Working from home is getting tired as the sounds of the suburbs intrude on our columnist’s peace of mind. Practicing presence may offer a way out of the losses and woes of the second wave
meditation
Posted inGeneral
How often he’s tried to touch death
*** “How often he’s tried to touch death” How often he’s tried to touch death Caress the cheeks make them familiar Wipe away flecks of blood Or crumbs off death’s chin Perhaps he should shave death’s face Use lipstick and ear rings make the gender a man One that prefers intimacy with other […]
Posted inEnvironment, General, Lifestyle
Sacredness, antiphons and transplanting a lemon tree
A certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house… The silence is all-consuming as I work with spade and hands. As if from far away, I hear my own breath deep in my body, deep in the caves of woodland braided with the smell of sea. Waves nearly splash on their shadows. I […]
Posted inEquality, General
The cold white shoulder to shoulder
On Youth Day weekend, thirteen South Africans gathered at a retreat centre in the Underberg to experiment with Insight Dialogue as a way of dealing with the pain and anger caused by the racism and prejudice that is thick in our country. We were an Indian woman, 6 black people (all women), 6 white people (including two men), […]
Posted inHealth
Tim Noakes and the weight of the soul
Other people, when they feel the need to get away from it all, to meditate, or to seek spiritual guidance, withdraw into seclusion. They visit gurus on mountain tops. They trudge into the desert. They go wandering with rucksacks on uncharted footpaths. I went on a pleasure cruise on a gigantic, crowded luxury ocean liner. […]
Posted inGeneral, Tech
Information overload and OCD
I guess I’m VERY lucky, having been earning a living for over 40 years doing one of the things I love: philosophy. Actually, it is not “one” thing in the sense of focusing on one “field” to the exclusion of others; rather, it is “one” thing because the activity of doing philosophy involves something distinctive, […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Christopher Hitchens not great, says this “atheist”
It depressed me a bit to write the title for this column, playing on one of the late Hitchen’s book titles, God is not Great. I think nothing can ever be achieved by slamming other people’s religious beliefs. Those people are going to continue holding on to their beliefs. Perhaps even more dearly. The attack […]