REVIEW: THE QUARTER-LIFE BREAKTHROUGH
BOOK: THE QUARTER-LIFE BREAKTHROUGH: Invent Your Own Path, Find Meaningful Work and Build a Life That Matters AUTHOR: Adam Smiley Poswolsky PUBLISHER: Tarcher/Perigee (Penguin Random House imprint) [2016]
ACTIVIST
Here’s the work of another guest poet. Deborah Coleman is a regular presenter of poems at our Maui Live Poets gatherings. She says of this poem, “Afro-American history from the time we landed on American shores is full of Sheros and Heroes that have advanced humanity forward many times by leaps and bounds….Our history’s achievements were woven into our life style, repeated in celebrations, song and dance.”
FACING FUTURE
I’m writing this on the day after Christmas. It always seems to be a time that encourages reflection. This time of year feels like what I imagine landfall at a home port must have felt like for the captain and crew of the tall ships in centuries past. There’s all kinds of hoo-hah and celebration, but underneath it all you are thinking and planning and preparing for your next voyage. Very soon now we’ll be ringing in the new year. …
MAKING ROOM
I’m re-reading an invaluable book, CREATING A LIFE WORTH LIVING, which was written by Carol Lloyd, the founder of The Writing Parlor and the Life Worth Living workshops. Over the years since I first read it in 2011 it has kept me focused on integrating my propensities for Making into a regular, ordinary sort of life. It is an ongoing process, always.
FOMO: FEAR OF MISSING OUT
Apparently there is a fairly new form of social angst going ’round, a mind-set gone viral in the past decade or so. The people- in-the-know call it “FOMO.” The acronym stands for the “Fear Of Missing Out,” it says here.
DOING VS MAKING
Tobin Hart, in his book THE FOUR VIRTUES, defines “creation” as “harnessing the capacity to take action.” Everything can “do” stuff….it’s why we’re here on the planet, apparently. (Even rocks and dirt can “do” stuff.) What turns doing into creating is what Making is all about: a purposeful directing of energies that brings something new into existence.
STEP BACK AND SEE
Very often we are told that the best way to solve any Problem is to concentrate and focus down and down into it, blanking out everything except that Problem. The Problem becomes a world all by itself. By delving into it deeper and deeper, you’re supposed to be able to pull out a solution that should, logically, solve the silly thing.
DEALING WITH CHANGE
The wise guys tell us that most of the phenomena in the world are the results of consensus and moving energy. They are part of the larger dance that includes everything and everybody. How you see it is filtered through your own memories and the patterns of behavior built up by past experiences. But then, one day you look up and notice that the world-as-you-know-it has changed so much you don’t recognize anything any more. What do you do then?
REVIEW: THE GO-GIVER
PRODUCT (Book): THE GO-GIVER: A Little Story About a Powerful Business Idea AUTHORS: Bob Burg and John David Mann PUBLISHER: Portfolio/Penguin [2007, 2015]
