Alan Briskin is a writer, consultant, and field researcher whose work lives at the intersection of soul, systems, and social change. As co-author of Space Is Not Empty, he invites readers to attune to the invisible forces—fields of energy, memory, and meaning—that shape our inner lives and collective realities. His work blends decades of organizational wisdom with a deep reverence for mystery, social justice, and the interconnected web we are all part of.
July 25, 2025
Field Notes from the Outer Hebrides
Last month I traveled with my wife to the Outer Hebrides in Scotland and spent time with the Callanish Stones on the Isle of Lewis. These stones, older even than Stonehenge, carry an otherworldly quality, a felt sense of time as elastic and outside our normal causal worldview. Without realizing it, we had booked our visit to coincide with Summer Solstice, allowing us to witness the stones under a sun that lingered until 10:30 PM.
In preparation for the visit, I went with the intention of photographing the stones with infrared photography, a format I had never attempted before. Using a specialized camera converted with an infrared filter, I didn’t have to pretend to adopt a 'Beginner’s Mind'—I was a genuine novice in a landscape unlike any I had entered before.
These images, captured in wavelengths just beyond human sight, are like our investigation of fields: revealing more of what’s there—just beyond the edge of ordinary perception. In black and white, the stones emerge with heightened contrast and radiant textures, evoking a presence that feels both seen and unseen.
The Road Dance: A Tragedy and Reckoning Reverberating Through the Field
Shortly after returning from the Isle of Lewis, I stopped into an art gallery in Inverness and struck up a conversation with the gallery’s owner. I told him about my foray into infrared photography and filming the Callanish Stones during Solstice—the haunting, almost otherworldly presence I felt there. He quieted for a moment, then said, “You should see the film The Road Dance. It was filmed on that island.”
Based on the novel by John MacKay, the movie tells the story of a young woman in a close-knit Hebridean village whose life is irrevocably altered by violence, silence, and the weight of social expectations.
What struck me most—beyond its visual beauty and emotional depth—was how vividly the film illustrates the dynamics of a social field: how unseen currents of trauma, shame, protection, and resistance move through a community. Everyone in the village is affected, consciously or not, by what is left unsaid. Fields are not just metaphors but living realities—relational spaces where energy and information circulate.
The power of the film lies in how it reflects back to us the ways a person, an event, or even a single moment can reverberate through a collective field—lingering, distorting, and at times corrupting the truth. It reveals how both courage and silence shape what is possible in a community—and how healing begins when what has long remained hidden is finally brought into the light.