Tuesday, April 1, 2025
Life its ownself.....................
I started staying after practice just to work on rebounding. In many ways, this approach to finding a unique path wasn't just about basketball; it was about life. It was about understanding that true success doesn't come from following the crowd, but from daring to be different, to see opportunities where others see obstacles. It was a lesson that would serve me well beyond the court.
-George Raveling, What You're Made For: Powerful Life Lessons from My Career in Sports
on unlocking human doors...............
It is a secret which every intellectual man quickly learns, that, beyond the energy of his possessed and conscious intellect, he is capable of a new energy (as of an intellect doubled on itself), by abandonment to the nature of things; that, beside his privacy of power as an individual man, there is a great public power, on which he can draw, by unlocking, at all risks, his human doors, and suffering the ethereal tides to roll and circulate through him: then he is caught up into the life of the Universe, his speech is thunder, his thought is law, and his words are universally intelligible as the plants and animals.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson, from his essay The Poet
On opinions....................
I think opinions should be judged by their influences and effects; and if a man holds none that tend to make him less virtuous or more vicious, it may be concluded that he holds none that are dangerous, which I hope is the case with me.
-Ben Franklin, as culled from here
discipline........................
Discipline turns intentions into action.
Discipline means no procrastination.
Discipline means now.
Choose the pain of discipline, not the pain of regret.
Discipline means no procrastination.
Discipline means now.
Choose the pain of discipline, not the pain of regret.
An undisciplined moment seems harmless, but they add up to disaster.
Without discipline, the tiny things will be your downfall.
Self-control is always rewarding.
-Derek Sivers, How To Live: 27 conflicting answers and one weird conclusion
choose............................
What use are these people's wits, who let themselves be led by speechmakers, in crowds, without considering how many fools and thieves they are among, and how few choose the good? The best choose progress towards one thing, a name forever honored by the gods, while others eat their way toward sleep like nameless oxen.
Monday, March 31, 2025
Accounting.............................
Natural selection, in short, does not anticipate future needs. But this principle, while explaining so much so well, presents a difficulty. If the principle is universally true, how did natural selection prepare the mind for civilization before civilization existed? That is the great mystery of human evolution: how to account for calculus and Mozart.
-Edward O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge
Productivity-debt..................
A done list isn't solely a way to feel better about yourself, though. When you start to view each day not as a matter of paying off a debt, but as an opportunity to move a small-but-meaningful number of items over to your done list, you'll find yourself making better choices about what to focus on; and you'll make more progress on them, too, since you'll be wasting less energy stressing about all the other tasks you're (inevitably) neglecting.
-Oliver Burkeman, Meditations for Mortals: Four Weeks to Embrace Your Limitations and Make Time for What Counts
not there yet........................
If all your beliefs line up into neat little bundles, you should be highly suspicious.
-Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant
Sunday, March 30, 2025
good questions.......................
What conventional wisdom are you relying on in your situation? What would happen if you forgot the obvious answers that spring to mind and searched for new ones? What can you overlook or ignore?
-Roger Von Oech, Expect the Unexpected (Or You Won't Find It)
Underneath.........................
Underneath the lessons of things, spirits, Nature, governments, ownerships, I swear I perceive other lessons, Underneath all to me is myself, to you yourself.
-Walt Whitman, By Blue Ontario's Shore
great is the responsibility.................
The time at which I stand before you is full of interest. The eyes of all nations are fixed on our Republic. The event of the existing crisis will be decisive in the opinion of mankind of the practicability of our federal system of government. Great is the stake placed in our hands; great is the responsibility which must rest upon the people of the United States. Let us realize the importance of the attitude in which we stand before the world. Let us exercise forbearance and firmness. Let us extricate our country from the dangers which surround it and learn wisdom from the lessons they inculcate.
-Andrew Jackson, from his second inaugural address, March 4, 1833
Verse........................
3. Darkness is lack of light as sin is lack of love. It has no unique properties of its own. It is an example of the "scarcity" belief, from which only error can proceed. Truth is always abundant. Those who perceive and acknowledge that they have everything have no needs of any kind. The purpose of the Atonement is to restore everything to you; or rather, to restore it to your awareness. You were given everything when you were created, just as everyone was.
-The Course in Miracles, Chapter 1, Section IV
Verse......................
The softest of all things
overrides the hardest of all things.
That without substance enters where there is no space.
Hence I know the value of nonaction.
overrides the hardest of all things.
That without substance enters where there is no space.
Hence I know the value of nonaction.
Teaching without words,
performing without actions—
few in the world can grasp it—
that is the master's way.
Rare indeed are those
who obtain the bounty of this world.
performing without actions—
few in the world can grasp it—
that is the master's way.
Rare indeed are those
who obtain the bounty of this world.
-Tao Te Ching, as channeled by Wayne Dyer
Verse...........................
By virtue of the divine consciousness of his previous life, he automatically becomes attracted to yogic principles—even without seeking them. Such an inquisitive transcendentalist, striving for yoga, stands always above the ritualistic principles of the scriptures.
-Bhagavad-gita, Chapter 6, Text 44
Verse...........................
4. Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!
5. Let your forbearing spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near.
6. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
7. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
8. Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything is worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things.
-The Holy Bible, Philippians 4, The Open Bible version
Saturday, March 29, 2025
Thursday, March 27, 2025
Abundance liberalism, or, learning how to build...
But what frustrates me most is that by insisting on degrowth over abundance, progressives are hurting themselves much more than they’re hurting any billionaires, oligarchs, or conservatives.
-Noah Smith, from this blog post
Checking in.......................
............................with the busy people:
I love scrolling and can do
it for hours. In fact, I often do it for hours. Television is too demanding.
I’m a busy person.
Wednesday, March 26, 2025
some books.......................
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.
-Francis Bacon, from his essay, "Of Studies"
the quiet moments....................
Why me?
Why was I spared when so many others weren't?
Why was I gifted with this extra time?
And what do I do with this gift?
This kind of introspection isn't merely a luxury of age, it's a necessity, a way to reconcile the randomness of existence with the purpose I sought. I realized that the answers weren't in the grand events, but in the quiet moments, in the decisions made when no one was watching, in the way I chose to face each new day.
-George Raveling, What You're Made For: Powerful Life Lessons from My Career in Sports
the vital yet messy questions.........
The prevailing ethical framework of the [Silicon] Valley, a techno-utopian view that technology would solve all of humanity's problems, has devolved into a narrow and thin utilitarian approach, one that casts individuals as mere atoms in a system to be managed and contained. The vital yet messy questions of what constitutes a good life, which collective endeavor society should pursue, and what a shared and national identity can make possible have been set aside as the anachronisms of another age.
-Alexander C. Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska, The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West
Aging like a fine wine.............
Good habits when you’re young are like a bizarre form of time travel. You’re sending little care packages to your future self.
Truth is, no one wants to hear about good habits. They’re not sexy. They’re not even moderately attractive in that “I know you’re bad for me, but I’m drawn to you anyway” kind of way.
-Eric Barker, from this post on aging well
Truth is, no one wants to hear about good habits. They’re not sexy. They’re not even moderately attractive in that “I know you’re bad for me, but I’m drawn to you anyway” kind of way.
-Eric Barker, from this post on aging well
allergic.........................
Born and bred a member of the leather-aproned class, Franklin was, at least for most of his life, more comfortable with artisans and thinkers than with the established elite, and he was allergic to the pomp and perks of hereditary aristocracy. Throughout his life he would refer to himself as "B. Franklin, printer."
From these attitudes sprang what may be Franklin's most important vision: an American national identity based on the virtue and values of its middle class.
-Walter Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
Tuesday, March 25, 2025
never ceased..............
But the highest minds of the world have never ceased to explore the double meaning, or, shall I say, the quadruple, or the centuple, or much more manifold meaning, of every sensuous fact: Orpheus, Empedocles, Heraclitus, Plato, Plutarch, Dante, Swedenborg, and the masters of sculpture, picture and poetry.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson, from his essay, The Poet
some quotes...............
Orpheus was one of the handful of Greek heroes to visit the underworld and return; his music and song had power even over Hades.
-Wikipedia
-Wikipedia
Many fires burn below the surface.
Time is a game played beautifully by children.
-Heraclitus
-Heraclitus
Wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.
-Plato
-Plato
As Cæsar was at supper the discourse was of death, —which sort was the best. "That," said he, "which is unexpected."
-Plutarch
-Plutarch
Love and the gracious heart are a single thing...
one can no more be without the other
than the reasoning mind without its reason.
A life of kindness is the primary meaning of divine worship.
Opening paragraphs................
His arrival in Philadelphia is one of the most famous scenes in autobiographical history: the bedraggled 17-year-old runaway, cheeky yet with a pretense of humility, straggling off the boat and buying three puffy rolls as he wanders up Market Street. But wait a minute. There's something more. Peel back a layer and we can see him as a 65-year-old wry observer, sitting in an English country house, writing this scene, pretending it's part of a letter to his son, an illegitimate son who has become a royal governor with aristocratic pretensions and needs to be reminded of his humble roots.
-Walter Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
sandcastles.....................
History is a child building a sandcastle by the sea, and that child is the whole majesty of man's power in the world.
Can I get an Amen.......................?
“Success Strategies” could be an exciting new academic field, but it may be even more beneficial if its lessons are addressed in elementary and high schools as a Life Skills program.
-Michael Wade, from his substack
Monday, March 24, 2025
Spin...............................
When faced with the prospect of admitting you’re wrong or looking for a better explanation, most people get busy looking for an explanation.
-Ben Carlson, from this post
I've cut more than my share.............
In the school of life, every experience offers a lesson. . . .
Some people fully embrace learning, while others choose to cut class.
On Camus...........................
"I wanted to change lives, yes," Camus wrote when young, "but not the world, which I worshipped as divine."
His deepest gift, always, had to do with finding the confidence to affirm: "The great courage is still to gaze as squarely at the light as at death." His enduring lesson was that the difficulty—the irrationality—of life need not rob us of our joy. That Sisyphus's efforts will always be fruitless need not mean that his life is wasted. A plague can awaken heroism and compassion precisely because we are no longer sleepwalking through life.
-Pico Iyer, Aflame: Learning from Silence
Normal.....................
Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.
We shouldn't forget, as we learned in school, that normalcy is merely the psychosis of the majority.
Fifty years ago.....................
Liked the album. Missed the movie. As Gene Siskel wrote: "a disappointing, slap-dash pictorialization of the fine music of the Who [with] no cinematic flow."
Asking for directions...............
What we need more than ever, though, is help in discovering if we’re asking the right questions and choosing to go to the right place.
-Seth Godin, from this post
unpacking...................
Soil.
Air.
Sea.
Air.
Sea.
Basic words for complex things.
Language is amazing,
but it compresses huge, messy concepts
into tidy signifiers like overstuffed pockets.
but it compresses huge, messy concepts
into tidy signifiers like overstuffed pockets.
Unpack the common words.
See what's hiding inside.
See what's hiding inside.
Stone.
Sun.
Tree.
Sun.
Tree.
Not simple.
Fundamental.
Each, an invitation.
Fundamental.
Each, an invitation.
-Jarod K. Anderson, Definitions
likely true.....................
I'm crazy enough to believe that the happiest man on earth is the man with the fewest needs.
immersed....................
We are immersed in beauty, but our eyes have no clear vision.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson, from his essay Art
Sunday, March 23, 2025
idle hands..........................
When we lack real problems, we create imaginary ones; when we
lack meaningful work, we perfect the unimportant.
Ah, politics.......................
The deep question in American politics today, however, concerns the fate of the Democratic Party. For Republicans, the future will look and sound like Trump and his band of young buccaneers, about to take Washington by storm. They may succeed or fail in arriving at their destination, but the direction is set. It is otherwise with the Democrats: the 2024 election shattered the party, and it isn’t clear how—or if—the pieces will come together again. . . .
Ever since, the Democrats have stumbled inside a house of mirrors, where wish is confused with reality and fatal errors appear as a mere failure to communicate. In that place of illusion, they embrace a mythology that elevates them into wondrous spirits—representatives of science, perpetual guardians of “our democracy,” saviors of a dying earth, adjudicators of perfect justice. By definition, only satanic forces could oppose such a chosen people. To abandon this mythology will be traumatic and identity-crushing.
-Martin Gurri, from his essay Lost in the Funhouse
Opening paragraphs.............
Those little bastards were hiding out there in the tall grass. The moon was not quite full, but bright, and it was behind them, so I could see them plain as day, though it was deep night. Lightning bugs flashed against the black canvas. I waited at Miss Watson's kitchen door, rocked a loose step board with my foot, knew she was going to tell me to fix it tomorrow. I was waiting there for her to give me a pan of corn bread that she had made with my Sadie's recipe. Waiting is a big part of a slave's life, waiting and waiting to wait some more. Waiting for demands. Waiting for food. Waiting for the end of days. Waiting for the just and deserved Christian reward at the end of it all.
Those while boys, Huck and Tom, watched me. They were always playing some kind of pretending game where I was eight a villain or prey, but certainly their toy. They hopped about out there with the chiggers, mosquitoes and other biting bugs, but never made any progress toward me. It always pays to give white folks what they want, so I stepped into the yard and called out into the night.
-Percival Everett, James
the light......................
The soul is dyed the color of its thoughts. Think only on those things that are in line with your principles and can bear the light of day. The content of your character is your choice. Day by day, what you do is who you become. Your integrity is your destiny - it is the light that guides your way.
-attributed to Heraclitus
Saturday, March 22, 2025
Friday, March 21, 2025
A night out on the town.............
After a very pleasant dining experience at 1922 On The Square, My Sweetie and I walked down the street to the wondrous Midland Theatre where we took in a great show from the ageless Oak Ridge Boys. Much fun.
Thursday, March 20, 2025
a geometry of sunbeams.............
I am present at the sowing of the seed of the world. With a geometry of sunbeams, the soul lays the foundation of nature.
2028.................................
..........................this will be interesting.
There’s a long roster of governors, senators, members of Congress, and celebrities who can take the plunge. A short list includes Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker, Maryland governor Wes Moore, Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro, Kentucky governor Andy Beshear, and California governor Gavin Newsom. Senator Christopher Murphy of Connecticut and Ro Khanna, a Silicon Valley congressman, seem likely to announce. For Democrats hungry for wealthy, famous outsiders, billionaire Mark Cuban and Stephen A. Smith, the ESPN commentator, could be viable. Pete Buttigieg will probably run again. Both Harris and her old running mate, Tim Walz, might be in the mix. For those nostalgic for bruising centrists, Rahm Emmanuel is floating a trial balloon.
Wednesday, March 19, 2025
Wisdom.............................
When I think I am getting too caught up in daily events, I do two things: First, I wait 24 hours (or at least overnight) before starting to form an opinion. Second, I try to think like a historian and put myself 50 or 100 years in the future and frame the disagreement that way.
Fingers crossed that ......................
.....................it will all be worth it.
To say that people, companies and the market are unsettled would be an understatement. Everyone is whipsawed by tariff announcements, other foreign affairs issues, uncertainty about where federal spending and the deficit are headed. So no surprise that indicators on economy-wide trends are also in flux. Going to be an interesting next few months.
Noah Smith decides.........................
.................it's time to start panicking about the national debt.
Welcome to the party, although I disagree with some of his analysis. But still...........
Tuesday, March 18, 2025
I like simple and boring..............
I watch financial markets every day because I think they’re a window into culture and behavior. They’re so fascinating, so beautiful, like art. But my personal finances are simple and boring. They will win no awards. But they’re practical for me and my family. They provide what I need them to do. Isn’t there beauty in that?
-Morgan Housel, concluding this post
habits...................
You need ritual, not inspiration. Everyday, no matter what, you must practice. Your practice ritual is your highest priority—an unbreakable commitment. Stubbornly protect this time against the demands of the world.
-Derek Sivers, How To Live: 27 conflicting answers and one weird conclusion
the path................................
Don't hope that events will turn out the way you want, welcome events in whichever way they happen: this is the path to peace.
balance......................
Truth is our element of life, yet if a man fasten his attention on a single aspect of truth, and apply himself to that alone for a long time, the truth becomes distorted and not itself, but falsehood; . . . How wearisome the grammarian, the phrenologist, the political or religious fanatic, or indeed any possessed mortal whose balance is lost by the exaggeration of a single topic. It is incipient insanity.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson, from this essay
responsibility....................
Success on any major scale requires you to accept responsibility. . . . In the final analysis, the one quality that all successful people have is the ability to take on responsibility.
the unending tug of war..............
From the outset, the convention reflected a pointed truce in the unending tug of war between those who believed in the necessity of a functioning union and those who feared the encroaching despotism of a national government and clung to states' rights; between fervent slaveholders and ardent abolitionists; between those who worried that small states would be smothered by the political juggernaut of the big states and those who worried about the tyranny of the minority; and between radicals who wanted a clear repudiation of the past and traditionalists who wanted only to tinker at the margins. The reality was that after more than five generations of laying down roots in America, the exigencies of life had only sharpened the old insistence upon demands for personal liberty and equality. Now the Americans found themselves arguing both for the historic and chartered rights they had once enjoyed as Englishmen, and for the timeless and universal rights of man.
It was complicated, it was messy, and somehow everything came together. Politicians all, the delegates compromised repeatedly.
-Jay Winik, The Great Upheaval: America and the Birth of the Modern World, 1788-1800
Monday, March 17, 2025
Checking in ..................
.................................with Mark Manson
People like to make happiness complicated, but it’s actually quite simple.
The art of stoicism.........................
But in Stoicism the art of journaling is more than that, more than some simple diary. This daily practice is the philosophy. Preparing for the day ahead. Reflecting on the day that has passed. Reminding oneself of the wisdom we have learned from our teachers, from our reading, from our own experiences. It’s not enough to simply hear these lessons once, instead, one practices them over and over again, turns them over in their mind, and most importantly, writes them down and feels them flowing through their fingers in doing so.
As questions go.............................
...........................this one is pretty legitimate.
Either way, Trump’s salvo brings to the forefront a major unanswered question about the Biden presidency: who made executive decisions in the last four years?
Sunday, March 16, 2025
Checking in..........................
.............................with Farnum Street:
The most powerful productivity tool ever invented is simply the word "no."
The single most effective habit is the willingness to change your own mind.
If you want to understand someone, figure out the narrative they
tell themselves about themself.
If you want to change your behavior, change your narrative. If
you want to change someone else’s behavior, offer them a more compelling
narrative they can tell themselves.
If you are not reading....................
...............David Kanigan's Thrive, well, please do.
When will we finally understand that we are all drops of the same ocean, hurting together, healing together, hoping together? Don’t just pray for hands to heal the hurting. Pray with hands that are healing the hurting. Don’t just pray for arms to help the helpless. Pray with arms that are helping the helpless. Don’t just pray for feet to respond to need. Pray on feet that are responding to need. Don’t just pray for someone to do something. Be someone who does something.
-David Kanigan, channeling L.R. Knost
conceptions..........................
Let all your efforts be directed to something, let it keep that end in view. It’s not activity that disturbs people, but false conceptions of things that drive them mad.
-Seneca, “On Tranquility of Mind,” 12.5
The challenge...............................
..........................of behaving ethically.
Some people dine out on a single good deed for years.
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