This Powerful Notion of Being Home!

Hey,

I hope you’re doing well. Last week, for us, will live on forever for multiple reasons as so many great things happened amongst all the bad ones...! 

Alex reached 100 Substack entries, the entire band gathered at the HQ and worked really hard before leaving for the Cruise to the Edge, and new music has been shared as well! What a week! 

As you’re reading this, we just landed in Miami, as we’ll be leaving for this wonderful cruise we’ve all been waiting a long time to see happening! Can’t wait to share more of that crazy trip with you all!

🎧 Music I’m listening to

Old Sea Brigade - Heaven in the Right Light (Winter Version)

What we are speaking of is proximity 
Proximity creates empathy, a closeness
A closeness in heart, nerve and mind 
So expand outward 
Reach out, for proximity is closer than you think

Listen to the Missive Playlist

📖 Reading highlight I’m pondering

Following what happened to Alex’s home in Virginia lately, when I came across this amazing and powerful statement from Lewis, it brought me to think deeply about the art of not only feeling at home but also being at home even if it’s completely destroyed. 

What came to mind was when C. S. Lewis wrote that happiness at home is “the end of all human endeavor,” he wasn’t diminishing this idea. On the contrary, he was redefining it. 

To me, societal norms often measure worth through productivity, status, and reach, yet the moments that truly sustain us are radically small: a table shared, a pint between friends, a book opened in silence. Proximity is not just physical closeness, it’s emotional availability, presence without performance, and conversation without agenda. All our systems — whether we’re talking about economics, politics, or culture — claim importance, but they only matter if they protect and multiply these intimate constellations of connection. 

In the end, what we build outwardly only has meaning if it deepens what we hold closely. 

🎙️ Podcast That Inspired Me

Why Young People Are Struggling for Finding Mastery

Angela Duckworth! I’m a huge fan of hers! Alex offered me her book called Grit a little while ago and my answer to this incredible gesture was a little less aligned with the moment, as I literally said, "A book about Grit! Feels like this is something I could’ve written myself...!” Yes, sometimes, humility leaves the building and is replaced by something proud, arrogant, self-centered, egocentric, egotistical, and narcissistic, which I’m of course not really proud of, but this is what happened nonetheless. 

After digging into a few pages I became so truly fond of her writings and approach to daily challenges and this insane adventure called life...! Especially her take on perseverance without purpose and how to stay committed when enthusiasm fades and outcomes take much longer than expected...! 

Since "proximity" is this week’s word, I thought this pod was diving right into the heart and soul of our cultural forces shaping our day-to-day through social media, the erosion of in-person connection, the mental health crisis, and what we can do about it. 

📸 My Picture Of The Week 

Cheers and congrats to you Alex for your incredible hundred ways of welcoming us into your heart and, of course, to the next 100!!!!!! 

(I’m wearing a Jalisco cap to support my dear friends living in that wonderful area who welcomed and truly impacted Alex and me for the better.) 

💬 Shared in the Long Shadows Chat this week

Alex’s 100th Substack entry offering a new song’s segment has been the huge highlight of our last week! When Alex traveled back to the HQ, we welcomed him with hundreds of balloons all promoting this incredible achievement of 100 entries! Seeing Alex in his humble recording space in his devastated home, if we can even call it that, offering new sounds and noises was to me completely mind-blowing, as, knowing Alex quite well, I knew this was a huge triumphant scream from his new heart! 

Our chat was filled with encouragement, truths, celebrations, excitements, and so on! 

To feel at home is not always about walls or geography; sometimes it is about emotional permission. When Alex speaks about numbness, about being too worn out to reach the affective depth required to give life to his art, he is describing a kind of exile from the self. And no one can create from exile. Just as Francis Bacon, often cited by Alex, could never reduce his visions to paint-by-numbers without betraying the very tension that made them breathe, an artist cannot force intimacy with their own inner world when that world feels distant or muted.

This world often demands output over presence, performance over process, and speed over incubation. But some sensations require proximity, time, silence, and safety before they can unfold. To feel at home within oneself is to allow that room. It is to accept that creativity is not manufactured on command but cultivated in closeness to what moves us, unsettles us, and restores us. 

When that closeness returns, the bloom is inevitable! Not because it was forced into the light, but because it was finally given the required space to grow right there and right now.

“It will get much worse before it will start to be a little better."

Let’s be great to one another! 

Your friend and Chief Operator, 
Jeff 

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