Personal Development
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The Things We Pretend to Be
Photo by freestocks on Unsplash The lantern is heavier than it looks. A candle burns inside a hollowed turnip, its flame dancing behind a crooked face carved into the stubborn… Read more.
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The Question Was Defective
Photo by Arthur Mazi on Unsplash Humanity has spent an extraordinary amount of time searching for the meaning of life. We have consulted prophets, philosophers, mystics, poets, and occasionally people… Read more.
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Disasters That Never Happened
Photo by Sergio García on Unsplash By the time the city began congratulating itself on another uneventful harvest, Cassandra had nearly forgotten about the fire. She had seen it weeks… Read more.
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Something Other than Grief
Photo by Jason Leung on Unsplash There is an argument in The Kite Runner that has stayed with me longer than most of the plot. Baba tells Amir that there… Read more.
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The Price on Your Soul
Photo by Md. Hasanuzzaman Himel on Unsplash Anubis waits beside the scales. At least, that’s how we remember him. The dead arrive having already surrendered everything that once allowed them… Read more.
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The Lineage of Atlas
Photo by Olga Iacovlenco on Unsplash The war was already over when they brought Atlas before Zeus. There was little ceremony left in it. Ceremony belongs to uncertainty: to trials… Read more.
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The Instruction of Trees
Photo by Cassiano K. Wehr on Unsplash The first sword I ever trained with seriously was a katana. Not, perhaps, in the exact lineage someone might imagine from that sentence.… Read more.
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A Protocol for Disengagement
Photo by Souvent Su on Unsplash I have noticed that there is a point at which I become quiet. It is not usually the first point of disagreement, and it… Read more.
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Outrunning the Shadow
Photo by Martino Pietropoli on Unsplash The first thing you learn is how to stand, and that alone is harder than it sounds. Your feet sit at an angle you… Read more.
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Which One Yields
Photo by Joshua Kettle on Unsplash Author’s Note Last September I wrote down eight virtues and called it a return to form. I have been reading it again this week,… Read more.
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The Thread
Photo by Andrea De Santis on Unsplash I have known many smokers who were constantly under financial stress. I have rarely seen one of them without a cigarette. And, for… Read more.
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The Gap Between Desire and Appreciation
Photo by zero take on Unsplash There is a particular way you reverse a Lamborghini Countach. You open the door, sit up onto the sill, and look backward over the… Read more.
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Only Ink
Photo by The Cleveland Museum of Art on Unsplash Consider a drawer of maps, all of them describing the same county. The first shows roads: highways in red, gravel in… Read more.
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After the Introduction
Photo by EJ Yao on Unsplash Husband. Son. Veteran. Southerner. Stoic, at least in influence. Taoist, though not in any way that fits neatly on a form. A technologist, self-taught,… Read more.
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Already Decided
Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash It begins with someone who has not done anything wrong, not exactly. An analyst opens a session and runs a query. It is not malicious.… Read more.
