art – The Conscious Pilgrim

the hollywood version of not giving a fuck

I turned 44 earlier this week. The notion that I’m in better shape, both mentally and physically, than I was at 34 certainly takes the sting out birthdays.

I gotta say, now that we’re past the 1/3 mark of 2026, this year is absolutely wild. There are bonkers-level things happening all around me as I both prepare my child to be become a legal adult and am anticipating being an uncle (again) – I had assumed (and even posted about) the notion that I’d be settled in, riding shotgun for some massive life changes for the people around me.

… then I got a wild (to me, not surprising to many others) mental health diagnosis and decided to start an arts-based side business.

It’s certainly an interesting time in my life, as the combination of so many of the events of my life are coming into view with a much clearer focus than ever before at the very same time that so many of the artistic and business experiences are gathering under the same umbrella.

Every experience I’ve ever had has brought me here, whether significant or otherwise. Every show I’ve played, website I’ve launched, shirt I’ve ironed, dishwasher load I’ve put away, beer I drank, beer I said ‘no’ to… all of it was a step toward this exact moment in time. I feel alive.

I’m anticipating some test pressings from the new Confusionaires record pretty quick here. We haven’t announced anything about it other than teasers but given the 7 songs that are featured on it, I think the single we’ve chosen is atypical. In the past we’ve chosen catchy, short songs (as most of our songs have been catchy and short) but this time around we’ve chosen something with a little more franticness and urgency – it’s rock & roll, it’s got a country riff, and it feels like a surf song, and it’s about something. It doesn’t care what you think.

It’s called “Anything Happens All The Time” andit about how anything can happen on the road, and it does. I’m excited for you to hear it and I am not concerned with whether or not you like it. But I DO want you to buy a record. I’m not certain how release dates for this album will go because festival season is fast approaching now, and I really don’t have any interest in hosting a show at a time when nobody is around to come see it.

How’s that for complex?

I also don’t think we’re doing a video… not a formal one, anyway. Maybe a live one down the road but I the way we’ve been approaching this batch of songs is different than our previous records. We have some Alberta and B.C. dates through the summer.

Perhaps we’re older and wiser.
Perhaps we’re just older.
Maybe we don’t give a fuck anymore… Honestly I hope that’s the case, because that’s where bands always start doing their best work. I’ve essentially been waiting my entire life to stop giving a fuck what other people think.

I always thought I didn’t care what people thought… but it turns out I cared a lot about how I was perceived – and I wanted to be perceived as someone who didn’t care what you thought. I had the “Hollywood Version” of not giving a fuck… which is in the same realm as being “Hollywood Fat” which is not fat at all, just ‘less defined’ in the muscle department (like me!). It’s also similar to the “Hollywood Ending” wherein everything gets resolved, which is a laughable concept at 44 years old.

Life is not like that.
Life doesn’t have an instagram filter, and is certainly not AI generated.
Life is lived.
Life is weathered.
It’s complicated and it gets bloated, and has bad hair days and wears ugly sweaters unironically on occasion.
Life has mustard stains.

At any rate, this is my public journal entry for the week, in all entitled glory.

Some really cool things on the horizon, and I am doing my best to live in this moment, here & now, because I know I will never be here again. I will never stand in this river again because the river is always flowing and I am always changing, growing, and learning.

Much love.

scheduling creative output

Sounds counter-intuitive, doesn’t it?
Well, maybe it doesn’t to you, but it always did to me.
Don’t knock it ’til you try it, though.

I’m not sure when, or how I started doing it, but it’s been a few years of attempting to do this and I have to say, It’s been working pretty well. However, there are some common beliefs that most people seem to hold around creativity that you’re going to have to drop if you want to get a handle on this.

There’s no such thing as writer’s’ block…

… or any other kind of creativity block for that matter. Writer’s (or creator’s) block; as a concept, is not the inability to write (or creator). It’s the fear that you’re going to write something bad.

So, write something bad and toss it. You’ve written bad things before and tossed them.
Night time is not the only time you can make art.

You don’t have to dig very hard to find documentation that supports the notion that proper diet, exercise, and a good night’s sleep does wonders for your brain. It stands to reason that; since your brain is pretty heavily involved in the artisan process, that you could sleep during that sacred late hour and be more refreshed and more creative any other time of day.

You might just prefer to create at night. That’s fine. But it’s worth noting that there are reasons for it, such as being interrupted by distraction less, since most people are asleep, and we have social contracts in place that prevent people from calling late at night. Maybe you have a fear of missing out during the regular waking hours. Maybe you lack discipline. It doesn’t matter, really… work all night for all I care – but acknowledge that it’s ultimately a choice.
Drugs and alcohol don’t make your art better.

If anything, they make bad art more tolerable. You’re free to believe whatever you want but I’ve seen more than a few decent artists become shitty artists, seemingly on purpose. I don’t have a problem with drug fuelled art – I actually enjoy quite a bit of it, but I do believe that art was in you to begin with.

In an alternate reality, I’d have been able to hear Hendrix play straight & sober. I think we tend to (and yes, I have certainly done this) have a propensity for nerves, and want to ‘take the edge off’ in order to give what we think will be a better performance.

But to “take the edge off” is to admit that (a) you have an ‘edge’ and (b) understand why. I’d rather “live on the edge”, if you’ll pardon the antiquated term.

Clearly I’m not talking about prescribed medication here.

Circumstances. I get up early and I go to the gym. I often work up a sweat, as is typical with long intervals of steady-state cardio followed by heavy weightlifting. Since I have an elevated heart rate, my blood pumps faster, speeding the whole body system up, including the brain. As a result I get wild ideas about art and writing while I’m running on a treadmill, or on the trails, or lifting weights – often frustratingly with nothing to write on or with.

I keep my weightlifting progress noted, but my pen actually DIED this morning, which may have been what prompted this whole post.

I’ve taken to writing emails to myself so I can log the idea or develop it further next time I’m sitting at a computer. Hours later, computer bound, I’ve written numerous songs, blog posts, and developed a few different ideas for my most recent art project. Obviously, during the work day, I’m fairly focused on the tasks at hand, but once the evening rolls around and I’ve got a few hours to burn, I’ll dig in hard.

Dig in on what? I may have to consult my calendar reminders…

If there’s an upcoming show I’m playing, I may find myself running songs, which will likely turn into me trying to perfect some technique by the end of the alotted time.

If it’s an idea for an art project, or a further pursuit of an idea I’ve been working on for some time then I’ll leave it a little bit open. I may need to solder or weld something – but; if my hands and eyes don’t want to work together, then I might do some sanding or prep some things for paint. OR, maybe I’ll just plug a guitar in and push creativity that way.

The point isn’t specifically what I’m doing, so long as I am moving forward. All steps forward are progressions toward the ultimate goal, so just because I didn’t accomplish exactly what I’d set out to doesn’t mean I didn’t accomplish anything… small wins are still wins… even if it ends up being on a completely different project altogether.

That’s some AuDHD shit right there. The time dedicated to art is planned… of the 2 (groan…) “Wolves” inside me (ASD and ADHD) – the plan is integral to my success as an autistic artist. I have set aside this time for this and if I don’t use the time and space to be creative then I’ll be upset. The ADHD in me is totally fine with “my painting sucks today… let’s hash out some guitar riffs” and can seamlessly move to another creative outlet. This is how I’ve learned how to utilize both sides of this AuDHD diagnosis and it’s been very helpful to be able to acknowledge both, and how important each of them are.

Then when it’s time to wind down (again, a predetermined time), it’s important to develop and practice a routine that gets your head out of the art and into the pillow. That can be really hard to do… but fortunately you’re allowed to make notes, or send yourself another email, all in an effort to spend what’s left of the mental energy and move into a place of quiet and rest.

Then you can get that ever important sleep, get some good food in you, and maybe your hands won’t be so shaky tomorrow evening and you (or I, in this instance) can get that soldering or welding project tackled after all.

The goal; for me, at least… is to be artistic in all aspects of life. It’s perfectly natural to have a few projects on the go at a time… but if distraction is a challenge for you then you may need to limit the amount of projects you take on, or at least change your expectations of progress.

There’s no wrong way to make art, but there are definitely ways of being more effective and being more efficient… and there are ways of being an artist and taking care of yourself, too…

managing the unbridled

I’ve driven a few people nuts over the years, from romantic partners to band members, but none so much as myself. It’s not until very recently that someone flipped on the lightswitch and the reason was revealed – AuDHD – the 1-2-punch that is the combination, and often conflicting traits of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

One of these things can be medicated. So, I spent a month building up levels of that medication, and I’ve been on my full dosage for a month now, and I have to say that the barking dog that is ADHD put on a leash (still barking, though – it’s being treated, not cured) it’s really given my Autism symptoms some space to move around and show itself – and while it can be challenging at times, and I definitely catch myself being weird in public more frequently… I have to say that I really do like myself.

What really adds layers to this is that I’m also starting a small business that allows me to make really cool stuff. Full disclosure: I’ve been running small performing arts businesses: rock & roll bands – for decades, so while some of this is very new, a lot of it is very familiar and I definitely DO have something to compare the experience to, and that comparison is Me vs. Medicated Me.

I’ve put an inordinate amount of energy into this new venture that seems to be falling together pretty seamlessly, somehow. I don’t have a wild number of gigs right now, which sucks, but it’s good for the development of ‘this thing‘ (as I’ll refer to it henceforth) because there is not much to distract me from ‘this thing‘ currently. The big year-end push at my day job has recently happened, so there’s a little more mental space for ‘this thing‘ right now on that front as well.

So what’s different?

My level of focus is huge. As much as I’ve become Dr. Doolittle around my house, forgetting whether I’ve let the dog outside and when, or that I have rice on the stove, or that I have a coffee growing colder by the minute still sitting under the Nespresso tap… completely losing track of time to the degree that I have set multiple alarms to remind myself to check the time… all this aloofness is happening in favor of mentally differentiating between small parts for something I’m building, or paint shades.

I’m suddenly able to point myself in a direction and see it through to the end. Sure… time-blindness is a factor more than ever before, but that’s become part of the planning, and the ASD part of my brain loves a plan… while the ADHD part can roll with a plan that changes… so while my plan may be to do some very detail-oriented work, if my eyes and hands aren’t cooperating that evening, I can change gears and tackle something that I’d planned to do another evening. It all needs to get done… so all steps forward are progress.

It’s when I don’t have a plan, and things change… that shit goes sideways in a hurry. I’ve walked away from a few flaming wreckages in my day, and this won’t be one.

I’ve still got a thousand things going on in my brain at a time, but each of them has time & space to breathe and develop. It’s a very exciting and explorative time in my life and I’m honestly really excited to do it, and while I’m pursuing this I also get to learn how to work with myself in a whole new way, which is thrilling. It’s like having a business partner that understands my shortcomings and compensates for them – meanwhile, creativity is flowing in a really cool and interesting way.

I’m excited to reveal what I’ve been working on – ideally by the fall of 2026, I should be able to do some sort of reveal, because there are legal and tax things at play that I don’t fully understand – but some of that might be a job for someone else if this all goes the way I hope it does.

What no entrepreneur will tell you is that there’s a possibility that the whole thing falls flat… They can’t think like that, and neither can I. But what I can say is that if it doesn’t rise to the level I hope to see it reach, I’ll still be richer for the experience.

You can’t buy that kind of fulfillment.

no idea

Hi, I’m really not sure what to write about today, so I’m going to just trust my process and trust that by the time I feel like it’s time to stop writing, I’ll have made some profound point.

I’ve got a lot on my brain right now… and it’s an ADHD brain so that means quite a bit. I’m in the process of developing a thing – an artistic thing… a wonderful thing that I’m very proud of, but am now working out how to duplicate so that I can send it home with people, in exchange for dollars.

So it’s an artistic venture that has become a yet-to-be revealed small business that I’ll be running on the side of everything else I have on the go… but a lot of it feels pretty normal to this “30-year rock & roll band” guy. There’s a long list of things that need to be done that I have experience doing in rock & roll fields.

I’ve got someone working on a logo. I’m writing website content. I’m looking into promotion avenues, and cross promotion, weird influencers, Social Media pages, YouTube, Meta ads… I honestly don’t have time for a lot of this because I’m too busy making a cool thing… That being the case, I’m not ready to actually talk about what it is and how it works just yet… So, I’m going to stay cagey about it.

Beyond that, my primary focus has been using my powers for good and not evil… and by that I mean I’ve begun commodifying my ASD to hyperfocus on this (these) thing(s) I’m building, and my ADHD to keep as many balls in the air as I can. It’s been an interesting case study – well, not a case study in the traditional sense, but more in the vein of ‘observational evidence’ – at any rate, I’ve ultimately become my own superhero when it comes to getting work done on this new venture, as I have developed a lot of skills over the years.

With my ADHD more in check due to medication I’ve been prescribed, I have to say (as I have to a few people) that I’ve never felt more autistic. My time blindness and lack of awareness around time is an interesting challenge. I’ve been realizing that I don’t do well with specific times, but I am capable of measuring time with tasks… for instance:

I know how long it takes me to get home from the gym and get ready for work.
I know how long my workout is… and I know how long it takes to make breakfast and coffee… so, as long as I get out of bed at the right time, I will get to my office at the same time every day.

On the flip side of that – I don’t know how long it’s going to take me to accomplish one of the new tasks for this new venture. Sometimes I will work on it until either my hands are shaking (signifying that it’s time to eat) or my eyes hurt (signifying that it’s time for bed). So I set a lot of alarms now, and I make good use of my calendar.

Anyway… In a lot of ways this new thing scratches all my itches…

It’s music adjacent
It involves sound design
It involves working with my hands and building something
It involves historical knowledge
It involves working with other people
It involves visual art
It’s a niche market, but seems to be a community minded one, rather than a competitive one

It’s got elements of making music and elements of hotrod building… it’s very involved and I think the timing is right, in spite of certain world events and the advent of tariffs and high transportation costs, I’m hoping to service in my own community and in my own province, something that exists, but exists regionally.

Anyway I’m very excited about it, and I’m sure there will be small reveals along the way.

transitional period

whenever I think of the term transitional period, I think of that scene in Pulp Fiction when the couple is holding up the diner and Julian (as played by Samuel L Jackson) mentions “I’m in a transitional period right now and I don’t want to hurt you, I want to help you...”

I’ve said those exact words so many times that I’m surprised nobody ever mentioned the reference, though it is rather obscure. I’m just as surprised that nobody’s ever retorted (‘retort’ being another word that reminds me of Julian from Pulp Fiction) and said “Davey, you’re always in a transitional period.”

And I guess I am.

I suppose I am in that long transition from birth to earthly death, but I am also constantly changing. I often think of the old Greek philosophical proverb ‘A man never stands in the same river twice‘ – something that is constantly in mind, and I jokingly said to someone who was describing how the pizza from this one family-owned pizzeria is always a little different than the time before, but it’s always good. My joke flew past… but I’m autistic so whatever.

I will often wonder if I am the only person who feels this way. From the outside, it seems like so many people are just hitting that day-to-day as consistently and (possibly) as aimlessly as ever, just surviving… never thriving or flailing, steady as she goes until something life-altering happens, at which point they are so jarred by circumstance that they can’t get their footing, and their eyes are opened for the very first time.

That’s not a description of anyone in particular. It’s a broad generalization about the seemingly ‘non-player characters’ (NPC’s, for the less hip readers) we come across in places like the pet food store or the food court at the mall.

Perhaps I’m the same, but I was jarred into consciousness by circumstance at an early age. Perhaps at birth. Because even within my own family there are NPC’s, just circumnavigating their own container… never trying to do better… but never doing bad enough to warrant a swift and brutal change.

It almost sounds blissful, even in it’s mundanity… to never know struggle because you’ve never known challenge. I’ve seen people who are really smart somehow end up in these scenarios and they ultimately destroy themselves one way or another… possibly intentionally but likely by accident. As if nothing bad ever happens, so they do bad things with impunity… until; of course, something punitive happens. Are they then brought into the consciousness that I’ve known my whole life? Where they must actually make choices and defend their actions, and learn something integral? Will they see God, perhaps? Or will God see THEM? Will they THEN become a player in the game, giving up their NPC status?

Wild shit, folks.

Part of me knows the flaws in this line of thinking.
But another part of me can’t help but think that maybe it really is that simple.

It doesn’t matter.
I mean, sure, those people matter. Their vote counts and they have rights and they exist… own real estate… what have you.
But I don’t know them, and I have no say over what they say or do.
THUS… I cannot be concerned with their lifestyles or decision-making processes, as these are things I cannot really affect.
All I can do is hope.
Hope they’re good people who treat their children and spouses well, and shovel their goddamn sidewalks.

All I can do is what I can do.

And… I’m doing some really cool stuff that I’m really excited about, but I must remain cagey in an effort to put forward “a big reveal” in the future.

What I can tell you is that – on an unrelated note – my band just approved the artwork for the album we’re releasing this year. You should get a copy for your turntable.
You should buy a turntable.

At any rate, what I can EMPHATICALLY tell you is this:

I’m in a transitional period.

coaxed out of my little world

It’s funny how a diagnosis for something you’ve had for your entire life without ever knowing it can change your perspective.

Before this blog took the shape of it’s current container, it was primarily based around my relationship with my environment, which is a pretty broad field that encompasses fitness, art, my dog, interactions with nature, food… but I started it when I started triathlon training – so a lot of fitness posting.

Anyway, I still do that. The difference is that when I am turning the volume of my headphones up, I realize that I’m not ONLY doing that because Rob Zombie makes some of the best treadmill-running music ever recorded (more on that below!), but also because I need to tune out the noise of everyone around me. The action has not changed, but the perspective has.

What has also most definitely NOT changed is how jarring it is when someone wants to talk to me.

So I’m in the locker room this past week, about to embark on some relentless sprinting drills when an old man comes out of absolutely NOWHERE and scares the shit out of me to eventually get around to saying “last time I was here I saw you ran for A WHOLE HOUR! I only do 20 minutes!” which was simultaneously mortifying knowing that people are watching me that closely, and flattering knowing that people are watching me that closely. I tried to say “well it’s time to go do it again” in a somewhat encouraging way – though it probably came out all monotone and dismissive.

At any rate, I came away more encouraged than embarrassed and I got to thinking about how when I started, I was fat. I couldn’t jog my slow ass to the end of the block without wheezing, let alone adhere to the first day of my “couch to 5k” plan I was following which involved 6 minutes of jogging followed by 1 minute of walking, 3 times over.

It made me glad that this little disarming man was able to coax me out of my little insular world and encourage me to keep pushing the limit.

The snow that’s falling on my house as I type this is upsetting. I got some brand new shoes delivered yesterday – Saucony Endorphin Pro 4’s that are being blown out as the 5’s are now available. I got a killer deal on them and it’s making me excited for spring… so the falling snow is really fuckin’ up my good vibe right now.

Also, I meant what I said when I said that Rob Zombie makes some of the best treadmill running music ever recorded. His new album “The Great Satan” harkens back to early Zombie days, and has some old collaborators on it as well.

As an aside, Rob Zombie reminds me of a lot of the self aggrandizing elements of rock & roll that are often disregarded. And by that I mean that in the tradition of Bon Scott and David Bowie, he takes on characters that demand that you refer to him as various things… including but not exclusively “The Devilman” “Sir Lord Acid Wolfman” “The Black Scorpion” “Tarantula” and “Rock ‘n’ Roller” (which has it’s own nod to Bowie, or rather Ziggy & The Spiders from Mars) and I find it all very endearing, personally. It’s all reminiscent of such rock & roll proclamations as AC/DC’s “I’m TNT” “I’m a rocker” and the cancel-culture-worthy “I’m the Night Prowler” or Iggy Pop’s “I am a passenger” or even Thin Lizzy’s “I am just a cowboy.”

I don’t plan to do a “best of 2026” album list at the end of the year but you can rest assured that this album would be on it if I did.

If you heard this album and hated it, consider giving it another spin while on a treadmill.

mixed bag

In all honesty, I have been quietly considering stopping this blog.

Not because I didn’t have anything worth talking about, but because everything I’ve been doing has been sort of… mechanical. Not mechanical in the sense that it’s emotionless or straightforward, but I’ve literally just been doing the “work” part of my art for a while.

I have been creating… so, it’s not that.

I’ve been recording songs with my band for months at this point. This is where all the creativity becomes tangible, and as much as it IS creative work, it’s also a realization of things we’ve already created. It’s a difficult thing to blog about because the process takes some real time to accomplish.

It’s a mechanical process in a lot of ways.

I’ve also been writing quite a bit. Also a difficult thing to specifically talk about for a big pile of reasons without sharing what I’ve been writing. I suppose I’m not averse to that, but it would lack context at this point.

I’ve been learning how to create guitar pedals.

Again… a difficult thing to talk about directly without getting into the weeds. It inspires creativity, but is very mechanical in it’s execution. If one is proverbially supposed to walk before they metaphorically run, then I am figuratively crawling right now.

I’m training, but not for any particular event.

It’s hard to discuss training for an event that doesn’t exist just yet. I’ve got my eye on a race or two that I’d like to run, but it’s difficult to know if I’ll be able to participate before knowing what my performance schedule for the summer is. Though… I’m sure to do some fitness blogging soon.

So; that, too, is a bit mechanical.

And then spiritually…

Well, I won’t say I’m at a stand-still spiritually… but this time of year, by spirituality is strained because I live in Canada and my spiritual connection to nature is on an extended pause.

HOWEVER… I have been on a bit of a journey of self discovery that includes seeking out some professional help in assessing my modus operandi and what makes me tick; upstairs, and it’s been a wild ride so far. I’m not sure how it relates to me on a spiritual level other than the fact that I am a spiritual person who’s going through some stuff… but I guess we’ll see! It’s been really insightful and special, but there have been some definite times of absolute suckdom, if I may be so bold as to invent a word for it.

Again… not something I can really dig into until I have a formal diagnosis but I’ve certainly been challenged, and overwhelmed, and enlightened, and I’m certain that there is some meaningful writing coming around the bend.

So please stay with me as I gradually get to a place where I can be more open about what’s been happening… because it’s a lot.