Keely Adler

Perhaps the New Age crystal enthusiast and the experimental scientist have something in common.

The world into which we are born was shaped by a capacity to generate the new through billions of years of evolution. Now, for us, a comparable capacity to imagine, together, is a vital aspect of what it means to be free and alive. Imagination liberates us from the illusion that the way the world is now is the only way it can be. In this sense,

The post-2016 obsession with conventional beauty isn’t a coincidence. It’s a cultural reaction to far right politics, and one that conveniently furthers the movement’s goals. Think of it as the aesthetic arm of trad-wifery2 — a promise that women can find peace, ease, and fulfillment by retreating not into the traditional roles of wife and mother,

"Where is the edge of me? Where is the edge of you? When I ask, 'How can I be a better person?' — the question carries an illusion that is out of kilter with families, cultures, and histories that we are all responding to. I would rather ask: 'Who can you be when you are with me?' This is a more ecological question."

Nora Bateson, Combining

Because we are taught to assume that people who are threatened will naturally run or fight (or imagine that is what we would do if faced with a dire circumstance), it confuses us to hear that somebody might instead freeze, dissociate, or shut down.

The experience was kaleidoscopic. A sentence, an idea, an anecdote could turn the barrel, refracting and reframing my perspective.