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You are the sky.
Everything else is just the weather.

―Pema Chödrön

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Welcome!

My intention and aspiration is for the following alphabetized pages to serve as an ever-expanding integrated resource library, one as curious as it is clinical. May it be of benefit to you as it continues to be to me.

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5 disclaimers

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1. Quotes from a human lineage of wisdom and confusion

Ever since I was a child, I have found quotes―from the uplifting to the disturbing―to be catalysts for insight into our singularly human condition, often capturing the heart of a subject I otherwise struggled to find the words for. While I have included in the following pages a great many quotes that reflect (to me) some salient aspect of their respective subject, they do not necessarily reflect my own thoughts, feelings or values. Indeed, in some cases they may reflect the contrary.

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2. The clinical use of poetry,
lyric & song

As with quotes, I have found poems, lyrics and songs to be powerful portals into accessing and exploring the human experience. Throughout this website I have compiled a great many poems, lyrics and songs, each of which has helped me glean further insight into what it’s like, how it feels, and what it means to be human. If there are poems, lyrics or songs from which you have benefitted along your life’s journey that you feel may be of benefit to others, please feel free to share.

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3. Pages as symbols of indestructible curiosity

The reasons for living inventory is a clinical instrument given to assess the strength of one's reasons for living; say, if one is experiencing major depression, hopelessness or suicidality. One might view the following pages (e.g., on buildings & bridges, feathers & fish, trees & trains, octopus & owls) as symbols of our shared indestructible human capacity for curiosity, even in the midst of deep despair―reasonsone might find to keep on keeping on when keeping on otherwise feels stupid and pointless. It is my hope that the following pages―complicated, downright weird, even dystopian―may serve to remind you of your own indestructible curiosity, no matter how remote it may feel at present, and the reasons unique to you for forging ever onward in this one wild & precious life―especially when the darkness pulls on you and you lose sight of your north stars. What are your reasons for living, even just one?

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4. Satire, levity & making the unbearable bearable

From time to time throughout this website you may encounter satirical pieces comprising elements of humor, irony, parody and absurdity. Such offerings are included here not to minimize or make light of suffering, rather to help us, in moments, to take this often heavy human experience, to whatever extent is possible, a wee less seriously—to loosen the grip, however briefly, on all that is so painful and difficult to bear. In this way, satire may serve to playfully punch up at the powers that be, to illuminate truth through exaggeration, and to bring a measure of levity and light to the darkness. It is my hope that this lightness—alongside the quotes, poems, songs, butterflies, bees, and myriad other phenomena gathered here—might, in its own little way, offer yet another reason for living.

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5. Financial

I have no financial or other vested interest in any of the resources linked throughout my website. Some articles may require a subscription to access. I apologize in advance for any frustration such paywalls may cause.

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