Expanding Mind

A conversation with designer and snowboarder Sijay James about archaic revivals, neotribal design, mystic powder, flow, and falling with style. 

A conversation with Scottish poet and novelist John Burnside about Henry Miller, the flight from society, sexual braggadocio, folk ballads, Taoism, and his arresting book On Henry Miller: or How to Be an Anarchist (Princeton). 

A conversation with alt-lit novelist, poet, and artist Tao Lin, about Terence McKenna, feeling happy (or not), degenerate humans, writing trip reports, and his refreshing new non-fiction book Trip: Psychedelics, Alienation, and Change (Vintage). 

A conversation with Ken Layne, the maestro of the Desert Oracle podcast and field guide, about Joshua trees, desert Christianity, Edward Abbey, military secrecy, and the mysterious (and smelly) Yucca Man of local legend.

A three-way idea fest with Marcus Boon and Gabriel Levine about art, discipline, self-care, crafting community, tikkun, and their rich and stimulating edited collection Practice (MIT Press).

A conversation with Brazilian anthropologist, conference programmer, and  chacruna.net editor Bia Labate: peyote politics, the bureaucratization of psychedelics, and working with indigenous leaders. www.bialabate.net

A sprawling conversation with my interlocutor and old pal Ed Phillips (aka Faustroll on Twitter) about revery, misery, irony, and the ethics of being real. https://congruenz.wordpress.com/

A juicy chat with occultist Joe Max about punk-rock sorcery, Cthulhu invocations, intensity and fear, and the power of chaos magic in rave-era San Francisco. 

A conversation with artist and independent scholar Bruce Rimell about psychedelic entities, evolution, and his new book They Shimmer Within: Cognitive-Evolutionary Perspectives on Visionary Beings. 

A conversation with classics professor James Romm about mortality, Stoicism, the ambivalent freedom offered by suicide, and his new book of Seneca translations, How to Die: An Ancient Guide to the End of Life (Princeton).