Hey, Mom! Talking to My Mother #561 - The Best Brain Pickings of 2016

Hey, Mom! Talking to My Mother #561 - The Best Brain Pickings of 2016

Hi Mom, Just a place to stash readings today. Lots going on. My birthday is tomorrow. Dad has decided to stay in Mexico another month. I am trying to study Calculus and do my work for my jobs at the same time. I walked the dogs today and made an easy dinner (salad, rice, tofu in curry).

Not much in the way of original content here Mom, but that's to be expected. The original content will wax and wane. In fact, pressed for time as I am, and posting a day late, I am going to skip Daily Bowie posts both today and tomorrow as I cannot do both.

I always think I can do more than I can do. You would think I would have learned these lessons by now.

Hello, chris tower! As this season of reflection draws to a close, I take stock of the best Brain Pickings articles this year -- "best" being a composite measure of those you read and shared the most, and those I most enjoyed writing – in this special annual edition. The regular weekly newsletter will return on Sunday, as usual. If you're enjoying it, please consider supporting this labor of love with a donation – in 2016, I spent thousands of hours and tremendous resources on it, and every little bit of support helps enormously.

10 Learnings from 10 Years of Brain Pickings

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What Makes a Person: The Seven Layers of Identity in Literature and Life

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There Is a Crack in Everything, That’s How the Light Gets In: Leonard Cohen on Democracy and Its Redemptions

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The Secret Life of Trees: The Astonishing Science of What Trees Feel and How They Communicate

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The Third Self: Mary Oliver on Time, Concentration, the Artist’s Task, and the Central Commitment of the Creative Life

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Young Barack Obama on What His Mother Taught Him About Love

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The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone

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The Psychology of What Makes a Great Story

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Cry, Heart, But Never Break: A Remarkable Illustrated Meditation on Loss and Life

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Rebecca Solnit on Hope in Dark Times, Resisting the Defeatism of Easy Despair, and What Victory Really Means for Movements of Social Change

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Against Self-Criticism: Adam Phillips on How Our Internal Critics Enslave Us, the Stockholm Syndrome of the Superego, and the Power of Multiple Interpretations

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No Place for Self-Pity, No Room for Fear: Toni Morrison on the Artist’s Task in Troubled Times

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The Science of How Our Minds and Our Bodies Converge in the Healing of Trauma

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Ursula K. Le Guin on Power, Oppression, Freedom, and How Imaginative Storytelling Expands Our Scope of the Possible

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The Difficult Balance of Intimacy and Independence: Beloved Philosopher and Poet Kahlil Gibran on the Secret to a Loving and Lasting Relationship

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Bruce Lee’s Never-Before-Seen Writings on Willpower, Emotion, Reason, Memory, Imagination, and Confidence

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What Depression Is Really Like

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Frida Kahlo on How Love Amplifies Beauty: Her Breathtaking Tribute to Diego Rivera

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Leonard Bernstein on Cynicism, Instant Gratification, and Why Paying Attention Is a Countercultural Act of Courage and Rebellion

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How Pioneering Physicist Lise Meitner Discovered Nuclear Fission, Paved the Way for Women in Science, and Was Denied the Nobel Prize

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The Magic of the Book: Hermann Hesse on Why We Read and Always Will

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James Baldwin on Freedom and How We Imprison Ourselves

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Reflect and connect.

Have someone give you a kiss, and tell you that I love you.

I miss you so very much, Mom.

Talk to you tomorrow, Mom.

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- Days ago = 563 days ago

- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1701.18 - 10:10

NOTE on time: When I post late, I had been posting at 7:10 a.m. because Google is on Pacific Time, and so this is really 10:10 EDT. However, it still shows up on the blog in Pacific time. So, I am going to start posting at 10:10 a.m. Pacific time, intending this to be 10:10 Eastern time. I know this only matters to me, and to you, Mom. But I am not going back and changing all the 7:10 a.m. times. But I will run this note for a while. Mom, you know that I am posting at 10:10 a.m. often because this is the time of your death.