We are slaves to our stories. Your next job must fit within a particular story you refer to as “my career.” For the hiring manager, you as a candidate must fit within a story they are telling about their organization and themselves. Your child’s poor grades in school are a…
Leader, boss, parent, mentor, friend — as we embody each of these roles, we are consistently looked to for advice. They come to us when they aren’t sure what to do next. They bring us their intractable problems, looking for solutions.
And let’s be honest — it feels pretty good…
Hi, my name is James, and I’m a thinkaholic. Only through nearly two years of meditation and mental self-flagellation have I come to this realization — that I am hopelessly identified with my own thoughts. That I have trusted the voice in my head over my own intuition, and over…
There’s a reason Stoic philosophy has been making a comeback in recent years, more than two millennia after its creation. There’s a reason the fundamental beliefs and virtues of Stoicism overlap so much with those of Christianity and Buddhism. …
With today’s release of Fear Inoculum, Tool ends a 13-year hiatus and resumes their exploration into what it means to be a human being.
For all the over-analysis of Lateralus, that album in particular contained a treasure trove of practical wisdom (which I explored in a previous real-time meditation). Given…
During a pivotal moment early in Fight Club, Tyler Durden turns to his friend as they exit a bar and says, “I want you to hit me as hard as you can.” And lo, a men’s group is born.
Fight Club is a men’s group in the extreme—a place where…
You might die tomorrow, but that’s ok, if you live a good life today. To live a good life requires constantly thinking about death, as we have discussed previously, but this is not as morbid as it sounds.
Thinking about death does not mean thinking about dying, or how you’re…
I drive fifty minutes to work every day, and fifty minutes back home. Most of that time, I’m either dealing with big-rigs on a two-lane country road, or I’m dealing with big-rigs on a busy highway. …
Fifteen months ago, my life was… fine. I had what I would consider a pretty good career for someone who was still on the short side of 40, and who had never pursued an advanced degree or developed much of a plan. My marriage was strong and stable, and my…
Viewed from a high enough altitude, humans are nothing but dots. In the vast expanse of time and space, we are specks of dust.
This is not to say that our lives are a waste, or that we are each indistinguishable from the seven billion other dots on the planet…
