Sometime last year, I saw a Facebook meme that suggested creating a “gratitude jar,” where once a week you’d write down one good thing you’re thankful for. I decided to take up the challenge. Here are some of my observations from a year observed via positive Post-It Notes. Continue reading “Tracking Your Gratitude”
Childhood is all about learning to use your senses and body: just getting up to speed. Adolescence is about adjusting to other people: socializing and learning your place in the pecking order. Adulthood is where you take what you learned from the earlier stages to shape the rest of your life and, potentially, a partnership and family. If you’re not prone to partnering or procreating but are prone to philosophizing, as I am, you might spend more than the average amount of time trying to figure out what to do with yourself. Today’s post will take you through my process…one of them, anyhow. Continue reading “What Are You Supposed to Do With Yourself?”
Pride is a tricky thing…for me, at least. You grow up receiving praise for things you do, but also getting a heaping helping of “reality checks” where authority figures or peers tell you not to brag too much or get “too big for your britches.” Still, should you be proud of yourself or not? That’s where today’s rumination took me. Continue reading “Is Pride a Sin, a Necessity, or Something in Between?”
I don’t seem to write fiction so much as anecdotes or dramatized lessons. Be that as it may, this piece came to me this morning. Enjoy or not as you see fit. Continue reading “Fiction Experiment: The Way of the Spider”
Wow, so here it is: 50 years old. Not quite sure how it snuck up on me like this, I’ve now clocked half a century on the old chronometer (“It’s not the years, honey. It’s the mileage”). I guess I’ll take this occasion to share what’s on my mind: Where am I in life? What have I learned? Where else might I go? Read on if you dare. Continue reading “The View from 50”
There will be a lot of retrospectives today (oddly enough) as we’ve reached 50 years since the first landing of human beings on the Moon. I’m going to try looking forward. There’s so much left to do! Continue reading “Looking Forward from Apollo Plus 50”
I was direct messaging with an internet friend recently about what to do to find a “mission” in life–always a big thing for me–because I like a solid reason to get up in the morning and be motivated. What I came up with as a potential project was to start researching technologies to make the world a better place. Today I’ll take a shot at explaining what I mean by that and then, over subsequent posts, I’ll discuss individual topics or technologies of interest. This could be a hit, it could be a flop; in any case, it’ll keep me entertained. And being the harmless egoist I am, that’s pretty much why I’m doing this. So let’s start with something “simple,” like answering, “What do I mean by ‘make the world a better place’?” Onward! Continue reading “Making the World a Better Place”
Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.
—George Orwell, 1984
Any quotation from 1984 usually implies that the author is about to write something sinister or dystopian. Today, I’m going to turn that notion on its side a bit, consider the wisdom of Orwell’s “Big Brother,” and discuss how it relates to how people think about their past, present, and future. Continue reading “Curating Your Own Past”
Okay, great. I’ve shared the fact that I’ve been in a funk. And yesterday I took the time to share how I’ve attempted to cope with it after waiting for it to go away didn’t work. But have I learned anything? Made any progress? That’s today’s entry. Continue reading “How One Geek Sorts Out His Mind II”
I’ve been reading a lot about “toxic masculinity” on the Twitterverse and elsewhere, and I suppose enough comments got under my skin to post something here. The goal is not to flame anyone, denounce anyone, or otherwise have an unseemly flash of temper. I merely wish to share the thoughts of a nearly-50-year-old guy who grew up in a household run by a single mother and more or less taught himself how to be a man. Continue reading “Masculinity, Non-Toxic or Otherwise”
The Real Bart Leahy 