As followers of this blog have surely noticed, I’m a big fan of David Richo, the psychotherapist and author. Although their titles sound simplistic, his books How to Be an Adult: A Handbook on Psychological and Spiritual Integration and How to Be an Adult in Relationships: The Five Keys to Mindful Loving impress me with their clear, sensible analysis and compassionate insight. The latter book also serves as a primer/refresher on Buddhist meditation and Buddhist principles as they apply to everyday life.
In the course of recommending these books to a therapy client, I discovered that Richo has his own website, on which he offers a free book as a downloadable PDF, a compendium of excerpts from his various writings. You might want to check it out here.
Archive for the 'good stuff online' Category
Good stuff online: downloadable free book from David Richo
August 1, 2011Good stuff online: WAIT, WAIT, DON’T TELL ME
July 24, 2011
The folks who create the popular NPR quiz show Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me have acquired a weekly column in the NY Times’ new “Sunday Review” section, and it’s hilarious. Here’s an excerpt:
The Navy plans to buy 168 Northrop Grumman Fire Scout remote-controlled attack helicopters … despite that it might do what, if the operator accidentally touches the space bar?
A. Transform into an evil robot
B. Self-destruct
C. Become a pacifist helicopter
D. Make the jump to hyperspace
Answer: (B) In a recent flight test, an operator brushed against the space bar and the aircraft initiated a self-destruction sequence. That is, it started to drink, sleep around and hang around with attack vehicles that were all wrong for it.
Read the entire column here.
Good stuff online
May 10, 2011Adam Nagourney’s piece on Jerry Brown in the New York Times Sunday Magazine renewed my long-held respect and admiration for the governor of California (below). He has exemplary personal integrity, and he walks his talk.
photo by Douglas Adesko for the NY Times
My friend and colleague Glenn Berger is now a hard-working and successful psychotherapist in Manhattan and a family man raising two kids with his wonderful wife, Sharon. His first career, however, was in the music business, where he got his start as a recording engineer with the legendary record producer Phil Ramone. Glenn is an excellent writer with energy and ambition to burn, and he has lately started to write detailed reminiscences of his time in the rock ‘n’ roll trenches, chapters of what I hope will be a full book. After his fascinating account of being in the studio with Bob Dylan for his landmark Blood on the Tracks album, Glenn has surpassed himself with a piece commemorating the recently departed Phoebe Snow, whose great first album was also the first project he completed as Ramone’s assistant. The essay gives a great eyewitness account of the recording sessions, with shrewd musical analysis and knowledgeable contextual background, but Glenn also steps back and considers Phoebe as a person and what she meant to her fans (including himself). The piece left me in tears.
Good stuff online: Dr. Brené Brown
December 21, 2010I just watched the video of this TED Talk tonight, and it occurred to me that almost everybody I know might get a lot out of watching it. Dr. Brown is a researcher from Texas who speaks very honestly, personally, and humorously about the challenge of embracing vulnerability in life and relationships. True human connection, she says, requires the willingness and courage to be vulnerable and imperfect.
Good stuff online
December 17, 2010I’m a little behind on blogging because I was preoccupied with rehearsing for and performing two concerts December 11 and 12 with Gamelan Kusuma Laras. It was a lot of work but fun and thrilling to make music with a group of talented musicians. Javanese gamelan is unusual and exotic music for most Western listeners, which my friends who attended confirmed. You can check it out for yourself on this YouTube video of our opening number. It’s very much an ensemble performance without soloists or an obvious place to rest your attention. You can see me next to the gong, the guy in the blue batik shirt. It was a special treat to have Laurie Anderson and Lou Reed in the audience Sunday afternoon. Lou nodded off almost immediately, but Laurie was fully present and engaged. They left at the intermission but Laurie e-mailed me the next day to say, “It was gorgeous. Meditative but a lot of detail.”
another eye opens 