Category: Entertainment
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We rarely recover spiritual loss
“Behold a temporal loss is mourned over; for a trifling gain we labour and hurry; and spiritual loss passes away into forgetfulness, and we rarely recover it. That which profits little or nothing is looked after and that which is altogether necessary is negligently passed by; because the whole man slides away to outward things,…
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Imagination Confines Us in Mystery
“By means of the imagination we confine our mind within the mystery on which we meditate, that it may not ramble to and fro, just as we shut up a bird in a cage or tie a hawk by his leash so that he may rest on the hand.” — Francis de Sales
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Doing Your Best Brings Happiness
“Often we imagine that we will work hard until we arrive at some distant goal, and then we will be happy. This is a delusion. Happiness is the result of a life lived with purpose. Happiness is not an objective. It is the movement of life itself, a process, and an activity. It arises from…
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Two Americas :: Thoughts on the Foster-to-Homeless Pipeline, the American Worship of Comfort, and Finding Your Calcutta
Now and again you’ll come across a strange night where you learn about yourself and, if you take action, those nights change your life’s entire trajectory . Tonight was one of those nights for me and I think I’ve placed a stake in the ground in a way that ten years from now will illuminate something of a…
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Whoever got you here won’t get you there. Or will they?
Last year, I was having a nice conversation with a communications executive about my frustration working for a second time with a former collaborator. Her response was: Well you know what they say: whoever got you here won’t be the one to get you there. It’s brutal, but true. For months after her advice, I…
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A Life of Learning :: Striving for the Striver’s Life
“When am I ever going to use this in real life?” Remember asking that in sophomore Algebra? Here’s the best-kept secret in education: this inevitable question pokes a hole not only in algebra but also in every other subject. Through that hole, a light leaks in from a land much deeper and higher: from a…
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Lone Wolf Artist: On Bad Myths, Guilds, and Societies
Some idiot along the way started lying to us. The lie was this: that genius, that true genial power, can only happen when some dude or dudette cordons themselves off from society to spend the next decade crafting his masterpiece. Lone wolf artists. It has many sources, frankly, but the lion’s share of the burden of the lone wolf artist…
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Novels Like Babies Don’t Need Perfect Parents
When Tara and I still lived in Joplin, I witnessed one father’s transformation from a mediocre parent into a good parent. He’d been the kind of tiger dad, the ruthless victor, who pushed his kids towards success and integrity at the expense of their joy (his words, not mine). He and I were walking through…
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Writers Retreat and Going Off-Grid
Last week, I took a midweek writers retreat up to Salem, Massachusetts (of witchhunt fame) by way of Boston bus and train. The retreat was organized by those who organized the Writer Unboxed Uncon (the writing conference I won the scholarship to last year). It was informal and available to everyone who went to the conference, so…
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Mosaics Fix Potholes
Thanks to Jeff Youngblood for this one. In a stunning work of culture care, Jim Bachor started fixing Chicago’s abandoned potholes with mosaics: Go see the rest here.
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Will My Alma Mater Save 9 Million Dollars ?
Tis the season for phonathons — political, religious, and otherwise. Got a call from my alma mater and I was unfortunately unable to give to their phone-a-thon cause this year, but I figure I can give something better. Something that has me REALLY excited, hopeful, and proud: together, we could generate over $ 9 million in savings…
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Dead Guest Post — Areopagitica
Today’s Dead Guest Post comes from John Milton. Milton delivered this originally as a speech. I’m rehosting this pubdom article (also part of the Harvard Classics) because of the recent article in The Spectator that shows how students want comfort in their classrooms. The classroom is for many things, but your comfort is not one of them, friends… This…