History
Art and healing the collective body: reconfiguring controversial public art
Dearest readers, A friend and very talented and compassionate fellow writer recently shared with me the fascinating and horrifying true story of her ancestor, Massachusetts Puritan Hannah Duston (1657-1736). Hannah Duston has been commemorated and was at one time celebrated for her brutal and vengeful acts of scalping and murdering in their sleep 10 Native […]
Creativity in the time of COVID-19: Why be creative only in times of crisis?
Dearest readers, I celebrated (in my own way) my 53rd birthday this April 4th. 4/4/2020 is said to be the day of perfect balance in the year of perfect balance. Although the world seems chaotic these days, we are clearly shifting in the physical or most dense areas of life on Earth to a new […]
The Comforts and Discomforts of Living Inside and Outside of the Box
Dearest readers, I recently finished reading an intriguing and thought provoking novel by Celeste Ng, called Little Fires Everywhere. Throughout the story, the author contrasts the life choices of two families. One is a single mother Mia, and her teen-aged daughter, Pearl, who live a nomadic and minimalist lifestyle. The mother is an artist, and […]
The Stranger & the mirror: How looking inward changes our cultural paradigm towards outsiders
Dear readers, I recently reread Albert Camus’ iconic novel, The Stranger. It struck me as I was reading that Meursault’s detached personality and precise, yet objective truthfulness would probably place him somewhere on the autism spectrum today. As most people know, the bizarre cultural mindset of the time in which the novel is set (1950’s […]
The body, intuition, and shamanic energy
Dear readers, We are living in the midst of a paradigm shift, and it is an exciting time to be alive. We are experiencing the end of a long (in human terms) period of history dominated by male energy in which we have been taught that all power is outside of ourselves. It seems paradoxical […]
Waking up: what tomorrow will bring
Hello readers, Many people want to know why we are here on Earth. What is our purpose? I have been trying to figure this out for many years. Over the years, gradually, like the opening of a flower bud, small bits of realization have come to me. When I was in my early twenties as […]
Power and the new age of the human being
Hello readers, I have always known, felt, and experienced that reality and the world in which we live are so much bigger and more wonderful than we are told as children. As we grow up in this world, we are often taught to think of ourselves as so much less than what we are. We […]
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 […]
How fear of women has led us to global warming
Hello readers, Do you ever wonder why we take for granted that God is a male and doesn’t have a wife? Do you ever wonder when human beings began to think of themselves as apart from the rest of Nature and possibly superior to Her? Just what process of human history and evolution has led […]
What do Buddha, Jesus, and C.G. Jung have in common?
Dear readers, I’ve written about how co-dependency is encouraged in our culture and relationships, so much so that most people don’t even notice how their relationship to self and to the world is permeated by drama and the inability to face one’s own shadows and pain honestly. Numbed by overwork, entertainment, and countless distractions, we […]
Angry, broken, insecure: the world we inherited from Cain
Dear readers, I am not a religious person, but I believe in the life of spirit. I also believe that together as living beings, we imagine and create the world we live in. It is a collective work of spirit and art. That is why I particularly enjoy folk tales and creation stories. The story […]
Socialism and America…and what discrimination does to our country
Hello readers, My fifteen year old son introduced me to Bernie Sanders, and I’m guessing he had a good hunch that I would like his ideas about integrity, personal responsibility, the role of government, social justice and accountability of business leaders and government institutions. To be precise, my son showed me a video clip of […]
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 […]
Fresh: a different perspective on the survival of humanity
Hello readers, If you’ve been following my blog for any length of time, then you will know that my main quest in life, art, and in writing is to observe and respect reality, and to find balance between human life and culture and all of nature. In my search for a simpler life in harmony […]
WHAT IF? ON FREEDOM…
July 4, 2013 Hello readers, What does freedom or independence mean to you? To some, it means having no one over yourself to tell you what choices to make or how to behave. To others, it means enjoying the ability to be your true self without censorship, to be able to reach full potential without […]
Some Thoughts on the Power of Fear and Negativity…and How to Go Beyond
Hello readers, While I was rinsing some beans at my kitchen sink the other evening, the thought came into my mind that the many stressful challenges and “negative” experiences that have peppered my life were expressly chosen by me before coming to this Earth and this lifetime for a specific purpose. I often wonder why […]
Starving or Feeding the Feminine from within: Some thoughts on eating disorders and spiritual purpose
Hello readers, Yesterday, I read a blog post by Elena on thecitizensoffashion.com (see link below) about how young women are promoting and spreading eating disorders through social media. http://thecitizensoffashion.com/2013/01/09/valeria-levitinthe-worlds-thinnest-woman-campaigns-against-anorexia/ Reading about Valeria Levitin, described as “the thinnest woman in the world” in the article, gave me pause. I remembered N., a former room-mate from art school […]
Artist: Defender of Individual Liberties
Hello readers, In our hearts, we all crave freedom. The desire for freedom takes up permanent residence in a corner of our beings, bumping up to the desire for security. In the heart of the artist, the need for individual freedom is more often than not stronger than the need to assimilate into the group and be […]
Bringing Meaning, Art and Symbolic Language Back into Architecture & Daily Life
Museum of Contemporary Art, Nice, France Hello readers, Although we are all bombarded in most parts of the world with a constant barrage of images and messages from advertisers and media, the Fine Arts have taken a long leave of absence from our living rooms, abdicating the places of business that we frequent on a daily business. The […]
Scapegoat: A History of Blaming Others… A Book Review
Hello readers, As personal responsibility and self-awareness are two of my favorite topics to ponder, you can well imagine that I was immediately drawn to British author Charlie Campbell’s 2011 book, “Scapegoat”. This brief history of blaming, shaming, and diminishing other people in order to feel better about one’s own self or group; creating cohesion […]
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