Category: Poetry
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Conversations, Re-evaluations and Recombinations: A David Whyte Workshop on Difficult Harvests
I attended my first David Whyte workshop last month, held at the First Covenant Church in Seattle. The theme was The Harvest of Winter, exploring the challenges posed by difficult harvests and the opportunities they provide for asking beautiful questions: disturbing, provocative questions whose answers can unlock deep, hidden insights. These questions become increasingly important during…
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David Whyte on Feminine Wisdom, Courage and Power
David Whyte shared his inspired and inspiring wisdom about the feminine embodiments of power last night at Town Hall Seattle. At a benefit event for Young Women Empowered (Y-WE) – an organization co-founded by his wife, Leslie – he guided the audience on a journey exploring the "five forms of female courage" and revealed aspects…
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The Power of Pull: Institutions as Platforms for Promoting Individual Passions
There are a number of interesting and provocative ideas in The Power of Pull, by John Hagel III, John Seely Brown and Lang Davison. I’ve already tweeted about a number of articles by the authors – based on their book – that highlight the importance of physical places, the ways we can shape serendipity and…
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Jonah Lehrer’s Metacognitive Guide to College
Jonah Lehrer, the 27 year old author of How We Decide, gave the Opening Days convocation keynote at Willamete University last Friday. After being introduced by Willamette president M. Lee Pelton as “a humanist disguised as a neuroscientist”, Lehrer offered a fun and fascinating whirlwind tour of neuroscience, psychology and sociology, in the context of…
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Blessing and Wounding: Longing, loss, pain and transformation
I was transfixed by an article in today’s Wall Street Journal – In Praise of the Crackup: A novelist peers through darkness to find glittering gems in writing and art – by Jeanette Winterson, in which she explores “the collision of creativity and mental instability”, digging deeper into the way that artists are often able…
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Contradictory ridges, self and Self
Continuing with the themes of poetry, inspiration and great friends, another great friend, Dan Oestreich, bought me a book of William Stafford‘s poetry, “The Way It Is“, a few years ago – one of many ways he helped me navigate a dark time filled with shadows.The other night, I picked up the book – which…
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Direction, by Len Silverston
The following poem was composed by my great friend, Len Silverston, a spiritual teacher and database guru. I am posting it here with his kind permission … and can't help thinking "When the reader is ready, the poet appears". Direction (Where I go, matters less than where I come from)by Kensho Len Silverston It matters…
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The Paradox of Choice: Decisions, Happiness and Appreciation
In addition to seeding my last post – on Dark Nights of the Soul – by sending me a link to an evocative image, Yogi also sent me a link to a 20-minute video of Barry Schwartz giving a presentation on The Paradox of Choice a few years ago at a TED conference. The presentation…
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Dark Nights of the Soul
Maureen McHugh, a science fiction writer (who also enjoys "not science fiction" books), has written about the challenges of writing novels (and battling cancer) on her blog, No Feeling of Falling. She augmented her words – which unfold with exquisite openness and vulnerability – with a graphical depiction of the soul work involved in rising…
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Celebrating the Future Within … Everyone?
Amy and I attended the Jubilee Women’s Center‘s 10th Annual Benefit Breakfast on Wednesday, which had the inspiring title "Celebrating the Future Within" … and a correspondingly inspiring program that included several women recounting their challenges, and now the Jubilee Women’s Center helped them rise to meet those challenges. Our good friend, Mary, is on…