Why I Burn
I am writing this for you. The person asking; “Why would someone go to the desert and build a theme camp at Burning Man for 4 days to only use it for 7 days?” And then pack it up again in 3 and leave the space as they found it! Come on!
To answer that question I have to go back to the reason why I took my first journey to the Playa. To provide some context will start with who I am. My name is Jose Caballer (Love Captain on the Playa). I am the son of a pastor who went to art school. Instead of becoming a pastor like my father and my uncles I became a designer. Not a fashion designer or an interior designer. A graphic designer focused on software.
This is important. I will come back to it later in my story. I will transport you to 6 burns ago. My first burn. I was 39. After 12 years of running my own digital agency I came to a crossroads. The journey of entrepreneurship had been amazing. Success, failure, joy, pain all had been part of it. But I felt like there was something more. This could not be all there was. I knew that there had to be something more. So I shut everything down. I completely shocked my system into a new chapter. I jumped forward. Into the unknown.
Follow The White Rabbit
During that jump at a UX event in Los Angeles I met my “White Rabbit”. I was standing behind her watching a panel. And she turned around, saw me and jumped in surprise. I asked if I had startled her. She said “No, but I had just finished liking your online post and here you are standing behind me.” Like if the internet wove our meeting in the form of a “like”. We connected, shared our stories and made a “beer date” for the following week. At a dive bar in Pasadena she told me her story. Her story as a Burner. She said that “it works if you go to build. If you apply the principles. If you show up ready, willing, open and with love. No expectations.”
In addition she shared how to get there, how to prepare and all her planning tricks. She introduced me to the LA Burners group on FB. She told me about The French Quarter. I got a ticket from a friend in SF and on the LA Burners group found a ride with an amazing veteran burner. Jay. Amazing man. He dropped me off with my gear, five large Home Depot plastic containers with all the gear I needed to build, survive and thrive. All labeled with the playa name (My white rabbit and her partner gave me using “Knuckles” the game) - FIRE MONK! That was my first name. The transition name. The name for my journey of becoming a burner. I was on a mission to find out what fueled my passion. To find my fire.
On a Thursday morning 4 days before the burn Jay dropped me off in the middle of the French Quarter. I came prepared with the gear needed to build. Drill, check. Saw, check. Hammer, check. Knee pads, check. Hammer, check. Water, Check..
In those first 4 days I experienced such camaraderie, such unconditional love, that I knew immediately that building was the secret. During those days my burlap shade structure became a filter for the rays of sun light, my little tribal drum became a bridge to my Caribbean ancestry. The drum taught me that the center was the fire, the heart and the edges were the conversation. I played with camp mates at Mardi Gras like if I was channeling the spirit of Tito Puente.
That burn I went to a talk on Sacred Geometry at Red Lighting, I went to yoga and meditation, I went dancing, skating, pillow fighting and to a non-sexual nudity workshop that I stumbled on during a Physics talk. It was an explosion of new ideas, new ways of being and a world I knew existed before but didn’t even know I was looking for.
I was hooked. The next year I camped with a different camp. A different experience all together. But It was awesome. The people, the stories, the late nights bartending and meeting people from all over the world were awesome. I engaged in a completely different way with the community. The biggest lesson was one late night at the bar. My friend Jay shared why he burned. He said “This is my 10th burn. Every burn is coming home. The 11 months and 20 days in the default world are a dream. The 10 days I am here I am home.” This was an amazing realization. The place where he felt the most himself, the most expressed was the 10 days with his Playa family.
My 3rd burn I returned to the French Quarter. Some old faces some new faces. But the same. Family. I came to build. We built and we experienced the burn. I have two many stories to tell. But I am going to tell you the 3 most powerful lessons I’ve gotten from building.
1. Love each other like yourself.
No expectations. Just unconditional love. I don’t know who you are in the default world and I don’t care. Here you are my brother, you are my sister. I respect and love you as I do myself.
2. Do It Together!
No ego. No agenda. Just help each other build and thrive. Learning to co-create a new reality by surrendering to presence and to love. Together it’s much easier. It’s fun. Hard, but fun.
3. Equanimity.
You are not your story. Your pain. Your thoughts. Abandoning all attachment to success or failure. Attachment produces fear. Doubt and uncertainty. This requires faith. And trust.
Building Community
On my 3rd burn I was invited to speak by a veteran community builder on a panel on community building. Part of a 5 day series on Conscious Business, The Divine Feminine, Community and Building Permanent communities at the dome at Red Lighting. I was curious why he had asked me. What qualifications I had. This is when I realized that my purpose in life was to build community. That this was my gift. That what Brad Nye saw in me was himself. Someone who’s art form was building community. I prepared for my talk on index cards. I set them in front of me during my talk. In the process I had to look at my story and understand what had worked for me. I shared principles I learned from Agile Project Management, Leadership Training, Communications and most importantly how to harness everyone’s intentions and energy to co-create. That true community was not about telling people what to do. But about making their own dreams possible in a container of safety and love.
On my 4th burn I had the fateful conversation with Medici (Jesse G, AKA King J) on lawn chairs in his camp. Medici; “Let’s build a camp.” Me; “Ok. Let’s do it.”
A year later Node Republik was on the Playa at 3 and D. What it took to get us there was a lot of work. Lots of intentional direction of energy. Vision. Money. Planning and Re-planning. It was nothing short of an epic journey. What I can share with you now is why we built NR. I will give you a hint. The gift we gave to the playa and to our Nodes was simple; Transformation through community. Our shows, our bar, our DJ’s our kitchen our journeys together were all the mini-quests of connection in community were all the gift. Mini-quests of joy. A playground where we came to share, to connect to transform.
This year the theme is Metamorphoses. The quest of transformation. Burning Man is often called a “DIY transformation festival.” Going in itself is the act. The journey itself is the process. The experience the catalyst.
Person after person will tell you that “Burning Man changed my life.” I can do the same. But I have to be intellectually honest. That is what I used it for. I used it as my own transformative playground. I came to build. I came to participate. I came to dance. I came to love. I came to give. And in return I have received the most valuable gift. I found my purpose. And my purpose is not to build Burning Man camps. I found out I was an alchemist. A design alchemist. That the heart has the power to unlock our ability to build new worlds. And that only in our willingness to fully experience living in tribe, living under the 10 Principles of Burning Man can we witness what the future looks like. That we can experience being human again. Being fully alive.
We Are Designers & Users
I promised to loop back to software design. On my 4th burn I walked into Center Camp into one of the open talk stages. A UX Designer from the Bay Area was on stage with a flip chart explaining why we were both programmer and user in “the system”. In life. In our reality. At first I said; “This guy is nuts.” But then I just sat there. And listened. Really listened. By the time he was finished he had concluded with; “We are both user and designer/programmer and since the totality of the system is god, we are collectively each a manifestation of the super user. eg. god.”
I looked around and saw a woman who was dumbfounded. She was trying to grok it. So I walked up to her and introduced myself. And proceeded to explain to her how startups work. How the CEO is ultimately the first user. She started the company because she was trying to solve her own problem. And that she had to enroll her users into helping her build her software. That customer development was us acknowledging that we make up the system. At this moment I understood that I wasn’t a “User Experience Designer.” But I designed reality. And reality starts with community.
Build Together
I leave you with this fellow traveler. I know you are looking. For something. It might look like a better career, better relationships, to heal from the past, to know how to be powerful, to know how to design your own reality. Whatever it might be you are looking for. It’s there. But it’s not at Burning Man. It’s inside you. Showing up, building, participating fully won’t show you anything except what is already there. Inside you.
So I invite you to come. Build with us. Design a new reality with us.
As I like to say; “Hello fellow traveler, where are you headed? These are my gifts. What are your gifts? This is my destination. What is your destination? Let’s be wizards together!”
Much love,
-Love Captain
PS. You can find out more about Node Republik on our website. Click Here.
PPS. Follow this years journey on Node Republik’s Instagram! Click Here.
PPPS. You can follow my journey on Instagram Here.
