crazy calm

on may 28, 2024 i participated in an 'imaginarium' workshop called ‘what if our blooming is a threat? and i got a new a new nick name

note: listen to the audio version here

This workshop was about the art and story-form of Burlesque as a radical complexity proposition and was presented by the Wolf Willow Institute for Systems Learning, notably by faculty members Vanessa Reid, Laura Blakeman and guest artist, Dainty Smith. 

This was my second Imaginarium that I participated in. It's basically a practice space for building our complexity muscles and aims to bring what is known and unknown into a new inquiry that open different vantage points and lean into ‘embodied imaginings’ to access different kinds of intelligences.

And it worked. It was a lot of fun. 

One of the exercises suggested to us by Dainty Smith was to give ourselves a burlesque name in a playful and self-empowering way.

I dubbed myself ‘crazy calm’ explaining that I felt crazy to live in a time of imminent societal collapse (see accept | adapt | respond) but ignoring reality (denial) is far more crazy.

The calm part is an antidote to the craziness. 

As our poly-crisis deepens I think we need to nurture that calm, that extreme calm, in order not lose our minds in these crazy times. 

Therefore I now carry the burlesque name : ‘crazy calm’. crazy calm claude.

With gratitude to my fellow Imagenarium participants and to the brilliant and generous Imaginarium workshop leaders.