An hour into the experience, about 10 minutes before we began to eat, I thought to myself, “how could a dozen or so educated women talk about food for an hour without getting bored and switching topics?”
The demand to be authentic is so commonplace that it has lost its meaning. ‘Today, there is little premium placed on being authentic,’ writes the American philosopher Gordon Marino in his moving meditation The Existentialist’s Survival Guide: How to Live Authentically in an Inauthentic Age (2018). The increasing prevalence of social media constructions of ourselves, … Continue reading Performative Authenticity: Mass Society in Real Time
"...overcoming otherness is bringing our uniqueness to a situation not originally intended to accept it, and then translating and transforming the situation so the uniqueness can feel at home. "
To be saved by grace sounds simple enough, grammatically at least. We are born into sin, and redeemed by a sacrificial love which we do not deserve. Baptized at 11, I seemed to have passed the test. Sunday school stuff, really. Let’s go to the all you can eat buffet together, laugh a little, and … Continue reading The Ways of Grace
When the detained people who stormed the Capitol are prosecuted, my guess is the charges will have something to do with sedition, destroying property, or threatening lives. Democracy will be defended, but it is this terrorism that needs to be tried.
What has been expressed as widespread mistrust is not of what is around us, such as churches, universities, stock markets, and governments; the distrust is of ourselves. We distrust who we are. And I don’t believe it.
“What about this? And what about that?” Don’t talk of nourishment; let’s eat till we’re fat. We look to a promise and give up the now, We exchange our Being for furrowed brow.
"...tending to our own resilience is a vital task for living well. But that requires not only that we don’t overlook the severity of loss or the suffering that we regularly experience, but also that we experience and embrace the suffering.”
There is a persistent feeling that self-isolating at home is like being herded into a ghetto; [We] had to be prepared for domination before efficient domination could occur.
"...depression and addiction are related phenomena, and ... they are symptoms of a more general malaise of which the world-ending consequences may be of our own doing."
I thought social media loved me for who I was, with its catered advertising and photo- and video-sharing capabilities; but really, it only loved me for the attention I gave to it.
Trumpism, Prophets of Deceit suggests, is the inevitable outcome of a social, economic, and political order that generates human needs that it cannot satisfy.
"...if mass society is experienced as a force that wears us down as individuals, then our belonging to community should build us up..."
"the seeming destruction of context is the modus operandi of a more inclusive background which could provide both meaning and beauty to our lives."
"If we stand with others in their reality, rather than focusing on issues, then we are doing much more of what Jesus would do."
"An experience of "resonance" is an indicator what a person ought to be doing."
A Little Bit More Some people want just a little bit more, Not just three bedrooms, but maybe four. A view from above, from the second floor, One has a spouse, but wants a whore. A minimalist will say that they want less, To give up want, to need - acquiesce. To unclutter all the … Continue reading A Little Bit More
The seeming inability of recent generations to purchase either home or land is known to be a first-order symptom of this historical system of wealth acquisition, like having shortness of breath and a fever are first-order symptoms of having acquired the corona virus. At least two full generations of people who do not know how to grow food is another first-order symptom of the failure of a system of wealth acquisition.
Part 3 This is a continuation of Part 1: https://idealsandidentities.com/2020/03/28/the-sickness-before-the-infection/ and Part 2 https://idealsandidentities.com/2020/04/10/the-sickness-before-the-infection-part-2-preservation-or-carrying-on/ I am continuing to write it, and will publish the entire “The Sickness Before the Infection” upon completion. This is the up-to-date edit of Part 3. What amazes, and sometimes perplexes, me is what will be carried on after the coronavirus … Continue reading The Sickness Before the Infection: Why we Want Social Distancing
In other words, there is no identifiable locus of the virus. It doesn’t matter whether the virus is transmitted among the community, or brought in on a plane or train. It doesn’t matter whether we have been globally exposed or locally situated, the virus is all around, and it could be transmitted by any of us. And even though I might feel well, I have been infected and have transmitted it to others before I even knew I was sick. How terrifying is that?
" by attending to the needs of himself and others, Wayne practiced eternal life here on Earth"
When someone uses capital letters incorrectly in official documents, we tend to think of the writer as having missed a lesson from their elementary school Language Arts class. They may also be conforming to the format of texting out of context. In reviewing student writing for a living, I find misused capitalization to be a … Continue reading A Deeper Cliche
"the overlooked habits in human beings’ interactions with one another will also rear their ugly, destructive, and malicious effects on the world around us and within us. Unconscious habits will emerge because we have too often overlooked them, and they will appear and be treated as hints and allegations that exist on the periphery of our conscious view, with the grand temptation to push them aside because the reality from which they emerge is too uncomfortable to deal with."
“Often I feel I go to some distant region of the world to be reminded of who I really am…Stripped of your ordinary surroundings, your friends, your daily routines…you are forced into direct experience [which] inevitably makes you aware of who it is that is having the experience.” Michael Crichton, Travels In the process of … Continue reading Living Abroad and Our Sense of Self
After the most unique, and commonly-experienced year in our lifetimes, the widespread experience of burnout is upon us. Like many people reading this, I also feel burned out. In my case, as a teacher and writer, my work exists as a constant pressure; it sits in my mind even when I shut off my computer. … Continue reading Unique Burnout; Unique Recovery
At night we approached the loss of the other Not merely a thought, but the possibility of being… lost in the abyss, So we retreated into our sacred place, where the pale of past daylight Faintly shone between our lips, in a present kiss. Artifice light shines not through skin pressed together. Neither can the … Continue reading 30 More Years of Otherness
It is as if the neurological science of memory, which correlates precisely with the workings of our imagination, has been transposed into a work of social progress. In a very real way, we have embedded confusion in a work that requires clarity.
Behind opaque doors doctors were battling for his life. Hooked up to the I.V. with the blood of his father and grandfather being pumped into his veins, the son was receiving medicine to stay out of septic shock. Trying to release another blockage, he was fighting sickness and poison on all internal fronts. He was … Continue reading Quick Reactions
