I’m fascinated by the way that the cheerleaders themselves have narrativized this sort of self-objectification: in all the talk about locking eyes with a spectator and giving them that special moment , in the focus on the happiness you provide just by existing , in the focus on sanding down just enough individuality (even height differentiation) to... See more
But having an enviable career is one thing, and being a happy person is another.
Creating a life that reflects your values and satisfies your soul is a rare achievement. In a culture that relentlessly promotes avarice and excess as the good life, a person happy doing his own work is usually considered an eccentric, if not a subversive. Ambition is... See more
But the real root of the problem is something much deeper than cost-cutting exercises, maximizing shareholder value, and a general loss of craft and bold originality. Somewhere along the way, we lost respect for each other. We’ve broken our social contract, forgotten our manners, ignored the golden rule. The producers have lost respect for the... See more
Creating high density of not only people, but ideas and energy = serendipity and aliveness. Lewis Mumford writes that the primary purpose of the city is “to permit—indeed, to encourage—the greatest possible number of meetings, encounters, challenges, between varied persons and groups, providing as it were a stage upon which the drama of social life... See more
The next stage of human economy will parallel what we are beginning to understand about nature. It will call for the gifts of each of us; it will emphasize cooperation over competition; it will encourage circulation over hoarding; and it will be cyclical, not linear. Money may not disappear anytime soon, but it will serve a diminished role even as... See more