Eudaimonia & Wellbeing
“At the same time, art cannot be understood in terms of purpose. As the sculptor Charles Ray has said, art is “for absolutely nothing.” To make, or experience, art is to enter a kind of free zone; it slows us down, places us in some epistemological estuary, takes us into the wild. We make art from our flaws, fragilities, perversities, from our need
... See moreSomething strange and wondrous begins to happen when one spends stretches of time in solitude, in the company of trees, far from the bustle of the human world with its echo chamber of judgments and opinions — a kind of rerooting in one’s deepest self-knowledge, a relearning of how to simply be oneself, one’s most authentic self. Wendell Berry knew... See more
Maria Popova • Kahlil Gibran on Silence, Solitude, and the Courage to Know Yourself
What takes hold when control slips?
substack.com
The project I'm doing is basically turning myself into a certain type of person who is able to have these thoughts. The essays are kind of just exhaust from the project. The work is growing emotionally and intellectually in such a way, and just going out into the world, talking to people, reading, looking at things, and becoming the kind of mind
... See moreThe Harvard Study of Adult Development has assessed the connection between people’s habits and their subsequent well-being since the late 1930s.... See more
The happiest, healthiest people in old age didn’t smoke (or quit early in life), exercised, drank moderately or not at all, and stayed mentally active , among other patterns. But these habits pale in
Patricia Mou • [non-paywalled issue] The Rabbit Hole 🕳🐇 issue no.34
i’ve found it incredibly difficult to come to terms with the fact that people can just come and go out of our lives and all we are left with is grief and loss. most of the people we meet in life are just passing moments. you’ll know them for a brief period before they are a stranger again and there’s nothing you can do about this. you don’t want to
... See moredistilled happiness to the knowledge that you have enough. It is not an easy knowledge to live with amid the commodified counterfeits of happiness that light up these sunset days of Western civilization, with its mesmerism of maximums and its cult of more, materially and spiritually — capitalism goads us to do more in order to own more while the... See more
Maria Popova • The Marginalian
emily dickinson
You can’t wait until everyone understands you and gives you their permission and blessing to go live your life how you want. You don’t need to feel guilty about moving on, letting go, losing their dumb status games, and going after your own life goals. It is ok if you’re not properly calibrated to humanity and meet some people who try to take... See more
Patricia Mou • [non-paywalled issue] The Rabbit Hole 🕳🐇 issue no.34
Zielschmerz n. the exhilarating dread of finally pursuing a lifelong dream, which requires you to put your true abilities out there to be tested on the open savannah, no longer protected inside the terrarium of hopes and delusions that you created in kindergarten and kept sealed as long as you could, only to break in case of emergency.