You’ve defaulted to the font. Now see the movie!
Unrequired Reading: Apr. 6, 2007
After the jump, a bunch of links I didn’t have time to expound upon this week!
Continue reading “Unrequired Reading: Apr. 6, 2007”
Aiee! It’s sensitive, new-age, ponytail guy!
I’m not one to go the “[x] changed my life” route. I mean, I’ve had a ton of inspirations and I tend to think of life as a big matrix of all those internal and external factors (plus the nefarious impact of the Trilateral Commission, of course). That said, I have felt a million times better since I started doing yoga last fall.
Now, my caveat is that it took a long time for me to start doing the stuff. I bought a DVD of some Yoga Journal series a few years ago, but never bothered to pop it in the player till last summer, when my brother inspired me to give it a try.
Listening to the calm, soothing voice of the instructor, I have never felt so ready in my life to punch someone out. Back on the shelf it went.
Fortunately, my bro turned me on to the book that got him started, Yoga for Regular Guys. YRG’s written by a pro wrestler, with an intro by Rob Zombie. As such, it doesn’t have the “calm, soothing” demeanor that pushes me into a rage. And the workouts don’t involve holding a position for 5 minutes or anything. It’s the first exercise regimen I’ve stuck with for more than a few weeks, and the results have been great: back pain’s all gone, my mood during my morning commute is much more at ease (when I work out in the morning, that is), and the official VM wife sez my ass is sagging less.
So, in that respect, I guess this has changed my life. (Not in any mystical way. I mean, while it’s nice that I feel more peaceful from these workouts, I have no desire to go the Maxon Crumb route and start “cleansing” with dhauti.)
All of which is preface to Ron Rosenbaum’s recent article on the “hostile New Age takeover of yoga“. Ron seems to share my twitch-like reaction to the “calm, soothing” instructors, “that soothing syrupy ‘yoga-speak’ that we all know and loathe”. He proceeds to dissect the “yoga lifestyle” and its attendant fashion and accessories.
But he takes it to a whole new level when he checks out a recent ish of Yoga Journal and dissects an article called “Forgive Yourself” in which the writer obsesses over a 20-years-gone high-school friendship in a way that borders on the psychopathic.
I can’t begin to do justice to Ron’s takedown of the article, the hippytrippy mindset of the editors who decided to run it, and the self-centeredness of their version of ‘forgiveness.’ You really need to read it for yourself. I’m gonna do some shoulderstands and be Mr. Plow for a while.
(Official VM Bonus! “How to deal with dead-and-gone relationships” advice: A few years ago, a buddy of mine who was engaged told me how he sorta wished he could go back and show some of the women from his past how he’d ‘grown up’. I said, “We all wanna fix the past, but when you’re really grown up, you won’t have to worry about proving it to old girlfriends. Let it go.”)
Nyeh!
Well, maybe I don’t feel like posting today! Whattaya think of that?
Publish or perish?
Just about everyone wants to get his words in print. At the trade magazine publishing company where I work, it’s become far less of a thrill for me — my 10th anniversary is next month — but the associate editors and freelance writers always get a jolt when they see their first byline.
Still, that drive to get your words and thoughts out in the public can be a bitch. For me, I’ve found that this blog is a pretty good outlet. It’s not suitable for everything I want to write, but it gives me a good forum for exploring the world, sharing neat or funny links, and opining (okay, ranting).
Which leads me to wonder: if we had blogs 15 years earlier, would the Unabomer/Unabomber have been so focused on getting his manifesto published? Happy 11th anniversary in captivity, Mr. Kaczynski!
The calendar’s just another grid
April Supergenius’ Day!
We had a happy little 65th birthday party last night for my longtime friend Chip Delany. I’ve known him for a less than a decade, now that I think about it, but I guess that’s pretty long. Anyway, we had a lovely meal at a little restaurant called Vince & Eddie’s, and bantered about all sorts of subjects, including American Idol, Ecstasy, and Equine Therapy.
I guess that’s a quintessential “you had to be there” comment, but hey. Here’s to friends.
Chag Sameach and Play Ball!
To all my Jewish readers out there: have a great Pesach!
To all my True American readers out there: have a great baseball season!
To the Gators and the Buckeyes: have a great 3OT game tonight!
WoW
Here’s a slideshow of architectural “wonders of the world,” as picked by architect Steven Holl. I guess you sorta have to put a Frank Gehry building in there nowadays, but still . . .
Monday Morning Montaigne: Of Cato the Younger
Yeah, yeah, I know: who cares about what Montaigne has to say about Cato the Younger? Well, as usual, M. uses the occasion of a brief (3+ pages) essay on Cato to digress into the nature and impact of poetry.
The essay begins with a gorgeous little passage about M.’s unwillingness to judge other people by using himself as a baseline:
I believe in and conceive a thousand contrary ways of life; and in contrast with the common run of men, I more easily admit difference than resemblance between us. I am as ready as you please to acquit another man from sharing my conditions and principles. I consider him simply in himself, without relation to others; I mold him to his own model.
From here, there’s a little digression about how virtue doesn’t exist in “modern times,” which unfortunately put me in mind of the great Ali G monologue about “Respek”:
Respek is important. Da sad ting is, there is so little respek left in the world that if you look up the word in the dictionary, you’ll find it’s been taken out. You should learn to Respek everyone: animals, children, bitches, mingers, spazmos, lezzies, fatty boombas, and even gaylords. So to all you lot out there, but mainly to the normal people: Respek, westside.
But that gets us off the subject, namely Montaigne’s vivid description of poetry, its audience, its critics and the chain of art:
We have many more poets than judges and interpreters of poetry. It is easier to create it than to understand it. On a certain low level it can be judged by precepts and by art. But the good, supreme, divine poetry is above the rules and reason. Whoever discerns its beauty with a firm, sedate gaze does not see it, any more than he sees the splendor of a lightning flash. It does not persuade our judgment, it ravishes and overwhelms it.
The frenzy that goads the man who can penetrate it also strikes a third person on hearing him discuss it and recite it, as a magnet not only attracts a needle but infuses into it its own faculty of attracting others. And it is seen more clearly in the theater that the sacred inspiration of the muses, after first stirring the poet to anger, sorrow and hatred and transporting him out of himself wherever they will, then through the poet strikes the actor, and through the actor consecutively a whole crowd. It is the chain of our needles, hanging one form the other.
Booyakasha.