by Jill Schroder “When day comes, we step out of the shade…” is an excerpt from Amanda Gorman, the youth Poet Laureate’s contribution at the Biden-Harris inauguration. This phrase landed with me and then rippled out. It does seem like we are stepping out of the shade now, in January. The days are getting longer,… Continue reading Stepping out of the shade
Tag: philosophy
Our Christmas tree: musings on mortality
by Erlene Woollard One might well wonder why I would bother taking such a photograph during this pandemic when our craving for beauty and positive distraction is so great. However, as I walked towards our still beautiful live Christmas tree waiting in our back alley to be picked up and sent off to its next… Continue reading Our Christmas tree: musings on mortality
Waiting it out: patience in a time of COVID
by Stan Hirst Another year almost gone. Only 7778,582 seconds left to the end of 2020 says the doomsday app on my computer screen. There is a morbid fascination in watching seconds tick away on a coloured clock face. To think that somebody actually took the time (ha!) to programme an app like that. To… Continue reading Waiting it out: patience in a time of COVID
Time
by David Suzuki My seven-month lockdown to avoid COVID-19 brought my life to a screeching halt which was a gift, an opportunity to reflect on what really matters in life. By sheer luck, my wife and I were at our cabin where we hoped to kick off Spring Break with our daughters and their families,… Continue reading Time
Living with uncertainty
by Jill Schroder Our southern neighbour is in the throes of a vital election which affects almost everyone on the planet and has created a lot of uncertainty. In addition it’s a hugely challenging time for many of us in Canada and elsewhere. There are risks of disastrous losses, multiple concerns, and deep uncertainty about… Continue reading Living with uncertainty
Cultivate Joy — we sure need it now!
by Jill Schroder Joy and delight, enthusiasm and lightheartedness are good for our health, our immune systems, and have trickle-down benefits for everybody and everything we come in contact with. I find that when I focus on joy and delight, love and light, my energy changes… the energy that I bring to whatever is in… Continue reading Cultivate Joy — we sure need it now!
If we want to solve complex social and environmental problems we need to think in terms of systems
by Leyla Acaroglu — Condensed with permission from “Problem Solving Desperately Needs Systems Thinking,” originally published at Medium June 26, 2018. Most of us are taught, from a young age, that in order to solve a problem, we simply need to break it down to its core components and solve for x. We learn science… Continue reading If we want to solve complex social and environmental problems we need to think in terms of systems
Why the simple life is not just beautiful, it’s necessary
by Emrys Westacott The good life is the simple life. Among philosophical ideas about how we should live, this one is a hardy perennial; from Socrates to Thoreau, from the Buddha to Wendell Berry, thinkers have been peddling it for more than two millennia. And it still has plenty of adherents. Magazines such as Real… Continue reading Why the simple life is not just beautiful, it’s necessary
Walking through the woods at dusk
by Lillian Ireland Walking through the woods at dusk, The silence seems to pierce the ‘ifs’ and ‘whens’ and ‘whys’ and other endless thoughts. A quiet overtakes my soul as I hear the nearby gurgling stream, It doesn’t question its future or from where it gets its strength. The cradling water and bottom sand gently… Continue reading Walking through the woods at dusk
Given how little effect you can have, is it rational to vote?
by Julia Maskivker For far too long, the accepted wisdom among scholars of politics has been that the interests of the individual and the interests of society are not in harmony when it comes to voting. The American economist Anthony Downs, in his foundational book An Economic Theory of Democracy (1957), argued that a truly… Continue reading Given how little effect you can have, is it rational to vote?