Category: spections

“Feeling overwhelmed” is an interesting emotion. It says nothing about the source of overwhelm, and everything about the quantity of it. It also speaks to beliefs of success and failure. Phone numbers are 7-digits long because humans can’t really remember more than that easily. Seven is at our upper limits. And on top of that, […]

There’s an ancient ‘trick’ that shamans would use to find answers to things. They called it “rock staring”. And, as the name implies, you would stare at a rock until you saw ‘something’ in the rock, and then after determining what that ‘something’ is, you interpret what it means. Then you spin the rock 45 […]

All you need is love.  Is that really true?  I mean, as a universal, blanket statement, to stand solid as something that is true for each and every person in the world, does that really ring true? Well, let’s take a step back.  Surely, people WANT more than just love.  So the song would never […]

What is the difference between a dream state and an awake state?  Specifically, I wonder about the moments after waking from a dream when you’re still in the dream state, and you get up to go to the bathroom or to get a drink of water. In these moments, expectations of reality are different, and […]

What are the steps you take towards happiness?  Are you happier today than you were yesterday?  Is happiness a cumulative state of being, something that can multiply over time?  Or is it a fragile state of being, something that can easily be disturbed or lost? What if happiness is as simple as a particular breathing […]

Emotions are thoughtless, wordless feelings. Only over time do we learn to recognize them, put words to describe them, and associate external events that trigger them. Yet we are often very, very wrong.  Too often, we mistake one emotion for another, such as using the word “anger” to describe a feeling much better suited to […]

Travel has long been the reliable healer, the way to find yourself, the way to truly experience the world. Yet your emotions are always with you.  You can plant yourself in a city that evokes your awe and wonder, that makes all your routines seem small and silly, yet you will have emotional reactions to […]

How do you decide what’s important?  I mean, how do you decide when it’s worth the effort to begin worrying, or stressing, or fearing, or hating? Truth is, usually you don’t. Usually, we don’t choose to experience these emotions.. they happen to us.  And there’s usually a reason that appears to be outside of our […]

Work is such a misunderstood thing.  I was brought up with all this work forced upon me as a child in school.  The value proposition was always result-oriented; get good grades so you can get into a good college so you can get a good job.  Very rarely was the value of doing good work, […]

What is it about family that we have such emotions attached?  Why do we love our families implicitly?  Is that even a question worth asking… is there anything worth talking about on this topic… Well, maybe the interesting part here is that NOT the implicit love people feel for their families, but all the other […]