CURRENT MISSION

I am on a journey of discovery and invention. I suppose I could say a journey of discovery and (re) invention of myself, but that's not it. I am looking for that "bigger" self - the one which is known by its greater connection to other people and things.

ABOUT ME

People know me as a free and creative thinker. I love problem solving and challenging the status quo. Even great ideas are not off limits for me. Choose a side and I will play the devil's advocate. I do this playfully at times. Sometimes to be helpful to others when they are stuck. Sometimes as an exercise in creativity.

I collect experiences of ambience, enjoy the sublime and ineffable, and often enjoy the company of others in quietude. I don't really understand spiritual pursuit as something which can be separated from anything else, and I am given to mystical experience. Maybe this doesn't make sense. I'll working on refining the articulation.

I like reading in cafes and prefer real books over laptops (although if you see me, you'll probably see a laptop near by).

Before studying psychology, I owned an art gallery. I didn't make any money at it, but it was the best job I ever had. I guess I just like to sit there. I sit with art, I sit with books, I sit with people and for all that sitting, there is so much going on. Beautiful, beautiful worlds. One whole and a zillion moving parts.

PHILOSOPHY

I'm not sure what "personal" philosophy is. The notion is a bit diminishing to us philosophers. It is as I have said about spirituality. It does not exist as something separate from anything else. "Philosophy," in and of itself is but an abstract notion. Think what you think, ponder what you ponder, utter what you utter, choose what you choose, but don't call it "philosophy." There you go. I've probably revealed something of my personal philosophy. I'll leave you to wrap it up and put a name on it if you must.

Что привело меня на Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

This is what I wrote in 2010. I am only now, in 2022, resuming my involvement. This will give you a sense of my relationship with couchsurfing. This will need updating. As you will see below, I am NOW able to provide a couch again. I am not presently traveling myself.

From 2010:

I am new to CouchSurfing. I joined recently upon the recommendation of a friend. I recently sold all my possessions, and due to my "today's the day" philosophy which sometimes seizes me, gave more away than I sold. It was very liberating to be free of all the possessions which had possessed me. I fired myself from my job as a psychologist. All this to say, I am starting out in need of couches rather that providing them. Although I only have one friend at present who is an official "CouchSurfer," I have been giving my couch to people for extended periods of time for all my adult life. A Native American man temporarily displaced, a writer who was in town for mental health treatment, a college friend who was on a trek across America protesting storage of nuclear waste on Shoshone territory (he trekked twice), his Danish fellow trekker after my college friend had left, a musician kicked out of his girlfriend's apartment (his girlfriend was my close friend), a Kashmiri businessman debilitated by his worry for his family during an upsurge of violence back in Kashmir while he remained half a world away, an older man (my age) who had been camping out while trying to establish himself with work and shelter in Portland. So, I have been a lifelong "participant in spirit," but not officially (yet) with CouchSurfing.

I have much less experience surfing than I have providing shelter to others. I am trying to work on receiving as well as giving, but I suppose there is a learning curve.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Okay, it looks like I'm writing outside the box. I just explained much of this (above).

I have had many great experiences with the people who have stayed with me. Perhaps my Danish friend summed it up best. During his stay, he was repeatedly moved, it seems, to say in his Danish accent, "You Americans make me laugh!" It always made the rest of us laugh in that it helped us to see ourselves - both as American buffoons and as buffoonish individuals. No, I am not a self hating American My friend's humor helped us to appreciate ourselves in greater fullness. Sometimes we take ourselves too seriously and in doing so, cling too tightly to various illusions. Humor, well delivered, can catch us lovingly off guard.
Standing back, we humans are pretty funny in our folly and error and ridiculous gesticulations!

Интересы

Right now? Well I am going through an existential crisis (midlife crisis?) and am looking to manifest all the things I've long been interested in and have long neglected. Although, I have long been a writer, I have not published more than a few music reviews and my master's thesis. Although I am an artist, I've scarcely shown my work (although I did own my art gallery and have shown myself modeling for figure drawing classes). I am presently trying to learn French, and as well, the violin. I am looking for artist community and refuge and have come to believe I may need to search the world over in order to find what I want.

• arts
• writing
• books
• poetry
• exercise
• running
• modeling
• clubbing
• chess
• reading
• traveling
• cars
• juggling
• painting
• drawing
• magic
• music
• violin
• camping
• surfing
• skiing
• boxing
• soccer
• anthropology
• teaching
• emergency services
• psychology
• science
• sociology

Музыка, кино и книги

Okay, I'm sure this is a bit banal, but I like chamber music, ambient and experimental music, high and low film, and 19th-century literature. I like most art to have the end cut off - poems with the closing lines omitted, stories in literature or film (and even scientific publications) which end without conclusion, music which stops before I am ready.

I don't tend to like loud music. I don't like a lot of rock and roll or hip-hop. I will not read a best-seller. I will not read entire books which are based upon single ideas (which are often revealed start-to-finished in the books' title).

I like BIG art. I am into good design in all things - ordinary objects, interior and exterior architecture, urban landscaping ...

Books I've read and recommend include:
George Orwell: 1984/ Animal Farm
An Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen
Civilization and Its Discontents by Sigmund Freud
Dostoevsky, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and Kafka by William Hubben
Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman
Faust by Goethe
Frankenstein (or The Modern Promethius) - The 1818 Text by Mary Wollstone Shelly
Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World by Alan Weisman
Hermann Hesse: Demian/ Siddhartha/ Steppenwolff
Into the Silent Land: Journeys in Neuropsychology by Paul Brok
Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth by R. Buckminster Fuller
The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley
The Ethics of Ambiguity by Simone de Beuavoir
The Myth of Psychotherapy by Thomas Szasz
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
Walden Two by B.F. Skinner
The Crucible by Aurther Miller
The Stranger by Albert Camus
The Secret Life of Laslo Count Dracula by Roderick Anscombe
All the Sad Young Literary Men by Keith Gessen
Carlos Castenada: The Teachings of Don Juan - A Yaqui Way of Knowledge/ Further Conversations with Don Juan
Angel-Head: My Brother’s Decent into Madness by Greg Bottoms
Crime and Punishment by Fyofor Dostoyevsky
Alice Hoffman: Second Nature/ The Ice Queen
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
Illusions by Richard Bach
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Sleep Pale Sister by Joanne Harris
Daniel Quinn: Ishmael/ My Ishmael
The Giant’s House by Elizabeth McCracken
Kurt Vonnegut: The Sirens of Titan/ Welcome to the Monkey House/ God Bless You Mr. Rosewater/ Breakfast of Champions/ Slaughterhouse Five/ Player Piano/ Cat’s Cradle/ Mother Night
Paulo Coelho: Eleven Minutes/ The Fifth Mountain/ The Devil and Miss Prym/ Veronika Decides to Die
Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo
A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
Anais Nin: Children of the Albatross/ The Journals of Anais Nin - Volume 3
Them: Adventures with Extremists by Jon Ronson
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Set This House in Order by Matt Ruff
The Myth of Sanity by Martha Stout
Gödel, Escher and Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter
The Minds I : Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul by Douglas R. Hofstadter & Daniel C. Dennett
Douglas Adams: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy/ The Restaurant at the End of the Universe/ Life, the Universe and Everything/ So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones compiled by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki
Das Energi by Paul Williams
Be Here Now by Ram Dass
How Can I help? Stories and Reflections on Service by Ram Dass and Paul Gorman
A Hearttbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

Классная вещь, которую я сделал(-а)

Only one amazing thing? Hmm. I have constructed an unstructured autobiography and I will just put it out there. Please excuse the incomplete sentences. Here it is:

Christian’s Biography Unstructured

Been in a tornado
Jumped from a plane
Run over by a train
Killed a man (not really, but this does introduce an interesting story)
Been lost skiing, growing a 2 inch beard of solid ice
Been on fire
Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
Hiked the California redwoods
Hiked the spires of Bryce Canyon in Utah
Was 1 of 2 best readers in 1st grade, and before “gifted classes” was nearly skipped a grade
Most frequent feed back in grammar school was that I did not make good use of spare time
Won “Science Fair” awards in grades 1 and 2
In 9th grade was teachers assistant for an 8th grade science class
Was one of the 50 top high school science students in my city and was inducted into “Science Seminar” at the local university
Was president of my chess club
Was graduate school vice president of Psi Chi (an academic psychology honor society)
Was nominated and inducted into Phi Kappa Phi (an academic honor society)
Highest score on graduate school qualifying comprehensive exams
Top grades among peers in graduate school (Dean’s and President’s lists)
Was Teachers Assistant and Graduate Assistant in graduate school
Published my masters thesis
Masters thesis referenced in a presentation to the US congress in 1997
Have written at least 50 complete songs
Have disastrously performed a few of these in public
Have been in a bluegrass band
Currently (2011) am learning violin
Have been given credits on a CD of experimental music
Managed a small music venue (300 - 600 people) in college
Ran a 24 channel soundboard for a municipal amphitheater
Helped to wire the amphitheater’s stage in its construction
Sold my first watercolor painting at age 10 for $5.00
Won a regional watercolor award in 7th grade
Have shown my drawings and paintings a few times publicly
Earned money in college posing nude for figure drawing classes
Owned and operated an art gallery for awhile
Have frequented the Nelson-Atkins Gallery of Art in Kansas City
Have frequented the Chicago Institute of Art in Chicago
Have been to the Louvre and D’Orsay in Paris
In 5th grade wrote and acted in a play which was censored by the teacher
Wrote a play at 18 which was performed in a number of states
Introduced my parents’ church to professional theatre lighting and effects
Directed a play once
Have acted in an original play on a small stage
Have acted and sung in a musical production of Bertolt Brecht’s “The Good Woman of Setzuan”
Managed a dinner theatre production
Have legally married two straight couples and four lesbian couples
Was the “maid of honor” for a friend at her wedding
In high school, constructed a functional “bed of nails”
Have felt the dying pulse of a red tailed hawk
Have felt the dying pulse of a 4 year old girl
Raised Lazarus (no, not “the” Lazarus, but this does introduce an interesting story)
Carved tombstones for awhile during college
Built agricultural buildings with concrete, steel beams and sheet metal
Worked the bread industry ingrain silos, flour mills, and bakeries
Worked the printed word in two printing presses, two bookstores, and once as a newspaper deliverer
Worked once as a garbage man and several times as a janitor
Been in sensory deprivation tanks
Been in sweat lodges with the Potawatomie
Owned approximately a dozen cars
Lived in the countryside 3 times
Have had psychotherapy several times with the longest continuous period being one year
Have had therapy at the Process Work Institute in Portland, Oregon
Have had therapy at the Menninger Clinic in Topeka, Kansas
In college, was the coordinator of a suicide crisis line
Worked 6 years as an aide in a state psychiatric hospital
As of 2011, have practiced as a psychotherapist for 15 years and have been licensed for 12
Have been in jail twice (one hour each time)
Have been homeless against my will one time, but never “on the street”
Presently (2011), am voluntarily homeless and have sold most of my possessions in order to travel
Have had a gun drawn on me by police
Have been handcuffed by police
Have represented myself in court and won cases
Have written at least 50 completed poems
Wrote published record reviews at age 16 for a national magazine
Was only male in a “Psychology of Women” class
Was only male in a “Women Against Rape” (WAR) rally
Was only male working in a “Womens’ Resource Center” on a college campus
Attended Burning Man 4 times
Seen the Blue Man Group twice
Saw Allen Ginsberg read Howl at Kansas University
Talked with Todd Rundgren (about football!)
Met US President Jimmy Carter
Got in to see US President Ronald Reagan speak using a black man’s ID
Know how to juggle
Once owned a unicycle which I never quite mastered
Broke my nose twice (once on the back windshield of a car and once on a man's fist)
Spent a day in New York City
Went to the top of the World Trade Center
Been to the top of the Sears Tower in Chicago
Been to the top of “The Arch” in St. Louis
Been to the top of the Space Needle in Seattle.
Have been to British Columbia in Canada twice (once to Victoria on Vancouver Island and once to the city of Vancouver)
Have spent the night in Ottawa, Canada
Have spent the night in Las Vegas visiting the casinos
Spent 10 days in Paris in 2009
Presently (01/2011) awaiting approval for a visa to visit St. Petersburg, Russia for 30 days
Have designed and maintained more than a half dozen websites on the internet
Have shared my home and couch with many travelers, strangers, and friends
In college, focused on psychology, philosophy, sociology, and anthropology and as I think on it, did before college, and continue to do so today.

Учу, учусь, делюсь опытом и информацией

This profile is a work in progress. I will think on this.

Чем я могу поделиться с хостами

Hmm. Also a question I will need to ponder.

Где я побывал(-а)

Australia, Austria, Estonia, Fiji, France, Italy, Malaysia, New Zealand, Poland, Russian Federation, Singapore, United States

Где я жил(-а)

United States

•