Insights
Ivan explores themes like curiosity, happiness, perception, and choices.
Insights
Borrowing Trouble
I was reading Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maude Montgomery. This is a book I’ve read more than once, and one I highly recommend for its warmth and its many characters. In it, I came across the expres...
Insights
The Culture of Perception
Members of a society or culture share certain beliefs. What these beliefs are and how they change is the subject of Cultural Anthropology. One of its leading lights was Ruth Fulton Benedict (1887-1948...
Insights
Looking Up
How many times a day do we look up?
Insights
Do You Feel Lucky?
Luck is defined as success or failure brought about by chance rather than our actions.
Insights
Good Things
A mantra is an utterance that is considered to have spiritual power. The word comes from Sanskrit, and literally means “instrument of thought”. A mantra is constructed from a sound, a word, or a phras...
Insights
Happy What?
I used to compete in triathlons and the occasional marathon and half marathon. I loved the training more than the actual competitions. I would feel confident as the morning of each race dawned, having...
Insights
Satisfaction
We all want to be satisfied with our lives but achieving that state can be difficult because life never allows us to reach a high point (or even a low point) and then stop. Life has a way of continuin...
Insights
Changing States
If one finds oneself in trouble, beset by problems from every side, and filled with doubts and uncertainties, it is nonetheless possible to do something about the situation.
Insights
Golden Days
We rarely recognize golden days when we are living them. Good can only be evaluated by what we consider bad, and bad by what we consider good. Contrast determines the difference. Habitually, we focus ...
Insights
Useless?
took six years of Latin in Grammar and High School. Even in the 1970s, Latin was considered a useless subject, but for a subject that had so little ‘supposed’ utility, what has surprised me over the y...
Insights
The Many Faces of Joy
Joy has many nuances. There is the joy of standing and looking out on the land, seeing the greenery of nature, the blue of the sky, of feeling the sun on one’s skin, the breeze on one’s face. There is...
Insights
Some Thoughts on Love
Kakuzo Okakura wrote:
Insights
The Mind-Killer
Frank Herbert wrote the novel Dune in 1965. Sales were dismal after its release, and critics didn’t take to it either. The publisher, Chilton Books, eventually wrote off the costs and fired Sterling L...
Insights
Curiosity
When I was growing up, I often heard the saying: “Curiosity killed the cat. Satisfaction brought it back” *. Frankly, I found the satisfaction part rather baffling, but the “killed cat” stuck with me....
Insights
Effort
Swimming is a skill I learned when I was little. I could swim after a fashion. Mostly, it was taught to prevent drowning. Later, as a kid, I swam in the ocean, snorkeled off the coast of Florida, and ...
Insights
Studying to Learn
Many people dislike mathematics, sad but true. I can’t say I blame them. It has taken me an extraordinary amount of mental work and persistence to be conversant with only a small part. The subject is ...
Insights
Intelligence
I once had a governess tell me a piece of profound wisdom couched as an admonition. I was looking at a giant slice of cake when she said, “Your eyes are bigger than your stomach.” And she was right.
Insights
Hovering
According to Bowker’s Books in Print, there were 2,714,409 new books printed in English in 2015. Given that this extraordinary number represents only one year’s publication in English, how many books ...
Insights
New Track
Someone once said that the past never changes. This isn’t wrong, but neither is it entirely correct. For many, the past is always the same: a record of failed attempts rather than success, a study of ...
Insights
Channeling the Inner Tortoise
I have two observations about growing old (older, if that's easier to bear). The first is that "exceptions to the rule" are far more numerous than we were ever led to believe when we were younger. Iro...
Insights
Meet Me Halfway
I came across an interesting hack the other day. Granted, the need for it may never be in your future, but I’m always one to look up obscure problems and solutions. I store them away in my mind just i...
