juliana ong

I’m no moral philosopher, but from a behavioral standpoint, a lot of what we consider “evil” is poor self-control and/or psychopathy, which both make some of us less likely to suppress acting on impulses coming from the darker side of our human nature.

In a world of fast content incentivized by advertising-based attention-hacking business models, being slow and considered is a superpower.

I really believe that the only way to find relief from anxiety, to find self-esteem, self-respect, self-love—everything we’re searching for and is so prized in modern culture—is trying to live a more virtuous life.

introspection is overrated. That’s in part because what’s going on in your mind is not only more complicated than you understand, it is more complicated than you can understand. Your mind hides most of your thinking so you can get on with life. Furthermore, you’re too close to yourself. You can’t see the models you use to perceive the world because

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In the end, the boy discovers what we all must eventually, if we are to grow into the full bigness of the heart: that in every relationship of trust and tenderness, each is the guardian of the other’s particularity; that to love someone not for the comfort or compliance they can give you but for exactly who they are, the special and particular... See more

Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield titled one of his books, “After the Ecstasy, the Laundry.” Achieving enlightenment, he argues, does not preclude one from the daily, mundane tasks of life.

We seem normal only to those who don’t know us very well. In a wiser, more self-aware society than our own, a standard question on any early dinner date would be: “And how are you crazy?”

The path isn’t a straight line; it’s a spiral. You continually come back to things you thought you understood and see deeper truths.