cage around it, and then put the slug net over the top.
00:02:43.520 --> 00:02:48.639
So this whole thing has just become so much more expensive and complicated than I thought.
00:02:48.879 --> 00:02:50.000
But now they're growing.
00:02:50.159 --> 00:02:58.319
I am so excited, and the speed at which they're growing, like each morning I come and have a look, and it's more and more and more.
00:02:58.560 --> 00:03:04.159
So I don't think I've ever been that patient in my life as waiting from October to now.
00:03:04.319 --> 00:03:13.840
But hopefully I'll be rewarded with this little window ecosystem of birds and bugs and bees and butterflies and what else begins with B.
00:03:14.159 --> 00:03:16.400
I'm on the first floor, so I don't think I'll get badgers.
00:03:16.800 --> 00:03:17.840
Bats, maybe.
00:03:18.560 --> 00:03:19.360
Who knows?
00:03:19.680 --> 00:03:27.120
And thanks as always for all of your lovely messages and responses and sharing and ratings for the last episode.
00:03:27.280 --> 00:03:30.400
It really means a lot and I appreciate every single one of them.
00:03:30.479 --> 00:03:37.919
So anything you can do to spread the word, share this podcast with someone that will like it or rate it, or I don't know, whatever else you want to do.
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Maybe if you're a town crier, you can incorporate it into your daily crying.
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But whatever it is, I really, really appreciate it.
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And one of the things I really, really love about doing this podcast is when people get in touch and they send me things, and that's often in the form of like a message or a DM on social media, like sharing an interesting fact or a bizarre story.
00:04:01.439 --> 00:04:08.879
And because so much of what I speak about centres around my various creaturely obsessions, a lot of the messages that I get reflect that.
00:04:08.960 --> 00:04:24.160
And I've learned a lot about Jays and where to find them from someone who's an expert, because I don't know, Jays just don't feature in my life, and I know they live around here somewhere, and they're a member of the Corvid family that they're just a bit alien to me.
00:04:24.240 --> 00:04:26.079
So I've really appreciated that.
00:04:26.319 --> 00:04:32.319
And I get sent a load of crab facts and photos of crabs that people around the world have found and encountered.
00:04:32.560 --> 00:04:40.560
But recently I was also sent a physical book that I now treasure as a kind of sacred object for a number of different reasons.
00:04:40.720 --> 00:04:48.800
And the book is an old children's book called Strongwing, and it's a story about rooks, but that's only one of the reasons that I love it.
00:04:49.120 --> 00:04:54.160
The cover is fascinating, especially for a children's book.
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The rook on the front of it looks terrifying, and it's a weird mix of colours.
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It's sort of brown and blue and purple, and it looks like it's swooping down to terrify a community with a massive wide open beak.
00:05:11.279 --> 00:05:12.800
And that's just the cover.
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And inside the book the artwork carries on with some odd black and white illustrations where some look normal and then some look just a bit weird.
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And it also has the largest font size that I've ever seen, which I really appreciated because it made it really easy to read, but it means you get about three sentences per page.
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But what I love most is how the life of the book itself seems to tell a parallel story.
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And inside the cover there's a really old sticker that reads London County Council, awarded to John O'Neill, St Mary's Boys' School for Progress in Reading, July 1953.
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And that just makes this book a time capsule.
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Because somebody's carefully coloured in all the strange black and white illustrations using coloured pencils.
00:06:03.120 --> 00:06:13.680
And I've no idea if that was John O'Neill or a subsequent owner of the book, which makes me wonder how many hands has this book passed through in the 73 years since it was presented as an award.
00:06:13.839 --> 00:06:34.800
And then I can't help wonder if the award was handed out in a school assembly or in a classroom or privately to John O'Neill, or how John felt to receive it and whether maybe he was a nature nerd who loved it and thought the book was incredible, or maybe he thought it was a bit rubbish and embarrassing and worried it might ruin his tough guy image.
00:06:34.959 --> 00:06:37.199
And the book itself is a fascinating read.
00:06:37.279 --> 00:06:43.120
I mean rooks are one of my favourite birds, as I've said before, so I'm invested in the storyline, whatever happens.
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But what I found most interesting is how this book offers a glimpse into 1950's life and what it probably reveals about the culture of the UK at that time.
00:06:52.079 --> 00:07:04.560
There's a lot of subtle messages woven throughout the story about strength and status and a sense of aspiring to be better than others and rising to the top and becoming admired by all is what every child should aim for.
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And then there's some really interesting gender dynamics, even in the Corvid world.
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Strongwing is the main character in it, and then he meets a female rook called Glossy, and some of the interactions between them are amazing.
00:07:18.879 --> 00:07:20.639
So I'll read a little bit of one of them.
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This is Strongwing talking to Glossy.
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Uh and Glossy is wanting to go up a tree and look for food.
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This is Strongwing.
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Oh dear! You must this is how I imagine Strongwing talks.
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Oh dear, you must be careful, because you are not as strong as me.
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The wind could not blow me off the tree.
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I am much too strong.
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And there are so many incidents like that.
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And Glossy, who who I imagine talks like this, just always responds.
00:07:53.439 --> 00:07:55.519
Oh Strongwing, you're so strong.
00:07:55.600 --> 00:07:57.439
I'm glad you're here to protect me.
00:07:57.839 --> 00:08:05.519
I couldn't be as strong as you And I mean it's a children's book, but Strongwing seems like a bit of a dick by the end of it.
00:08:05.759 --> 00:08:14.480
And those themes continue throughout about the importance of rising to be a leader and these rather awkward feeling stereotypes.
00:08:14.639 --> 00:08:22.480
And it made me wonder how much of this was intentional and how much simply reflects the culture at the time that's seeped into the way the book was written.
00:08:22.720 --> 00:08:28.560
But either way it feels like there are layers here in this book that extend far beyond the simple children's story.
00:08:28.800 --> 00:08:31.439
And I was I was so excited to get it.
00:08:31.680 --> 00:08:36.720
It's one of my most treasured possessions, so thank you so much to the person that sent it to me.
00:08:36.960 --> 00:08:41.600
But it was another recent gift that captivated me and led me down a creaturely rabbit hole.
00:08:41.759 --> 00:08:49.759
And it was a message from someone that said the number one animal fact in their household was that crows are actually rainbow coloured.
00:08:50.320 --> 00:08:53.360
And my immediate thought was no, that's not true.
00:08:53.600 --> 00:08:57.360
And I assumed it was like a child's vivid imagination at work.
00:08:57.600 --> 00:09:12.480
But there's something about it that intrigued me because having spent a lot of time feeding crow by the river, so crow being the crow that I know that comes and sits on my lap, and I'd noticed flashes of purple and blue on her feathers when the sun hits them at a certain angle.
00:09:12.639 --> 00:09:19.600
So I thought maybe there's some truth to this, and I looked into it and discovered that it is in fact somewhat true.
00:09:19.840 --> 00:09:24.000
And it all starts with the fact that birds have a different set of colour receptors.
00:09:24.159 --> 00:09:27.039
Like we have cones in our eyes, and so do birds.
00:09:27.120 --> 00:09:30.080
We have cones that detect red, green, and blue.
00:09:30.240 --> 00:09:35.200
And the combination of light coming through those cones creates the palette of colours that we experience.
00:09:35.440 --> 00:09:42.240
But most birds, on the other hand, have four cones that detect red, green, and blue, but also ultraviolet.
00:09:42.480 --> 00:09:46.159
And that means that they can see colours that we don't even know exist.
00:09:46.720 --> 00:09:51.279
And that's, I mean, it's been a long known thing, I remember, maybe even learning about it in school.
00:09:51.440 --> 00:10:08.080
That's one of the reasons why birds of prey hang about above motorways, because they're looking for the ultraviolet trails left by, I don't know, voles and mice and stuff against the concrete of the motorway because it stands out better than like you know, in a woodland or something.
00:10:08.320 --> 00:10:26.159
But I found out that not only the birds have this extra cone, which means they see a colour palette that we can't possibly perceive, they also have oil droplets in their eyes that sit in front of each cone and it filters the light to make it an even more precise colour.
00:10:26.399 --> 00:10:31.840
So the colours may appear even more distinctive and even more vivid.
00:10:32.320 --> 00:10:44.080
And the downside of these oil droplets, and probably one of the reasons why we don't have them, is it gives birds such a vivid colour definition in daylight but gives them poor vision at night.
00:10:44.320 --> 00:11:08.799
And if that wasn't enough, I discovered some birds also have light sensitive proteins in their eyes called cryptochromes, which biologists think responds to light influenced by magnetic fields, which potentially gives them like a kind of satnav overlay on top of this already brilliantly pimped up vision that is so different to ours.
00:11:09.039 --> 00:11:20.080
So taking all of that into account, while we obviously can't ever know what a crow actually sees when it looks at another crow, it's likely that they appear far more colourful to each other than they do to us.
00:11:20.320 --> 00:11:26.960
Or they at least can see some definitions and shades and hues that we just can't detect.
00:11:27.200 --> 00:11:36.080
And that makes me wonder if the strange bluey purple hue of Strongwing on the cover of the book wasn't an accident but a wise choice.
00:11:36.559 --> 00:11:47.679
And then that makes me wonder if maybe there's a whole different hidden storyline in the book itself that's only visible to Corvids, which is why it appears slightly odd to me.
00:11:48.320 --> 00:12:00.080
And maybe that's also true of the everyday story we find ourselves in, that we're moving for a world that is far more vivid than we're able to perceive with our limited human perception.
00:12:00.399 --> 00:12:19.679
So I thought I'd study Crow a bit more closely the next time I saw her, but as it's spring, her and lightning have disappeared again, and this happened this time last year, because I guess it's nesting season and egg season, and last year they disappeared for a while.
00:12:20.000 --> 00:12:31.279
So maybe I'm not gonna see her again until the autumn, which I mean is I don't take it personally, I don't think I did anything to offend them, it's just what crows do.
00:12:31.519 --> 00:12:38.159
So I guess the last time that I saw her I didn't know would be the last time, and I don't know when the when the next time would be.
00:12:38.399 --> 00:12:43.600
So like last year it sort of feels like a sudden, inevitable but unexpected ending.
00:12:43.759 --> 00:12:46.399
And I've been thinking about endings a lot recently.
00:12:46.639 --> 00:13:00.639
And in the last episode of this podcast I spoke about not wanting to mark the tenth episode in any special way, and that got me wondering, I wonder how many episodes I'll actually end up doing.
00:13:00.879 --> 00:13:06.480
I remember recording the first two or three and then thinking, would I actually stick with it long enough to get to ten?
00:13:06.960 --> 00:13:15.840
And now I'm realising that there's so many different things I want to explore each month that it'll probably keep going for at least another ten or twenty or thirty episodes.
00:13:16.080 --> 00:13:25.919
I even spent some time working out when episode one hundred would come out, and if you're wondering, the answer is Friday the 19th of February 2033.
00:13:26.480 --> 00:13:29.120
So make sure you mark that in your diary.
00:13:29.440 --> 00:13:40.879
And part of the reason I've started reflecting on all of this is that a really important part of my creative practice and something I feel I've become good at over time, is knowing when to kill a project.
00:13:41.200 --> 00:13:48.879
And I like paying particular attention to endings, because even though they're inevitable, I can easily develop a pattern of avoiding them.
00:13:49.120 --> 00:13:54.720
But when it comes to my creative work, I seem to have found a somewhat stoic approach to endings.
00:13:55.200 --> 00:14:02.559
And my earliest memories of these types of endings were saying goodbye to family pets as they left for their final trip to the vet.
00:14:03.039 --> 00:14:09.840
I remember being about nine years old and sitting up all night with my cat Sally the night before she died.
00:14:10.080 --> 00:14:12.399
And the same was true of my rabbit Skippy.
00:14:12.480 --> 00:14:15.519
I I named Skippy, my parents named Sally.
00:14:15.919 --> 00:14:19.360
And both of those were really sad occasions, and I felt a lot.
00:14:19.519 --> 00:14:23.120
But when it came to say goodbye, I felt ready.
00:14:23.279 --> 00:14:30.399
I felt like I'd done the work that I needed to do, and there was just a very brave goodbye that had to happen.
00:14:30.639 --> 00:14:38.080
On the other hand, my parents had my beloved dog Toby put down while I was away on a school trip, and that made that ending much more difficult.
00:14:38.320 --> 00:14:52.720
So this relationship with endings and recognising when something needs to come to a close is carried through into many areas of my life, and like I said in my creative work, it's become really important for me to give as much attention to endings as I do to every other part of a project.
00:14:52.960 --> 00:15:02.720
The cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker wrote a fascinating book called The Denial of Death that I read many years ago, and it still influences my thinking to this day.
00:15:02.960 --> 00:15:13.120
And Becker suggests that because human beings are aware that they're alive and that they will die, we have the unique capacity to experience existential anxiety.
00:15:13.279 --> 00:15:33.120
And this existential anxiety that results from that creates a tension that can manifest as a simultaneous fear of insignificance and impermanence, meaning that we're caught between fearing both life and fearing death, like fearing the impermanence of death, but also fearing that we're insignificant in life.
00:15:33.360 --> 00:15:39.919
And Becker goes on to suggest that to cope with this, we create what he calls immortality projects.
00:15:40.240 --> 00:15:47.679
Ways of making our existence feel meaningful by leaving a mark that at least symbolically transcends death.
00:15:48.000 --> 00:15:49.919
And many things can take this form.
00:15:50.240 --> 00:15:56.960
An immortality project could be a career or a project or a family or status or creative work.
00:15:57.440 --> 00:16:04.399
Anything that often at a level outside of our conscious awareness says I matter and this will continue in some way.
00:16:04.559 --> 00:16:11.840
And Becker acknowledges himself that the writing of the book that he's writing all of this in is an immortality project.
00:16:12.080 --> 00:16:16.879
And that culture itself is simply a system of shared immortality projects.
00:16:17.200 --> 00:16:19.519
This podcast is an immortality project.
00:16:19.759 --> 00:16:32.720
But the important thing here is Becker suggests that immortality projects as he's defining them aren't optional, but they're psychologically necessary for us to function as a creature that is aware of its own mortality.
00:16:32.960 --> 00:16:37.120
So he's not suggesting this is something we should or even could avoid.
00:16:37.279 --> 00:16:44.080
Only that it's an important pattern in our human experience to become aware of and to be mindful of.
00:16:44.399 --> 00:16:49.759
And I find this exploration of existential awareness really exciting.
00:16:49.840 --> 00:16:52.159
I've never found it depressing at all.
00:16:52.320 --> 00:16:57.440
And I think it's that that makes impermanence such an important part of my work.
00:16:57.679 --> 00:17:05.279
And I have a rule of thumb for any new project that it must end intentionally, end well and end at a peak.
00:17:05.519 --> 00:17:14.720
So before I even recorded the first episode of the Sound of Silence podcast many years back, I publicly announced that there would only ever be one hundred episodes.
00:17:14.960 --> 00:17:23.519
And for my experimental in expert conference in 2018, I made it very clear before we'd even done it, that it would only ever happen once.
00:17:23.759 --> 00:17:34.640
And for my What the February Instagram project, I declared that the fourth year would be the final one ever, despite thousands of people around the world now taking part in this strange annual tradition.
00:17:34.960 --> 00:17:46.079
And whilst it feels important to me to do these things, these advanced declarations end up being quite challenging, especially when a project turns out to be something I really enjoy or that really takes off.
00:17:46.319 --> 00:17:59.279
Towards the end of the Sound of Silence podcast, each episode was getting between 8,000 and 10,000 downloads, which are enviable stats compared to this podcast that I actually put so much more work into.
00:17:59.519 --> 00:18:08.000
And the inexpert conference proved to be an utterly exhilarating and groundbreaking experiment, and many people got in touch asking when the next one would be.
00:18:08.240 --> 00:18:17.279
And what the February was not only attracting more and more participants each year, but was growing my Instagram following exponentially, which in turn increased sales in my shop.
00:18:17.519 --> 00:18:28.319
So even despite endings being that important to me, the pull towards a common sense and perhaps very capitalist instinct to repeat, scale up and grow was very, very strong.
00:18:28.480 --> 00:18:38.799
But I knew in my heart that not killing these projects would be driven by my own attachment to success, rather than an acceptance of the impermanence of all things.
00:18:39.039 --> 00:18:49.039
And one of the dangers that Ernest Becker warns about is that if immortality projects remain unchecked, they can become dangerously entangled with our sense of identity.
00:18:49.279 --> 00:19:00.240
Like the project shifts from something that we do to something we are, and that means that any threat or challenge to the project begins to feel like a threat to our very existence.
00:19:00.480 --> 00:19:04.160
It can tap into our fear of insignificance and impermanence.
00:19:04.400 --> 00:19:15.599
And given that everything eventually fades and dissolves and ends, failing to end a project at a peak can result in our sense of identity and self-esteem slowly slipping away.
00:19:15.920 --> 00:19:26.319
I didn't want to identify solely as the silent podcast guy or the curator of the weird annual anti-conference, or the artist who dares people to do stuff around the world in February.
00:19:26.480 --> 00:19:45.440
And don't get me wrong, it was incredibly tempting to anchor my sense of self-worth and success in these projects and hoping that they would just grow and grow, but I knew at some point that they would fade, or I'd simply get bored with them, and if I was too entangled with them, that could lead to a significant psychological crash for me.
00:19:45.680 --> 00:20:00.880
And I also have to admit at the same time that whilst this can sound like a bold, philosophical, existential move, I just also get a kick out of doing the opposite of common sense and doing the opposite of what everyone says that you should do.
00:20:01.119 --> 00:20:09.119
So there's something that I really like about ending a project at the very moment society would advise the opposite.
00:20:09.440 --> 00:20:16.400
In 1988, musician and artist Fred Deakin co-founded a creative agency called Airside.
00:20:16.880 --> 00:20:34.559
And Airside went on to produce some amazing groundbreaking designs and interactive art installations for the likes of the Victorian Albert Museum, the Big Chill and Best of all, and they won dozens of awards from places like DAD and Design Week and the BAFTAs.
00:20:35.039 --> 00:20:42.079
And then in 2012, at the pinnacle of their success, they decided to stop and close down the agency.
00:20:42.319 --> 00:20:48.559
And Fred's a friend of mine, and I remember him telling me about this years ago.
00:20:48.799 --> 00:20:55.119
So I got in touch with him again recently and said, Could he tell me the story of how the ending of Airside happened?
00:20:55.359 --> 00:20:57.039
And here's what Fred said.
00:21:00.000 --> 00:21:06.240
We'd just done an MBA at London Business School, and all they said to us was, What's the exit strategy for Airside?
00:21:06.400 --> 00:21:07.920
Buy, sell or merge?
00:21:08.240 --> 00:21:10.319
Do you want to buy another company and get bigger?
00:21:10.559 --> 00:21:15.680
Sell the company and cash in or merge, which is a kind of halfway house.
00:21:15.920 --> 00:21:19.519
We thought, no, we're not going to do any of those, so screw you.
00:21:19.759 --> 00:21:24.880
We're going to have a really big party and go out with a bang, just like all the best bands.
00:21:25.119 --> 00:21:30.400
I've seen many friends running similar ventures, and at the end of their cycle they say, okay, time to sell.
00:21:30.640 --> 00:21:38.640
Then stay for another three to five years with the golden handcuffs, watching the beautiful thing they created being slowly tarnished by hack-handed corporates.
00:21:38.799 --> 00:21:42.400
It's a common fate, I think, to feel that slow death.
00:21:42.640 --> 00:21:46.319
But life is too short to spend years doing things you don't feel drawn to.
00:21:46.480 --> 00:21:52.960
There's that classic Zen analogy you have to be like a surfer, knowing the wave will inevitably crash.
00:21:53.119 --> 00:21:59.359
And it's the art of falling off the surfboard that's the key, not trying to stay on the wave to the very end.
00:22:00.640 --> 00:22:12.480
That's Fred Deakin talking about the intentional ending of the highly successful award-winning design studio Airside at the peak of its success.
00:22:12.720 --> 00:22:15.359
And the music that I put underneath that was by Fred.
00:22:15.440 --> 00:22:20.319
Fred was one half of an amazing Mercury-nominated band called Lemon Jelly.
00:22:20.400 --> 00:22:21.759
So check out Lemon Jelly.
00:22:21.839 --> 00:22:24.799
And that was a piece of music that Fred has allowed me to use.
00:22:24.960 --> 00:22:32.319
It's not lemon jelly, because if I did use the brilliant work of Lemon Jelly, it would just get taken down automatically by the algorithm.
00:22:32.559 --> 00:22:37.759
But the thing that I'm pondering is I'm still unsure about this podcast.
00:22:38.000 --> 00:22:40.240
Why am I not thinking about endings?
00:22:40.319 --> 00:22:45.920
Why haven't I said there's only going to be 20 episodes or 50 episodes?
00:22:46.240 --> 00:22:52.799
And I think that's because it feels different to these other projects, and I don't really feel the need to think about when it'll end.
00:22:53.279 --> 00:23:02.160
And one of the reasons is that I'm still enjoying watching how it grows and it connects me with people around the world and people send me weird facts and books about rooks.
00:23:03.200 --> 00:23:07.039
And another thing might be that the whole thing started by accident.
00:23:07.279 --> 00:23:15.359
If you you go back to episode one, you'll hear me say, I just wanted to record an accessible version of my Substack and accidentally created a podcast.
00:23:15.599 --> 00:23:21.200
So it sort of became a thing before I even had a chance to think about impermanence.
00:23:21.440 --> 00:23:31.920
But when I reflect more deeply, I realize that the main difference between writing and recording this podcast every four weeks is it isn't a project.
00:23:32.160 --> 00:23:33.680
It's a practice.
00:23:34.160 --> 00:23:51.119
It's a practice that's just for me and alongside practices such as running or meditation or sitting by the Thames observing nature, they help me maintain a sense of well being, physically, mentally, and maybe even spiritually.
00:23:51.599 --> 00:23:55.519
So I don't feel the need to predetermine an endpoint for any of these practices.
00:23:55.680 --> 00:23:59.680
They they're just part of my day-to-day life.
00:24:00.079 --> 00:24:05.519
So I think that's why I don't feel the need to define an endpoint for this podcast.
00:24:05.839 --> 00:24:07.759
Because it isn't really a project.
00:24:08.000 --> 00:24:11.920
And I find that distinction between project and practice really helpful.
00:24:12.160 --> 00:24:15.279
For me, a project is an impermanent expression of something.
00:24:15.759 --> 00:24:19.279
Bound within the time boundaries of a start and an end.
00:24:19.440 --> 00:24:23.599
And that's it separate from my underlying and ongoing sense of self.
00:24:23.839 --> 00:24:30.319
It isn't who I am, but just a fleeting expression that comes from who I am at any particular moment.
00:24:31.039 --> 00:24:33.599
Whereas the practice is something entirely different.
00:24:33.759 --> 00:24:47.759
It's like an unending tuning into my moment by moment experience, a process that gradually reveals deeper layers of the mystery of who I am and what this bizarre human experience is and what I can learn from it.
00:24:48.079 --> 00:24:54.559
And even though these practices will also one day come to an end, I don't feel the need to decide exactly when that is.
00:24:54.880 --> 00:25:01.119
I mentioned the phrase just for nice many episodes ago, so these practices are just for nice.
00:25:01.200 --> 00:25:02.559
They don't need any other reason.
00:25:02.720 --> 00:25:04.720
But I would always kill a project.
00:25:04.960 --> 00:25:12.799
One of the new things that I've really enjoyed doing have been these long River Thames walks.
00:25:12.960 --> 00:25:17.839
And I started a recent one of those at Batsea Power Station and walked back to Kingston.
00:25:18.079 --> 00:25:24.559
And one of the reasons for starting at Battersea was just that there's a tube station there, so it made it a convenient start point.
00:25:24.799 --> 00:25:28.960
But also Batsey Power Station has always fascinated me.
00:25:29.200 --> 00:25:43.359
I remember passing it on the train as a child many times or seeing it on TV and being struck not only by its size but its solid art deco, ridiculously massive industrial form.
00:25:43.519 --> 00:25:46.000
And I always wondered what it would be like to go inside.
00:25:46.400 --> 00:25:58.000
I've got a vague memory of recurring dreams from childhood, maybe on the borderline of nightmares, about vast brick structures, like big industrial brick structures.
00:25:58.240 --> 00:26:03.200
So there's something about Battersea Power Station that both fascinated me and unsettled me.
00:26:03.599 --> 00:26:09.519
I could imagine going in there and being simultaneously awe inspired and overwhelmed.
00:26:09.759 --> 00:26:13.759
And the power station's been there for a long time, it has a rich history.
00:26:13.920 --> 00:26:27.759
The first part of it was built in 1929 with Station B, the second part was finished in the mid fifties, and each station added two chimneys to it, and it gives it that iconic four chimney structure that we now know.
00:26:27.920 --> 00:26:35.599
And at the time it was one of the largest coal-fired power stations in Europe, and its peak it supplied around 20% of London's electricity.
00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:49.680
But then after over 50 years of operation, it closed in 1983 just because of the viability of coal-fired power stations becoming very inefficient and far more polluting than other alternatives.
00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:53.519
So it closed and just sat there, falling apart.
00:26:53.680 --> 00:26:55.599
And it's a grade two listed building.
00:26:55.759 --> 00:27:03.839
So it got into a bit of a bind where you can't do anything with it, but because you can't do anything with it really, it was just falling apart.
00:27:04.079 --> 00:27:10.880
But eventually it was bought and redeveloped by a Malaysian Development Corporation and it reopened to the public in 2022.
00:27:11.279 --> 00:27:15.759
And even though I've passed it quite regularly, I've never actually been in since it reopened.
00:27:15.839 --> 00:27:21.039
So when I got out of the tube at Battersea, I thought, oh, I could just pop in here finally and have a look.
00:27:21.279 --> 00:27:23.200
And I was really excited by this.
00:27:23.359 --> 00:27:29.200
I imagined walking in this cavernous, eccentric Art Deco turbine hall.
00:27:29.359 --> 00:27:32.319
I mean they had marble floors in a power station.
00:27:32.400 --> 00:27:35.759
It's like eccentric art deco design.
00:27:36.000 --> 00:27:42.880
And I'd read that these big halls evoked the experience of being in a cathedral of power.
00:27:43.119 --> 00:27:48.960
But as I walked through the doors for the first time, I experienced the opposite of that.
00:27:49.440 --> 00:27:57.039
I just experienced a massive sense of disappointment and sadness because I found myself in a shopping mall.
00:27:57.119 --> 00:28:01.279
And it was a shopping mall that looked like a shopping mall anywhere else in the world.
00:28:01.599 --> 00:28:12.160
Like low ceilings, fluorescent lights and generic stores, and very clean and uniform, and you could win like a Ferrari in the middle of the floor.
00:28:12.240 --> 00:28:14.720
And I was thinking, where where are all these high ceilings?
00:28:14.960 --> 00:28:18.720
Where's all this Art Deco industrial brick?
00:28:18.960 --> 00:28:21.599
And I thought maybe this is just one part of it.
00:28:21.759 --> 00:28:25.200
And so I tried to get out, but I got trapped.
00:28:25.440 --> 00:28:28.559
It's like there's only one way in and one way out of this shopping mall.
00:28:28.720 --> 00:28:33.440
And so I asked some someone like how do you get out and realised I had to go back the way that I came.
00:28:33.680 --> 00:28:40.480
But by the time I got back outside, I was so discombobulated and disappointed by this experience, I decided to just head home.
00:28:40.720 --> 00:28:54.960
And the gap that I experienced between what I'd imagined for so many years and what I found felt like biting into a much anticipated exotic fruit, only to discover it had gone rotten in the middle.
00:28:55.119 --> 00:29:00.559
And I spent the next few hours on the walk home wondering why this had disturbed me in this way.
00:29:01.119 --> 00:29:23.839
And I've since found out there's some areas of the building that are a bit more reflective of the original space, but even those have had their openness broken up by new floors and mezzanines and escalators, and that original openness throughout the whole structure has been subdivided, and looking at photos of these areas just leaves me with a sense that something important has been lost here.
00:29:24.079 --> 00:29:26.400
And I recognise part of this reaction is personal.
00:29:26.480 --> 00:29:33.440
It's like I love the idea of big empty spaces and abandoned industrial structures.
00:29:33.599 --> 00:29:39.839
But the way the Battersea has been repurposed made me curious about what it says about modern society more broadly.
00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:49.920
Because it felt like the soul of the building had been carved up and packaged into bite-sized chunks of commercial modernity without sounding too pretentious.
00:29:50.160 --> 00:29:57.200
And it's true that the building was falling into disrepair, so arguably this redevelopment saved it, but at what cost?
00:29:57.680 --> 00:30:07.839
And what does it say about the current climate when the only way we can save something beautiful is by making it more like everything else and making it entirely commercial?
00:30:08.079 --> 00:30:17.839
The German philosopher Walter Benjamin wrote a lot about art and culture and modernity and how mass reproduction can change our relationship to meaning and experience.
00:30:18.079 --> 00:30:21.519
And one of his core ideas was what he called a loss of aura.
00:30:21.680 --> 00:30:30.640
And that's when something is reproduced or standardized to such an extent that it loses its unique and unrepeatable presence.
00:30:30.880 --> 00:30:38.960
And he describes aura as an object's presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be.
00:30:39.279 --> 00:30:48.480
And when that uniqueness is eroded through standardization and the norms of modern commercial design, that unique aura begins to fade.
00:30:48.799 --> 00:30:53.039
So through this lens, yeah, the building of Batsea Power Station remains.
00:30:53.279 --> 00:30:57.599
But what constituted its presence has been fundamentally changed.
00:30:57.839 --> 00:31:05.519
And that modernization and subdivision of the space means that the meaning we make of the building, it's changed forever.
00:31:05.839 --> 00:31:19.519
The place I imagined I would encounter with a sense of reverence and awe has been commoditized in a way that it comes with his own instructions about what meaning I should make of it, rather than leaving me to uncover it in my own way.
00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:26.960
The anthropologist Mark Orgay will probably describe the modern interior of Battersea Power Station as a non-place.
00:31:27.200 --> 00:31:33.759
And he talks about non-places as being a space that lacks identity, history, and meaningful human connection.
00:31:34.079 --> 00:31:41.359
And non-places seem to be an inevitable byproduct of capitalism, like airports, shopping malls, etc.
00:31:41.839 --> 00:31:51.759
Where the unique meaning of an empty space is flattened as it's turned into something that can be compartmentalized and replicated just to generate profit.
00:31:51.920 --> 00:31:54.799
And a similar pattern shows up in the natural world.
00:31:55.039 --> 00:31:59.200
Ecosystems thrive when they're allowed to remain messy and complex.
00:31:59.440 --> 00:32:07.119
And when human beings neaten them up and control them just for our consumption, they lose their natural diversity and vitality.
00:32:07.680 --> 00:32:18.960
And a number of years back I met the forester Jim Riley when we were recording the Glendire podcast, and he spoke about the art of forestry and the importance of forests being allowed to remain biologically untidy.
00:32:19.039 --> 00:32:23.440
And Jim made a distinction between that and what he called golf course forests.
00:32:23.680 --> 00:32:31.359
Golf course forests are forests that have been landscaped and artificially tidied up for the ease of human use.
00:32:31.759 --> 00:32:38.160
But in nature, messiness equals diversity, and that diversity and messiness equals resilience.
00:32:38.400 --> 00:32:42.799
But by contrast, there's a fragility to a golf course forest.
00:32:43.039 --> 00:32:48.640
It becomes more of a monoculture and it's much less able to adapt and respond to inevitable change.
00:32:48.880 --> 00:32:55.599
And for me, this is why our messy, biologically untidy, creative self-expression matters.
00:32:55.920 --> 00:33:01.519
There's a constant pull to tidy it up and make it more palatable and more easily consumed.
00:33:01.680 --> 00:33:05.359
But something essential and unique is lost in that process of doing so.
00:33:05.519 --> 00:33:22.480
And in the same way that monocultures reduce resilience in nature, a kind of human monoculture begins to emerge when we all start to move towards replicable golf course creativity, because it fits more comfortably within the structures of a capitalist algorithm driven society.
00:33:22.640 --> 00:33:32.160
It can prove more and more difficult to be creatively biologically untidy in a world where what's valued and prioritized is the opposite.
00:33:32.400 --> 00:33:41.119
What I experienced as absent in Battersea and what often feels absent in many modern spaces is that invitation to awe and mystery.
00:33:41.359 --> 00:33:50.480
That sense of encountering something I don't fully understand, and then I've got to make meaning of it through my own imagination because of its utter uniqueness.
00:33:50.720 --> 00:34:00.160
And whether that's a building or a forest or our own way of making a mark in the world, when everything becomes more uniform, something essential disappears.
00:34:00.480 --> 00:34:18.880
So it feels vital to resist the pull towards golf course creativity, and instead know that our messy, unique, imperfect and uncensored creative self-expression is really what makes us and society more resilient and fascinating and awe inspiring.
00:34:19.519 --> 00:34:20.639
It's dark now.
00:34:20.719 --> 00:34:22.159
I don't know how that happened.
00:34:22.320 --> 00:34:28.000
That felt like a rant, but hopefully it made sense and is of interest to you.
00:34:28.239 --> 00:34:31.199
And I need to stop there because we're up on time.
00:34:31.599 --> 00:34:39.599
Couple of things before I go, one of the other things that I've loved about doing this podcast is it's connected me with other podcasters around the world.
00:34:39.760 --> 00:34:44.239
I was on Jim the Podcast Shopper's podcastpics a couple of months back.
00:34:44.400 --> 00:34:54.480
And recently I met Heather who presents Creatively Eccentric, which she describes as a podcast about radically redefining what it means to be a creative in a world that still prefers conformity.
00:34:54.800 --> 00:34:59.119
So it feels very appropriate to all of the stuff I've just been talking about.
00:34:59.360 --> 00:35:10.960
Heather and I had a lovely meandering conversation about all things creative and the importance of messiness and the importance of moving towards our own natural-born weirdness.
00:35:11.199 --> 00:35:16.400
And the episode that we did together is called Why Being Misunderstood Might Be Your Creative Superpower.
00:35:16.639 --> 00:35:19.199
And I'll put a link to it in the podcast notes.
00:35:19.280 --> 00:35:25.519
So if you want to jump from here to Heather's podcast, there's loads of other episodes and guests on it, then please do.
00:35:25.679 --> 00:35:31.199
And if it's the kind of thing you do and have time to do it, then subscribe and rate and review Heather's podcast.
00:35:31.519 --> 00:35:37.360
Because that type of thing means a lot and it's vital to support independent podcasters.
00:35:37.760 --> 00:35:49.840
So independent podcasts that are just done because people are passionate about the subject don't get buried in this deluge of big budget corporate celebrity shows.
00:35:50.239 --> 00:35:52.000
And same goes for mine as well.
00:35:52.159 --> 00:35:57.360
If you want to rate and review and share, then it just helps not get too swamped.
00:35:57.920 --> 00:36:02.239
I have some open studios coming up in April and May.
00:36:02.320 --> 00:36:08.320
If you want to come and hang out in my brain for a bit in my studio, I'll put a link to those in the podcast notes.
00:36:08.400 --> 00:36:12.639
And then there's some workshops and stuff that I mention every episode.
00:36:12.800 --> 00:36:16.079
I'll put a link to them in the podcast notes as well.
00:36:16.400 --> 00:36:18.000
But thank you so much for joining me.
00:36:18.159 --> 00:36:21.679
Episode 12 will be out on the 15th of May.
00:36:21.840 --> 00:36:33.760
And hopefully I'll be recording episode 12 with the background sound of hundreds of bees and bugs and butterflies frolicking in my wildflower garden.
00:36:38.800 --> 00:36:40.079
But thank you so much for listening.
00:36:40.159 --> 00:36:41.280
I'll speak to you next time.
00:36:41.440 --> 00:36:42.480
Bye for now.
