How to Support Myth Pilot

Where we've come from and where we're going

Edit: March 5, 2024

I’ve decided to revert this to a free substack. I have some personal projects that are occupying my time such that I can’t write enough to justify charging for anything here. I hope to being able to write more by the end of this year. If you’d like to support, I appreciate your comments and shares. All the best, Paulos

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Good morning,

I’ve decided to open this Substack to paid subscriptions, something I’ve been considering for quite a while.

Simply, we’ve reached the point where you, as my readership, and I, are ready for it. This newsletter has grown from what began as a small and happy diversion into a project where I derive an enormous amount of satisfaction, where more and more I find myself spending more of my time. I find myself thinking about Myth Pilot constantly, dreaming about what I can write for you. I want to go to that place, where I can live in Myth Pilot and open that door for you to visit too. I’m still a long way from being able to do that, but opening subscriptions is the next step in that journey.

At the same time, I know we’re ready because I’m now being asked by some of you for options for how to support. I can’t tell you how much this means to me.

For the time being the way I want to do this is that everything is free. If you are a free subscriber, you will get exactly everything that a paid subscriber does. I believe very strongly in giving content to the world, and I don’t yet feel like locking it away. If this thing grows to the point where I’m making my livelihood off Substack exclusively, that could change, but for now paid subscriptions will exist soley as a way to support the work I’m doing here.

Simply, if you like what I produce here, you are guaranteed to get more of it if you subscribe.

Where did we come from?

Myth Pilot began with strangeness. I had always been a wide reader but never a writer. One day over a year ago I found the Riace Bronzes and became instantly fascinated. These bronze statues were clearly more than decoration, they were the highly refined artifacts of a completely alien age, a mystery. I slipped through this crack and found a whole world on twitter and substack.

I have been a student of Bronze Age Pervert for many years, and inspired by him I embarked on an exploration of understanding. You see, BAP has an immersive method of analysis which has the unique aim of bringing his sources to life. His method has academic qualities but is nothing like the dead work you find in journals; it’s more like religious exegesis which aims to explicate for readers and lead them into greater appreciation and beyond. I thought to apply the same methods to understanding the Riaces. You can read the piece here and see if you find it successful.

Next came my piece on Perseus and the Gorgon, on the nature of monsters and how to slay them. Looking back on this piece, which explicitly identifies gorgon imagery with transgenderist programs of the kind that have only grown more topical and more powerful since its publishing, I count this as one of my most important for understanding our present situation. Many of you seemed to agree as well; the piece got 30,000 reads. I will definitely be revisiting these themes this year and explicating their meaning as they apply to life today.

Then there was my fiction. I wrote a “Masque of the Red Death” style dream-piece, NEMESIS, that was published in Expat press, featuring a beautiful model with a very strange dream about the Met Gala. You understand that no one can hold back the intrusions of MYTH that are coming into the world OK?

Last summer I published one of my favorite works ever, Our Private Kingdom, a love story. I poured so much of myself into this one. I wanted to tell a story that was true. I wanted to write something that was exactly as impactful for men as it would be for women. I’ll paraphrase some comments, not to congratulate myself, but to share with you some of the reactions: many many people told me it awakened dead memories of lost summer loves. Many told me they were moved to tears. Many have said they want to see it in film. Many said they found it sexy and beautiful and sad and raw. I store all these comments in the coffer of my heart like treasure, because in writing this I stirred memories, I shed tears, and I, just like you, desperately wanted to see something beautiful loosed into the world. We are in this together.

There’s much more. There were cultural plans, like Great House Plan, or the Community Notes guide. I am a big-picture guy and I bridge the gap between theory and reality. There’s the story of Ricky Vaughn, which I made into a twitter thread that got 14 million views and a reply from Elon Musk. You see we like to swing for the fences here.

They say you should “define a brand and focus.” They say this helps you find a niche and an audience. In the interest of doing that I think I do three things here:

• Fiction

• Cultural analysis / commentary

• Proposals

The through-line here is that in all cases I am trying to understand or directly bridge the gap between the following layers:

1. The layer of myth: where deepest, often invisible, wants are engendered and deepest questions are answered

2. The layer of theory: fundamental understandings about people and the world, also the layer of inchoate plans and strategy

3. The layer of action: actionable conclusions that lead to transformation in the real world when decided on and brought into being with people doing things

I am particularly interested in the myths that inspire great social movements.

I don’t have a succinct way to describe this “brand” for you. Maybe you can help me.

Where are we going?

I am going to keep writing vignettes. I have so many little stories to share with you, or even just reactions to a few paragraphs of whatever I’m reading. History, little fictions, extended thoughts, character sketches. There’s going to be a lot because these are easy and fun to write. Part of the intent here is to practice different aspects of the writing craft, for example to stage a dialogue, or to experiment with making different moods. As I get into these we might see recurring characters and a kind of serialization.

I am going to keep writing cultural commentary. Right now I have in mind a piece about the myth of Adam and Eve, and its implications for the body and relations between men and women. This one is burning me up inside to write for you, I was moved in this direction after the Covenant massacre. I think its important for me to write for you.

I am working on research for an analysis piece of the effects of nuclear war. The idea was that a post-war setting might be the background for a novel or series of stories. Now I am not sure if I want to use this idea in fiction, but I want to go through what a post-war world would like like in a rather rigorous way: which U.S. states would be most affected, what would be the reaction of different governments, which countries would be best positioned after such a war, etc.

I have several articles promised for various publications. Though most of these are just ideas discussed with editors, I am looking forward to getting these out in print.

So much more. I have an idea for a novel. I’m not going to start it soon, but it is out there for me. One day with your help I might go hunt it.

No, where are we REALLY going??

• This account stands for the overthrow of everything vicious, base, and ugly

• This account stands for personal loyalty

• This account stands for rewarding your friends and punishing enemies

• This account stands for the restoration of everything true, good, and beautiful

• This account stands for eternal life

• This account stands for the glorification of the world by noble men and women who participate continually in acts of co-creation with God that spill over like rivers to renew the face of the earth and sanctify it, making great love stories, great houses, making all of creation a temple fit for perfect sacrifice, continually and without end from age to age, every moment of every day for everyone everywhere beyond the stars a burning act of worship, world without end

• This account stands for TOTAL VICTORY