The Land of Ounces (Oz)
When I was a young girl, my family and I watched The Wizard of Oz every year. This timeless 1939 film was based on a 1900 children’s novel by L. Frank Baum. Our culture now takes it for granted, but everything about this story is fascinating. What amazes me first…
Beliefs, Perceptions, and Reality
ew men have imagination enough for reality. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe When a majority rules, it feels like their beliefs and perceptions are grounded in facts and based on reality. But they are actually based on artificial constructs, on missing information, on things we don’t know and cannot see, on…
The Three Gifts
Merry Christmas! Today we celebrate a birthday in Bethlehem during the reign of King Herod. According to Matthew 2:1, some wise men from eastern lands arrived asking about the newborn king. They had seen his star and came to worship him. King Herod and everyone in Jerusalem was “deeply disturbed”…
Artificial v. Natural Intelligence
I love epiphanies, and I’ve been having more of them lately. While everyone is talking about Artificial Intelligence (AI), I’ve been learning how to grow different strands of beneficial bacteria, to rebuild my gut microbiome from the damage of antibiotics (see the book Super Gut by William Davis). I’m also…
Everyone has a slave and a master
I have great respect for quotemasters and aphorists. People who make keen pithy observations with general truths have serious intellect, and a superior style in the art of communication. Slavery is not an easy topic to intellectualize, let alone aphorize. We like to think of ourselves as enlightened post-enslavement creatures,…
What Is a Dollar?
I’ve always been fascinated by non-verbal communication, particularly letters and symbols, but also body language. In college I took a counseling course on Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). Here, I learned about directional eye movements and how to determine what type of thinking people are doing as they speak. If your boyfriend…
Our Ancestors Are Stones
With my eyes closed, I can smell the water and feel the beach sand clinging to my feet. A wind whips over my face, tangling up my hair. The rhythm of the deep blue waves sync to my heart beat, while the sun rises over a sandy dune sprinkled with…
All the World Is a Stage
I just found out that Javier Milei was elected President of Argentina. At first, I was surprised. Then a little excited to see some change on the horizon, until it occurred to me that I was being taken for a lamb. It isn’t the first time that I’ve been tricked…
Go Local, Not Green
“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” –Edgar Degas Edgar Degas was a French Impressionist best known for painting ballet dancers. He was fascinated by their grace and power and tried to capture their energy on the canvas. When he couldn’t paint them anymore, because…
The West and East Lives in Your Brain
“Logic can take you from A to Z. Imagination can take you anywhere.” —Albert Einstein There is no logic without nonsense, no reality without imagination, no future without past, no something without nothing, no woman without man, no you without another. There is no hot without cold, no dark without…