Category: Arts and Letters

The Accumulated Self – Therapy and Meditation, Two Approaches Towards

You had a line I thought was interesting where you said:

Traditional therapy unpacks in order to make sense. Meditation asks us to stop making sense so that we can find where happiness truly abides. Therapy examines the accumulated self, the only one that is shaped by all the defenses we’ve used to get through life.

Meditation asks us to divest ourselves of those very defenses.

Tell me a bit about that tension. You’re setting them up as almost, not quite opposite ways of knowing, but one mode is very cerebral and takes the stories very seriously, and the other mode is, in some ways, trying to get you to loosen your grip and be very skeptical of the stories your mind tells.

Yes. I was trying to channel David Byrne there with “stop making sense.”

Taking the story — one’s own personal story — seriously is superimportant. And there’s a real tendency among people who don’t have a psychotherapeutic interest but are coming strictly from the meditative point of view to diminish the importance of everything we’ve learned from a hundred years of psychotherapy: Early childhood experience, emotional pain, even traumatic events — those are all just phenomena to be observed. Don’t make too big a deal.

I think that’s a mistake. I think we need to take ourselves seriously and understand ourselves as best we can, and then begin to loosen the attachments that we all have to the various events that have formed us.

From the spiritual side, freedom from identity is the goal. And we can see what happens in the world when people are unable to free themselves from their identity. It’s a big cause of conflict and pain. But those identities are superimportant to be able to make sense of, too. So that’s one of the ways that I see these two worlds really helping each other.

Why Does My Mind Keep Thinking That?
The Ezra Klein Show
Interview with Mark Epstein
Epstein is a Buddhist and a psychotherapist. His first book, published in 1995, was called “Thoughts Without a Thinker.” His 2022 book is “The Zen of Therapy.”

Now a lot of people go to therapy. The fact that today it might have all these dimensions of mindfulness and awareness in it would seem normal and natural. But some people built that bridge, and Epstein was one of them.

The Joke, Milan Kundera – Couple Quotes from

“Do you think demolition can be beautiful?” said Kostka, and I smiled inwardly, recognizing in his response (delivered mildly, but conceived as a challenge) the Kostka (at once likeable and ridiculous) I had first met more than fifteen years before. I replied, “I know you’re a quiet workman on God’s eternal construction site and don’t like hearing about demolition, but what can I do? Myself, I’m not one of God’s bricklayers. Besides, if God’s bricklayers built real walls, I doubt we’d be able to demolish them. But instead of walls all I see is stage sets. And stage sets are made to be demolished.”
…
“What you’ve just said sounds good. But tell me: How can a skeptic like you be so sure he knows how to tell a stage set from a wall? Haven’t you ever doubted that the illusions you ridicule are really nothing but illusions? What if you’re wrong? What if they were genuine values and you were a demolisher of values?” And then: “A value debased and an illusion unmasked have the same pitiful form; they resemble each other and there is nothing easier than to mistake one for the other.”

The Joke
Milan Kundera

Snark 1998 – Television Without Pity Archives

View the archives via the wayback machine:
televisionwithoutpity

From Wikipedia :

Television Without Pity (often abbreviated TWoP) was a website that provided detailed recaps of select television dramas, situation comedies and reality TV shows along with discussion forums. These recaps were written with sarcastic criticism and opinion alongside a retelling of an episode’s events, which the site referred to as “snark“. Their official motto is “Spare the snark, spoil the networks”, a takeoff on “spare the rod, spoil the child”, and its mascot is Tubeelzebub (a portmanteau of tube and Beelzebub, “Tubey” for short), a devilish television set with horns and a pointed tail.

From Dawson’s Creek Season 1 ep 2 recap:

Cut to the Sanctum Dawsonorum; Joey clicks off the TV in the middle of the scene we’ve just watched, and Dawson works on a fake head with makeup and tells Joey she’s “going to have to” kiss Pacey, because the movie “doesn’t work without the kiss — it’s a love story.” Joey corrects him, “It’s a horror movie, Dawson.” Dawson in turn corrects Joey, “It’s an homage with a heavy allegorical slant.” “Homage”? “Allegorical”? Mark those Sars Maalox Scorecards at “1 minute 10 seconds,” folks. Joey, to her credit, rolls her eyes and flops back on Dawson’s bed and calls Pacey “un-kiss-worthy,” and Dawson says manipulatively, “Do it for me?” and Joey says she doesn’t “want to regurgitate on-camera — why don’t you kiss him?” Dawson, coyly: “‘Cause my lips are reserved for someone else.” Joey asks if he and Jen have kissed yet, to which Dawson smugly responds, “There’s no need to rush fate.” Joey advises Dawson not to “wait an eternity” because Jen comes from New York “where things tend to move faster.” Dawson theorizes that Jen will therefore find it “enchanting to meet a strapping young man who doesn’t have sex on the brain.” Another eye-roll from Joey, along with the skeptical comment “if it helps you sleep at night.” Dawson reminds Joey that Jen “is a self-proclaimed virgin.” “For another second,” Joey snipes. Dawson defends Jen as “a bright, intelligent young woman who is clearly in charge of her own body.” Joey shoots back, “I’m not suggesting leather straps and Crisco, just a kiss.” Dawson, who hasn’t looked up from the fake head once during this convo, announces, “Jen and I will kiss, don’t you worry. Question is, will your lips ever find Pacey’s?” Joey votes for “an extensive rewrite.” Dawson: “Well, that’s too bad, ’cause you definitely have kissing lips.” Joey (and Sars): “What?” Dawson turns the head around to reveal a replica of Joey, then suggests that Joey get through the kiss with Pacey by closing her eyes and thinking about someone else. Joey slumps down on a pillow and looks sidelong at Dawson. Dawson arches a brow and says, “Explain to me the Crisco.” Well, Dawson, it might help ease the passage of your giant head out of your ass. Just a thought.

Credits. Paula Cole ululating.

Dick Cavett’s Criterion Closet Picks

…
I guess this is sayonara. By the way, you ask people what sayonara means and they say, “Well, it’s Japanese for goodbye.”
We don’t need this here, but I’m going to say it anyway. Sa-yo-nara. It’s three words. And, brace yourself, it means “if it must be so.” Isn’t that nice? See ya.

See also:
https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/a24t19/why_do_most_people_translate_sayonara_as_goodbye/

Check out a couple of his books, highly recommended:
Talk Show: Confrontations, Pointed Commentary, and Off-Screen Secrets

Brief Encounters: Conversations, Magic Moments, and Assorted Hijinks

Woody Allen in a Clint Eastwood Movie – ChatGPT on

Can you write a short scene where Woody Allen plays the protagonist in a Clint Eastwood movie?

ChatGPT said:
Certainly. Here’s a short imagined scene in which Woody Allen, neurotic and talkative, is dropped into the tense, stoic world of a Clint Eastwood movie — something like Dirty Harry or Gran Torino.

INT. ABANDONED WAREHOUSE – NIGHT
Dim light filters through broken windows. Crates are stacked like crooked tombstones. Somewhere, a rat squeaks. A tense silence. Then—

FOOTSTEPS.
Deliberate. Heavy. Eastwood-esque.

ENTER FRANK HARDIGAN (Clint Eastwood):
Grizzled. Squinting. Holding a .44 Magnum.

He rounds a corner.

Suddenly—

A SHADOWY FIGURE stumbles out from behind a crate, holding… a baguette.

It’s LEONARD BLOOM (Woody Allen). Nervous. Inappropriately dressed for a gunfight.

FRANK HARDIGAN
(aiming gun)
Who the hell are you?

LEONARD BLOOM
(stammering)
Look, I-I-I was just trying to find the restroom, okay? I took a wrong turn at a jazz club and now I’m apparently in a shootout with a man who looks like he gargles with gunpowder.

FRANK
Drop the weapon.

LEONARD
This? It’s a baguette. From Le Petit Croissant. I was stress-eating. Is that a crime now? Because if carbs are illegal, I need a very good lawyer and a Xanax.

FRANK
You got five seconds to give me a reason not to shoot you.

LEONARD
Okay, uh, look—statistically speaking, violence only leads to more violence. You shoot me, then my mother finds out, she sues you, you lose your pension, and next thing you know we’re both sharing a room at the Jewish Home for the Chronically Surly.

(beat)

FRANK
(squinting)
You’re not the guy I came here to kill, are you?

LEONARD
Kill? Oh God. No. Absolutely not. I have asthma. I can’t even jog in high-pressure situations, let alone participate in them. I’m a film critic.

FRANK
A film critic?

LEONARD
Yes, but I’m in recovery. I only write about Scandinavian cinema now—very low risk. Lots of ennui, minimal gunfire.

(a long pause)

FRANK
(grudgingly lowers gun)
Get out of here.

LEONARD
Thank you. You know, for a guy who looks like he was carved out of desert rock by a vengeful god, you’re very warm underneath.

FRANK
Go.

LEONARD
Right, yes. Absolutely. Just—one last thing. Do you validate parking?

FRANK
Get. Out.

LEONARD
Right, right. You’re the man with no name. I’m the man with too many words.

Leonard scuttles off into the darkness, baguette clutched like a white flag. Frank sighs and resumes stalking his real target.

Wu-Tang Clan – Denver* – July 4, 2025

Run the Jewels was the opening act.

Excellent show. 10/10

From a review of their Ft. Worth show:

24. Energy stew. All night RZA has been our master of ceremonies, conducting the crowd and getting us to participate in certain songs. After U-God and RZA called out different sections of the arena for their energy, RZA said, “Let’s take all that energy and put it together in one big energy stew. And we gonna take you back to that ‘90s hip-hop and make your energy just explode!” The beat for “4th Chamber” came in. It turned the place up.

25. Cappadonna is having the best night. In every verse Cappadonna did, he rapped with more intensity and heart. RZA has instructed us to ball our negative energy into a fist, open our hands to release it and make a chopping motion like an axe to chop up the bullshit. It set up Cappadonna’s “Run” nicely, which now instructed us to keep it moving when things get sticky.

Wu-Tang Clan Forever: 36 Moments From Their Final Show in Fort Worth
Wu-Tang Clan is currently on its last tour, a rare opportunity for the members to say goodbye and thank their fans.
By Eric Diep
June 15, 2025

* This was at Fiddler’s Green, which is technically Greenwood Village.

Snippet from Covid Days – In pandemic America’s tent cities, a grim future grows darker

To deal with an exploding homeless population and encourage social distancing during the pandemic, Marcipoa County officials turned this pair of asphalt-topped parking lots into the area’s newest homeless shelter. The county has more than 7,500 people on the streets, and nearly 5,000 dead from COVID-19.

Inside the crowded encampment, ringed by security fencing and barbed wire, each family has been allotted a 12-by-12-foot lot, marked by paint, to separate people as much as possible.

Phoenix is just one example of a slow-motion disaster unfolding in many large U.S. cities as homeless numbers, already growing in recent years, spike during the global pandemic.

The virus presents a compounding threat. Not only are these populations some of the most vulnerable to the coronavirus, but by destroying millions of jobs, the pandemic threatens a wave of evictions that experts warn could lead to a catastrophic housing displacement and even more people living on the streets.

In pandemic America’s tent cities, a grim future grows darker
Michelle Conlin, Reuters
December 23, 2020

I’m Thinking of Ending Things – What Was it About, Interpretation

reddit

Several-Operation879

I know this is an older post, but I just watched and I would love to chime in…

This is all the day-dream, imaginary scenarios/stories of the janitor periodically coming into conflict with reality as well as his deteriorating mental state.

It’s like a self-insert book where he highlights the good parts, and paints over the bad parts. He writes “Jake” to be well-read, sensitive, caring, but also insecure, and vulnerable in a humanizing way. His girlfriend is intelligent, successful, a physicist, painter, poet, doctor. Her name changes because it’s either unimportant, or because his memory is failing with his health.

Jake’s part is like the writer catching himself being insecure. Jake has to know enough and be sensitive enough to catch her attention, and know about his stuff as well as hers. Then reality hits, and she’s way more put together than him. He gets unbelievably angry, but never hurts her. Then he calms, and relents. He caught himself attempting to have more control of the story than he ought to.
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