contention
counter.part
to vie with…
one cannot fight without an other, even when that other is ourselves as other. struggle requires a counterpart.
Without competitors in the race, winning is impossible. Comparison is rendered moot. How would excellence be measured? And yet…
For the past few years, I’ve been working with Joy Usher on her book Munakara (pronounced “moon-kai”) about a long-neglected maxim in al-Biruni. She expands a short paragraph into an over 700-page exploration of what “contention” (the meaning of munakara) signifies in chart delineation. She strings together chart examples that give you a tour of world figures and illuminates why those we love are also so often those we hate (or love to hate or hate to love or or or)…
Talk about big things having small beginnings.
My publishing house Revelore Press is launching Munakara on April 17, 2025; reservations are open now.
Joy has thrown down a gaunlet. Can you wrangle with the lesser-read maxims of yore and bring them out of retirement, make them enter the fray of things-we-need-to-remember-and-apply-now….?
Summon up the smallest spark and fan it into a raging bonfire of prowess. That spark is yours, you can run against yourself and see how far you get, how extensive you can stretch outside your comfort zone, past the zones of fear, into a future that’s always been waiting for you with open arms, ribbons, ticker tape and arrival.
~
See you again on April the First at 4:48am PDT, no joke.
This is so cool, Jenn.