Good Clean Reads

“It’s also helpful to realize that this very body that we have, that’s sitting right here, right now… with its aches and its pleasure is exactly what we need to be fully human, fully awake, and fully alive.”   -Pema Chodron

One of my favorite movie scenes comes from the old Wim Wenders’ film “Wings of Desire” when Peter Falk is speaking to the air, to an angel he senses next to him. He bubbles...

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door shall be opened.”   -The Bible

The more that I pursue projects that I love, the more that life says yes. I feel like I have discovered a basic precept of success. That really we are moved by what we love and that the...

“From a certain point onward, there is no turning back. That is the point that must be reached.”  -Franz Kafka

These days the most painful part of life isn’t what happens to me, but rather what happens in me.  On my recent 50^thbirthday, a close friend of mine dropped the ball. It wasn’t just her missing the party because of a work commitment, it was a total absence of contact for the entire week...

Half of all the honey bees on the planet have died in recent years. A startling fact when you consider not only the impact that this has on the food chain and our food supply, but the even deeper metaphor that this represents for our culture. The disappearance of the bees has been named “Colony Collapse Disorder” and one well-known bio-dynamic bee keeper featured in the new film by Taggart Siegel,...

“To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you. Train yourself never to put off the word or action for the expression of gratitude.”  -Albert Schweitzer

Gratitud...

One of the most obvious, if least utilized practices of positivity is creating a strong social network. I am not talking about digital friends here, but rather actual 3D situations where you do things with people you like. Ironically, all of the hyper online social connectivity is leaving many people with less time and opportunities for real interactions. So I have been starting positivity circles...

“I do not ask to know,  I do not ask to see,  I ask only to be used.”  -Sufi Prayer

Today is my last day of my last year of the forties. Tomorrow is the first day of a new decade for me and so it seems only right that I start with the beginner’s mind. These last weeks of my 49^thyear have been a jumble of success and pain. I have been recognized outwardly as a success by large groups of...

“The only real voyage of discovery exists not in seeing new landscapes, but in having new eyes.”  -Marcel Proust

I have lost all of my routines. All the good habits that anchored my days like regular mediation and my ability to write daily have collapsed in the face of deep and abiding pain. Our pain and suffering is the greatest teacher we have in this life. It makes us listen more closely to our...

I am still thinking about the premature death of Steve Jobs. Last night I watched the commencement address he gave to Stanford graduates in 2005. He said that every day he asked himself: “If this were my last day, is this what I would be doing?” This was a real thought for him at the time; because he had just been given what he thought at the time was a free pass from his first cancer diagnosis.

T...