Here are Four Great Things from the week of 03/08/2024.

"How to Be a Poet"

Wendell Berry is a fan fave amongst those who long for a simpler, slower-paced life. He has championed for intentional Sabbath rest, wariness towards progressivism, and hands in the dirt sort of living.

Rabbit Room has their own corner of published poetry and tagged this gem:

"You must depend upon

affection, reading, knowledge,

skill—more of each

than you have—. . . "

I appreciated this work so much this week because poetry forces the reader to slow down—what a gift.

"Waste Your Time, Your Life May Depend on It"

L.M. Sacasas writes for a Substack called The Convivial Society. In this essay he challenges the why and how behind the push for more efficiency—what are we even doing with our time that we're saving? If it's just for leisure, then are we just amounting ourselves to social media and television subscriptions?

"Most importantly perhaps, I think that we should recognize that with all the talk of automated labor and outsourced intelligence we are being distracted from the one element of most profound human consequence—care. Care is what creates the possibility of purposeful action. Care is what issues forth in meaningful knowledge of the world and others. Care is ultimately what transforms the quality of our involvement and engagement with the world so that we pass from “getting things done” to living."

"Bookish Diversions: Do Audiobooks Count?"

The short of the long, according to Joel Miller—yes, they do. He cites plenty of people who perceive many similarities between the passivity of watching television and the passivity of listening to someone else's tone and inflection in an audiobook. In the end though, he provides an archaic reason to keep hitting "play."

"If you venture into the brightly lit corners of book history, you find that all books were once audiobooks. When, for instance, a Roman poet published a book, he’d so so by reading it aloud to an audience at an event called a recitatio—a recitation."

"How to Break Free from the Dopamine Culture"

Ted Gioia—I posted his "State of the Culture" a few weeks ago. He had such overwhelming exchanges over it that he did a sort of "encouragement post" of what we as individuals can do to live more as active humans than passive automatons. 

My favorite counsel he gives: "Celebrate rituals—both family and personal rituals, as well as larger communal rituals. Rituals cannot be uploaded or downloaded. They are sources of joy and stability in everyday life. Instead of the ceaseless quest for novelty embedded in scrolling, ritual offers the deeper satisfaction of mindful repetition."

What I'm working on:

• Still thinking through a true definition of beauty. I'm reading Plato's Republic and came across some wonderful ideas of beauty (at least, that's my initial rendering of it)

Are the things that are in the best condition least altered and moved by something else?

—Of course.

And a soul that is most courageous and most prudent, wouldn't an external affection least trouble and alter it?

—Yes.

And, again, the same argument surely also holds for all composites, implements, houses, and clothing; those that are well made and in good condition are least altered by time and the other affections.

Quotable:

• "...because every man possesses a soul, this means that he has both a natural and a supernatural aspect. Because animals lack a supernatural aspect, they cannot fight their natures. . . A human being, on the other hand, can submit his natural aspect to his supernatural aspect (2 Corinthians 2:15) or he can use his supernatural aspect to make war on his nature (becoming a 'carnal man')."

        —"Love What Lasts" by Joshua Gibbs 

Worth the Memory

She Walks in Beauty

By Lord Byron

She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

And all that’s best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes;

Thus mellowed to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impaired the nameless grace

Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o’er her face;

Where thoughts serenely sweet express,

How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,

The smiles that win, the tints that glow,

But tell of days in goodness spent,

A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent!

What are your great things from the week?