Two U. S. senators, privy to closed-door briefings, profited by selling off stock in industries that would be affected by the virus. One of them invested in a technology that allows people to work from home. As Mr. Leonhardt wrote, “They could have made a difference, but they made a profit.” Okay, that’s enough. That’s enough. We get it. The coronavirus will have an effect on the world economy; we’re already seeing it at home in the U.S. Okay. I am afraid, but I’m not. Every single client I have has either cancelled or postponed their appointment. No one knows what’s going to happen.
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It has been said by many more authoritative persons than I that we live in an Information Age. I cannot dispute the claim. What I can and do dispute is that it’s valuable. Information is information. Facts. Figures. Data. Zeroes and Ones. Ho-hum. There for the taking. So? So the consistent error we make, at least in the West, is to behave as though information is knowledge.
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My spiritual teachers are legion, and they often arise in the oddest places. Take this morning, for example: I have been a fan of Mary Engelbreit for decades. It is my custom to have a page-a-day calendar of hers that displays her prodigious illustration artistry. Mary Engelbreit understood sound bytes even before they had a name. She’s used quotes that inspire her for decades. This morning’s read: If you are more fortunate than others, it’s better to build a longer table than a taller fence.
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In the space of twenty minutes this morning, I scanned The New York Times, The Huffington Post, and a newsletter from my primary care doctor’s practice. All three made me long for the days when I was certain that The Times really was, by their own report, “All the News that’s Fit to Print.” It might be. Or, it might not.
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Lee Siegel’s article on why America is so depressed is chilling. His thesis is that our politics are affecting our mental health. I’d submit that the reverse is also true: our mental health is affecting our politics.
N.B. I address a particular kind of depression in this essay—spiritual angst/ennui, not clinical depression.
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Kate Murphy is a listening expert. She’s written a book on it. Here is my take on her take on listening. Listen is an anagram of its own prescriptive: silent. Could that be more perfect? When was the last time you really listened to someone?
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A thirty-something friend of mine had to explain the term call-out culture to me when someone we knew mutually called me out, and it totally whiffed me. After way too many words for my comfort as a definition, I finally said, “You mean holier-than-thou?” She nodded vigorously.
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Today’s issue of The On-The-Other-Hand News comes to you via C. Thi Nguyen and Bekka Williams’ article in The New York Times from Sunday, July 28, 2019. Its title is: “Why We Call Things ‘Porn’.”
I will cop to it upfront. I am not a Facebook person. There are several reasons for it, but the main one is: I don’t get it. It has been TMI from day one as far as I’m concerned.
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Composer and author Michael R. Jackson, author of Off-Broadway musical hit A Strange Loop, says it all, “It is your self-hatred that will kill you,” he said. “Secrets, silence, stigma, shame—that is the virus.”
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Self-help is not self-care, but self-care can be self-help. Kate Carraway’s Analysis piece in The New York Times made me sad. Is there anything we fail to turn into commerce? Anything? At all? Lately, the answer seems to be no. There’s even a relatively new word for this: monetizing [first usage unrelated to the silver or gold standard, 1997, OED].
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When I went off to college, my mother forbade me to major in theatre. She said I needed to learn something that would lead to a career,* and that the theatre was pie-in-the-sky. I promptly developed a bleeding ulcer which I brought home with me at Christmastime. By the eve of the holiday, I was majoring in theatre.
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“People ..., research shows, touch, swipe or tap their phone 2,617 times a day.”
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Today’s issue of The On-The-Other-Hand News comes to you via author Amy Westervelt’s article in The New York Times Sunday Review from May 26, 2019. Its title is: “The Surprising Benefits of Relentlessly Auditing Your Life.”
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Today’s issue of The On-The-Other-Hand News comes to you via Op-Ed editor Susan Fowler’s article in The New York Times Sunday Review from Thursday, May 30, 2019. Its title is: “Before I Could Change the World, I Had to Change Myself.”
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