Are We Nearly There Yet?

Photo by Norbert Kundrak

Every day we can decide whether we want to participate in a process of normalisation, or whether we choose to be somehow ‘removed’ from this condition or place. Set apart, we can question what is perceived and portrayed as normal or accustomed, to what extent we might wish to disrupt this, and where such action might take us.

The peculiar realm of ‘normalisation’ can, and usually does, lead to monopolies of production. This understanding does not only implicate physical and material processes of making things, but also of regulation of mental production that determines how (we think) we think and act, as well as where and why we do this.

Behind the monopoly are often authorities, regulators, or gatekeepers of the normal and the orderly. These bodies or entities are often motivated to regulate things through other endorsed factual, material or fiscal value, and where this value is measured against other comparable outputs or assets of value.

So, where something ‘unfamiliar’ may not initially be afforded space, platform, or dignity, it may never assume the significance and potential it merits until the ‘something’ garners respect and value through extended contact and proximity.

But where, this procedure may be ‘protected’ or managed by the authority, the ‘something’ may no longer be new knowledge by the time it is formally disseminated. In this instance, its currency may be significantly diminished, compromised, or entirely lost.

For many, even those enlightened, an absence of the familiar can prove more palpable than the presence or potential of the unfamiliar. Often, it is not until something begins to accrue context that it will develop cultural presence, significance, and ultimately value.

“…it is more important for an ideal or strategy to be captivating than for it to be right.”

So, there arises a concern about how we locate and nurture places of unfamiliar creative inconsistency. But, rather than the idea of ‘place,’ and especially the end place, it should be the expectancy, the journey, and active engagement with states of unfamiliarity that will really matter. This itinerary is surely the one that will yield compelling new knowledge and new forms of adventure.

And, if it is ‘tension’ that delivers adventure, then it is the particular chemistry of the known and unknown that will fuel real operational discovery, and which may establish principled, yet practical utopias for us.

In effect, it is more important for an ideal or strategy to be captivating than for it to be right. And, where this idea may be considered ‘pie in the sky,’ the assertion stands that where unfamiliar creative progress is ‘perilously’ nourished, at some point new markets always open up.

But first, find that way to be removed. All else comes from that.