I shared the first draft with my paid subscribers a few weeks ago. And now…I present it to everyone!
I may not be very witchy these days, but I still can’t help but marvel at astrology. I really love it. It feels like no wonder, when considering astrological cycles, that as I begin my Saturn return in my 2nd house of possessions, income and values I am honing in on 1) what I value and 2) what is truly mine to keep and earn. It also feels unsurprising that I am rooting myself more deeply in a materialist understanding of the world and politics. Although given the focus I give to the civil war of a left-wing counter-culture, it doesn’t seem I’m actualizing that as fully as I could. I’m working on it. It’s a process.
A few weeks ago I was having a conversation with friends. I concurred with a friend who said that they want to begin focusing on what they stand for rather than what they stand against. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, as I continue publishing work in the world. So far I’ve been primarily focusing on my issues with cancellation campaigns (though what I really want to be doing is talking about neoliberal identitarianism more), but I haven’t put out much writing on what I envision In response, my other friend said that they are are fully comfortable being “anti-” because it makes it clear what they oppose.
I get stuck here. Because on the one hand, I think it’s important to fully delineate the problems with an idea, belief, behavior. Especially when it comes to dogma and deprogramming. It’s important to smash through denial and help people put words to fear, pain and confusion. For all that I want to write for me, I think it would be disingenuous to reject that I also do want to write for other people. For one, I don’t want people to anguish mentally over this like I did. Two, I want us collectively to move somewhere else, away from not only punitive harassment campaigns, but away from the authoritarian-impulse-driven ideology that rewards—really: necessitates—it. And so, I feel like I need to help people contend with cognitive dissonance. I don’t know if that can be accomplished solely through envisioning alternatives.
Standing against something, stating this opposition directly, can be orienting. In a way, I suppose it’s a boundary practice (forgive me the buzzword). It’s difficult to practice “for” if you don’t have a clear idea of what you will reject on the way to getting there. I wonder if standing in opposition is a natural state of development not only as a human in terms of age, but in terms of separation from anything that refused to grant you agency (or that you subsumed your agency to).
Or maybe it’s just dialectics. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis. Forging a path forward needs the synthesis of “for” and “against”, maybe.
So, to that end, in the spirit of paving a way forward, I present what I stand for and stand against. To navigate my way through the world, I need to have solid footing; I need an impenetrable foundation to root into. Clarifying values is necessary to live in integrity. Whenever you are confused about how to move forward, you remind yourself what you value. Then, you evaluate if and how the action you are about to take aligns with that.
I’ve named my “anti-values” points of refusal. I couldn’t find a particularly beautiful term for them, but I think this will do. These are concepts I refuse to act from. I refuse behaviors from others that are rooted in them, too.
I planned to write more extensively about these values and points of refusal. I’ve decided to make that a slower, long-term personal project. So for now, here are 7 guiding values and points of refusal. I decided on 7 unintentionally but I’m going to say it is a nod to my Enneagram type (7w8s hmu).
Values
Truth
Curiosity
Connection
Playfulness
Autonomy
Compassion
Solidarity
Points of refusal
Cruelty
Authoritarianism
Dishonesty
Confinement
Coercion
Inequity
Avarice
Amazing. I started journaling about mine after reading yours. Very hard to narrow down. These lists really resonate with me and I’m making a hard decision this week and your explanation of how to use your values really helps. I want to add paradox / duality to mine except it honestly ends up feeling confusing when it comes to making a decision rooted in values 😂
TENETS OF MONS
- Loyalty
- Vision (it was a toss-up between Ambition and Innovation)
- Playfulness
- Generosity
- Curiosity
- Autonomy
- Passion