Tag Archives: Anne Lamott

Something Good

4 Replies
Sam and Ringo hiking on Deadman Road, image by Eric

Sam and Ringo hiking on Deadman Road, image by Eric

1. Kickstarter project: Broken Saviors, “Broken Saviors is an original graphic series that explores what happens when humanity becomes the subject of a global ‘nation building’ endeavor conducted by a mysterious race of aliens who claim they’re here to save us.” Written by my good friend and CSU colleague, Todd Mitchell. Issue #1 of this alien invasion epic is available now and FREE!

2. The Weight of the Evidence: It’s time to stop telling fat people to become thin on Slate.

3. Wisdom from Anne Lamott on Facebook

Even if you grew up with parents who loved each other, and their kids, it’s very hard and erratic here. And if you grew up around alcoholism, or mental illness, you developed ways of surviving that much terror and craziness, which have–let’s say–not served you in later years.

You grew up with a clenched fist in your stomach, agreeing not to see what’s going on; tip-toe-ing around, not trusting yourself as a reliable narrator, trying to rescue people who were 30 years older and hundred pounds bigger. Scared, alone, small.

You grow up waiting for the other shoe to drop.

But I think God only has one shoe. Love never fails; never not once, eventually. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not ever overcome it, at some point. Never not once.

4. Modcloth. I like how this company rolls.

5. Good stuff on Medium: The Laziest Coming Out Story You’ve Ever Heard and The complete and logical guide to winning at your own life in 19 super difficult steps.

6. How to Protect Yourself from Thinspiration Disguised as Yoga.

7. Dove’s One Beautiful Thought Will Have You Thinking Twice About Yourself.

8. Watching an Elegy: My Love of Gus Seinberg, Gay, Jewish Dog from Sara Seinberg. One day if I’m lucky, I will have an old dog.

9. How to Become Gluten Intolerant (Funny) – Ultra Spiritual Life episode 12 – with JP Sears

10. This Rare ‘Magic Rabbit’ Was Spotted For The First Time In 20 Years And It May Soon Be Lost Forever.

11. When Addiction Is An Act of Bravery And Self-Love from Rebelle Society.

12. “I Was the Fattest Hiker on the Mountain”: An overweight mom makes a soul-searching climb up Kilimanjaro.

13. Nothing is the New Skinny from Dances with Fat.

14. Buddhist Author and Meditation Teacher Lodro Rinzler Speaks About Compassion, Honesty and Wisdom in the Workplace.

15. She lists 10 things every woman should know. #3 makes me weak at the knees. Her poem “Beautiful Body” is one of my favorites. I have such a crush on Natalie Patterson…

16. How to Talk to Others about Your Intuitive Eating Journey from Jenna Hollenstein.

17. The Top 10 Lies Keeping Us from Eradicating Racism.

18. This isn’t a Bucket List; it’s a F**k-it List.

19. 5 Year Old Girl Discusses Princess Leia’s Slave Outfit with Dad.

20. Recovering From An Eating Disorder.

21. Groupon Posted This Product on Facebook, Then Replied to Everyone Who Made a Sex Joke.

22. How Obesity Became a Disease.

23. O Adjunct! My Adjunct!

24. Imagine What It’d Be Like If People Left Parties The Way They Leave Facebook.

25. Artist Creates Memorial Ash Beads From Cremated Remains Of Deceased Loved Ones. I want, one for Obi and one for Dexter.

26. Yoga Doesn’t Care: A Disclaimer that should be Posted in every Studio on The Elephant.

27. Wisdom from Pema Chödrön,

We can begin anything we do—start our day, eat a meal, or walk into a meeting—with the intention to be open, flexible, and kind. Then we can proceed with an inquisitive attitude. As my teacher Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche used to say, “Live your life as an experiment.”

At the end of the activity, whether we feel we have succeeded or failed in our intention, we seal the act by thinking of others, of those who are succeeding and failing all over the world. We wish that anything we learned in our experiment could also benefit them.

28. Wisdom from Lori Deschene, “We can’t hate ourselves into a version of ourselves we can love.”

29. The real inner circle from Susannah Conway.

30. They asked 11,000 people: What stands between you and where you want to be? One answer stood out. I love you, Soul Pancake.

31. Make A Bee Waterer And Help Hydrate Our Pollinators.

Something Good

2 Replies

1. Good stuff from Marc and Angel Hack Life: 7 Things to Remember When You Feel Discouraged and Defeated and 10 Courageous Ways to Live Life Without Regrets.

2. Good stuff from Derrick Clifton: 10 Celebrities Who Had the Perfect Response to Fat Shaming and Kelly Clarkson’s Response to Criticism of Her Weight Deserves a Standing Ovation.

3. Wisdom from John Lubbock:

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.

4. Classic Vegan Caesar with Avocado & Chickpeas recipe. Looks yummy.

5. Bill Murray’s Dharma Talk on What It’s Like to Be You.

6. Why I stopped giving a shit about my size.

7. Questions of Priority on Zen Habits.

8. Good stuff from Be More With Less: The Life Altering Practice of Making Cuts and The Challenge of Not Doing.

9. 3 Ways to Responsibly and Compassionately Respond to Panhandling.

10. 39 Stunning Images Of Women At Work All Over The World.

11. Pieces about Lisa Bonchek Adams on The New York Times: Lisa Bonchek Adams Dies at 45; Chronicled Fight With Breast Cancer and Remembering Lisa Adams.

12. After decades in prison, first day outside a shock for Colorado parolee, the first in a five-part series on former inmate Kevin Monteiro and the state’s parole system.

13. How I learned to live in my body from Susannah Conway.

14. how to dismantle the patriachy from Sas Petherick.

15. From Jamaica to Minnesota to Myself on The New York Times Magazine.

16. Telling Them a Story from Laurie Wagner.

17. The Side of the Oklahoma Racist Frat Story That Nobody Is Talking About.

18. Good stuff on Medium: Why Work Is Broken: The Changing Face of Vocation and Why It Matters, and I’m Not Pregnant, and Why I Live At The P.O.

19. Kids Are Super Ultra Mega Fucking Weird on Terrible Minds.

20. 3 Reasons Your Employees Hate Their Jobs.

21. Dutch students can live in nursing homes rent-free (as long as they keep the residents company).

22. Good stuff on Bored Panda: Rescued Magpie Becomes Lifelong Friend With The Family That Saved Her Life and Urban Treehouse Uses 150 Trees To Protect Residents From Noise And Pollution.

23. Wisdom from Pema Chödrön:

In the early seventies a friend kept telling me, “Whatever you do, don’t try to make those feelings go away.” His advice went on: “Anything you can learn about working with your sense of discouragement or your sense of fear or your sense of bewilderment or your sense of feeling inferior or your sense of resentment—anything you can do to work with those things—do it, please, because it will be such an inspiration to other people.”

That was really good advice. So when I would start to become depressed, I would remember, “Now wait a minute. Maybe I just have to figure out how to rouse myself genuinely, because there are a lot of people suffering like this, and if I can do it, they can do it.” I felt a sense of interconnectedness. “If a schmuck like me can do it, anybody can do it.” That’s what I used to say, that if a miserable person like me—who’s completely caught up in anger and depression and betrayal—if I can do it, then anyone can do it, so I’m going to try.

24. the ripple effect, redux from Chookooloonks.

25. Baby Steps from Jeff Oaks.

26. Homeless Former U.N.C. Player Balks at Efforts to Help Him from The New York Times.

27. Wisdom from Jiddu Krishnamurti, “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

28. Confessions of an Uneducated Queer, by Lauren Zuniga.

29. Ellie Goulding – Take Me to Church (Cover).

30. Ebola Survivor Ashoka Mukpo: “I Knew I Had to Practice” on Lion’s Roar.

31. Diet doesn’t cure disease. And it’s irresponsible to say otherwise from Sarah Wilson.

32. Paul Kalanithi, writer and neurosurgeon, dies at 37 and his essays How Long Have I Got Left? and Before I Go.

33. Good stuff from Tiny Buddha: 52 Ways to Tell Someone You Love and Appreciate Them and 40 Ways to Give Yourself a Break.

34. Make Yourself Comfortable from Rachel Cole.

35. Finding Your Personal Magic (and Mine) on The Mojo Lab.

36. How to Use Your Work to Get a Better Life from Laura Simms.

37. What Yoga Taught Me About the Balanced Life on The New York Times.

38. The Problem With ‘Fat Talk’ on The New York Times.

39. 10 things I learned while writing my last book from Austin Kleon.

40. Shared on Susannah’s Something for the Weekend list: Frittata Two Ways + New Zealand and 23 Things Only People Who Love Spending Time Alone Will Understand.

41. Good stuff from Dances with Fat: Say Something Sunday – Fat Joke Edition and Body Shaming Baby Onesies.

42. Water For Elephants Author Sara Gruen Reflects On The Life Of A Writer.

43. Wisdom from Anne Lamott, “I decided that the most subversive, revolutionary thing I could do was to show up for my life and not be ashamed.”

44. Double and half (freelancer math) from Seth Godin.

45. Good stuff from Alexandra Franzen: Your reasons will always win the battle, and Email guidelines for the world, and Gold Interview with Alexandra Franzen.

46. #36: Food Sanity, a podcast interview with Isabel Foxen Duke.

47. Wisdom from Eve Ensler, (thanks for sharing, Kirsten),

I was raised in America. All value lies in the future, in the dream, in production. There is no present tense. There is no value in what is, only in what might be made or exploited from what already exists. Of course the same was true for me. I had no inherent value. Without work or effort, without making myself into something significant, without proving my worth, I had no right or reason to be here. Life itself was inconsequential unless it led to something. Unless the tree would be wood, would be house, would be table, what value was there to tree?

48. What Keeps Me Up at Night (and It’s Not My Bladder) by Lisa Sadikman.