Today's newsletter offers three anecdotes to contextualize an important reminder:
Sometimes the world just won't give us nice, neat, coherent stories.
Never has before!
So when despairing at the haphazard state of the news, maybe consider these three tales: of messy beginnings (mitochondria!), middles (mince pie mythology!), and endings (Patron Saint outcomes!).
We have so little control over the "story" as a whole.
Maybe there's a strength in embracing that, though.
https://open.substack.com/pub/mlclark/p/on-mitochondria-mince-pies-and-patron
yes, we are the collators, the editors, the authors, in fact, of our lived experience.
although circumstances surrounding us provide endless possibilities for despair,
we can choose to concentrate on what has been called The Good, for want of a term for which there is none.
even in the midst of horror, people have found ways to embrace and carry it forward.
lotus from mud is possible, always. not easy always.
concentration and insight in balance. following guides, reliable.
@MLClark
"there is no moment when ‘contact’ does not occur.
At least one of the six senses (and in this model the mind is treated as a sense), if not all of them, is in contact with its cognitive object at any given moment.
Hence each moment constitutes and is constituted by intentionalities inhabiting one or several of the sensory domains.
Put another way, experience is always in and of the sensorium.
existential-phenomenologists claim man is never other than being-in-the-world."
Good luck dancing on the head of the pin.
I might need a bigger pin. 🙃
@MLClark It's brilliant and I've finally subscribed. I only wish I could afford to pay you. x
Stuey, just having a kind eye like yours on the words is more than reward enough. 🤗 Thank you for the warm words, and for taking the time with it. I'm so glad it served.
@MLClark
Indeed. Good stories aren't necessarily true and true stories aren't necessarily good.
*First newsletter.
I'll have Coriolanus up tonight. It just needs editing, *after* I finish today's paid writing task.
My brain has been braining... very slowly this past week and a half.
But I'll add that it's always an extra big challenge to tell a science story simply and well - so I don't mind the time it took to get the first part just right. Making science histories accessible can be a tricky business, but they're rewarding when pulled off.
Cheers, folks. Have a day! 🕊️