I believe that if, at the end of it all, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy to the world. That ( Read more... )

Dying Day: This might be a film I very vaguely remember seeing on PBS back in the 80s. It came up today because I was explaining the term "gaslighting" to Tim, and this is the earliest personal example I remember. I know that in the film I saw, someone (a wife?) was trying to drive someone else insane. There was a train. Someone's glasses got ( Read more... )

My horoscope, according to Mystic Medusa ...

Style: Capricorn is cosmically blessed with beautiful bone structure, good taste and the ability to look younger with every year. … You are in Phoenix mode all year, particularly in February, and it is time to slough off vestiges of out-moded routines, much-loved but no-longer-you accessories and ( Read more... )

Buddhism teaches cultivating cheerfulness as opposed to happiness. Happiness is an imposed, lofty ideal. But cheefulness is something you can add to a situation, build up in layers comfortably. ... As the Tibetan monk Rinpoche taught, cheer is inherent in us all and we can choose to turn to it ... In choosing to do so, we access our true nature.

“It’s all like a dream. Everything is ecstasy, inside. We just don’t know it because of our thinking-minds. But in our true blissful essence of mind is known that everything is alright forever & forever & forever. Close your eyes, let your hands & nerve-ends drop, stop breathing for 3 seconds, listen to the silence inside the illusion of the world ( Read more... )

“Make a radical change in your lifestyle & begin to boldly do things which you may previously never have thought of doing, or been too hesitant to attempt. So many people live within unhappy circumstances & yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, & conservation, all ( Read more... )

I don't want to tell you how to do your job, but somebody has to.

Anybody looking outside themselves to make themselves whole is delusional and probably sick.

-- David Fincher

Love After Love

The time will come ( Read more... )

"Jobs require us to ignore our happiness instructions, and that is how they take us down." -- Cary Tennis

"A lot of people think of political activism as some grim duty, and I think we do have an obligation to be citizens-to be informed and engaged-but it’s not just duty. Public life enlarges you, gives you purpose and context, saves you from drowning in the purely personal, as so many Americans seem to." -- Rebecca Solnit in the Believer