what is really ours and what we can be happy about — Several years back, I produced a set of videos providing line-by-line commentary on a classic work of Stoic philosophy, Epictetus’ Enchiridion. I’ve started a project of taking the downloaded transcripts of those from YouTube, editing them, and I plan to compiling them all into a short book. I’ve been sharing…

the heavy metal philosopher’s recommendations for sliding into the genre on the early end — One of my Twitter interlocutors asked me an interesting question a few weeks back: Yo Sadler — I never really listened to metal but always wanted to get into it. What’s some good bands or albums to start with? That is a good question. I think for a lot of…

is it Stoic to stick with these commitments no matter what? — By this time of the new year, one week into the month of January, millions of people have probably broken at least one of the New Years resolutions they made. If you’re not familiar with this notion and practice, these are commitments that a person makes around New Years Day…

free video lectures exploring themes, plot, characters and the narrative world of Leguin’s last Earthsea book — The sixth and final book set in the fantasy narrative universe of Earthsea bears the title The Other Wind. And that, as we learn, is one vast domain where the dragons fly. …

lessons about a difficult emotion drawn from monastic life — One of the thinkers whose insights about anger I have personally found particularly worth rereading and reflecting upon is John Cassian. He is a not-particularly well-known, but historically influential, 5th Century monastic Father who traveled from his home in the Latin-speaking West to take vows in a monastery at Bethlehem…

Who should a Stoic blame when things go badly? — Several years ago, I recorded a sequence of videos providing a line-by-line reading and commentary on one classic work of Stoic philosophy, Epictetus’ Enchiridion. …

reflections on what is, was, and cannot be — A few nights back, my wife and I were watching an episode of the show Law and Order: Criminal Intent, the finale of season nine in fact, and the last episode in which Jeff Goldblum would play his character Detective Zack Nichols. In that episode, he winds up having to…

Every situation we place ourselves in, we’ve got a choice to make — Several years ago, I recorded a set of 21 videos providing a line-by-line reading and commentary on a classic work of Stoic philosophy, Epictetus’ Enchiridion. I take transcripts of those from YouTube, edit them, and am now compiling them into what will eventually be a short book. I have shared…

free video lectures exploring themes, plot, characters and the narrative world of Leguin’s fifth Earthsea book — The fifth book in Ursula K. Leguin’s Earthsea saga differs from all of the others in that it is not a novel in the sequence, but rather a collection of shorter stories set within the archipelago. Several of those stories fill in and expand the history of Earthsea in critically…