Tag: musings
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On the Art of Travel
It occurs to me, having spent the greater part of my Sunday immersed in Paul Tillich’s The Courage to Be, trying to finesse a poem that simply won’t come, and making heavy notations on Maslow’s thinking about the marriage of “higher living” and our instinctual lives (including his concept of “aggridants”), that it might be […]
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B-Sides
This post is formatted to reflect an original journal entry. 8/21/18 I find that I am prone to more frequent bouts of spontaneous creative activity lately. This thrills me. Makes me feel soulful. What does that mean, anyway–soulful? Integrated? Aligned? Deeply and holistically expressive? Yes. Back to alignment. Makes me think of the Peterson book. […]
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A Spoonful of Sugar
There is a blackboard on the wall of the office where I write. I reserve its use for questions and concepts that require prolonged reflection. For those particularly elusive or mesmerizing phrases that deserve a wealth of consideration. “Holistic Thinking” now occupies the top third of that space. Scrawled in blue half-cursive and slightly off-center. […]
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Means & Ends
My parents divorced when I was in my teens. My father decided to remarry when I was in my twenties, which means that I, an only child for the duration of my childhood, now have a much younger, teenage stepbrother. He is a cool kid, although admittedly, I don’t see him as often as I […]
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Pendulum
I arrived at yoga class this morning with the hopes of losing myself in the pause. Of immersing myself in the kind of restorative quiet that is often necessary for the achievement of insight. For the mental clarity required to imbue this post, with which I’d been struggling for the past few days, with meaning, […]
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On Wisdom
It’s an ashen sky and lo-fi Sunday. Bone dreary and mellow with intermittent sunlight. The air is pregnant with repose. Heavy. Lingering with moisture, the kind that clings to your hair and drips off the edges of your windowsills. The temperature in a slow and steady climb, typical of spring afternoons in the American South. […]
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In Terms of Life and Death
I’m not sure when exactly I began thinking of creativity, generally, and of the dynamics of creative living, in particular, in terms of life force, or energy. Those activities and attitudes that are life-giving versus those that take it away. Indeed, I was, you might say, “smacked over the head” with an aha moment recently […]
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On Sensual Living II
We want to be the poets of our life—first of all, in the smallest, most everyday matters. – Friedrich Nietzsche I imagine that, of all the creative games we play, some of the most purposeful and functional are those designed to transform otherwise painstaking components of our reality into more tolerable—even pleasurable—experiences. Work. Errands. Personal […]
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On Introspection
Beyond myself, somewhere, I wait for my arrival. —Ocativo Paz I’ve always been an introspective sort. My mother occasionally likes to remind me of the time I spent as a child perched on the edge of my bed, reading whatever material I could get my hands on and subsequently reflecting on those readings for hours. […]
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On Feeling Pretty
There are certain states, certain complex, or elaborate, sensual and emotional experiences, that consistently elude description. It is as if these experiences, no matter how significant, are destined from their inception to remain feelings—to stay tucked beneath the veil of consciousness, with certain qualities rising, occasionally, to the surface where they spark a vague sense […]
The Used Life 