It’s an interesting quirk of human nature that sometimes we are the most confident about the things we understand the least.

When something passes from one person to another, it does so in one of two ways. Either it’s a transaction or it’s a gift.

Who are the people who really know how to push our buttons?

The idea that we “make” decisions is misleading. We are complex systems. No decision we make reflects all of us.

Over the last few months, I’ve developed a meditation practice that I do everyday. It’s something that I’ve tried to establish, unsuccessfully, for many years. I’m not entirely sure why, but this time it seems to be sticking.

A little while ago, I got to attend a week-long gathering with some people who have been meeting like this for over 50 years.

So many people look back on their average childhoods, where they were cared for and protected and given everything they needed, and still feel that they weren’t well-loved.

Who are we? It seems like a simple enough question, but as soon as we try to answer it, things get complicated.

Every argument or conflict is like an onion--it has multiple layers.

It’s spring, and pretty soon everyone’s garden will be erupting in bloom. That includes our neighbor’s camellia tree, with which I have a deeply ambivalent relationship.

Sometimes, in relationships, people say that they want to be known. They also say that they want to be seen. It’s worth considering whether those two wishes are not the same.

When I heard that the path of the solar eclipse was going to arc right through Cleveland, I called up an old friend who lives there part time and asked if I could crash with him that weekend. He said yes.

If you wander around downtown Berkeley, with your gaze turned downward rather than trained on the always colorful local inhabitants, you’ll soon run across one of several dozen metal medallions that have been fixed to the sidewalks in seemingly random spots.

It’s not in our nature to be stagnant.

There are going to be times when you don’t know what to do--when it seems like there’s nothing that you can do. There are going to be things that aren’t your fault, that you can’t control, and that you can’t fix.

By dividing the world into tidy compartments, we make it more predictable, more manageable--and a little more dull.

We live in fear that we’ll be discovered for the frauds we truly are, and that we’ll be shamed and humiliated as soon as our masks are lifted.

Once in a while, you’ll hear the phrase “self-authorship.” It conjures up the image of a novelist, cloistered away in their study, hunched over a keyboard, tapping out a stream of thoughts and images from their singular imagination until it fills the previously empty page. It’s a compelling vision, but a misleading one.

When I misbehaved as a kid, my parents put me in timeout behind the door to the basement stairs. I never actually went down the stairs, where the oil heater made weird noises, and mice scurried around amid the boxes and garden tools, and there were probably dead bodies hidden behind the wood pile.

We put our time and energy into daily worries, momentary squabbles and short term plans, as if they’re the most important things in the world. And all the while, the sand keeps trickling to the bottom of the hourglass in a steady, unrelenting stream.