Exile Lifestyle

I can’t prevent devastating storms, keep my local grocery store from selling out of my favorite product, or make someone else behave in a way that is more convenient for my preferences. These are issues over which I have little…

These days, I make part of my living doing news analysis. In practice, this means spending a lot of time reading: the news, but also all the stuff that informs and becomes the news, including history books, research papers, tweets…

I’ve been thinking about needs and where they come from, of late. In particular, how needs and wants differ, but also how that distinction doesn’t necessarily take us as far as it might in terms of helping us determine what…

We don’t fully appreciate some things until they’re gone. We might intellectually know that we’d miss them, and may even recall a previous absence that struck us like a bell, reverberating through seemingly disconnected aspects of our routines and priorities…

I’m not a consistent note-taker, in the sense that some people are very good about jotting down insights and quotes as they read or go about their day. For the way I learn, personally, I find that unloading new knowledge…

Before fully investing myself in a new undertaking, I attempt to whittle away flaws, identify weak points, and allow myself to consider setting the concept aside, completely, if warranted. In practice, this might mean that I’ve dreamt up some new…

Strength, fortitude, gutsiness, grit, dynamism, determination, purposefulness, brilliance, courage; these are all wonderful traits to have, whether you’re hoping to accomplish a personal goal or produce something of value. Also vital, though, and often under-appreciated, is the importance of just…

If you find yourself in a dangerous environment, there are two primary paths you can take to reduce the potency of those dangers: you can build barriers between yourself and the threats, and you can acclimate yourself to them. The…

There’s a fair amount of effort required to instigate change in our lives, and maintaining change over time often requires additional mental effort. Some behavioral changes stick because there are no alternatives, or because they’re latently enjoyable, but many adjustments…

The degree to which we feel we’re in control of a situation can influence the way we feel about that situation. This is often true superficially, in the sense that it can be comforting to have our hands on the…