Recently I marked the second anniversary of the death of my beloved cat, Barnacle Pete. Wasn’t he handsome? I know, this bougie white childless lady is obsessing about her cats way too much. As Groucho Marx says, “I resemble that remark.” Hey, we’re all working with what we’ve got. Pete was a friend who was… Continue reading When Bad Things Happen
I have an addictive personality – I can turn just about anything into too much of a good thing. I think meditation is about the only thing I’ve found that I can obsess about and it doesn’t do me harm somehow. I have a lifelong addiction to TV. I’m kind of strung out on the… Continue reading The Addiction that Pays YOU
See, I thought I was so clever borrowing this concept from natural history to describe the human condition, and just last month came across a delightful Meditative Story, “Writing the Main Character” by Franklin Leonard, using “punctuated equilibrium” in exactly the same way. Great minds, I guess. Still, I thought I was so clever. To… Continue reading Punctuated Equilibrium
Our attention is all we have. You’ve maybe heard, “Time is all we have.” That’s not exactly right. I’ve spent plenty of time doing something and paid zero actual attention to it – watching TV, petting the cat, spending time with family – and had it pass by without me truly noticing it. It’s right… Continue reading Time and Attention
Fear and anxiety are widespread human experiences in this modern age. In modern societies where many of the external pressures of subsistence are solved for us, our attention settles on less tangible problems to fret over. We have food and shelter and, for the lucky ones, health care, but now we worry about our careers… Continue reading Fear, Pain and Anxiety
Smoking has bedeviled me for 25 years. After years of success slaying one behavioral and mental health demon after another (binge eating, alcohol, and depression), smoking is the one that keeps coming back. Why is this addiction so persistent and pernicious? I still don’t fully understand the allure, and why I lose the power to… Continue reading Smoking Gun
Kristin Hersh released Hips and Makers in 1994. Her band, Throwing Muses, was my favorite band, and I idolized her. I can still picture the record store chalkboard where her impending solo release was announced. In the days before Google, we got our news from chalkboards in record stores. I bought the CD the day… Continue reading The Ghost of 1994
