Sub/Conscious Meanderings

Prime Objec­tive 16 is to pub­lish Gray­mat­ters, a peri­odic pub­li­ca­tion that serves as an incu­ba­tor for ideas, a sound­ing board for rants, a cel­e­bra­tion of excel­lence, and a lab­o­ra­tory for typo­graphic experimentation.

This post is the first article/essay in issue 1. The plan is to have peri­odic arti­cles posted here and on a com­pan­ion blog, that is yet to be designed. In the end I’d like to have each edi­tion printed and sold, but we’ll see if that get’s off the ground.

A man­i­festo seems appro­pri­ate at the start of this par­tic­u­lar new ven­ture. This man­i­festo does not pro­pose to become the source of a rev­o­lu­tion­ary new art form or polit­i­cal move­ment, nor does it assume its exis­tence will make any sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tion to the his­tory of the world. Its only sup­po­si­tion is that of indi­vid­ual quality—specifically of thought, of pas­sion, and of action. I applaud those who gov­ern their lives by these three quin­tes­sen­tial human qual­i­ties and seek to asso­ciate with them. How­ever, a decrease in their appar­ent­ness within mod­ern soci­ety has cre­ated a need for resur­gence.* Too many care­less wan­der­ers have taken the places of mind­ful labor­ers. Medi­oc­rity rules where excel­lence once did. Rather than accept­ing com­pla­cency with bowed head, I pro­pose a return to cre­ative exis­tence; a return to self-initiated value of integrity and virtue—not dic­tated by another man’s con­science, but by my own. No longer will I be weighed down by any­thing other than my own expectations.

Thought, pas­sion, and action have recently become the dri­ving forces in how I approach most things, not just design. The inter­play of these three attrib­utes, prop­erly bal­anced allow for immense growth. As I look back on times when I have felt a great sense of accom­plish­ment, these three have been per­fectly bal­anced.
Each cor­re­sponds to a part of liv­ing: men­tal, emotional/spiritual, and phys­i­cal. The three are depen­dent upon each other and I upon their col­lab­o­ra­tion. When one out­weighs another, I find myself less than my best. Their order is impor­tant also. My father used to say some­thing that has stuck with me: “Thoughts lead to actions, actions lead to habits, habits cre­ate a char­ac­ter, and char­ac­ter builds a life.” The most key part of that process lies within thoughts to actions. Thoughts ini­ti­ate pas­sion which dri­ves action, and the sub­se­quent sum of actions cre­ate a life. My aim is to cre­ate one worth remembering.

Gray­mat­ters is intented to serve as a cre­ative out­let for all three. First, and fore­most, this pub­li­ca­tion is intended to be thought-provoking, both for me, as the author, and for what­ever read­ers are per­suaded to pick up a copy and peruse. Sec­ond, Gray­mat­ters pro­vides a source of explo­ration within my pas­sion for design, and more specif­i­cally typog­ra­phy. Third, I hope that in some way, Gray­mat­ters will inspire another to fol­low their thoughts and pas­sions and act on them.

*A friend of mine, after read­ing this, com­mented that per­haps, it is not so much a decrease in the level of qual­ity in the world, but more likely an increase in my recog­ni­tion of what has always existed—that qual­ity is rare.

Unfor­tu­nately this is not a report of some debil­i­tat­ing dis­ease from a lab test gone bad that spreads through the pop­u­la­tion like wild­fire, turn­ing peo­ple into zom­bies. This is just me tak­ing account of my inabil­ity to write a blog post. Kinda pathetic really. But it’s a turn­ing point, even though it’s taken me a few days shy of a month to post the results of the begin­ning of my 29th year.

I’ve decided that New Year’s day is no longer Jan­u­ary 1st, it’s Sep­tem­ber 29th. Tech­ni­cally (at 8:01 p.m. MST), that day is when a new year of my life begins. The num­ber 29, for some rea­son or other has taken on a level of impor­tance that other advents have not. Per­haps it is because I turned 29 on the 29th dur­ing 2(00)9. Regard­less of the rea­son, I’ve selected 29 goals that I’m call­ing my Prime Objec­tives. (Cheesy and lame, I know. Make sure to com­ment about that. Lol)

In the end, I plan on improv­ing the qual­ity of my life over the next year, and the Prime Objec­tives are the means.