[n.b. I can’t continue with my usual personal development content without acknowledging the seismic shifts taking place in the country where I live. While I don’t think this post will make a difference, I refuse to stay silent. But if you don’t want to read about US politics, skip this one.] We knew it was […]
Category: politics
You don’t have the answer
One of my pet peeves is when people tell me what I should do. Normally, this is because they did something that worked for them, and they want to tell me I should also do it. I generally don’t want such advice for a variety of reasons: I don’t want the same thing that they […]
So You Want to Talk About Race, by Ijeoma Oluo
Amazon link I was recently reminded of this book, and decided to read it during Black History Month. It’s a good introduction for those that want to educate themselves on racism in America. The book shares Oluo’s perspective on intersectionality, police brutality, affirmative action, microaggressions, cultural appropriation, and the school-to-prison pipeline. I particularly liked her […]
De-capitalization
A friend recently mentioned the concept of de-capitalization, which seems to be the idea of moving away from capitalism and the “market” as the only way to measure value. This really resonated with me, as a big part of my own recent journey has been to move away from that worldview. When I was deciding […]
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 […]
Me and White Supremacy, by Layla F. Saad
Amazon link Book site This is one of the most recommended books for beginning one’s work on antiracism, so I worked through it in June. The book’s content was originally written as a 28-day Instagram challenge, and is thus brief with each chapter being only a few pages. The chapters are all structured similarly, first […]
Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Amazon link I purchased this book when it came out several years ago, but gave up on reading it at the time because I didn’t have the patience to absorb Coates’s words and perspective. I restarted it this week, and finished it in a couple days, as it’s not a long book…but it is a […]
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 […]
The Coddling of the American Mind, by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt
Amazon link Book site This book started as an Atlantic magazine article that was later expanded into a book. Their thesis is that trends on college campus such as a greater awareness of microaggressions and emotional safety serve neither the students nor society at large, as those trends are driven by what Lukianoff and Haidt […]
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 […]
