Reclaim The Brain

The point Klinenberg wanted to make was this: If there was no such thing as a library, and someone proposed it today, there's a 99.9% chance they and their “radical and crazy idea” would be laughed out of the room.

But, as we know, it’s not a crazy idea.

This is the quiet art of living well. It does not demand that we abandon the world, but that we engage with it more mindfully. It asks that we slow down, that we look more closely, that we listen more carefully. For in doing so, we discover that much of what we seek—clarity, peace, even strength—was always within reach. It was simply waiting for us

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One of the take-home lessons of Buddhist philosophy is that feelings just are. If we accepted their arising and subsiding as part of life, rather than reacting to them as if they were deeply meaningful, we’d often be better off. Learning to do that is a big part of what mindfulness meditation is about.

I set an intention for 2025: fewer things, fewer tabs open at once - on my laptop and in my mind - but doing things well, present and mindful. Less, but better.

Basic dynamic in life: there is nothing meaningful enough to make you happy that could not make you sad if you lost it. This is the paradox of feeling, and it’s inherent and existential. If things inspire real positive emotion in you then they are necessarily things in which you are sufficiently invested that you would feel negative emotions when... See more

It is tempting, in moments of ambition, to think that we must change everything all at once, that the path to mastery or peace requires a sudden, dramatic shift. But this is rarely the case. In truth, most lasting changes come from small, deliberate actions. It is in the repetition of these small actions, over time, that we build strength, that we... See more