An Ode to Pop: Mysticism Wrapped in Cellophane

I love pop culture.

Sure, I’m biased.  How could I not be? After all, this is the only culture I’ve ever actually known. 

But still, allow me the ethno-centric space to proudly proclaim: pop culture is the most amazing cultural force the world has ever seen.

Never in history have we had such a comprehensive reflection of the human condition—whether you’d like to wade in the bubble-gum shallows or dive into the deepest esoteric waters, pop culture has it all, and it’s all waiting for you.

Pop culture does not seek to transcend the superficial, it revels in it.  It is mysticism wrapped in cellophane, sprouting from seeds planted deep in the heart of the American Tantra, and blossoming in recent decades as the world’s first truly global culture.

The ancients have descended from Olympus and taken up residence in the Hollywood Hills, trading their togas for the new regalia—blue jeans, black leather jackets, and black sunglasses, the perennial vestments of cool.  Make no mistake: these archetypal deities are alive and well in the 21st century, they’re just a little bit harder to see.  The gods of pop continue to shape our world and our thoughts, invisible patterns shining through a perpetual parade of actors, actresses, and musicians, enveloping us in a warm blanket of shared symbolism that ensures that we will always have something to talk about.

I wasn’t always so in love with pop culture.  I used to resent being born into an American mythos that seemed to me to have about as much depth as a thinly stretched sheet of saran wrap.  This was especially true as a younger man, back when it was more difficult to tease my own sense of identity apart from the media I surrounded myself with, afflicted with the same false sense of “hipper-than-thou” elitism that seems to plague so many immature aficionados.  I would stubbornly ignore and condescend pretty much anything that got pulled into the currents of the pop mainstream, turning my attention instead to the sounds of the underground—sounds that I would not only find to be far more interesting (which they were), but would also assist my own desperate struggle to feel cool (which they did), while convincing myself that the underground was somehow separate from the rest of pop culture and safely quarantined from the candy-coated surfaces of the mainstream (which it wasn’t). 

But eventually, my tireless search for the ever-elusive “cool” began to flip itself inside-out, beginning in my late twenties when I discovered my new obsession with hip hop and the art of the DJ.

When I acquired my first set of turntables, I was almost immediately confronted with my own naive elitism: “I’m only going to play integral music,” I told myself. Well, it only took a day or two to find the five-or-so albums that could even come close to meeting this nobly closed-minded standard, and it didn’t take much longer before I realized that there was something fundamentally flawed in my own aesthetic sensibilities.

I eventually began to realize that it’s not so much the depth of the actual artistic expression that matters, but the depth of authenticity behind the expression that ultimately makes me shake my ass into oblivion.  This was the opening I needed, through which my own palette of artistic influences and inspirations would expand until it covered all space and all time.  The relentless quest for the sort of exclusivity I needed to prop up my own sense of separateness finally began to quiet, and a deep yearning for inclusivity began to trickle through.  I no longer wanted to play integral music; I wanted to play music integrally. 

Pop culture—this unholy union of capitalism, mass production, and artistic passion—suddenly revealed her true form to me, whispered her secrets into my ear, and showed me how to find limitless beauty in even the most superficial drips of gloss.

I often say that if understanding the depths and patterns of growth explored by integral theory doesn’t help you love more of the world, you’re doing it wrong. And it is as true for art as it is for human psychology.

If your own elite sense of aesthetics doesn’t help you see more beauty in the world, you’re doing it wrong.  After all, the superficial is not the enemy of the beautiful—it is beauty in its most accessible form. 

But God knows that doesn’t make it any prettier….

Continue to Part II: A Zeitgeist for Every iPod —>

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