Brian Wiesner

As Oldenburg notes, people’s roles at home and the office are carefully circumscribed, but there’s no status markers at the dive bar except for the ability to drive conversation. That means the tone of such a chat is more playful than purposeful and that it’s completely democratic — if either party stops being entertained at any point, they can... See more

I suppose this is just a gentle reminder that if you sense you are in a moment where things are blossoming, where your hard work is crystallizing, where what you once hoped for is coming true—it is a good idea to take some time and appreciate it. To cherish the abundance you have created. To allow it in. To take some time to be with it. There is no... See more

Seven years ago, Kevin Kelly wrote, “Intelligence is not a single dimension, so ‘smarter than humans’ is a meaningless concept.” It bears repeating.

she suggests, this is because people have an internal alarm clock that goes off at big life events, like turning 30. It reminds them that time horizons are shrinking, so it is a point to pull back on exploration and concentrate on the here and now. “You tend to focus on what is most emotionally important to you,” she said, “so you’re not interested... See more

• “It’s well known that telling and retelling one’s past leads to changes, smoothings, enhancements, shifts away from the facts ( ‘reconsolidation’ ) ... isn’t just a charged psychological foible. It turns out to be an inevitable neurophysiological consequence of the process of laying down memories that every studied conscious recall of past events

... See more

Love is presented as being selfless, but perhaps it can also be a harmonious union of rational self-interest.

Life is nothing more than a series of stages, one after another. Our problem is that we often enjoy a particular stage so much that we’re hesitant to move to the next one. Each chapter should be enjoyable, yes, but each chapter should also prepare you for a new chapter that you could only reach by experiencing your current one . And you do, at some... See more

Way beneath every step you’ve ever taken and every step you will take is this thing called mycelium. Long threads of fungi that grow one cell at a time, branching and re-branching, growing in every direction. They even grow three-dimensionally.

As Bill McKibbenwrote recently, the best thing you can do to prepare yourself for climate change is live in an area with a high degree of social trust.

We’ve come through 75 years where having neighbors was essentially optional: if you had a credit card, you could get everything you needed to survive dropped off at your front door. But the next 75

... See more