How does creation work? This question is as old as mankind. Humans have sought answers in creation myths and the fantastic stories of mythology all around the world. Those stories informed our religions and the belief in creative superpowers ruling over human life. In our contemporary culture those stories of creation have been gradually replaced by the scientific paradigm. …
A Magic Formula for Success
Barnacles are small water animals. Once they decide where they want to live, they spend the rest of their lives with their heads cemented to a rock. In a speech delivered in 1990 the social scientist John W. Gardner told his audience that many humans behave like those barnacles. We look for a reliable rock-like structure on which we …
Your Emotional Property
The other day a friend called me in a state of emergency. Something had happened, and it had triggered an overwhelming tidal wave of emotional reactions. A few questions revealed that there was no acute threat. Nothing ‘real’ was putting her or her family in danger. An intense surge of emotions had been activated inside her, and it …
Be the Change
“If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do.” These words by Mahatma Gandhi have somehow mutated into “Be the change you want to see in the world.” …
The Key to Authenticity
“Authenticity is our natural state.” — How many times have you heard this phrase? It sounds as if being authentic and living a life that feels authentic should be very easy. If it really was so easy, why don’t we all live in this ‘authentic natural state’ all the time? What does it even mean to live in an …
Problems and Ways of Thinking
Everybody has problems. This is both challenging and exciting. Problems can be difficult or desirable. The challenge is to find solutions to our problems, that’s the hard bit. The exciting part is that problems nudge us to discover something new, something we’ve never known or even thought of before, perhaps something nobody has ever thought of. After all, the …
Trust, a Currency for Peace
In 1961 Bertrand Russell was arrested during an anti-nuclear demonstration in London and put into jail for ‘breach of peace’. The philosopher, writer, mathematician, and peace activist was 89 years old at the time. 11 years earlier he had been awarded the Nobel Prize of Literature in recognition of his writings about humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought. In …
The Stuff of Space
I am not a computer. My brain is not hardware. My mindset and habits are not hardwired into my brain, and change is not difficult. I am changing all the time, and so are you. What’s difficult is to understand those changes and move with their natural currents against the resistance of a culture that treats humans as if …
Creativity and Parenthood
On her recent book tour, promoting the publication of Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear, Elizabeth Gilbert told writers: “Your book is not your baby!” And to prove it she took her book and dropped it on the floor. Having watched the scene a couple of times, I wanted to go up to her and say, ‘but Liz, for …
Mirror Mirror
Fairytales are an infinite source of inspiration – not the disneyfied versions, but the raw and sometimes cruel narratives, where the main character meets an apparently unjust destiny. The young and beautiful princess is betrayed by an evil stepqueen; or a wicked witch puts a curse on the innocent and handsome prince. The spell can only be broken by …