Regional Spices

During a Facebook Live “Ask Me Anything” broadcast I did last week, the second question was “What I liked most about Burning Man Regional Events?” (The first questions was if I believed the earth was flat.)
Here is how I answered the second question:

TRANSCRIPT:

Troy asked, “What do I like most about regional Burning Man events? I Hope to attend BEquinox and more regional Burning Man events.”

Man, I heard BEquinox (Los Angeles Regional) tickets sold out in like a minute!

The thing I love most about the Regionals is that they’re intimate.   And they don’t require the same level of bureaucracy that the Big Burn does. So you have a real impact on the experience of the entire event. You can really make a difference. If you want to spend your year planning, building, & creating for a Regional, you can affect that event for everyone there. At the Big Burn, you could work the entire year on a project and have almost nobody see it.

Other things I like about the regionals is that … (I didn’t get this until I left California, because California regional events are, for most people, it’s so easy.) I used to think of Regionals as being like a minor league Burning Man. You practice there so that you can go to the Big Burn.

But went I went to Western Australia, when I went to Blazing Swan, I learned that these people, they weren’t practicing for Burning Man, they were doing Blazing Swan! And they were 10 Principle-committed Burners without ever needing to go to Nevada or to Black Rock City.

And I love that about regionals is that you can have this really intimate burner experience and it makes the whole community… and the whole movement… scalable.

Final thing that I love about Regionals is that they have a flavor of the region. You know, the Miami Regional Burn is way different than San Diego’s, which is way different, WAY different, than Blazing Swan in Western Australia, because it’s the 10 Principles as filtered through the region.

It’s kinda like the way I view spirituality and religions. That there is a truth to spirituality. There is divine oneness, this God something. And as people in different regions try to interpret it, they present this like … It’s like Iron Chef, cosmic Iron Chef. And the ingredient, the mystery ingredient, is Source.

And you know, if you’re from the south in the United States, you prepare Source with, like, mayonnaise and Fritos, you know. If you’re in the east, you present that Source, you make it with saffron and rice. And if you’re in Mexico, you present it with beans and chili. But it’s really … It’s the same thing.

At the Regional event. It’s like the 10 Principles as presented within the spices of that region. And I think that you can really feel that as you go to different Regionals. It’s a beautiful thing.

 

Why do YOU like Regionals?

*Top photo by Christian Clowes of Blazing Swan temple.

About the author: John "Halcyon" Styn

John

Halcyon is a 21-year Burning Man participant and co-founder of Pink Heart camp. He is author of "Love more. Fear less." and producer of the Burning Man short film, "The Pink Path." He's won Webby awards for his over-the-top personal site & his "Love On Demand" video podcast HugNation.com. Halcyon co-founded the San Diego based "1st Saturdays" homeless outreach program based on Burning Man Principles and coaches people how to be radically self expressed in the default world. You can find his full Playa Tips & Tricks series at www.PlayaPrinciples.com

11 Comments on “Regional Spices