Friendship
Feeling superior: antidote to feeling vulnerable?
Hello readers, People who value compassion are generally people who realize that life is a struggle for most of us. Some of us battle with health issues. Others struggle with domestic violence, poverty, drug or alcohol addiction, unemployment. There is no life that unfolds without challenge. When we look inside our own hearts and accept […]
Looking inward and getting away from fear
Hello readers, Humans are very emotional creatures. We like to think of ourselves as primarily rational beings, but for most of us, our emotions run the show – whether it be conscious or below the surface of our awareness. In fact, the most logical people who stubbornly assert that they live only by the facts […]
The layers of friendship
Hello readers, People always say that humans are social animals. I don’t know if other animals suffer from solitude, but I do know that our faithful companions, dogs, let us clearly know when they crave our attention. A dog knows that she needs to be touched, and she clearly communicates her desire and most of […]
What we value: let’s change one simple thing
Hello readers, I felt really proud when I heard a comment from French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, who is currently presiding over the Paris climate talks. He noted that it is our responsibility, as western powers, to help countries across the African continent who are currently experiencing significant damage (terrible drought) from climate change. Africa […]
Friendship and identity
Hello readers, People, including me, are full of ideas, opinions, and after a few or several years of living on this planet, we use our personal experience, exposure to family, media, friends, and other other influences to construct a view of how we think the world should work and where we belong. One of my […]
My life will get better: on hope and disappointment
Hello readers, Good parents know how to teach their kids to deal with frustration and disappointment, because not to do so is unkind to children. Parents who don’t delay gratification and who rush to fulfill their children’s needs and desires even before they have the ability or luxury to feel a little discomfort, are truly […]
Touching, isn’t it?
Hello readers, We often underestimate our sense of touch and how sophisticated it really is. We know that our skin is the largest organ in/on our body, yet our awareness of our instinctive ability to interpret the emotions and states of mind of other humans around us based on this under-appreciated sense is quite […]
How did love become a luxury?
Hello readers, It occurred to me as I was driving to work this morning that in the world in which I live, it seems like love, passion, and joy are something most of us feel like we can only rarely afford to live and enjoy. For example, most of us (including myself) do work to […]
Friendship
Hello readers, There are many ways to relate to the world and its many planes, material and spiritual. The upheavals we are experiencing as a nation with regards to police brutality, racism, gay marriage are interesting to examine. More than one person has noted that forty or fifty years ago, neighbors knew one another by […]
Letter to Mr. Nick Hanauer: Seeds for America
Dear readers, Below is a letter I just sent to Mr. Nick Hanauer, billionaire tech entrepreneur, author, and social activist. In the letter, I outline my own idea for fostering social and creative change in America, to help grow personal creativity, meaningful lives, and social and economic growth to America and beyond. Dear Mr. […]
Nationalism and Fundamentalism: Two Faces of Fear
Hello readers, Many of us around the world have been closely following the news during and following the terror attacks in and around Paris, France that killed over twenty people, including the majority of the editorial staff of satirical journal Charlie Hebdo, three police officers, and four Jewish civilians, as well as the perpetrators of […]
Strong or weak? States of vulnerability in America
Hello readers, I have been living, working, and raising my son in the United States for eleven years now, and I constantly run into the issue of self-protection. In other words, fear. I don’t think anyone feels safe in America, and I don’t think many feel safe to just be themselves, no matter what social media […]
Cramped skin or the web of love (a poem)
if skin were an envelope, a divider would it separate us from one another or allow us to better touch each other? sensitive nothingness cells drawing attention spirals around the luminous flux that is personality wrapped in bone human brains wrapping life and relationship into convenient patterns ruling out the vibrancy the freedom rainbow of pure […]
Thankful – thoughts on environment and culture
Hello readers, Sometimes I fantasize about an America built on the principle of inter-connectedness of all things and beings. I try to imagine a place where the schism of culture that is our European mono-theistic birthright never happened. Where man against nature was never a theme in literature or science. What might have happened […]
The Thing With Feathers (a book review)
a murmuration of starlings Hello readers, Who among us has never envied a bird in flight? Our mysterious neighbors, many of them so well adapted to urban life, are a subject of endless fascination. Noah Strycker’s book, “The Thing With Feathers: the surprising lives of birds and what they reveal about being human”, is a […]
Dear S. (letter to a reader) A poem
Dear S., I read your prose poem about fear four times each word fiercely aching and vibrating with the misery of a pure and tender heart shredded, fractured then armored with countless layers of terror, guilt loyal pump of life cellophaned to suffocation yet each word so precise so crisply observed so passionate It seems you gave […]
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