Day 16 - Jan 16th
FLASH
In the silk folds of a dream,
I gunned an amber light.
It was pitch night,
And the staccato flash
Told me the tab-keepers
Were due.
Forgive them, Father,
For they know not what they do.
Like Zacchaeus,
In his little tree:
"I can’t see! I want to see!"
Give them their pocket money.
Let them have it.
Niall Campbell
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This poem was a challenge I set for myself—to consolidate and write it in minutes. There’s not much to it. It emerged from a dream where I chose to run an amber light —not in a cavalier way, but as a decisive act.
Dreams often feel like a direct channel to the unconscious. I encourage clients to unpack them because they usually need very little editing.
This dream felt positive because it revealed clarity about following my path and my Dhamma. Near-term choices often feel wrong—dicey, even transgressive—where the best outcome might be a fine, and the worst could be a collision and public humiliation. Yet the act held its own kind of truth.
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I’m not particularly fond of terms like "neurotypical" or "neurodivergent." They can sometimes lean into cheap tribalism. That said, it’s fair to acknowledge that modal cognition—what’s considered standard or typical—doesn’t account for everyone. The neurotypical way of being has, of course, built the world around itself, but many people feel like they’re navigating its margins, searching for unprotected flanks where they can gain a foothold in the mainstream.
Maybe everyone feels this way to some degree. But I think creatives feel it more acutely, viewing it as both an opportunity and a burden. On some level, we all want to fit in and belong. Yet the rules and structures of this world—rules I accept as necessary—can sometimes feel oppressive.
I don’t think it makes you an anarchist to feel this way or to express it. Art, in its essence, is the more mature way to navigate these tensions and contradictions, creating space for yourself and others who feel the same.
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Dreams can feel like a rejection of this structure. Are they a solipsistic prison, or do they offer messages from the deep?
It’s easy to dismiss dreams as random synapses firing, post hoc rationalised into meaning. But that explanation feels hollow. What are they for, then? Are they inefficiencies in our biology, or do they offer something valuable—a whisper of insight or a creative spark?
Brilliant creatives often report breakthroughs originating in dreams: inventions, stanzas, solutions, proofs. For the rest of us, dreams might serve as a compass for distilling meaning, provided we hold their outcomes lightly.
Gunning an amber light isn’t always cavalier, nor is speeding. Context matters. Consider:
On a dry, open road, you miss a sign for a hamlet kilometres ahead. Doing 82 in an 80 zone, you’re caught in a notorious speed trap.
Or, on a rain-slicked road, battling hail, you drop to 70, still uneasy, only to be overtaken by someone doing 79 in an 80 zone.
You were speeding, he was not.
Both situations illustrate how rules, though necessary, are inherently arbitrary.
We must recognise that unthinking adherence to systems strips away human nuance. The artist, by contrast, resists. Creatives are a corrective force against dogma. We help relentlessly humanise everything.
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The fairness of this dream was affirmed by my emotional response. I wasn’t angry about the fine, nor did I feel like a naughty, impulsive boy deserving punishment. It was simply a “fair cop.”
This is what I call map respect versus territory respect:
The material world—the map—demands adherence.
Creativity—the territory—is where we pull from the ether, rendering new ground beneath our feet.
Once creativity exists, it too must adhere to the rules of the road. And while those rules may be arbitrary, there’s no use railing against them.
As my therapist says, “The world keeps a tab on artists.” You pay the taxman and move on, ensuring you stay solvent. The road is narrow and rough and will extract tolls and fines along the way.
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Neil Gaiman is fond of saying ‘You can't edit a blank page’. If you write upon this blank page, it will never again be the pure driven snow. It is no longer fit for the office printer. You can’t be wrong or judged. There will be no fine to pay. Similarly, if you never chase an amber light—just slow down like a good boy or girl and wait at the red light—you will never be wrong, you will never be fined.
The scribbled-upon blank page will probably be shit. Just like you may very well get a slap on the wrist from the fine department if you gun an amber light. It’s a machine that determines if you are speeding, not a human being with flesh and bones and gestalt discrimination. The judgement of either the mob or the machines does not matter.
It actually isn’t about the amber light you just ran or the shitty first draft you just wrote—it is about momentum. In Horrible Bosses 2, when the three feckless portagonists are plotting the heist for setting up a bag drop, Charlie Day’s character suggests a lot of absolute shit ideas (like zip-lining away from the cops). Once they come up with an actual polished plan, Chris Pine’s character says, “You had a lot of bad ideas that led to some good ones.” It’s a joke because his ideas were garbage, but this is actually the chronology of good art.
Fines galore, running ambers you had no business running, shitty first drafts—plenty of perfectly good printer paper ruined. But truly now, ruin the page. The blank page will never be ‘wrong.’ The draft may be. But the blank page will always be craven. And the shitty first draft will be anything but.
Society will keep tabs on its artists, but the prize at the end of the road will pay every tab, tithe, and toll along the way—with plenty left over.