NitN 37 - Queen of Cups (Nintozen: The Sustainability of Radical Rest)

Nintozen—a moniker meaning, among other things "survival-to-transcendence"—eloquently articulates the case for an almost monastic level of disentangling ourselves from the addictions we call "rest," and cultivating the true, sustainable, peace.

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Intro!

Look anywhere—at almost any conversation—and you’ll see people trying to persuade each other in one of four main ways.

We’ll explore them as methods to keep someone else’s boat from crashing into a rocky shore. All too often, after all, we tend to believe that unless we convince our debate opponents of some noble truth, the result will be catastrophe. Sometimes, it seems, we make some random internet stranger an effigy for the entire cultural trend that we believe is piloting the downfall of western civilization and our disagreements with them feel so profoundly important that we become desperate. We become so desperate to convince others of the errors of their ways that we lash out and even do ourselves harm.

You can even see this in the hundred-character-at-a-time mini-vitriol sessions that sprout up on TikTok.

First method: you can do what I’m doing right now. You can be the light house. Illuminate the rocky shoreline and announce danger. Inform the Captain of the imperiled vessel and let them make a choice for themself.

Through bringing light to dangerous situations, you can uncover objective truth, you can weave compelling narratives, you can sparkle with studies, numbers and sources and you can set yourself up perfectly to say “I told you so” when the other person, most likely, ignores your advice.

An alternative method is to cannonball the fuck out of the ship. This is the Ben Shapiro method. Prevent the ship from hitting the shoreline by bludgeoning it with cries of “fallacy!” and rationalizations meant to stump and pure, unadulterated viciousness. Obviously the best case scenario is that you sink the ship before it meets the disaster it’s on course to, but this strategy might make you feel important and powerful.

Option three is to be the ninja who sneaks aboard and commandeers the other boat. With the right social awareness, empathy, charm, intelligence and outright manipulation, you might actually be able to engineer the prevention of catastrophe. If you have this ability, use your powers for good, for the love of God. Please.

Or! The fourth option: to simply be the water. To push and pull the ship gently. To hold it. Hold space for it. To calm yourself completely and become navigable. To deescalate down to a subtle lapping chop that gently caresses the boat’s hull and thereby ferry it gently to safety. This, in my opinion, is the definition of incarnating as love. When you hear people talk about Ram Dass or his guru, this is the enlightened energy you hear them describing.

Work on yourself until you can hold the unconditional positive regard that ignites self-love to the degree every Captain needs to steer themselves away from calamity.