subvert the dominant paradigm. that's what beat writer and publisher lawrence ferlinghetti said. a kid in high school painted these exact same words on a wall opposite my english class. i would look at those words day after day, wondering what the hell that meant. para-digm. i enjoyed the sounds of that word, even though in high school i really could've cared less about what the dominant anything was. but that phrase always stuck with me. subvert the paradigm.



what is the paradigm? for ferlinghetti it's the dominant culture, the mainstream, the middle-of-the-road area where a form of mass hypnosis and unquestioned commercial and political propaganda passes for consciousness. the dominant paradigm is what "marginalizes other ways of being and thinking; it is what oppresses the human spirit, represses our mammalian natures and suppresses our godlike potentials. to subvert or change this dominant paradigm is to take action. to create real changes in the way we do things, the way we believe, make love, worship and spend or not spend money.



i don't even really know what mainstream culture is anymore. nike and mcdonalds are mainstream. but i love them. and i love my "underground hip hop" but the groups i love aren't really underground. to exist in this materialistic limbo of wanting everything brand named and everything have meaning is both liberating and terribly hypocritical. but we cannot always be slaves to our intentions and convictions.



the only thing that i try to do on a consistent basis is to think about the dominant "rights" and "wrongs" of interpersonal relations. i suppose because relationships consume so much of my life, i've had to think about ways of being pretty often. i don't like "shoulds." i don't like it when i have to do something for someone. i'm not really a giver, and when forced to give, i'm pretty resentful and bitchy. but it all stems from a solid base of thinking. i don't want to accept what the dominant means of establishing and maintaining relationships. i think everything should and could be challenged. but i find myself alone alot. on my ideas, ideals and thoughts. or i find myself tricked by people who verbally say they think like me but then act totally different. it's a tad frustrating. no. frustrating isn't the right word. it's a tad.....unfortunate.



friendships, relationships, to me, are not about giving. it's about exchange. you have to get something in return for your giving. this is clearly not my idea but i've adopted it lock, stock and barrel. there is no reason to be part of someone's life if all you do is give, give, give. even if i don't mind giving, it's still a spiritual crime to be in a -ship if you get nothing back. of course, don't we learn things from everybody in our lives? don't we get something out of everybody? but sometimes, when the tables turn and one party is depending too much on the other or when the friendship is not longer symbiotic, let it go.



but back to paradigm. the dominance of it. i'm trying really freakin' hard to break out of my dominant modes of thinking that i've held onto for the past three-four years. it's hard. to have new thoughts. to have new ideas. to hear the truth ring in a different tone. i've had certain ideas with me for so long that they've become "me." and i can't let them go and fairly evaluate them again. how to go from trangsgression to transformation to transcendence when you can't find step one? i'm not ready to settle into my personal dominant paradigm yet, at age twenty four. that's too sad. there should be parts of myself that are still up for sale. that are yet to be discovered. but i think people often go into college, concentrate on finding themselves, and then emerge with this image of them at a quarter century that they can't really shake. i think that's where i'm at a little bit.



i was never lost. but i was definitely found. and now i would like to be lost. just so i can be found again.