Who is simonthescribe?
Hi. I live in Cornwall UK and spend a lot of my time making stuff. I grow my own food as much as possible and love looking after my permaculture garden when I am not writing or making things. I also support my local community by working four hours a week as a ‘parish clerk’ for a tiny parish on the edge of Bodmin Moor.
My ‘A’ levels were in Art, English Literature, Theatre Studies and Theatre Design, before the internet was really happening and they later gave me an excellent basis for creating websites which I did for a while on a self-employed basis.
Some time after my ‘A’ levels I trained at Dartington College of Arts in Devon for a Diploma of Higher Education in ‘Art and Design in a Social Context’. This was a fascinating course that interfaced me with my use in the world as an artist. I resolved even here that I wanted my ‘art’ to contribute to the evolution of human beings in some way. I then worked in Haldon Woods near Exeter as Deputy Director of an Arts Council funded project called ‘Beginners’ Way‘. A story written into the woods in created spaces.
Then to Crewe and Alsager College to gain an Honours Degree in ‘Creative Arts, Combined Studies’ which involved film making, music, writing, painting in watercolour and photography.
Later on I trained as an adult educator (Certificate in Education for Further Education – Cert.Ed.FE ). I worked mostly on teaching Communication Studies, Media Studies and some Art and Design at Further and Higher levels at the main colleges in Cornwall. I started a Masters degree [M.A.] in Adult Learning but became convinced that mainstream educational provision was too focused on the indoctrination of adults for the purposes of employment and economics.
Real adult education is based on helping people get to where they want to go, not serving a redundant system of economics that is costing us our planet. So I started my own college in a rural community centre in Lostwithiel, gaining some grants to set-up ‘remote learning’ opportunities in Cornwall with Plymouth University. I ran it for a couple of years. In the meantime I also became chairman of the Community Centre and had to stop operating the college due to conflict of interest issues. Local politics had interpreted my role in facilitating my community as one of financial gain!
Fortunately I got a commission from Macmillan Publishers around then to write and produce ‘Mastering Desktop Publishing’ for one of their educational series. This started my interest in producing books and for a few years I learned my craft by publishing books for myself and other authors, using print on demand services at lulu.com.
in 2002 whilst working as a lecturer at what was then one of the best colleges in the country, the Department of Work and Pensions made an ‘attachment to earnings’ on my monthly salary. This was miscalculated due to several factors in poorly considered, new legislation concerning ‘absent fathers’ and left me more than £40 a week better-off on the dole. So, despite a lot of personal investment in a career, I resigned to save myself from slavery. I resolved to never again sponsor the government with my energy. I decided to co-create with the universe for my own enjoyment and limit my income to below tax threshold. That’s really when I started creating for myself and the world. My motivations became 5D rather than 3D [if you know what I mean].
Since then I have researched and written over twenty books on various subjects in the context of sustainable living. The motivation for these has never been making money. In fact one of my values; ‘First do no harm’ has led to my refusals to drive a car, limit my air flights to one every 10 years and object to payment of tax that sponsors a crooked government and its weapons and aggression-based economic strategies.
It’s great to see that people are catching up with issues of sustainability now. The revolution is here at last! Unfortunately a bit too late for the planet, which is in meltdown from human stupidity. It is shocking to realise that, in order to sustain the fiction that ‘happiness is achieved by consuming the planet‘, EVERYTHING YOU HAVE BEEN TOLD IS A LIE. The Emperor has no clothes. We have entered climate chaos as a direct result of the unconsidered greed and narcissism at the heart of our alleged ‘civilisation’.
Much of my work is about this change of consciousness and the shifts we need to make. Current conditions of our so called ‘civilisation’ have made many holes for people to fall through. Their ability to even survive in a terminally ill environment is destroyed. The pressure of terminal Earth is also provoking people to ask the big questions, such as ‘Why are we here?’. As a result some of us are evolving into a civilisation that is actually civil, by working together for mutual benefit of people and planet while we can. It is my job to support this.
My work here – as a self-proclaimed ‘Creator’ and ‘Warrior of Love’ is to bring more love and compassion into this world by making art, music, writing and other stuff. I am working on how to live on the earth in an equitable manner for all its inhabitants, while the conditions are still favourable enough to do so.
simonthescribe