I believe it was a ’56 Buick. I know it cost $50. It was my first car and I drove it mostly drunk, as I was drinking quite a bit in the Army. I would leave Ft. Dix sober, it being only Friday afternoon, drive the two hours to Brooklyn or Manhattan, and begin a weekend of drinking, hitting the road late Sunday afternoon snookered, sometimes not remembering to start the windshield wipers in a driving rainstorm. How can a person not die that way? Five of our seven Nobel...
Read MoreCultivating Calmness
Calmness may not seem like much of a virtue to you. Maybe you prefer a life of excitement, adventure, and risk-taking. Maybe you harbor the suspicion that calmness is very much like premature death. Or maybe you do crave calmness and would love to live your life more calmly but can’t see how to pull that off given your chaotic circumstances. And maybe you also doubt that you have the inner mastery or correct wiring to live calmly. Calmness may not seem like your cup of tea...
Read MoreArt and Life Purpose
For you, making art is one of your life purposes and one of your meaning opportunities. Are there others? There probably need to be, because putting all of our “meaning eggs” in one basket causes us to rise and fall precipitously based on how our art making and our art career are going. That’s emotionally and existentially dangerous! A better idea is to create a menu and a mix of meaning opportunities that include your art making but that also include other things like...
Read More
