Nothing, not one thing, hurts us more — or causes us to hurt others more — than our certainties. The stories we tell ourselves about the world and the foregone conclusions with which we cork the fount of possibility are the supreme downfall of our consciousness. Maria Popova
This project of mad scholarship and mad activism feels rather stuck, and here's why:
The Mad Studies course has been riddled with disruption. Staff strikes interrupted the modules and now a marking boycott leaves students wondering why on earth we should complete any assignments.
My PhD proposal was knocked back, and left dangling “like a lightbulb in some cheap motel.”
The study group I set up has had little traction, and few attendees.
The Mad Studies space on the Discord platform has fallen flat, with radio silence and nary a participant checking in these past few weeks.
The Edinburgh Mad Studies meetup group kicked off well enough, but in its second week no one showed up except the organisers.
The Glasgow Mad Studies meetup group has been met with little response.
So I sit here in the claypit, wondering why I'm making an effort at all – there are so many other directions that my energy could take me. And yet... “I'm like Rasputin: I get back up again.”
I'm not ready to throw in the towel. Not by a long shot, me. There's far too much good work to be done in this mad movement. There's so much that needs to change, about how we receive and care for the ones in our world who have cracked. Still so much to be learned. And still so many good seeds to be sprinkled out there, where it's true they may be blown away or eaten by birds or disappear without trace... but indeed they may also lodge somewhere to take root and eventually bloom.
All these discouragements piling up at my feet, I kick them aside and take another step forward.
In their book Active Hope, Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone tell the story of a Tibetan monastery that was destroyed in the Cultural Revolution:
… there was no guarantee that the monastery, once rebuilt, would not be destroyed again. That didn't stop the monks. They faced the uncertainty by bringing to it their intention. They assumed that since you cannot know, you simply proceed. You do what you have to do. You put one stone on top of another and another on top of that. If the stones are knocked down, you begin again, because if you don't, nothing will be built. You persist. In the long run, it is persistance that shapes the future.
The uncertainty may be supremely uncomfortable, but it is where the hope lies. I hold on, here in the claypit, and I think of one of my favourite words: persevere.
(Photo by Ramin Khatibi on Unsplash)