For every part of life there is a community that figured out how to maximize it: Money has the FIRE people, fitness the gym bros, spirituality the religions, impact the Effective Altruists. For losing control, that community is Burning Man.
When I went for the first time to Burning Man in 2016, I went roller skating in the desert, climbed art pieces, danced until sunrise and, like a little child, wished to just keep playing and not go home.
I felt free, like I could let go of everyday social norms, but at the same time felt incredibly safe. To achieve that the community built a container, a bubble, and that container itself again followed rules that were honed over many years.
Burning man is an extreme example but almost every society has rituals to let go of control: Carnival, festivals, sports games. It’s good for you: Letting go helps with connection, positive affect, and meaning, if the setting is safe and structured.
Another iteration on making explainer videos with AI, this field is moving fast!
How to (safely) lose control
Find your container
A container is a set of rules and norms that gives permission to let go. The criteria I put here are based on my own experience / burning man events, less on research, let me know in the comments you feel something is missing!
Do an inventory: What kind of containers exist in your city? What are local traditions? Carnivals, Pride, local street festivals, sports games, clubs, bars, communities?
Evaluate: Do they offer: Spaces to get to know new people (eg workshops), flexibility to move between high-energy and low-energy spaces, opening and closing rituals, removing distractions like phones and money, opportunity to participate in shaping the event (shifts), costumes or dress codes to fell different?
Create your own: This has the added value of the friendships you build organizing an event. A good place to start is copying concepts you like, that’s how all the regional burning man events started.
Make sure you feel safe
Letting go of control is great, until the guy next to you is also letting go of control and stops taking your boundaries seriously. Climbing art in the desert is fun and games until it breaks under you. Safety third, but not tenth.
Check the concept: How does the container consider safety? Is there for example safer spaces, an awareness team, or education on consent? If you can, check with people who went to similar events and check how they felt about it.
Go together: Double the fun, double the safety. As we suggested before: Be the spark. Do the work of finding great containers and invite people to go with you.
Plan for risks: What will you do when you don’t feel well, get anxious, or just tired? What will you do with unwanted attention? How to get out or to a safer space when things go south?
Consider drugs
Letting go is hard, drugs make it easier. This is a trade-off between your health and your fun and only you can take that. We wrote about risks from drugs here, please do your own research.
MDMA: Helps you let go of control by dampening your social threat detection. You basically “assume the best” of people and that pays off: You feel closer to people, approach more, become more generous and empathetic.
Alcohol: Helps you let go of control by dampening behavioral restraint. I know few people who regret actions on MDMA but a lot who regret actions on alcohol. Yet it helps let go of control, is legal, socially accepted, and ok in low doeses.
Sober containers: If nobody takes drugs, it becomes easier to let go of control without them. Communities to start exploring are for example extatic dance, tantra, or breathwork.
Three things towards lose control
Take a few minutes to find events in your area to lose control
Text one to a friend, see what they say