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I was pleased to be invited back to the ABC studios a few days ago to chat with Richard Fidler as part of Conversations. The last time I was on the show was five years ago, just after the release of Explore Everything. My recent appearance was a great chance to talk about my new research with Preppers in-depth. I walked (and talked) with Andrew Stuck 3 years ago and was delighted to update him on my current explorations to mark the event.

What was not expected was the way that having this time would make clear to me that for many years, I had been so blinded by my struggle to free myself from the structures of the institution that even my body was failing. A renewed sense of having a body has meant taking the time every day to tune it, and taking the time to flex those once-again-tuned-in sensory organs to see the ‘grandeur of nature, the heavens, the lands and the seas’ all over again. I have moved at incredible speed since I started my PhD 10 years ago, and though it was productive, insightful and, to be honest, a veritable carnival of desire and peak emotion, I also hacked my way deep into a structural ticket, becoming not only disembodied in my quest for a profitable life of the mind, but also consciously complicit in the capitalist exploitation of my research and life, which became inevitably intertwined. Streamlining my engagement on social media so it doesn’t feel like work Saying no to conferences, paper reviewing, helping random students with their projects and anything else that sucks up time when I should be reading or writing or swimming or making love Saying no to spending my own time or money doing things for institutions who are not invested in me on a personal level Writing only four hours a day, but writing words that matter Reading as much as a writing and tackling texts that have intimidated me in the past (see reading list here) Being a better son, uncle and partner, having decided I have no interest in ever being a parent

I asked my friends and colleagues to recommend to me a philosophy text (broadly defined) that was influential to them or that changed the way they thought. For the next 2 years, I’m going to work my way through these 85 books. Anna Tsing, Mushroom at the End of the World M. Cioran, On the Height of Despair Tim Ingold, The Perception of the Environment Gregory Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of the Mind Nicholas Abraham & Maria Torok, The Shell and the Kernel Susan Sontag, Regarding the Pain of Others Francis Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man Marilyn Strathern, The Gender of the Gift

The exhibition was built around a long weekend spent walking part of the Bundian Way Aboriginal Trail, a 365km track which follows an ancient Aboriginal route from Mt Kosciuszko to the coast in NSW. The project was coordinated by the arts collective Fugitive Moments (Barnaby Lewer and Tristan Derátz) and as they write on the project website, the trail It was great to be part of the exhibition and I am happy to post some of the materials from it here, in the hopes that they can live on beyond that space. Thank you to Barney and Tristan for inviting me on the walk, Alexandra Porter-Hepworth and Tylor Wilson for handling logistics, and to the other artists, writers and guides who shared the journey with us.