And just for a bit of bonus content for any bakers who may be tuning in today, Chelan came across this recipe of Amari’s late last night that calls for nine-thirds cup of maple syrup, nine hundred 48ths cup of whipped topping—this is super sweet—eight 4ths cup of chocolate chips, and then finally one-third cup of butter—b-u-d-r. But anyway, back to Chelan. In her poetry and in life, Chelan continually invites the fumbling, suffering parts of ourselves and our divine nature to meet for tea in the heart, to have a great laugh in the belly, and share a big hug. So it is with a big virtual hug that I am pleased to welcome Chelan. Welcome, Chelan! Chelan Harkin:&nb... posted on Apr 1 2023 (4,536 reads)

value-systems… in all types and kinds of human beings. The pursuit of frantic leisure… is perhaps one of the most dissipating qualities of the technical cultures. The individual on whom leisure has been imposed in massive doses, and who has little capacity to deal with it, then searches for distractions that will fill this vacuum… A great deal of the distress and psychic conflict that we see clinically… is the result of a warped and erroneous expectancy of human nature and existence. It is the omnipresent fallacy of our age that all life should be fun and that all time should be made available to enjoy this fun. The result is apathy, discontent and pseudo-neu... posted on Apr 20 2023 (5,023 reads)

and initiations. Initiations marked the seasons of our lives and linked together the soul and the body, made its transitions sacred. And when the corn was planted and then harvested with ritual, with prayer, we wove together the seen and unseen worlds. This is the land our ancestors walked, with a wisdom and knowing still held by Indigenous Peoples.  Now we have to find again the threads that can connect the moments of our lives to the patterns that surround us. Living in the midst of nature it is easier, as looking out of my window I can see the wetlands being filled by the flow of the tide from the bay. My day is marked by the rise and fall of the water, and the months pass with ... posted on May 2 2023 (3,444 reads)

are in fact no ‘parts’ as such, but that they are an artefact of a certain way of looking at the world.” Art by the Brothers Hilts from A Velocity of Being: Letters to a Young Reader. Punctuating his ambitious 3,000-page effort to braid neuropsychology (the way our brains shape our impression of reality), epistemology (the way we come to know anything at all), and metaphysics (our yearning to wrest meaning from fundamental truth as we try to discern the nature of the universe) is an ongoing inquiry into our way of looking at the world — the lens of consciousness we call attention. He writes: The world we know cannot be wholly mind-independ... posted on May 23 2023 (3,373 reads)

you may well be entering environments where there is little or no time and space for that kind of careful internal discernment and calibration. And the hard reality is that you may not even notice it. Because the thing about being off by an inch is that we most often don’t feel the misalignment until it is too late to make a quick course correction. It’s not like a situation of being a fish out of water, where we immediately jump up and realize we are not being true to our nature. It’s more like being the frog in water that is slowly heating up. We can end up being burned alive, without realizing it. That has certainly been my experience working in the big,... posted on May 30 2023 (8,600 reads)

inquiry for our own capacities to care for those who are in need of our attention? And so part of our focus in this ritual is the attention to aspects of society that we have marginalized, and we say we’ve pathologized to be the ones that we need to shut away. And this is the ritual about welcoming, reintegration, and guiding and walking with people towards their sacred truths, and finding out what are the needs along the way? We are not saying we know everything. We know the nature of ritual is to look at the needs and see where it could be met, and there are different levels of competencies that we could support a person to find the way of ritualizing their life, which m... posted on Jul 3 2023 (2,124 reads)

and I think that’s a wonderful question and I think it really pertains to all of us. I just happen to experience it through the trail of all my writings, but I remember there was a rabbi, Jonathan Omer-Man, and I’ll never forget his definition of integrity was “to stay true to a voice inside that doesn’t change, though the life that carries it will.” So I think there is an abiding voice within us, whatever we call that — soul, atman, dharma nature, whatever we call that. Of course, the life that carries it does change. So a key moment when I started to understand the evolution of self was after my cancer journey. Because before my can... posted on Jul 16 2023 (3,805 reads)

the distracting information that we hold true… Tippett: Yeah. Rubin: …that’s stopping us. Tippett: I want to kind of come to some of the very concrete and available practices that you offer, just to have a practice of awareness towards that state you’re talking about which somewhere you say the, it’s about learning “to learn and be fascinated and surprised on a continual basis.” And of course meditation. But also, a day walking in nature. I don’t know, you’ve talked about before you go to sleep “noticing the feelings of your heartbeat and the movement of your blood.” And you said, “The purpose of s... posted on Nov 30 -0001 (38 reads)

can work for those of us prone to rumination. Practice mindful awareness Creating a little separation from your spinning thoughts can help transform them into something more manageable. By becoming an observer of your present experience using mindfulness techniques, you can learn to let go a bit of the past and future (where thoughts reign supreme) and stay more grounded in the moment, accepting “what is.” Practicing mindfulness has the added benefit of revealing the transient nature of your thoughts, helping to defang them somewhat and make it easier to let them go. There are many mindfulness practices that might help with this. For example, a simple breath meditation, wh... posted on Jun 13 2024 (3,014 reads)

many, cheap flights overseas are a guilty pleasure. Aircraft currently produce 4% of Europe’s CO2 emissions and recent research by Jeff Gazzard, of the Aviation Environment Federation, has found that aircraft emissions have up to 2.7 times more impact on the air than ground emissions due to the delicate nature of the upper atmosphere. SCOTLAND - When planes were grounded across Europe last spring, due to the ash cloud from Iceland’s volcanic eruption, people were looking for alternative routes home over land and sea. During this period, Tom and Lorraine McMillan witnessed a 700% increase in visits to their website. Although visitor levels normalised after the cloud passed,... posted on May 29 2011 (7,253 reads)

today is to place the wild horses in programs across the country to work with disabled, troubled, and at-risk children. Photo Essay: From the projects to the program, Jar's life has never been conventional. In 2005, Jar founded Project Arrowhead, a program that translates his vision into action. Project Arrowhead recruits youth from Baltimore and Washington, DC, asking participants to leave their comfort zone—the city— and travel to Sunshine Acres, where they learn about nature, gardening, and Native American traditions. Most importantly, they have their first experiences with horses. Jar marvels at the transformation he sees when a child first climbs onto the back of... posted on Oct 4 2011 (7,953 reads)

ball out of his mouth. I wondered what in the world he'd brought back and discovered the wet ball of fur was a very young bunny. Jethro continued to make direct eye contact with me as if he were saying, "Do something." I picked up the bunny, placed her in a box, gave her water and celery, and figured she wouldn't survive the night, despite our efforts to keep her alive. I was wrong. Jethro remained by her side and refused walks and meals until I pulled him away so he could heed nature's call. When I eventually released the bunny, Jethro followed her trail and continued to do so for months. Over the years Jethro approached rabbits as if they should be his friends, but they u... posted on May 17 2011 (34,650 reads)

“the real you”—how you really feel about X or Y group despite your best, superficial efforts to hide it. This assumption is incredibly detrimental to improving intergroup relations. Why? The assumption that prejudice and egalitarianism is an all-or-none proposition (i.e., one is either prejudiced or one is egalitarian) makes us feel very threatened by the possibility that we may harbor a prejudiced impulse, as that impulse would thus reveal our “true” nature. This threat is particularly strong among people who strongly value egalitarianism, since egalitarianism is likely to be part of their self-concept. In a recent study by Nicole Shelton, Jenn... posted on Sep 10 2011 (17,544 reads)

day, each moment. There’s no improving tomorrow, it’s all in the now. Life is taking birth right now. And if you wander off the path, don’t ignore the signs. Don’t try to take the easy way out, don’t look for shortcuts. You will have to face the path at some point. There’s no difference between uphill and downhill. They’re both critical to the journey, two identical wings of the same bird. Remember that sometimes the path will be full of beauty, nature, and rivers that flow effortlessly. And sometimes you will find yourself walking on the highway going against traffic; trying not to get run-over and just hoping to make it through the day. It&... posted on Jun 7 2011 (23,441 reads)

it might seem that there’s not much in the way of silver linings in these dark economic times, there is at least one: as people learn to make do with less, they are discovering the many benefits of sharing. Car-sharing, babysitting cooperatives, and tool lending are just a few of the many creative ways people are eschewing ownership and learning to share the goods and services they need. But sharing can do more than just save you a buck. New psychological research suggests that sharing fosters trust and cooperation in the community and contributes to personal well-being. Here are some of the ways that sharing can boost your happiness levels and help your community thrive: 1. Sh... posted on May 21 2013 (26,294 reads)

which Kohn defines as any situation where one person can succeed only when others fail, seems to be something of a state religion in the United States. But Kohn is convinced that we’ve all bought into dangerous myths about the value of competition in our personal lives, workplaces, society, and economic system. He laid out his arguments in his 1986 book No Contest: The Case Against Competition, and he’s been spreading the word ever since. He insists that competition is not human nature; it’s something we learn. “The message that competition is appropriate, desirable, required, and even unavoidable is drummed into us from nursery school to graduate school; it is th... posted on Sep 23 2011 (18,397 reads)

inquiry into the origin and machinery of romantic love, the book follows the story of a love affair, tracing each stage — from the initial dopamine-driven lovesickness to the despair of love’s demise — through a beautiful blend of intellectual analysis and deeply human felt emotion. In De Botton’s classic style of networked knowledge, the narrative is sprinkled with references to and quotes from the major Western philosophers, yet equally reflective of his signature style of absorbing, highly readable narrative. Every fall into love involves [to adapt Oscar Wilde] the triumph of hope over self-knowledge. We fall in love hoping that we will not find... posted on Jan 24 2012 (14,634 reads)

one thing I’ve learned from living in countries that are more “easy going” it’s that they are way wiser than the rest of us in their pace of life. People and countries that do everything quicker also do it worse. Take it easy and go slowly. Enjoy every bite of food, walk at a slow pace and take in your surroundings, let the other person finish their side of the conversation while you listen attentively, and stop in the middle of your day, close your eyes or look at nature and become aware of your breathing. 17. You can’t please everyone “I don’t know the secret to success, but the secret to failure is trying to please everyone” - Bill C... posted on Jul 17 2011 (62,568 reads)

said that we need to think of all the gifts we receive as having come from the Creator of all things. Thus it is to the Creator, the Great Mystery, that thanks should be given—not to any human being. We say “Please” to each other and “Thank You” to Ktsi Nwaskw, Gitchee Manitou, Wakan Tanka, or whatever name we have in our many languages for the Great Mystery, the Creator. This may help ensure that those who give do so with humility, with an awareness of the sacred nature of all gifts. Thus the giver is not calling attention to himself or herself, but to the spiritual power behind it all. Thus both giving and receiving remain sacred. ... posted on Aug 16 2011 (36,372 reads)

idea of having concrete, achievable goals seem to be deeply ingrained in our culture. I know I lived with goals for many years, and in fact a big part of my writings here on Zen Habits are about how to set and achieve goals. These days, however, I live without goals, for the most part. It’s absolutely liberating, and contrary to what you might have been taught, it absolutely doesn’t mean you stop achieving things. It means you stop letting yourself be limited by goals. Consider this common belief: “You’ll never get anywhere unless you know where you’re going.” This seems so common sensical, and yet it’s obviously not true if you stop to think ... posted on Sep 1 2011 (28,745 reads)