luxorator

“Before enlightenment; chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment; chop wood, carry water.” 💬 Zen Kōan

One of my absolute favorite things is watching my husband while he cooks. He flits about the kitchen confidently, usually listening to his music or a podcast, with a little smile or laugh periodically lighting up his face, and therefore my whole heart. Concocting pure magic. I am a damn lucky guy.

“Confronting, accepting, being with negative thinking and feeling, knowing that they are not the whole of reality and not you, is the most fruitful and beneficial of all spiritual practices — better even than experiencing bliss or oneness.” 💬 Norman Fischer

My hot take of the day — I think the moralization of personal choice is a mechanism that absorbs political energy and redirects it away from power. I want to write an essay on this soon with emphasis on personal AI usage, but also activism more broadly.

Today I migrated Mastodon instances for the second (or is it third?) time. Partly because I think indieweb.social fits my current vibe. But mainly because universeodon.com refused to connect correctly to Micro.blog for cross-posting. Alas, you can now find me at @luxorator.

New project completed. Officially cut the cord from DreamHost and moved my WordPress install into a Docker container on my Mac. Running it through Cloudflare. Self-hosting is kind of addicting. Definitely not watching the State of the Union tonight…

Remember that your energy is your inventory. It’s finite, precious, and if you’re prone to burnout like me, you are probably bad at conserving it. Our nervous systems are not all created with equal capacity. “Toughing it out” may in the end be counterproductive. Find a rhythm of engagement that works for you and permits regulation.

I am committed to posting my thoughts more frequently in this new year. I definitely need the outlet. In the midst of working on my private pilot license, I have also elected to start a small housecleaning business. It should be enough to occupy my attention for a while, I expect. We’ll see where everything goes.

“Who’s to say that there is any more support for Freud’s psychoanalytic concept of the superego than there is for that old time religion that asserted that there is a God who ordains what is right and wrong, and that His righteousness endures for all generations?” 💬 Tony Campolo

“I’m about to leave the world with all the mess, whereas young people have to grow up into it. If they succumb to the doom and gloom that’s the end. If you don’t hope you sink into apathy; hope is a crucial way to get through this.” 💬 Jane Goodall

“When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.” 💬 Frédéric Bastiat

The U.S. has mastered the art of making people worship their oppressors while blaming the poor for their suffering.

It’s fascinating and positively gut-wrenching to watch how quickly the institutions that protect our rights can be dismantled. It’s downright terrifying to see so many people blind to the reality of what’s happening right in front of their noses…