What are your Way-Markers?
…noticing is what shifts the path.
👇 scroll down for links to the books Kostas discusses
“...Nature becomes your teacher, and from her you will learn what is beautiful and who you are and what is your special quest in life and whither you should go...
You live on manna vouchsafed to you daily, miraculously. You stretch out arms for hidden gifts, you yearn towards the moonbeams and the stars, you listen with new ears to bird's songs and the murmurs of trees and streams....
From day to day you keep your log, your day-book of the soul, and you may think at first that it is a mere record of travel and of facts; but something else will be entering into it, poetry, the new poetry of your life, and it will be evident to a seeing eye that you are gradually becoming an artist in life, you are learning the gentle art of tramping, and it is giving you an artist's joy in creation.” ― Stephen Graham
Andrea Hiott has a conversation with A.A. Kostas, a Singapore-based lawyer and writer behind the Substack Waymarkers, blending poetry, fiction, and essays. They discuss how moving through different places shaped his writing and his interest in avoiding simplistic binaries through discernment—first identifying what kind of decision is in front of you—using hiking metaphors of many paths versus a narrow ridge, or the ridge versus ‘anything goes’.
Kostas cites Into the Wild as a cautionary waymarker about seeking truth without rejecting human connection, and describes a Cradle Mountain hike where his wife had to find her own route.
They explore how technology reinforces binary thinking, why poetry and music hold meanings beneath prose, and the value of humility from engaging Western and Eastern traditions (including Merton and Suzuki). Mentioning various waymakers from C.S. Lewis to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenace to The Gentle Art of Tramping and the Cloud of Unknowing, Andrea and Alex explore what it means to be a writer, why noticing what we are moving through is key, the potentials of care and uncomfortable attention, the importance of embodied presence, and Alex’s experience of fatherhood as immediate responsibility and obligation where love grows and churns the soil.
00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
02:21 Becoming a Writer
03:51 Growing Up Everywhere
05:15 What Is Way Markers
07:12 Pilgrimage and Substack
10:29 Into the Wild Lessons
14:29 Beyond Binary Thinking
18:49 Cradle Mountain Metaphor
22:36 Discernment and Ridge Lines
25:20 Tech Shapes Our Minds
27:00 Why Braid Genres
31:04 Music and Poetry Under Language
34:12 Law as Applied Philosophy
37:41 Zen Meets Catholic Mysticism
43:00 Humility and Unknowing
46:48 Craving Oneness Safely
48:19 Mystical Moments Explained
50:20 Flow State With Meaning
51:00 Desire Points to God
52:25 You Cant Conjure Awe
56:14 Care In Writing
58:36 Audience Capture Trap
59:27 Pamphlets Off The Internet
01:02:40 Love Is Uncomfortable
01:17:58 Fellow Travelers And Faith
01:24:28 Humor Holds Paradox
01:28:34 Fatherhood And Obligation
01:32:18 Closing Reflections
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Books:
The Gentle Art of Tramping by Stephen Graham:
full pdf available here from Project Guttenberg
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The Cloud of Unknowing by a mystic of the 14th century:
full electronic scan of the book available here
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Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig:
full book on Internet Archive or as pdf
—
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
link to a pdf version here
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Alex also mentions this review of the book
Room for Good Things to Run Wild by Josh Nadeau, in which he discusses dealing with alcoholism.
Buy Holding Paradox: The Navigational Approach to Mind and Consciousness by Andrea Hiott
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