There are times that I’m struck by the synchrony of events in the world and in my own life. There’s no need to believe in destiny or some greater coherent plan to find moments when patterns align. The law of averages does all the work. Last week, the US elected a new president (based on all available information that we have at this time). Last week, I also took a voluntary severance offer from my job of 17 years, 4 months, and six days. Read more...

Today is Election Day in the United States. To say it is more politically charged than any election in my lifetime is an understatement. I can see one of two broad outcomes for how it will go. Either the results will be so overwhelmingly in favor of one candidate that the outcome is undeniable, or the race is too close to call and the remainder of the month is filled with outrage, sensational news coverage, and exhausting malaise as all the tallies are added, disputed, lied about and argued over. Read more...

Before 2020, I’d periodically see articles and conversations about work-life balance. The idea being that you need to find the right set point where you didn’t work too much but you also got the work done that needed to be done. Then a pandemic came and a lot of people found themselves working remote. Now it was possible to start work earlier and work longer because there were no commutes. Work could find you later in the evening because your workstation was no longer miles away at an office. Read more...

A common refrain that I hear from every direction is something to the effect of, “I just can’t wait for things to get back to normal.” This is an understandable sentiment. 2020 hasn’t exactly been the best year. We all want the sense of relative safety and security that we seemed to have before ‘social distancing’ and ‘pandemic’ became part of our everyday vernacular. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that sense of safety was an illusion and the pandemic has demonstrated that with a clarity so blinding that most of us can’t stand to look at it. Read more...

I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to live the way we do. The last ten years have had a different feel than the 36 that came before. That’s not just about pandemics and politics. It’s about our mediated and shallow interactions. It’s about the lack of long-term thinking, the bubbles of absolutism, the hours of distraction, and the dearth of wisdom. It’s about how we relate to the only thing that we truly have - time. Read more...