The Blog
Here’s where I share thoughts on the work of moving toward our biggest lives and baddest selves.
My Formula for Joy
I share Shinzen Young’s equation for suffering – Pain x Resistance = Suffering – several times each week. That’s how powerful I find it: its presupposition of pain; its invitation to accept the fullness of our experiences; its simple reminder that suffering is...
History will Squeeze the Complexity from This Moment, Too
I’m from Greensboro, North Carolina, originally. This past February 1 marked the 60th anniversary of when four young NC A&T students - David Richmond, Franklin McCain, Ezell A. Blair, Jr. (now Jibreel Khazan), and Joseph McNeil – sat down at the lunch counter of...
Aestivating Extraterrestrials and Self-Limiting Thoughts
I read a theory the other day that one answer to the Fermi Paradox – If the math suggests so convincingly that there are other sentient being out there in the universe, where are they? – might be that other civilizations are so advanced that they’ve uploaded their...
Living The Resistance as The Embracing
In a notebook of ideas that stays open on my desk, I wrote sometime in the last few weeks, “What if the movement changed its language from “resistance” to “expansiveness” or “embracing?” Who knows what I was thinking when I wrote it down but I spend a good bit of time...
Wooly Eyes and Bright Illumination
From the start of the pandemic (or really, our attention to it here in the States), I’ve been fascinated by how it’s worked as a sort of highlighter or illuminator. Yes, it’s novel, sure, no doubt. The last few months have, in many ways, been unlike any other in my...
The (Optional) Snap of the Band
You might imagine a rubber band. You might imagine a rubber band with two lines on opposite points of it circumference. You might imagine one line represents a feeling of discomfort: Anger, fear, or helplessness, for example. You might imagine that line pressed...
The Problem with Helping
“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping. '” – Fred Rogers Such a sweet sentiment. I also loved when Glennon Doyle took it to the next level and told her...
When the Doing Follows the Being
I’ve been in the midst of a very slow-rolling project of scanning and organizing all of my photographs for some time now. During a recent dive into a folder, I found a scan from just last year. It was a simple collage I made in January 2020 to illustrate one of my...
An Open Letter to My Fellow White Americans
Dear Fellow White Americans: On Saturday, I read an article in the Roanoke Times about a man, Walker Sigler, who was shot in his home by police in 2018. It seems there was an open door that led to suspicion of an active crime and five officers attempted to...
Raising the Dialogue, Part 3: When Do I Get to Talk?
A wee sentence tucked into each of my last two posts, each alluding to the need to address problematic words and behaviors, deserves a little attention today. This is where this conversation often gets to: Okay, I’ve listened deeply to them, I’ve listened into myself,...