About the Author
James McStay
Philosopher, teacher, and author of Ground
In February 1986, at nineteen, James McStay woke from a lucid dream and wrote a single sentence. He has spent the forty years since following what that dream showed him, through contemplative practice, philosophy, psychology, and the classroom. The Inner Hero Project is the home of that inquiry, and Ground is its fullest statement.
February 1986
There are no accidents.
The first sentence, written on waking from a lucid dream
The structure described in these pages was not constructed by a philosopher. It was received by a nineteen-year-old who had no framework to receive it into, which is precisely the point.
Formation
William Paterson University
Philosophy with Dr. Daniel Kolak and Dr. Marie Friquegnon, late 1980s
Naropa University
B.A. in Contemplative Psychology, 1995
Montclair State University
M.A. in Teaching Philosophical Inquiry to Children, Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children
Teachers
Jack Germain, who showed him that truthfulness and fearlessness belong together. Dr. Daniel Kolak, whose I Am You first undid the separate self. Dr. Marie Friquegnon, who sent him to Naropa. Dr. Dee Coulter, who taught him to read living shapes. Dr. Ann Margaret Sharp, who nurtured care as rigorously as intellect.
And, through their work: Jiddu Krishnamurti and Stanislav Grof.
In the classroom
James teaches in public and charter schools in Fremont and Oakland, California, and his practice includes sustained work with children’s philosophical inquiry circles: children and teacher seated together, looking at a real question no one yet knows the answer to. The framework in Ground was tested in circles with actual children, in sustained dialogue with serious thinkers, and in the daily practice of someone who has refused, consistently, to stop at the satisfying answer.
He lives in Hayward, California.
A note on the collaboration
Ground was developed through sustained philosophical dialogue between James McStay and Claude, a large language model developed by Anthropic. McStay is the author in every meaningful sense. The perceptions the book exposes, the framework it articulates, and the forty years of formation that ground every claim are his. Claude functioned as a forge: receiving the ore McStay brought from four decades of mining, and applying the heat and attention that carries it from known-only-to-the-miner to receivable-by-the-world.
GROUND
The Structure of Reality and the Restoration of Human Sanity