The Alternative Culture - A Part of the Future

We all want to be a part of something.

A part of a family, a part of a couple, a part of a group, a part of a team, a part of a band, a part of a crowd, a part of society. A part of those with whom we feel we belong. A part of something that's bigger than ourselves.

I want to be part of the Future.

Culture.
[The customary beliefs, social form, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group]
In a way, the culture we choose for ourselves defines who we are.
Because we can always choose. We are all born somewhere, and it means something, but we can choose what we belong to.

I choose to belong to the Future.

Alternative culture.
It's easy to think, be and do as other people, and harder to think, be and do for ourselves.
Hard, but easier than you'd think, once you wrap your mind around it.

The Other Culture.
It's when you start thinking differently that you can begin to evolve.
And the option is there for you to select, in the alternative culture, where you can choose to be proud to be different, and think thoughts no one else is thinking -where you can choose to be yourself, and live your life for yourself.

Subcultures are the many alternatives within the alternative culture. The words alternative culture act as hub for all the many customary beliefs, social forms and material traits that people can choose from in order to stand as different.

Why choose to be different? Because a very long time ago, someone, or a few people, dared to believe in a positive outcome from an alternate route.
No, that's crazy, Don't think that. No one ever did that before. No one ever went there. It might be dangerous. You might fail. 
I might, and maybe all of this is true, but I'll do it anyway because somehow, I'm feeling right about this.

And then someone created something, and someone else created something else, and out of many of these things, someone created a Wheel.
And then the world, and its people, expanded.

They probably invented the first box not long after inventing the wheel.
A place to put things, so they can be carried around, or hidden. Or just placed somewhere safe.

Outside the box is not safe. You might lose the thing, or it may break.

To think outside the box is not safe. You will be trialed, you will be tested, and the only way to feel safe in those times is to remain true to what you choose to believe in. Throughout history, it's always the revolutions that brought about Evolution (Revolution - the Wheel, it turns).

Art is the only true, authentic form of chronicling time. Indeed, the earliest recordings of events in time were depicted on stone walls all over the world, as my friend Nicholas fittingly pointed to me on Friday night, History was first told through visual art, folk songs, interpretive dances and stories.

Artists will portray what they experience and what they feel in their space and time here, through the means available to them. An artist's perspective is never tainted by an ideology behind it. It is only ever brought forth as a means of expression of feelings -a way to get the feeling out of themselves and into the world.

See this. Hear this. Feel this. Doesn't it feel strange? Doesn't it feel different?

When you start to really feel, and understand emotions like disappointment, fear, anger and failure, you can choose to learn how to face them, and it's when you start facing them that you can tame them, and change, and evolve. So you start inside yourself, and what you find in there, you can then release out for the world to see, and feel in return. Have a look within and figure yourself out first -then you can start understanding other people, and help them understand themselves.

The general human culture is all about things outside yourself. The alternative culture is about what's inside. It's not necessarily about being an artist. It's about noticing what Different feels like, inside yourself, and choosing to figure it out -and embrace it. Or perhaps to be different is an Art in itself.

In the alternative culture, we celebrate What Is Different: our ways of thinking outside the box, through the arts.
Because we believe in the Alternative.
We believe in change. We believe in Evolution.
And we want to be a part of the Future.

Posted in: alex robshaw,Column