Ancient Wisdom for a Modern World
During this week’s spiritual exercises, my thoughts keep drifting back to my day job. It’s clear I need to put more effort into sorting this mess out. During my Stoicism month, I did my best to cultivate detachment from everyday work annoyances. That was mostly successful. However, there is this constant, nagging feeling that I’m
In January, I left the full time, somewhat lucrative project I had been working on for a few years to focus on building out my business. With dreams of glory and dollars in my eyes, I confidently projected that I would wake up at 5 AM every day, do a bunch of business activities, work
For most Thanksgivings, I am  grateful for two things. 1. Time off from work. Four day weekends are amazing. 2. Turkey sandwiches made from leftover turkey (my delicious minimalist sandwich: white bread, turkey, and mayo) I usually don’t spend too much time reflecting on other things I am grateful for, which is a shame. So this year,
A few months ago my fiancee, Erica, and I took a two week trip to India. As someone with an interest in ancient wisdom, I was excited to see what lessons or experiences I could extract that would be helpful to me and my readers.  But my experience wasn’t of the Eat, Pray, Love variety where
I ran an experiment yesterday with my ice bath. I did my usual routine first (two bags of ice, 20 minutes in the water), but then instead of running around like a crazy person in my apartment trying to warm up, I decided to take a warm shower right after the bath to see if
It turns out I was doing my meditation wrong. Apparently what you’re supposed to do is go through a set of stages that start with counting each individual breath, and then focusing on the breath, and then focusing on the sensation of the breath. For example, stage one requires you to count after each exhale.
One of the readings at Mass yesterday told the story of “The Temptation of Jesus.” Jesus fasts in the desert for 40 days and the devil makes him three offers. He asks Jesus to use his powers to turn stone into bread. Jesus refuses. The devil asks Jesus to jump off the roof a temple
I’m finding that one of the toughest things about Epicureanism is that it doesn’t seem to offer any solution to what I believe is my fundamental problem: a lack of meaning in my day-to-day life. Epicurean philosophy is very smart about what brings us pain and what brings us pleasure. It provides a solid analytical
There is an interesting cognitive bias called confirmation bias in which people interpret information to suit their worldview or desires. For example, if you think your manager is a jerk, you will interpret many of his actions to be jerk-like, even if they aren’t. You may also neglect instances in which your boss is
We have all taken personality tests before. At work, your company have made you take the Myers-Briggs personality test in order to teach you how to effectively communicate and work with other people. Or you might have taken a less serious personality test like the “Which Disney Princess are you?” At best, you received some