In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.
~Albert Camus
This year is my 29th year on earth, and I’ve decided to make it the most memorable and remarkable year I’ve ever had. My entire adult life I have felt the unsettling feeling that I am not living up to my potential, and finally — just this year — that feeling is gone. I’m cruising, not treading water like before.
The choice to build a blog emerged as part of a personal renaissance of sorts, a shift in priorities that has changed my life dramatically over the last year or so. I’ve finally reached a point where I’m organized and clear-headed enough to be continuously moving towards what I really want in life. I’m learning a language, getting in shape, getting fantastically organized, and honing skills I’ve long neglected. Read More
My mom left out a few lessons that a lot of other kids got. Certain common habits, I just never developed because nobody taught me.
In the last few years I’ve become more and more interested in people, and I pay more attention to passers-by when I’m out and about. One thing that always enthralls me is seeing children learn from their parents. A wide-eyed and curious child, watching his mother’s actions and words, is a powerful sight to behold. It affects me today in ways it never had before. Now that I’m older and firmly in the habit of examining my habits, I can see how crucial those moments are in shaping a kid’s life.
What the parent does in those moments, in front of her vulnerable, impressionable child, is a far-reaching act of creation. How she interacts with her own world is probably the greatest factor in determining how that child will deal with his own life when he’s free to make his own decisions. Read More
I used to roll my eyes when people talked about the Beatles. Maybe you rolled your eyes when you saw this article’s headline. Thank you for bearing with me anyway. I’ll make it worth your while.
I had always pictured the Beatles as a tired novelty from my parents’ past. All I knew was that they played lot of teenagey love songs in their early years, and some weird drug songs in their later years, and that they seemed to have written virtually every famous song that I didn’t want to listen to.
Gradually I came around, and began to recognize that they really were something special. I harbored an understated respect for them for many years, but two summers ago I spent a few incredible weeks devouring all twelve proper Beatles albums, in chronological order. It was magical. I was struck by how beautifully and organically their sound evolved, growing more sophisticated and mature every album.
By the final phrases of of Abbey Road, I had grown too. And not insignificantly. I can’t quite put my finger on exactly what moved me, but it definitely had something to do with the beautiful metamorphosis I witnessed. Read More
This is part 2 of a 2-part post. The first half is here.
If there’s no good and evil, why do people steal and hurt others?
Because they’re dumb. They just don’t know any smarter and more rewarding ways to live.
Ok, ‘dumb’ is a little misleading. There are intelligent people who commit crimes and atrocities too. A person can have a genius IQ, yet still misbehave himself into addiction, ruined relationships, or prison. ‘Foolish’ might be a better adjective.
What they lack is wisdom. Insight. They just don’t know how to cultivate peace in their lives. So they grasp at things that provide fleeting scraps of fulfillment: money, power, gratification. They don’t know where else to look. But of course it’s never enough, and so desperation mounts. They begin to feel an even stronger draw towards gratification and security, mistaking them for some kind of salvation, and soon they are stepping over others (or worse) to acquire these things. They just don’t get it.
A common argument is that without morals, we wouldn’t know how to behave. We’d become greedy, cruel and petty, slaves of every selfish impulse we have. Well, I don’t think so. I don’t know about you, but I’m smart enough to see the benefits in being good to others, and the drawbacks of being mean. There are natural incentives built into both love-based and fear-based courses of action. It is clear to me that this is exactly what religions were trying to teach: that there are smart ways to live, and dumb ways to live.
Read More
This is part 1 of a 2-part post. The second half is here.
Disclaimer: Controversy rating: 8/10. This post contains unconventional views. Some readers may be upset. Some may unsubscribe. Que sera sera.
There is a famous quotation that most people seem to love, which I dislike. In fact, I find it quite worrisome, because of how quickly even reasonable people seem to jump behind it.
I am a staunch defender of ideas, and people’s rights to express them, even if I disagree. I don’t think ideas themselves can be harmful; any harm comes only from the actions they inspire. For example, I do not believe in laws against ‘hate’ speech; but I do support laws against deliberately inciting violence. It isn’t the speech that’s dangerous, it’s the actions. As far as I’m concerned, when a hateful person is allowed to speak his mind, he only reveals himself as petty and foolish. I think that’s a good thing. Let idiocy shine a light on itself, that’s what I say. If you tape its mouth shut, we might not recognize it.
But there is one idea, encapsulated in a well-loved quotation, that I think is at the root of every institution of war and genocide. Of course it does not always lead to those dark places, but it contains a fallacy that can delude even a good-hearted person into committing atrocities. And I want to expose its insanity. Read More
Thank you, everyone.
Thank you, raspy-voiced, chainsmoking high school student for showing me where the sheet metal shop was on my first day of junior high shops. I was lost and frightened.
Thank you Mr Isaacs, for pulling me out of class and chewing me out for quitting basketball. It was so thoughtful of you.
Thank you Ms Shawcross, for phoning me years later and telling me you shared my old short story with your new class. I’m glad they liked it.
Thank you Nadia, Lisis, Roger, Michael, Sherri, Gwynn, Ian, Jay and Alison for welcoming me with open arms into the blogging world.
Thank you, kind readers, for finding my words worthwhile. I appreciate it more than you know. Read More
“Hell is other people.”
~Sartre
Whether it’s the rude throng of last-minute Christmas shoppers, or the drunken fratboys slithering up to you at a concert, or the old man in the restaurant booth behind you who clears his decrepit throat every forty seconds, everyone finds themselves feeling a general aversion to people now and then. For those with any level of social anxiety, there is always at least a hum of this derision in the background, sometimes a full-on shout. Even for those without it, repeated ugly experiences can inspire a familiar distaste for people that may never completely disappear. Unless, of course, the people do.
Sometimes the feeling is disdain for their behavior, other times it’s a fear of it. Think of the last time you got upset. Chances are, the actions of another person had something to do with it. Other people seem to trigger the most unpleasant emotions in us. Self-consciousness, intimidation, embarrassment, anger, vulnerability and humiliation tend to characterize our most painful experiences and our most unsettling memories.
When people are present, suddenly there arises a certain tension in the body and mind, however subtle. Our senses are very keen to the spectrum of threats other human beings can present to us. This physical and emotional reaction to people could almost be described as an allergy; an involuntary reaction to the introduction of a certain element to the environment. This offending element is humanity. Read More
Music produces a kind of pleasure which human nature cannot do without. ~Confucius
I just took a look at CNN’s site and it was, as usual, boasting its favorite palette of troublesome nouns and verbs. Terror, death, murder, destruction, Bush. People do bad things sometimes; it’s not really news, I know. But contrary to popular notions, I think war, exploitation and violence are not the results of our differences. Rather, they are the result of our most pervasive similarity: that we all suffer, and none of us want to.
No, these ‘news’ items aren’t new. They are the same patterns of anguish that have recurred continually throughout all cultures, across all generations: lost love, fear, alienation, self-loathing and jealousy. Being human just hurts sometimes. Despite our surface differences, we’re all in the same boat. We all want the same two things: to fulfill our desires and to avoid suffering. These two motivations, and the behavior they inspire, comprise the human condition. There is nobody on this earth with whom you don’t have at least those two things in common. Read More
Recently I was surfing an online forum, and I came across something that almost made me cry. Somebody had dug up an old, old post of mine and replied to it. Sometimes new users on a forum don’t look at the date on a old post, and they respond to it as if it were still relevant, so the post goes to the top of the first page in the list, even if it’s years old.
Those of you who read online forums have seen this happen many times, I’m sure, and so had I. But this one gave me an instant lump in the throat.
The post was called, “My Struggle.”
The desperate tone of the post stunned me. I couldn’t believe it was me.
In it, I had spilled my guts to everyone who would listen, over my dissatisfaction with myself and my life. I hated how I never finished anything, never got on a roll, never got good at what I wanted to be good at. I was not able to accept myself, because to accept myself meant that what I was doing (and failing to do) was fine. Read More
Now, I don’t know all 6.5 billion of you out there, but of the few hundred people that I do know, I don’t know of anyone who doesn’t like to be happy. I think we all have that in common.
Type “Happiness” into Amazon’s book search and you’ll get over 350,000 results. For some reason, humans have a lot of trouble being happy. There’s no question that we all want it, so why are we so bad at it? With such universal demand, you’d think we’d have it figured out by now.
There seems to be some persistent force that keeps us unhappy. It’s almost like humans have some curious fetish with dissatisfaction. Read More
I'm David, and Raptitude is a blog about getting better at being human -- things we can do to improve our lives today.
I always enjoy your posts. But what I love most about your site is the absence of ads. I find it so incredibly ironic to be reading a post about living an intentional, distraction-free life - setting devices aside, unsubscribing to everything, etc. - while constantly dodging pop-up ads. Your...