Lives are full of stories. They revive the past. They bend the future. They lie, reveal, create, destroy. Every human knows at least a few. Every human lives at least one. One way to make sense of this fact is to understand stories this way: as a literal dimension that…

On Not Writing — They say to write every day. I envy people who do this painlessly. An ordinary life has enough little wounds, without writing more in. To be clear, I do not mean to say that I envy people who succeed at writing steadily. I do not mean to say that I…

An Exorcism of Whiteness — The secret to being white in America is that there is no such thing. Because there is no such thing, the specter of whiteness does not die. It haunts us, as a fine web of unspoken assumptions, innocent omissions, and careful ignorance. They say, however, that one way to bring…

How to Begin a Meditation Practice — Go to a quiet place and sit so that you can remain comfortably motionless for at least five minutes. If you cannot sit, then stand. If you cannot stand, then lie down. Fix your gaze on a point somewhere directly in front of you, without focusing your eyes on anything…

Instructions For Bad Hearts and Sick Souls — If you feel ill or hurt, it may be because the world is burning. It may be the heat of the flames that boils your insides. It may be the smoke that chokes off your voice. It may be that what is wrong is not what is inside of you…

One summer, my leg turned necrotic purple and swelled up to one and a half times its normal size. I thought that they would have to cut it off. I had been training for the midwestern-regional san shou (that is, Chinese-style MMA) fights, and I took an unexpected blow to…

American Safety Tips — “Grant an idea or belief to be true, what concrete difference will its being true make in any one’s actual life?” (William James, “Pragmatism”, 1909) “The best of all possible worlds for me will not be that for you.” (Robert Nozick, “Anarchy, State, and Utopia”, 1974) Not long ago, a…

Speck by speck of dust your old self drifts away. The window light shines through the galaxies of people you once were.

I found a note from twenty years ago the other day. I was going through my books when a tiny scrap of paper fluttered out and landed at my feet. …