Notes From A Bear's Journey

   One could look at that word --content-- in several ways, one definition being that of what's inside (as in the word "contains" or as is commonly seen in books, a table of contents) or that of being satiated (as in, a feeling of contentment).  And indeed, there's been a lot written on that latter definition as if our search for happiness and contentment is somehow growing more and more difficult (and not just limited to the U.S.; see my post on hygge ).  Even one of my own earlier posts on happiness continued to push me on this search, this effort to discard that which was anchoring me down and cluttering my life (truth be told, my wanting to shed five things daily has averaged out to about 2-3 daily overall, some days watching 20 files bite the dust and other days shedding none).    Some of this renewed vigor may have again started from the short piece in The Week at the beginning of the year which asked, "Can we train ourselves to live fuller, happ...

  It's been a bit of a pause since the last post; but then again it's summer and so much calls to you to get out of the house, from the cacophony of crickets giving you their nighttime mating symphony to the wild flowers just starting to bloom in the hills, even as the flowers in our gardens and yards struggle to make it through the drought-like conditions.  A quick peek at the calendar and one might gasp that here July is well past the halfway point -- summer is almost gone.  At times we might all feel that way, that of many of our own things being almost gone, even to the point of our memories or physical abilities, or the lifestyles and cultures or perhaps the neighborhoods we knew as a child; all appear to be disappearing or have disappeared entirely.  What's going on we wonder (and I say this especially to us older folks), or as the tee shirt more bluntly asked: Inside Every Older Person is a Younger Person Wondering What the Hell Happened ?  What actually ...

  The world is full of wonders, and nothing illustrates as well as that of new life emerging.  For humans, the birth of a child is truly life changing for both mother and child (and sometimes the father but hormonally it is the mother who experiences bodily changes).  In reading Paul Simon's biography this became an interesting side note, him spotting the menu offering at a Chinese restaurant, that of a dish with both chicken and egg and aptly titled Mother & Child Reunion, which led to the song.  It was a time in his life when he was going through a difficult time, everything falling into his lap (he would soon become one of the wealthiest songwriters of that time) and yet feeling so unhappy; all of this caused him to cry in the shower and wonder if he was actually crazy (he would later take that thought and write the hit song Still Crazy After All These Years ).  But even more interesting was the reflection by Christie Watson on her 20 years of nursing in...