Years ago, yet I visualize it in the moment, a student in my high school junior honors English class came up to me after students had departed.
“I don’t want to go on living. I get up early each morning and come to school and sit though days of meaningless classes. Then I go home and do three or four more hours of meaningless homework.” Continue reading
“Frankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus” 1931.
If you want to deal with stress, a good place to start is with Hans Selye’s 1974 book, “Stress without distress.” In the 1930s he began publishing about the general adaption syndrome (GAS). I have found it helpful to become familiar with GAS in working with stress in any form. Continue reading
Open-Focus Alpha Synchronous Brain Waves
Motivated by what he describes as blinding depression and crippling anxiety, Andrew Solomon, author of “Noonday Demon” set out reading, researching, and writing –bibliotherapy – about his own recovery and the range of treatments for depression. One world opened into another, like biting off chunks of Alice’s magic mushroom. Continue reading
Relax now.
Insight Meditation focuses attention and awareness on thoughts, feelings, urges, emotions, and sensations, without attachment and without judging. Continue reading
Can’t Get StartedI’m envious of someone who gets to work on a project without getting sidetracked. I’ve met a couple of people who seem not to procrastinate. But I’m not alone when I veer off to emails, clicking through to Smithsonian, Literary Hub, Quora and New York Times articles. By the time I get back to my project I can’t get started. Continue reading
We all procrastinate. Even the saints. Saint Augustine records in his “Confessions” that after years of sexual hedonism, it was time to return to Christianity. So he prayed to God for chastity and continence: “Give me chastity and continence, only not yet.” (Procrastination with Chutzpah) Although he abhorred his way of living and wanted to change, he kept deferring the change until “tomorrow.”
In his 2012 book, “Wait: The Art and Science of Delay, “ Frank Partnoy says that in most situations we should take more time than we do. In fact, the longer the better. We should delay any decision until the last possible instant. If we have a year we should wait 364 days. Continue reading
“Total Self-Renewal through Attention Therapies and Open Focus” (Sample chapters on Amazon.)
Alternate Title: “Attention Therapies for Total Self-Renewal with 50 Bits–All We Have– Attention”