*Commonplace Book

“When you ruminate, you mistake replay for reflection. When you catastrophize, you mistake worrying for preparation.”

― Katherine Morgan Schafler, The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control: A Path to Peace and Power

the economist Milton Friedman once wrote: ‘Only a crisis – actual or perceived – produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible

The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.

William James

“To suffer is one thing; another thing is living with the photographed images of suffering, which does not necessarily strengthen conscience and the ability to be compassionate. It can also corrupt them. Once one has seen such images, one has started down the road of seeing more — and more. Images transfix. Images anesthetize.”

Susan Sontag - On Pho

“Unlike cynicism, hopefulness is hard-earned, makes demands upon us, and can often feel like the most indefensible and lonely place on Earth. Hopefulness is not a neutral position – it is adversarial. It is the warrior emotion that can lay waste to cynicism." – Nick Cave

Destruction and renewal are part of the same cycle. Indigenous knowledge has always understood this. It’s not about avoiding collapse – it’s about preparing for regeneration.

– Mellisa K. Nelson

"Although losing is never fun, there is a certain satisfaction that can be found on the other side of losing — but only when you give your all. To lose with half effort offers no pleasure in the moment and no peace in the long run. But if your ambitions were full and your attempt was genuine, after the sting of losing wears off you'll be left

“We, as a society, would be better off if our politics could become re-centered around a collective process of searching for answers to solve problems, made possible by exploring evidence, and then learning from it.”

Brian Klaas

“Even in literature & art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it.”

C.S. Lewis