“The political debater practices how not to listen: he is given his side of the question, or he is chosen to defend what is already his side, and his first task is not to listen to the other side. He marshals arguments, rehearses his own broadcast while his opponent is speaking, gets up his own story in words as sizzling as he can make them - and the audience admires the side that can jam the other broadcasting station most effectively and that shouts its own program with more kilowatts of verbal noise. Is this training for communication - or is it training for misunderstanding?”
—J. Samuel Bois, The Art of Awareness (via commondense)
June 2012
I Will Follow You into the Dark
Death Cab For Cutie
Death Cab For Cutie - I Will Follow You Into the Dark
“Fiction seems to be more effective at changing beliefs than nonfiction, which is designed to persuade through argument and evidence. Studies show that when we read nonfiction, we read with our shields up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story, we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally, and this seems to make us rubbery and easy to shape.”
—“Why fiction is good for you” in The Boston Globe (via aaknopf)
In Our Bedroom After the War
Stars
Song of the Day:
In Our Bedroom After The War by StarsIt’s us — yes, we’re back again
here to see you through, ‘til the days end
and if the night comes, and the night will come
well, at least the war is overLift your head and look out the window
stay that way for the rest of the day and watch the time go
Listen! The birds sing. Listen! The bells ring.
All the living are dead, and the dead are all living
the war is over and we are beginningI really, really love this song and for some reason I feel it’s quite fitting at this particular time in my life.
“The grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never dried all at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls.”
—John Muir (via wichmanart)
