You have to leave behind everything that makes you what you were to find out who you really are. Or, as Tyler Durden said, "It's only when you've lost everything that you're free to do anything."

People can change. Whether through cycles of continuous improvement (a la Kaizen, but on a personal level), or dramatic, sudden changes, we are forced ( Read more... )

Crossposted at Scholars & Rogues. You can comment here or there.

Awhile back I was introduced to the concept of the "five supernatural perceptions" or "superknowledges," achieved by bodhisattvas as a pinnacle of achievement in meditation and understanding in Buddhism. I had cause to reflect on this recently while reading George Soros' 2006 book, ( Read more... )

A conversation I had with chestervhe not long ago on getting older and changing one's life gave me much to ponder upon, and now that my birthday has come and gone, I find myself mulling over the concept yet again.

( Read on for some minor and random philosophical musings )

Yesterday was my office's holiday party. As these shindigs go, it was quite good. Our boss made this awesome banana-and-strawberries concoction that looked so pretty we were hesitant to eat out of it. My team is made up largely of people like me--possessed of dry, laid-back senses of humor--so we shared some fun exchanges and generally reveled in ( Read more... )

The wise 2eclipse pointed me to evidence that LJ is blocking certain search terms from its interests list.

This seems to predate the Russian invasion and is apparently a relic of its last heavy-handed attempt to protect the children courtesy of Six Apart ( Read more... )

I love snowy nights ( Read more... )

This has generally been a crap day for me, but reading this article made me feel better:

A study in today's Journal of the American Medical Association found that regardless of their weight, people of middle age who remain fit are less likely to die for any reason than their sedentary counterparts. Even obese people benefited from regular, ( Read more... )

I try extremely hard to live an honorable life. Any time I have to compromise my ethics, even if it's for a necessity, I feel heartsick and guilty. Literally--it's like a crushing weight on my chest that makes it impossible to breathe. I suppose it's a consolation that the fact I feel guilt at all makes me a decent person at my core. I wonder at ( Read more... )

Bankrate.com has an interesting look at the Federal Reserve Board's survey of Americans' financial health.As Lee Eisenberg notes, the idea that a family making $40,000 a year might be doing better than half the households in America would certainly be surprising to some who are scraping by on that amount of money. But the Fed has always been overly ( Read more... )

This is a story about learning what it is in life you really want. About having the courage to stick to your guns and not take the shortcut. About believing in the best outcome for yourself and making it happen.

It starts and ends this way: I finally got the job I've been waiting four months to get.

( Here's what happened in between )