I like the double meaning of the tagline “get out of your mind.” It’s meant to imply both a designer’s “bias to action” as well as an element of craziness. The day of my first MATAGI event certainly was crazy but not for the reasons anyone might expect.

Looking back in ten years, I suspect it’ll be almost funny that on the same day we launched our first event, I was witness to my first and hopefully last, mass shooting. Since my car and the contents of my trunk along with my meeting materials, were stuck in the crime scene, there was certainly an element of “winging it.”

My prepared agenda went out the door.

That morning I had arrived at Swing’s when they opened at 7 AM. I go there to work for a few hours each morning on my novel. Ten minutes later, I would see a bullet hole in a black SUV across the street, realize that the “firecrackers” were actually gunfire and be laying out flat on the ground calling 911. It all seems so bizarre even now, two days later.

I think all writers write, a least a little because they don’t want to die with stories inside them.

All creative are like that, we don’t want to die with ideas inside us. That is what I thought about in those minutes that seemed to last an eternity.

That’s why I created MATAGI. I wanted to create a space and a community, for creative people to collaborate and manifest their ideas, to do the work that only they can do, the work they were meant to do.

There are a lot of reasons and benefits for creating MATAGI, but really what it comes down to is TRUTH. I’m manifesting my truth, my art by connecting and collaborating with others and also giving them the space, the opportunity, and encouragement to do the same.

Namaste.