In The Intensity

I've never experienced anything in my life like the last 4 months.  It's like somebody (probably me) took my 'life intensity' knob and turned it up to 11. In this picture, I'm on a 20 hour greyhound ride from Buffalo to Asheville, around November 16, 2013. I don't have many pictures from the ride, but I remember taking this one because I was just starting to get into the mountains, probably getting close to Tennessee, and despite the grey skies, I was extremely excited to see them. Between Asheville, and now this time in San Francisco I've spent, the mountainous terrain seems to reflect the ups and downs of this work I'm involved in, and the challenge of the steady upward climb.

Since I left the intentional household last March, I haven't had a place of my own exactly, but started hopping from place to place, going wherever the work on Metamaps, or personal pull, took me. First it was back to the farm where I grew up for 2 months, then it was to upstate Chatham NY for 2 months. After that, it was back to Waterloo to live with a wonderful lady in my life for 3 months. That takes me to November 2013, where you'll find me at the greyhound station in Buffalo, feeling terrified as I waved Alexandra off, both of us so uncertain of the future. So from that get go moment, things have been really intense. By that point in 2013 I've left the stable job that I had, the room that I had in Waterloo, I've discontinued my studies at the University of Waterloo, and we're redefining this important relationship in my life, all different aspects of being able to fully live into the possibilities of my passion for changing the world through my work on Metamaps. So of course on this bus ride I'm feeling scared. I'm leaving it all behind (not true, I'm carrying much of it forward) to spend 4 months in North Carolina dedicating the fullness of my life and time to personal growth and moving Metamaps forward, and even more uncertain is what comes after that. I was invited to spend time at Black Mountain SOLE during this period, and they would support me during that time so that I wouldn't have to be filling in the finance gaps with other work, which was exactly what I needed.

So I arrived at Black Mountain SOLE, and not surprisingly, it was intense. I welcomed it with open arms though, the chance to push myself harder and harder everyday, to learn more, to grow more, to work more, to play more. I think I dove into it so hard in that first month, nobody at Black Mountain SOLE really even knew I'd arrived until mid-December!

To paint a sweeping picture of my time at BMSOLE it was humble living quarters and a roommate, Ben Brownell, who I was also working with everyday; an elegant, spacious, bright (but sometimes frigid cold) work space with my multi computer multi monitor setup; delicious, nutritious (mainly quinoa and kale), home cooked meals prepped by SOLEmates on a rotating schedule; endless breathtaking views, and the crisp, clean air of the Appalachians, and many walks through the peaceful woods; friendly faces and bright spirits all about, designing, meditating, writing, video calling; adventure times with SOLEmates buzzing off into Black Mountain or Asheville to 'get into trouble', usually at some place like Dobra Tea;

So Ben and I worked long days. Usually he was working away in the hackpads (a wiki-ish website where he started our whole team into far more serious documentation practices) while I would be writing code, code, code. Either that or on video calls. Sometimes it felt like I lived on google hangouts and gmail, and the physical world was only a secondary one. Like when you question whether your dreams or this world are the real reality. I was having video conversations with my mom, my sister, my coach Yana, Alex, and many many calls to Ishan and Marija to coordinate the work, sometimes 3 or 4 hours a day. I just have to say, I have little but gratitude when it comes to Google, for all the things that they facilitate happening in my life. Since I bought a chromebook while I was at bmsole even more of my life runs on google, and I already had an android! My subheader should maybe read 'Connor Turland, brought to you by Google'. Ah well, I'll keep dreaming about my own personal cloud for now, and let that one work itself out a little bit later. Anyways, I don't think I've ever worked so hard in my life. Coding is particularly nefarious for that too though, at sucking you in to its intricate problems and leading you on into the depths of the night. Many a time it took someone or other coming to rescue me to pull me away from the infinite javascripting. A few highlights of the progress we made, and a teaser of the things to come down the road for metamaps: (I mention a few technical details here for the nerdier ones but feel free to just gloss over that stuff)

We built a collaborative realtime online coding environment where we can code metamaps together anytime anywhere. This is awesome because it lowers the barrier to entry for people wanting to contribute. (We used Firepad, which is the combination of firebase and codemirror)

We built a simple prototype of an app for capturing ephemeral subjective experiences :) (This one uses Jquery Mobile)

As part of the app, we were able to add image capture and uploading from mobile phones and tablets, which was really exciting. The prospect of being able to upload images to topics on metamaps will be at some point a really powerful addition. 

We made great progress towards being able to switch between the network view, a grid or list view, and a geographic map view dynamically. Combined with the mobile input into this realtime data interface, we're starting to get towards a really powerful collaborative data visualization and input tool. But this stuff is all far from being complete. Oh yeah, and for the map we used... the google maps api.

And finally! The very very new updates to the user interface of the live metamaps.cc website. This has been the result of the last 5 weeks of focused metamaps team development in particular, while we focused more on the organizational level discussions, documentation, and establishing governance patterns in the month prior. While the other developments are exciting, this is where the rubber actually meets the road because people are actively using the public metamaps.cc platform. Check out the featured maps section that's new to see some cool stuff: http://metamaps.cc/maps/featured

Working with the distributed 'metamaps open value network' as we've been calling ourselves recently, during this time was a pretty profound learning experience, as we all pushed and pulled and lead and followed, diverged and converged. You could feel the palpable friction of working together, that was polishing us all into smoother stones. We've been getting less and less afraid to play a little bit rough and tumble in one moment where it feels right, to being softer and uplifting in the next. I've learned many different ways of thinking about things through exposure to Ben, Ishan, Marija, Robert, and all the others. Not to act rashly unnecessarily, or self-indulgently. To never say "I can't do any more than I'm doing" because it's so unlikely that that's true: engage your capacity. Always be persistent at improving your processes, because the return is exponential; Always be learning on multiple levels. Don't settle for how things are, push, pull and ask hard questions to illuminate the possibility spaces. I feel blessed to be working with this inspired group, all of whom push me to be the better me, all of us striving to live our lives in integrity, and in service. As Marija said recently, the real work that we do together that will last is the work that we do on ourselves, and I very much believe in that. But to close off my reflection on Black Mountain SOLE I want to share a picture from my last moments there, on February 11 2014.

Cheers to a brilliant group of inspiring change-makers and go-getters, who will all stick with me for a long time to come.

So where am I now? No longer at Black Mountain SOLE clearly, on February 11 I flew out here to San Francisco to spend a month. It's been a whirlwind. One that involved for one thing a whole lot more javascript than I was hoping, but we fit in some swell adventures in the mix as well! I came out here to stay with Ishan and Marija, as we familiarize more in the 3D world, and lay some plans for... well I'll get to that soon. The first week was full of hard conversations, as we transitioned into a configuration of sharing three lives in one space. Where do we find solitude, what do we do together? We went on some really neat trips to Purisima Creek Redwood Reserve south of the city, and also north of the city up to the seaside at Bolinas. Beautiful beautiful places both of them.

at Bolinas

photo by Marija, at Redwood Creek

After the first week, we had talked through enough, and were probably tired enough of it, that things smoothed out into other experiences. Mainly we continued to work hard to finalize the updates to metamaps.cc which we took on in mid-january, and also to plan for an upcoming remote demo-day that would happen in Waterloo. We were also excited to start meeting and talking with some smart, talented folks who are interested in bringing their design skills, and strategic thinking to metamaps, so we were building those relationships. Ishan was doing his sidecar taxi driving thing on top of all that, and Marija was doing some serious video editing. And all the while we were sneaking in episodes of house of cards here and there. I was writing code, code, code. We fit in some neat encounters like a trip to the exploratorium, where we got a free entry and a tour from someone who worked there who Ishan drove with sidecar one day! We also saw the Chinese New Year parade. For personal reference, I also want to make note of the trip to the Castro on my own to watch Her, the HTML5 meetup at Yelp, the angularJS workshop at General Assembly, the drive to San Jose and watching our friend Gabe Noel (who played the bass on GTA V I learned!) play an amazing jazz show and then going to Peggy Sues diner with him, and Thursday night dancing times. So that was San Francisco, where am I now??? Las Vegas, at the start of a road trip with Ishan and Marija across the US and back to Waterloo, where they are planning to spend the next three months with me! I can't believe we managed to get it all done before we left the city. Subletting their place for three months, the simple fact that the pieces all came together for us to be able to do this is a good sign. There are still many unknowns though, like where exactly in Waterloo we're going to be staying, so if you have any ideas for us, or want to support our work and this project, please talk to us! It will be interesting to see what cultural flavors we can introduce into the KW area. We're excited about being so close to many of the other metamaps collaborators who are also up in Waterloo area, and Ben might even make a visit up to spend some time with us all. A metamaps retreat of sorts! Our main focus though will be figuring out what further funding for the metamaps project looks like, pursuing options through grants, as well as opportunities to build a customization for a client. We'll see!

I'll try and post some updates here about how the road trip is going. Today went really well, both in terms of getting food, coordinating logistics, and everything. We're super grateful for the people who've offered some housing options for us along the drive, this would all be a lot more difficult without you! Tonights place is a safe haven in Las Vegas, away from the crazy lights of downtown, where they do healing ceremonies with plant medicine, so its particularly neat to be here. Tomorrow, we have some time for outdoor adventures as we move into Utah, and we're all immensely excited to be seeing Zion National Park. Onwards, further into the intensity!

The three of us still at their SF apartment, moments before leaving

Why I'm Leaving The Best Bachelors Degree I Know

This fall, I'm not taking any more courses at the University of Waterloo, but haven't finished the degree, and I have to say that I'm absolutely delighted about it. I've come to believe that most of higher education is a racket, a system designed contrary to the overall well-being of myself and my peers, and I'm deciding to do something different. The curvature of my interaction over time with the university reflects my true learning these past 4 years quite well I think. 

I went from starting in Computer Science co-op at UW borrowing all the money for my fees, quickly switching into Knowledge Integration (the best bachelors degree I know, and also halved my costs and doubled my fun) and then slowly reducing my course load semester by semester, so that I could stop borrowing money and work part time to pay for school, until last year I was taking just one course per semester (each one a KI course).

There were so many factors involved in this gradual reduction: a slow discovery of the higher ed loan racket, a growing understanding of dwindling job prospects relative to a degree, growing thoughts a 9-5 job would never fulfill me anyways, disenchantment with most UW classwork and professors (outside of Knowledge Integration), and increasing enchantment with learning outside university walls, within an intentional household, as a web developer, through travel, and online learning and conversation.




These are some guiding words from Zendo56, the intentional household where I've lived these last few years. Click the image to see the rest of the steps of the 10 Step Neurotangle.

I thought about not enrolling multiple times, as I struggled to find the motivation, time, energy, or money to keep me "on the path".

I thought to myself, the best thing about the University is the community (especially and above all the Knowledge Integration one), but it's a damned expensive one. In these tricky economic times, is community not one thing that we can manage to have without paying for it? Well I will pay no longer... but stay to connected to the people I sure intend to.

Let me rant briefly:

The thing is, nobody is warning young people today about the higher education trap. And it kind of makes sense because it's a double bind. "Son, go to university and you'll end up back here in 4 years working at McDonalds paying off your $40000 debt, but don't go to University and you'll find yourself right off the bat in society's exploding lower class and never have a shot at working in any workplace that can provide you enough to buy a house and support a family."

To which the response would be "So dad, what the hell am I supposed to do?" But at least then, the question that needs to be asked, is being asked!

So young people desperately need to know what they're getting themselves into, either by going, or not by going to University or College, and we're doing a damn poor job of informing them.

So I'm done with it. I have my own chains ($15000 worth) of debt from my first two years at the University paying for it with OSAP to deal with now, and had to learn on my own that I didn't want to keep borrowing. It's a constant reminder of the system and it's capacity to entrap myself and others in its clutches.

This fall, I'm enrolling instead in a social experiment to provide young people with a different option. A learning institution brought up to speed with the 21st century, and the paradigm shift underway (You see, I think Knowledge Integration is a good start at this, but it's placement within the University of Waterloo severely constrains it's ability to innovate on the traditional University model). I'm sad and excited to share with the Knowledge Integration community this news that come November I'll no longer be around as much, and dearly miss my friends and fellow students there. Black Mountain, North Carolina is calling my name! They've started there a project called Black Mountain SOLE, a self-proclaimed self-organized learning environment for higher education. They offer no credentials, and charge no tuition (just pay for food and housing), and will fund many stu-people who pass through there on a pay-it-forward basis, which is how I'm going. They're building a place where self-directed people can come into a shared space to actualize their potential through being together. Black Mountain SOLE is taking a true stab at elevating the potential of higher education, within the context of society's shifting foundations. To show my support for the model, and to benefit from what they're doing,  I'm going with two other people, one from UW, and one from LA to work on the project that I began coding last year, Metamaps.

I'll draw a parallel between the choices I'm currently making in my life, and the choices we need to make as a society, and the human race. To some, my choices look "risky". In March this year I quit my job to work on Metamaps, and now, I'm leaving the University without my degree to work on Metamaps. Why?? Because Metamaps has a real (moon)shot at making the difference we need in the world by activating the potential of the internet to help us solve the complex problems we face in the world together, using the intelligence of everyone. And "why" is important! I didn't make those choices because I'm foolish, or lazy; I made them because the risk of not taking action (or taking the traditional path), outweighs the risk of taking action. We're at that point in history. We can't run from it. We, as a society, and as young people, have to make our way in the world in ways never before attempted, because the world has never been this way. Believe me, it has taken great courage on my part, and will demand the same of you if you choose to forge new pathways. But I feel good doing it because I know many people will, if not follow in my footsteps directly, use the same principles that I used for making choices, to make theirs and their difference in the world.


p.s. don't get me wrong for being point blank against university. If you've sorted out that being at University is how you really and truly want to pursue your calling, I respect that, and I want to add as a final note that I can't recommend any program more than I would recommend Knowledge Integration. If you want to know more specifically about why I think this truly is one of the worthwhile programs, comment and ask.

p.s.s. some of the metamaps team has profiles on the Black Mountain SOLE website where you can read further about our personal learning paths.
http://blackmountainsole.org/blog/portfolio/connor-turland/
http://blackmountainsole.org/blog/portfolio/robert-best/

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As an addon to this blog post here's some resources for further reading:

Matt Taibi of the Rolling Stone lays out the Student Debt scenario in the States, where it's even far worse than Canada, but closely related: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/ripping-off-young-america-the-college-loan-scandal-20130815?page=2

This one called 'Why Your College Degree Doesn't Mean S**t' talks about how getting a degree isn't something that will make you stand out anymore.

You want to do more than just “get some crappy job.” You want to truly make an impact, a real contribution… you want to give a piece of your best self. And you want to find someone who will pay you for it.

http://www.theunlost.com/work/why-your-college-degree-doesnt-mean-sh/

How about 'Should Higher Education Be Free?, posted just recently to the Harvard Business Review.

Since 1980, we've seen a 400% increase in the cost of higher education...

It tells how even Google is increasingly hiring people without a college education degree, based on the true initiative and smarts that person has shown, beyond what grades can tell.  It's a great read.
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2013/09/higher_education--for_free.html