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I would say that the thrust of my life has been initially about getting
free, and then realizing that my freedom is not independent of
everybody else. Then I am arriving at that circle where one works on
oneself as a gift to other people so that one doesn't create more
suffering. I help people as a work on myself and I work on myself to
help people.
―
Wednesday, May 13, 2026
The most important aspect of love is not in giving or the receiving:
it's in the being. When I need love from others, or need to give love to
others, I'm caught in an unstable situation. Being in love, rather than
giving or taking love, is the only thing that provides stability. Being
in love means seeing the Beloved all around me.
―
I practice turning people into trees.
When you go out into the woods, and you look at trees, you see all
these different trees. And some of them are bent, and some of them are
straight, and some of them are evergreens, and some of them are
whatever. And you look at the tree and you allow it. You see why it is
the way it is. You sort of understand that it didn’t get enough light,
and so it turned that way. And you don’t get all emotional about it. You
just allow it. You appreciate the tree.
The minute you get near
humans, you lose all that. And you are constantly saying ‘You are too
this, or I’m too this.’ That judgment mind comes in. And so I practice
turning people into trees. Which means appreciating them just the way
they are.
―
Tuesday, May 12, 2026
Dr. Gabor Maté Interview by Tim Ferris
https://tim.blog/2022/09/09/dr-gabor-mate-myth-of-normal-transcript/
In the new book, are there any chapters or concepts, anything at all that you really hope people do not miss? I know that’s perhaps a strange way to phrase it, but I’ll leave it there as a starting point.
Dr. Gabor Maté: No, that’s good. Thank you. Well, it’s almost like I felt I could just print the title, the title page, The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture, and just have people write their own books. Just have a bunch of empty pages. So I think the message is reinforced through the whole book. What we think is normal in our society from the point of view of human needs and human evolution is absolutely abnormal. And therefore, when we think of abnormalities in terms of illnesses and dysfunctions and diseases and so on, these are normal responses to abnormal circumstances. And the biggest loss you and I have already talked about. This is a society that from the very beginning, from in utero onwards, put stresses on human beings, that they lose contact with themselves.
And the essence of trauma is loss of contact with yourself, loss of connection to yourself. And that’s reinforced through parenting practices, the parenting advice people get. You and I already talked about that. It is reinforced in the school system where it’s all about competition and evaluation rather than relaxation and learning. We are judged all the time by our externals, like how we look, what we achieve, how smart we are, how fast we are. We’re not accepted for who we are with our flaws and our vulnerabilities. Society caters to those false needs so that for God’s sakes, people are botoxing themselves because they’ve learned that how they are is just not acceptable.
People are on Facebook presenting a false image of themselves because they believe that how they are and who they are is not good enough. We’re sold all these products and are manipulated into all these activities that are all attempts to fulfill some deep hunger in ourselves that is missing because we’ve lost our true selves. We are manipulated into buying products and eating foods that are actually toxically, addictively unhealthy. And this happens with the full awareness, even — not only the awareness, the employment of modern science as to how to get people hooked on cell phones or junk foods. Our politics reflects very traumatized people reaching the top, enacting policies that then create more trauma for large numbers of people. In other words, this is a society that for all its wealth, scientific ingenuity, incredible progress in science and medicine, has fundamentally got disconnected from the essence of what it means to be human beings.
And we suffer. There’s an article in The New Yorker about the alarming rise in childhood suicide, the mysterious rise in child — there’s nothing mysterious about it. Kids are stressed because of the conditions of this culture, all the lonely people, as the Beatles sang, all the lonely people. The number of people lonely has doubled in the last 30 years. Britain has appointed a Minister of Loneliness. Loneliness kills. It’s as dangerous as smoking 15 cigarettes a day in terms of causing illness or potentiating illness and death. There’s so many ways in which this culture is abnormal, and it’s causing people to be not well.
And so that message, that’s the essential one that I hope people won’t miss. But I doubt that they will, if they read the book. And the big message is, Tim, is we don’t have to be that way. It’s not our true nature. We’ve been sold a bill of goods about what human nature is. Human nature is not like that. And precisely the reason there’s so much dysfunction is because we’ve got disconnected from our true nature. We don’t have to be. We can find our way back. We can embrace it. And we’ll be lot healthier, both as a group and as individuals.
Sunday, May 10, 2026
Saturday, May 09, 2026
Writing isn't about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it's about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It's about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy.
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
The scariest moment is always just before you start.
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
Friday, May 08, 2026
I just trimmed Romeo's nails rewarding him with a morsel of kibble after each nail. He knows the drill. Lulu pup was close by and I clipped a few of her nails too. This is good news since last time I accidentally took off too much on two of Lulu's nails. She hadn't noticed but I saw the two drops of blood and felt terrible.
Having a puppy watch an older, calm dog get their nails clipped is an excellent, natural way to introduce them to the process. Puppies learn through observation, and seeing a trusted older dog remain calm (or get rewarded) during grooming sets a positive example and reduces anxiety for the new puppy.
Oh, Rats!
New noise when I sat at the breakfast table this morning. Sounded like a fire engine idling. My husband and went outside and looked around. No fire truck. It was our neighbors two rickety air conditioners recently installed in the alley windows. The sound reverberates spoiling the morning silence. I've decided I'd rather think of it as a fire truck than an annoyance. Sounds like I live at a truck stop.
Then after breakfast I heard honking and went out front. Three gigantic turkey vultures holding up traffic including a school bus while nibbling a freshly dead rat in the street directly in front of my house. Happy Friday!
Later in the day I peeked outside and the rat remains were gone except for a small red stain in the road. The vultures had done a great job. And my neighbors told me the landlord is evicting all of the tenants and putting the house on the market. All is well that ends well.
Now I began to understand art as a kind of black box the reader enters. He enters in one state of mind and exits in another. The writer gets no points just because what's inside the box bears some linear resemblance to "real life" -- he can put whatever he wants in there. What's important is that something undeniable and nontrivial happens to the reader between entry and exit. George Saunders
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