Monday, August 31, 2026
Fraud
"Carlos Castaneda is widely considered a fraud because he fabricated stories about a Yaqui shaman named Don Juan, who never existed, to gain fame and wealth through his books. His claims were later debunked, revealing discrepancies in his accounts and leading to significant criticism of his work."
Mankeeping
"Mankeeping is the unpaid, often invisible labor women perform to manage the social and emotional lives of men. Coined by researchers at Stanford University, the term describes how women often act as default emotional processors, social calendars, and relationship directors for their male partners."
Boredom
From AI Gemini:
At its core, boredom is an unpleasant emotional state characterized by a lack of interest, engagement, or meaning in your current activity, coupled with a strong desire for stimulation that you can't seem to satisfy.
It isn't just "having nothing to do." In fact, you can feel intense boredom while surrounded by potential tasks or even while actively working on something.
The Psychology and Biology of Boredom
- The Attention Deficit: Boredom usually strikes when there is a mismatch between your brain's capacity for attention and the environment's ability to hold it. When a task requires too little mental effort (under-stimulation) or far too much without clear reward (overwhelm), the brain struggles to focus.
- The Neurochemistry: Your brain thrives on dopamine—the neurotransmitter associated with motivation and reward. When a situation lacks novelty, challenge, or clear purpose, dopamine levels drop, signaling to your system that you are wasting effort or time.
- The Desire to Engage: Unlike apathy or fatigue (where you feel passive or exhausted), boredom is a restless state. Your mind wants to be engaged in something meaningful, but it cannot find an appealing outlet.
Why Boredom Exists (The Evolutionary Signal)
Far from being just a useless or annoying mood, boredom evolved as an essential psychological signal:
- An Action Indicator: Much like physical pain tells you to stop touching a hot stove, boredom tells you that whatever you are currently doing lacks value, progress, or personal meaning.
- A Driver for Exploration: Historically, boredom pushed humans to explore new territories, invent new tools, and seek out new learning when their current environment became stagnant.
- A Catalyst for Creativity: When the external world fails to engage the mind, the brain turns inward—defaulting to mind-wandering, imaginative problem-solving, and daydreaming.
From a contemplative and meditative perspective, staying with boredom rather than immediately trying to fix or escape it isn't just helpful—it is considered a major threshold.
In everyday life, boredom is treated as an uncomfortable error message that requires immediate distraction (scrolling, snack-seeking, switching tasks). In meditation, boredom is simply raw sensory experience stripped of entertainment. Resting right in the middle of it changes your relationship to your own mind.
Why Resting in Boredom is Valuable
- Exposing the "Itch": Boredom reveals the mind's habitual restlessness—what traditional traditions call the "monkey mind" or the constant craving for subtle stimulation. Sitting with it allows you to observe the physical and mental "itch" to move or seek distraction without automatically reacting to it.
- Deconstructing the Emotion: When observed mindfully, "boredom" isn't a solid thing. It is actually a cluster of subtle phenomena: a slight contraction in the body, a feeling of restlessness, a subtle mental story ("this is pointiess," "nothing is happening"). Dissecting it removes its control over you.
- Unlocking Deeper Calm and Presence: Beneath the restless surface of boredom lies a deep stillness. Once the mind realizes it isn't going to get a quick dopamine hit, the agitation eventually passes, revealing a clear, quiet awareness that was previously hidden behind constant engagement.
- Cultivating Radical Acceptance: Boredom usually stems from a subtle rejection of the present moment ("this moment isn't interesting enough"). Learning to rest comfortably in a completely mundane moment breaks the habit of conditional contentment.
How to Practice with Boredom
1. Shift from Content to Awareness: Stop focusing on why the moment is dull. Turn your attention directly onto the feeling of boredom itself. Where is it located in the body? Is it warm, cool, tight, or moving?
2. Notice the Desire to Escape: Watch the subtle impulse arise that says, "I should check my phone" or "I should do something useful." Just watch the impulse as an observer without acting on it.
3. Drop the Judgment: Soften around the experience. Boredom isn't a sign of a "bad" meditation or a dry practice—it is simply the current object of awareness.
At its core, boredom is an unpleasant emotional state characterized by a lack of interest, engagement, or meaning in your current activity, coupled with a strong desire for stimulation that you can't seem to satisfy.
It isn't just "having nothing to do." In fact, you can feel intense boredom while surrounded by potential tasks or even while actively working on something.
The Psychology and Biology of Boredom
- The Attention Deficit: Boredom usually strikes when there is a mismatch between your brain's capacity for attention and the environment's ability to hold it. When a task requires too little mental effort (under-stimulation) or far too much without clear reward (overwhelm), the brain struggles to focus.
- The Neurochemistry: Your brain thrives on dopamine—the neurotransmitter associated with motivation and reward. When a situation lacks novelty, challenge, or clear purpose, dopamine levels drop, signaling to your system that you are wasting effort or time.
- The Desire to Engage: Unlike apathy or fatigue (where you feel passive or exhausted), boredom is a restless state. Your mind wants to be engaged in something meaningful, but it cannot find an appealing outlet.
Why Boredom Exists (The Evolutionary Signal)
Far from being just a useless or annoying mood, boredom evolved as an essential psychological signal:
- An Action Indicator: Much like physical pain tells you to stop touching a hot stove, boredom tells you that whatever you are currently doing lacks value, progress, or personal meaning.
- A Driver for Exploration: Historically, boredom pushed humans to explore new territories, invent new tools, and seek out new learning when their current environment became stagnant.
- A Catalyst for Creativity: When the external world fails to engage the mind, the brain turns inward—defaulting to mind-wandering, imaginative problem-solving, and daydreaming.
From a contemplative and meditative perspective, staying with boredom rather than immediately trying to fix or escape it isn't just helpful—it is considered a major threshold.
In everyday life, boredom is treated as an uncomfortable error message that requires immediate distraction (scrolling, snack-seeking, switching tasks). In meditation, boredom is simply raw sensory experience stripped of entertainment. Resting right in the middle of it changes your relationship to your own mind.
Why Resting in Boredom is Valuable
- Exposing the "Itch": Boredom reveals the mind's habitual restlessness—what traditional traditions call the "monkey mind" or the constant craving for subtle stimulation. Sitting with it allows you to observe the physical and mental "itch" to move or seek distraction without automatically reacting to it.
- Deconstructing the Emotion: When observed mindfully, "boredom" isn't a solid thing. It is actually a cluster of subtle phenomena: a slight contraction in the body, a feeling of restlessness, a subtle mental story ("this is pointiess," "nothing is happening"). Dissecting it removes its control over you.
- Unlocking Deeper Calm and Presence: Beneath the restless surface of boredom lies a deep stillness. Once the mind realizes it isn't going to get a quick dopamine hit, the agitation eventually passes, revealing a clear, quiet awareness that was previously hidden behind constant engagement.
- Cultivating Radical Acceptance: Boredom usually stems from a subtle rejection of the present moment ("this moment isn't interesting enough"). Learning to rest comfortably in a completely mundane moment breaks the habit of conditional contentment.
How to Practice with Boredom
1. Shift from Content to Awareness: Stop focusing on why the moment is dull. Turn your attention directly onto the feeling of boredom itself. Where is it located in the body? Is it warm, cool, tight, or moving?
2. Notice the Desire to Escape: Watch the subtle impulse arise that says, "I should check my phone" or "I should do something useful." Just watch the impulse as an observer without acting on it.
3. Drop the Judgment: Soften around the experience. Boredom isn't a sign of a "bad" meditation or a dry practice—it is simply the current object of awareness.
Friday, August 28, 2026
White
What did Snow White do after she sent her pictures away to be developed?
She waited, hoping that some day her prints would come.
She waited, hoping that some day her prints would come.
Thursday, August 27, 2026
Nepal
I've watched videos of this, and it is a jaw dropping tragedy.
NPR: Floods kill nearly 400 people in Nepal and Tibet, with 90 Americans among the missing
Eclipse
Thursday’s eclipse will begin at 9:23 p.m. ET, when the moon first enters the outer part of Earth’s shadow.
Doug Weiss - Seniors - The Surprising Reason Balance Declines As We Age
Work on your balance - The Management.
Altruistic
"In a study at the University of British Columbia, researchers found evidence that humans are inherently altruistic. In their study, toddlers under two years of age experienced “greater happiness when giving treats to others rather than receiving treats themselves.”" Lama Palden Drolma
From AI Gemini:
The research comes from a landmark 2012 study conducted at the University of British Columbia by psychologists Lara Aknin, J. Kiley Hamlin, and Elizabeth Dunn, published in PLOS ONE under the title "Giving Leads to Happiness in Young Children.”
Key Findings of the Study
Giving vs. Receiving: The researchers found that toddlers under two years of age displayed significantly higher levels of measured facial happiness when giving treats (such as Goldfish crackers or Teddy Grahams) to a puppet than when receiving the treats themselves.
"Costly" Giving: Children experienced the highest happiness levels when engaging in costly giving—meaning they forfeited one of their own treats to give away, rather than giving away an identical "found" treat that was provided by the researcher.
Evolutionary Context: Because this emotional reward ("warm glow") appears early in development before extensive social conditioning takes hold, the study provides evidence that prosocial tendencies and cooperation may be deeply rooted in human nature rather than solely learned through socialization.
From AI Gemini:
The research comes from a landmark 2012 study conducted at the University of British Columbia by psychologists Lara Aknin, J. Kiley Hamlin, and Elizabeth Dunn, published in PLOS ONE under the title "Giving Leads to Happiness in Young Children.”
Key Findings of the Study
Giving vs. Receiving: The researchers found that toddlers under two years of age displayed significantly higher levels of measured facial happiness when giving treats (such as Goldfish crackers or Teddy Grahams) to a puppet than when receiving the treats themselves.
"Costly" Giving: Children experienced the highest happiness levels when engaging in costly giving—meaning they forfeited one of their own treats to give away, rather than giving away an identical "found" treat that was provided by the researcher.
Evolutionary Context: Because this emotional reward ("warm glow") appears early in development before extensive social conditioning takes hold, the study provides evidence that prosocial tendencies and cooperation may be deeply rooted in human nature rather than solely learned through socialization.
Wednesday, August 26, 2026
The National - 'Bloodbuzz Ohio'
I love this song. There are too many aspects of it that are brilliant.
Bogan
'A Tale' by Louise Bogan 1897–1970
This youth too long has heard the break
Of waters in a land of change.
He goes to see what suns can make
From soil more indurate and strange.
He cuts what holds his days together
And shuts him in, as lock on lock:
The arrowed vane announcing weather,
The tripping racket of a clock;
Seeking, I think, a light that waits
Still as a lamp upon a shelf,—
A land with hills like rocky gates
Where no sea leaps upon itself.
But he will find that nothing dares
To be enduring, save where, south
Of hidden deserts, torn fire glares
On beauty with a rusted mouth,—
Where something dreadful and another
Look quietly upon each other.
This youth too long has heard the break
Of waters in a land of change.
He goes to see what suns can make
From soil more indurate and strange.
He cuts what holds his days together
And shuts him in, as lock on lock:
The arrowed vane announcing weather,
The tripping racket of a clock;
Seeking, I think, a light that waits
Still as a lamp upon a shelf,—
A land with hills like rocky gates
Where no sea leaps upon itself.
But he will find that nothing dares
To be enduring, save where, south
Of hidden deserts, torn fire glares
On beauty with a rusted mouth,—
Where something dreadful and another
Look quietly upon each other.
Tuesday, August 25, 2026
Borges
To the One Who is Reading Me by Jorge Luis Borges
Translated by Tony Barnstone
You are invulnerable. Didn’t they deliver
(those forces that control your destiny)
the certainty of dust? Couldn’t it be
your irreversible time is that river
in whose bright mirror Heraclitus read
his brevity? A marble slab is saved
for you, one you won’t read, already graved
with city, epitaph, dates of the dead.
And other men are also dreams of time,
not hardened bronze, purified gold. They’re dust
like you; the universe is Proteus.
Shadow, you’ll travel to what waits ahead,
the fatal shadow waiting at the rim.
Know this: in some way you’re already dead.
Translated by Tony Barnstone
You are invulnerable. Didn’t they deliver
(those forces that control your destiny)
the certainty of dust? Couldn’t it be
your irreversible time is that river
in whose bright mirror Heraclitus read
his brevity? A marble slab is saved
for you, one you won’t read, already graved
with city, epitaph, dates of the dead.
And other men are also dreams of time,
not hardened bronze, purified gold. They’re dust
like you; the universe is Proteus.
Shadow, you’ll travel to what waits ahead,
the fatal shadow waiting at the rim.
Know this: in some way you’re already dead.
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