A spell for LinkedIn

I appreciate the people here looking to educate, share resources and decolonise minds—not only around imperialist, racist, and patriarchal structures, but around the belief that economic growth is the primary metric by which we should value ourselves, others and "progress".

I also get that many people are just trying to get by. They want to promote their businesses, cheer on successes, humblebrag, thought-lead, boost morale. That's what this platform is for. If I want something else, I can go to another platform and look at humblebrags of kids and vacations instead. If I'm sick of that, maybe I'll read a book, talk to actual humans or take a nap, instead of getting mad about how social media doesn't reward full-spectrum humanity. It's here to make money, not fulfill me.

With that said—the emotional gotchas, the rage-baiting, the "us vs. them", the zero-sum self-righteous judgment flowing through here now? They're not helping anyone. They're not paving the way to enlightenment. It's fast-acting venom that's making us sick. I don't know what the long-term effects will be, but they won't be good. The nausea I feel after a cursory scroll feels like radiation poisoning.

Stories are powerful. Words are powerful. Our energy is powerful, and it bleeds through screens. When I say "powerful" I don't just mean mentally. What impacts the body—our organs and cells, our guts and blood—starts in the mind and senses. We can heal and harm in the most literal sense without ever physically touching one another.

We can make each other ill for years, or try healing ourselves and those within proximity. We're responsible for wielding our powers mindfully.

It's important to understand this: Stories and words aren't just "technology," or vessels devoid of purpose. They live. They bite and suck and squeeze. They kill and maim. They can also restore, rejuvenate, and create fertile vivid possibility in concrete corsets over scorched earth. They can plant wild runaway gardens inside us and others.

May we use them kindly, judiciously and well. May we not poison just to poison, or curse others and ourselves. May we heal. I wish this for all of you and I wish this for me.

This little light of mine

A candle shot from the wedding of two friends.

I was reading about brothel candles, which populated European brothels between 1880 and 1905. The prostitute lit them as a timer, and you had until they ran out. (The candles are about the size and breadth of modern birthday candles, so maybe you're looking at 5 or so minutes? Definitely less than 10.)

This would be a good thing to implement for when somebody starts holding forth about a topic you just don't care about. You can lift a little birthday candle out of your pocket and hold it somberly aloft, and ideally they'd know they need to get all this out of their system before the flame hits bottom. Then you all have to move on, and they don't get to pick the next topic.

Blowing the candle out in bad faith would give them poor luck in that particular topic forever. Perhaps they'd develop an incapacity to get through it without stumbling over their words.

There are some logistical issues. You need to be able to stab a birthday candle into something, so the idea works best if you're in front of food. But you can also get a small conical ceramic holder for one single birthday candle, and just keep it in your pocket. 

I happen to own one, which I procured at a weekend market in Totnes. It's a fun worry item to roll between your fingers, while maximising your capacity to set up a single candle anywhere without losing time, which is of the essence when somebody starts venting about the same old shit, or getting way too excited about a topic that even the furthest-iterated parallel dimension version of you has no interest in.

That's my big idea. The world suffers from an overabundance of birthday candles, mostly forgotten in drawers. They merit purpose. We could get this off the ground so easily in the TikTok era.