On the Edge of Life & Death
The hospice community of Joseph's House in Washington, D.C. believes that no one should live or die alone. Perched on the very edge of life and death, it is a place of belonging where people are lovingly companioned all the way to the threshold of death. Grace and mystery abound in encounters between people across racial and socioeconomic differences where they meet and love each other. People are... posted on Jun 23 2023, 2,269 reads

Leave No Child Inside
"As a boy I pulled out dozens -- perhaps hundreds -- of survey stakes in a vain effort to slow the bulldozers that were taking out my woods to make way for a new subdivision. Had I known then what I've since learned from a developer, that I should have simply moved the stakes around to be more effective, I would surely have done that too. So you might imagine my dubiousness when, a few weeks after... posted on Jun 22 2023, 2,120 reads

In Praise of Fallibility, Everybodyism & Confusers of Certainty
Where universalism maintains only that "all humans will be saved, whatever their sect or non-sect," essayist Amy Leach's everybodyism espouses a more playful and radical redemption for "not just all the human rascals but also all the buffalo rascals and reptile rascals and paddlefish and turkeys and centipedes and wombats and warty pigs." While Leach's admiration for Earth and its inhabitants is s... posted on Jun 21 2023, 1,971 reads

Aluna: A Journey to Save the World
"In 1991, in the last edition of the original Beshara Magazine, we published an article by journalist Alan Ereira about an extraordinary people living in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in the north of Colombia. The descendants of a great civilisation which fled to the hills as the Spanish took over their lands, the Kogi had lived for 400 years in isolation, led by a class of priests called the m... posted on Jun 20 2023, 1,618 reads

Pilgrimage Up Longs Peak
"For as long as I can remember, I begged my father to take me back to Colorado to climb a mountain. Growing up in Tennessee, this dream was delayed many times, until only last year when my father (Jane's youngest son, Rarc) and I made the journey. Just before the trip, I came across this particular story printed on its own by type-writer. The story was both an inspiration and grounding force for m... posted on Jun 19 2023, 2,903 reads

David Whyte: On Seeking Language Large Enough
"It has ever and always been true, David Whyte reminds us, that so much of human experience is a conversation between loss and celebration. This conversational nature of reality -- indeed, this drama of vitality -- is something we have all been shown, willing or unwilling, in these years. Many have turned to David Whyte for his gorgeous, life-giving poetry and his wisdom at the interplay of theolo... posted on Jun 18 2023, 4,230 reads

The Practice of Tsundoku & Why You May Want to Adopt It
"Many readers buy books with every intention of reading them only to let them linger on the shelf. Statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb believes surrounding ourselves with unread books enriches our lives as they remind us of all we don't know. The Japanese call this practice tsundoku, and it may provide lasting benefits..." Read on for more on the intriguing concept of the 'antilibrary, the benefits... posted on Jun 17 2023, 2,897 reads

Lion Heart
Luzuko Madonci wanted to be a lion when he was a child. His friends laughed at him. And yet as an adult he has indeed developed the heart of a lion, exhibited by his joyous wholehearted laughter, his confidence, and his courage in the face of trials. Having overcome childhood trauma, he has learned to embrace his emotions and to see pain as a helper, a teacher, a residue of something good that is ... posted on Jun 16 2023, 2,325 reads

Curiosity: A Sponge for Terror
"And so I moved from hoping every morning to find myself waking up from a bad dream to realizing that this room and its contents were the only life I had. And this was the body I had to live it with. I started waking up ready to fully live this specific life and get acquainted with what was in many respects a new body every day. I started the day asking, what part of my body works today? What can ... posted on Jun 15 2023, 3,463 reads

A Dialogue on Consciousness
Bernardo Kastrup is a scientist and philosopher, Swami Sarvapriyananda is a Hindu monk. In this wide-ranging conversation they dialog on Eastern and Western concepts of self and mind, a conversation, "worth watching simply for the extraordinary clarity with which both men articulate a deeply complex concept. But perhaps the most profound point is made by their evident mutual respect for one anothe... posted on Jun 14 2023, 1,943 reads