In a Language without a Voice

“Linguists say that language comes after music
and we sang nonsense syllables

before we invented a rational speech
to order our days.”

~ Jim Harrison

Hear Out, Notice RestDaron LarsonMay 11, 2019Jim Harrison, poetry, horses, nature, language, uncertainty, understanding, communication, silenceComment

Seeking Discomfort

“I’m slowly learning how to bring anthropology and mindfulness together. I think they complement each other beautifully, but how to talk about it is a whole other thing. I think it comes down to excavation – what you do physically to understand where people come from. That’s a process of discovery and insight.”

Dr. Michael J. Kimball

Without a Sight of the Shore

“There usually isn’t a quick fix to what makes our lives so challenging, and that’s okay. A meditation practice, even as brief as a couple of minutes a day, can teach us how to accept the discomfort instead of trying to calm it down.”

~ Jinger Moore

Making Sense as a Second Language

Making sense is our second language.

Sensing comes first.

Practice in LifeDaron LarsonJanuary 15, 2018uncertainty, learning, growing up, imagination, sensing, sensesComment

The Flutter of Your Earnest Heart

"Dive in with your eyes closed
For the life you were born to claim
And the water will be paralyzed
By the courage you contain
And the flutter of your earnest heart
It will fill the silent seas"

~ Ryan O'Neal

Daron LarsonJanuary 9, 2018Sleeping At Last, music, video, courage, time, memory, uncertainty, historyComment

Inhabited Simplicity

"Holiness is reached not through effort or will, but by stopping; by an inward coming to rest; a place from which we can embody the spirit of all our holy days, a radical, inhabited simplicity, where we live in a kind of ongoing surprise and with some wonder and appreciation."

~ David Whyte

Until The Sound Ceases to Convey Any Idea

"Linguistic repetition, you learn from an early age, can give form or take it away, because it forces a confrontation with the malleability of language and the world we build with it, build upon it."

~ Ben Lerner

Hear Out, Hear In, ClarityDaron LarsonDecember 3, 2017Ben Lerner, poetry, language, uncertainty, learning, growing up, mysteryComment

What I Don't Know Matters Enormously

"It’s a very difficult principle to grasp, this idea that actually, what I don’t know matters enormously, and what I can’t see matters enormously."

~ Daniel Kahneman

Daron LarsonOctober 13, 2017confidence, uncertainty, self/other, On Being, Daniel Kahneman, Krista TippettComment

In a Different Language

"What we’ve been doing for thousands of years is just trying to piece by piece get some understanding of where we came from, where the universe came from, and where it’s all going. So, to me, that is not distinct from what the poet does or what the philosopher does or what the great writer does or the composer does. They just do it in a different language."

~ Brian Greene

Daron LarsonJune 12, 2017culture, On Being, Brian Greene, Krista Tippett, science, poetry, awe, understanding, certainty, uncertaintyComment

Saying Hello to Here

"What is home?"

~ Pádraig Ó Tuama

Daron LarsonMarch 7, 2017Pádraig Ó Tuama, Krista Tippett, poetry, strangers, On Being, uncertainty, Jonny McEwen, present, clarity, belonging, equanimityComment

The Hidden Discipline of Familiarity

"Half of what’s about to occur is unknown, both inside you and outside you."

~ David Whyte

Witness and Thing Seen

How still we became,
witness and thing seen

~ Dorothy Walters

Daron LarsonSeptember 16, 2015Dorothy Walters, poetry, present, uncertainty, stillness, paying attention, attention, objectivity, selfComment

It Ain't Easy

"I'll never be the fastest teenager, and I'm okay with that. It doesn't matter if I'm better or worse than someone. It just matters that in a year from now, I'm stronger, I'm faster, and I'm a better person."

~ Cole Cooper

Equanimity, MagnanimityDaron LarsonSeptember 14, 2015Cloud Cult, hope, time, uncertainty, medicine, illnessComment

Every Step I Take is My Home

But do not ask me where I am going,
As I travel in this limitless world,
Where every step I take is my home.

~ Dogen Zenji

Hear Out, Practice in LifeDaron LarsonJuly 10, 2015senses, present, Dogen, home, uncertainty, poetry, Zen Comment

The Present Often Sucks

If your strategy for trying to live in the present more doesn't acknowledge that the present often sucks, you will find yourself frequently convinced that you have failed instead of realizing that your expectations are unrealistic.

Speechless

When I first started practicing mindfulness, I saw internal words — aka verbal thoughts — as my opponents. Like most people, I thought the point was to not think. When verbal thoughts were present, I was obviously not. Start over. Try harder.

There's just one problem with this approach. It is normal for the mind to think in words.

We Don't Want to Want

"We cannot receive love, however, if we are not open to the raw and tender experience of wanting it. Suppressing or denying desire shuts down our openness to receiving nourishment, and thus only intensifies our hunger."

~ John Welwood

Already Arrived

To live is to be
uncertain.
Certainty comes
at the end.

~ Erica Jong

Clarity, Equanimity, Practice in LifeDaron LarsonMarch 9, 2015poetry, Erica Jong, certainty, uncertainty, home, rest, Adirondack MountainsComment

Knowing You Know Nothing

Empathy requires inquiry as much as imagination.

~ Leslie Jamison

Hear Out, Feel In, Magnanimity, Practice in LifeDaron LarsonFebruary 16, 2015empathy, feelings, self/other, pain, imagination, questions, medicine, listening, Leslie Jamison, uncertaintyComment

Clusters Based on Similarity

Stories cannot demolish frontiers, but they can punch holes in our mental walls. And through those holes, we can get a glimpse of the other, and sometimes even like what we see."

~ Elif Shafak

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