Are You a Settler?

Often, there’s a desire to cling onto how we thought life should go, sometimes until it outweighs the reality of how it is going — what makes us happy, versus what we feel should; what is truly stimulating or fulfilling, versus what we’ve been told should be chased and sacrificed for. A question I ponder is: How do we untether ourselves from the pe... See more

An individual who has become a person has staged a rebellion. She rebels against the individualistic ethos and all the systems of impersonalism. Society tells her to want independence, but she has declared her interdependence. Society says we live in a materialist reality, but she says we live in an enchanted reality. Society tells her to keep her

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There’s a pervasive idea, at least among my peers, that [your 30s] should bring about a sense of calm and self-acceptance. We may have dispensed with the precepts surrounding marriage and kids, but there remains a non-specific expectation of “settling in.” Into yourself, into what you want. I took great comfort in this idea when I was in my 20s. I ... See more

In the West, the sources of religion, family, clan, and even country could no longer tell you who you are. You decide. But once you decide, to truly have chosen, you can’t just sit on your hands, resting quietly in the glow of your chosen identity. That’s not how this “freedom” works. This “freedom” calls for constant motion. And this need for cons

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When I was a child, I felt what I needed to feel and I followed my gut and I planned only from my imagination. I was wild until I was tamed by shame. Until I started hiding and numbing my feelings for fear of being too much. Until I started deferring to others’ advice instead of trusting my own intuition. Until I became convinced that my imaginatio

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One of the fundamental choices that you face on Earth is the degree to which you’ll pursue deeper but riskier fulfillment or practice avoidance that exempts you from bad feelings but leaves you bereft of good ones.