Amazon link The plutocrats have always known that solidarity is the answer, that the sum of us can accomplish far more than just some of us. This is a fantastic book describing how racism has benefited “some of us”, while costing us the benefits of solutions that help all of us. McGhee suggests that “the […]
Category: community
The price and cost of belonging
I listened to a podcast conversation between Annahid Dashtgard and Jerry Colonna this week that inspired me to write about my relationship with race and belonging. I first heard Dashtgard on an episode of Colonna’s Reboot podcast, and then read her book The Bones of Belonging to learn more about her journey, before discovering her […]
Lost Connections, by Johann Hari
Amazon link Johann Hari was diagnosed with depression as a teenager, and was prescribed the antidepressant Paxil, because his doctor told him that depression was a disease of the brain, so his brain chemistry needed to be fixed. He stayed on antidepressants for 13 years, dealing with side effects like weight gain and sexual dysfunction, […]
Radical Friendship, by Kate Johnson
Amazon link Radical Friendship book site I learned of this book from listening to this podcast episode where Layla Saad, author of Me and White Supremacy (which I found valuable and challenging), interviewed the author Kate Johnson about her new book. Johnson, a multiracial Buddhist practitioner and teacher, based the book around the Mitta Sutta, […]
Together, by Vivek Murthy
Amazon link In response to my newsletter talking about Radical Friendship, a friend suggested I read this book, subtitled “The Healing Power of Human Connection in a Sometimes Lonely World”. Dr. Murthy became the Surgeon General of the United States in 2014, and was initially focused on all the usual health problems of heart disease, […]
Building a Community of Alignment
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” — Margaret Mead In my first post on alignment, I wrote “Alignment is the art and craft of creating or identifying a unifying purpose and a set of elements or parts, and then […]
Manifesto for a Moral Revolution, by Jacqueline Novogratz
Amazon link Book site and associated online course, which is free if you buy the book. “Whoever you are, and whatever you do, the world needs you to lead. There will be times when happiness may feel elusive and the horizon impossible to reach. But remember that each day, we wake up to another chance […]
What will you do?
Government of the people, by the people, for the people Those ringing words from Abraham Lincoln are inspiring me today. Things seems especially hopeless to me right now, with contributing factors including: The lack of justice in the Breonna Taylor case, where damaging the neighbor’s walls was considered to be a more serious crime than […]
Privilege and Self-Education
My heart hurts today, and I felt I had to write about what’s going on in America. Staying silent reinforces the current systemic inequities. Silence implies that the system we have is okay. And it is not okay. So I am sharing what little I know, and links for me and others in my position […]
Play to win, or play to include?
I’ve been thinking about different ways to approach situations in life. One is to play to win – look at the rules the way they are, and figure out how to exploit those rules to your advantage to the maximum extent possible. James Carse calls this playing the finite game. Examples include: Figuring out how […]
