Ant or Grasshopper – How We Spend our Time

I recently gave a short presentation on how we choose to spend our time, our life – planning for the future versus living more in the moment. The old ant and grasshopper parable came to mind. Are you more like the hard-working ant who struggled all summer storing food for the winter, or more like the carefree grasshopper who hopped and chirped the summer away?

We often hear about how we aren’t saving enough, whether that’s for emergencies or for retirement. Not to mention how nearly impossible it is to do that with most incomes not keeping up with costs, among other financial challenges. While I certainly don’t want to minimize any of that, I’m choosing here to focus more on the psychological side of things.

What are we saving for in terms of wants and desires? What are we expecting of the the future? And what are we giving up to get there? What if next week the ant and the grasshopper both have massive insect coronaries and die? Who will have had the better life? Would it be easier to save for the future if that future were guaranteed? Continue reading

The Right Rock

Once again, it’s been a while since my last post. With the aim to write here more often, I’m going to talk about something from one of my little scraps of paper. You know, those scratchings of random thoughts that occur, well randomly. Not to give too much away I hope, but on this scrap is written, “Myth of Sisyphus.” And here’s me talking out loud.

Have you ever felt like you were trying too hard? That you were working too hard to try to make something happen? Force it it into being. Make it happen no matter how many stumbling blocks you come up against. You keep trying because it’s something you feel convinced that you want. Something you’re convinced is supposed to happen. It just hasn’t for some reason. A reason you peg as you simply haven’t tried hard enough. And if you keep on trying, you’ll get there, you’ll get it, whatever that elusive “it” may be. Continue reading

Flying Time

It’s been a while since my last blog entry. I’d forgo the cliché of saying “how time flies” except it’s obviously too late for me to do that now. But there’s a reason clichés are clichés, they often hold a certain truth that can be universally felt. And maybe they become annoying to hear for that exact reason: “We already know it’s blatantly true without bothering to say or hear it.” Hmmm…I don’t think I want to think about how much time just flew by as I typed these non-words of wisdom…

The events of the last couple of years have been very life-changing for me, in that big-picture, how-I-see-the-world-and-what-I want-to-do-in-it-while-I’m-here sort of way. Funny how dealing with the death of loved ones, or other challenges of life, can end up making you feel more alive than ever. Continue reading

More Evidence Coffee is Good for Us

They say you can prove anything with statistics, and there’s probably a survey or study out there to support just about anything, so it’s no wonder it’s hard to know what to do sometimes. Given our propensity to believe the worst, and indeed the reality that many things we enjoy… Continue reading

Happy Mother’s Day – Musing on the Mothering Cycle

A mother bears a child, who in turn becomes a mother herself one day. Repeating over and over since the beginning of time. But where do the lines cross between mother and child, child and mother? A daughter can be both forever. And no matter how old we get, son… Continue reading

Titanic Sank 98 Years Ago Today

If there had been no iceberg in its path 98 years ago, we likely would hardly even remember the name Titanic. But there was, and we do. Some of us maybe think of it more than others, but it’s forever in our history as the ship that couldn’t sink, but… Continue reading

Powerless…A Great Comfort

Anthony Hopkins just has a way of saying things, and I’m talking beyond the famous Hannibal Lecter Chianti line. One phrase that has stayed with me, and that I can still hear in my head at will, is from Meet Joe Black. As Bill Parish at his birthday celebration, he… Continue reading

My Headaches Are Part of Me

One of my headaches. I say that. One of my not a. Maybe I’m just so familiar with them, they’ve been with me off and on for so long, they feel like part of the family, mine. Or maybe it’s because by possessing them, making them my own in some… Continue reading

Atom Split, Now Smashed

Alfred Nobel, who invented dynamite, was a pacifist who intended his creation to help people. Among other things, he wanted to make explosives safer to use, thereby making mining safer. And that, “My dynamite will sooner lead to peace than a thousand world conventions. As soon as men will find… Continue reading

Does the Size of Numbers Matter?

We often hear how X number of millions or billions, or even trillions of dollars have been spent doing such and such. Or how many carbon emissions are being spewed or credits traded. Like with anything we hear often enough, we can become almost desensitized to it. The numbers don’t… Continue reading