Posts tagged as:

mindfulness

Headlessness FAQ

by David on August 23, 2010

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This is the fourth article in a series about Douglas Harding’s method of self-inquiry, called headlessness. The others are here: [Post one] [Post two] [Post three] In the previous article, I described Harding’s discovery that he, in his first-person, singular, present-tense experience, did not have a head. He insists that anyone who gives it an [...]

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How to Make Life Agreeable

by David on August 9, 2010

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It was a scorching afternoon and both of us had given up on doing any serious work for the rest of the day. We’d surveyed most of a disused section of railroad tracks past the suburbs, when across the field I saw Mark pause, look at his watch, and begin packing up the equipment. “F [...]

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First Things First

by David on May 18, 2010

birds on light post

Ever since I declared my Big Goal — complete self-employment by my 31st birthday — I’ve been flip-flopping about where specifically to start. Because I’m working with such a long timeline, it doesn’t make sense to chart out every action along the way, because I just don’t know how it’s all going to play out. [...]

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red door

When you sit back and reminisce about your life, it’s almost a given that the most enjoyable and memorable moments are the ones in which you were completely present. Do you look back with fondness all the times you spent thinking about work while you drove home, or pondered dinner while you wheeled down the [...]

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A Thought From My Hero

by David on March 11, 2010

the path

A political victory, a rise in rents, the recovery of your sick, or return of your absent friend, or some other quite external event, raises your spirits, and you think good days are preparing for you. Do not believe it. Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph [...]

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Chop Wood, Carry Water

by David on December 21, 2009

chopping

When the mind is not crowded By imaginary things, It is the best season of your life. -Kabir I just chopped twelve hundred needless words from this article, which is fitting, because the point of all that blathering was to warn against getting lost in abstractions. I think too much. Virtually all of us do, [...]

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Things We Said Today

by David on November 30, 2009

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There was a moment last week when I found myself standing on a beach I never could have imagined. Bookended by two cliffs was a great, smooth expanse of the most otherworldly sand. It was like a Neapolitan ice cream of fine golden sand, exotic black obsidian grains, and clear, saltlike crystals. In the distance, [...]

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What Five Days of Silence Taught Me

by David on November 5, 2009

Just before flying to Thailand, I spent five days at a retreat community called Hollyhock. It’s a humble, rootsy little hamlet on the relatively remote Cortes Island. I knew very little about the program I’d signed up for, only that it was about Buddhism. It turns out that it was a rather intense regimen of [...]

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handwriting

When I was taking French classes a few months ago, we were each asked to write a composition in French and pass it to another classmate to read. It struck me then that I very seldom write more than a Post-It note’s worth these days. By the end of a paragraph, my hand is cramped [...]

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light meal

Another experiment has come to an end, but as usual, I’m not going right back to what I was doing beforehand. Just like my last experiment, 30 Days Without Drugs, one of the habits in my life has been permanently renegotiated. To recap, a month ago I decided I’d go thirty days eating defensively. That [...]

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