There’s this story I heard a few days ago, that goes like this:
Q: How do you know that a stand-up comedian is being too successful?
A: All of their new jokes suddenly are about hotel rooms, airports and comedy venues.
The risk of success is, you start working on your successful routine and you lose touch with everything else. Staying in touch with what’s out there, with everyday life, with people and events and ideas is absolutely indispensable to keep having fresh ideas.
Continue readingYesterday, the crowdfunding for the Italian-language edition of my game Hope & Glory was funded, with still over a week to go for some little extra – we’ve got a brace of stretch goals to unlock. Considering I had been told less than two weeks ago that it would be a disaster and we’d never make it, this is a great moment for me, for my partners in crime in developing the game, and for the team that worked on the crowdfunding.
And less than one hour ago I learned that my science fiction short story Sapiens has been accepted for publication in a magazine. This is a professional sale – the first this year, and the third in the batch of stories I have submitted between October the 1st and December the 31st. There are still eight stories in the loop being evaluated, and I have three more slated for submission by the end of the month.
Let’s hope this is not a flash in the pan, and that 2019 will see more of my stuff reaching the public.
Say to yourself first thing in the morning: I shall meet with people who are meddling, ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, and unsociable. They are subject to these faults because of their ignorance of what is good and bad. But I have recognised the nature of the good and seen that it is the right, and the nature of the bad and seen that it is the wrong, and the nature of the wrongdoer himself, and seen that he is related to me, not because he has the same blood or seed, but because he shares in the same mind and portion of divinity. So I cannot be harmed by any of them, as no one will involve me in what is wrong. Nor can I be angry with my relative or hate him. We were born for cooperation, like feet, like hands, like eyelids, like the rows of upper and lower teeth. So to work against each other is contrary to nature; and resentment and rejection count as working against someone.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 2.1
The third day in the Stoic Week hits close to home – and Marcus Aurelius reminds me of a thing I’ve been repeating like a mantra for the last two years: as a writer, I am in competition only with myself, and I am (or I should be) part of a community.
Continue readingAnd now for my next trick, I will do something completely different.
One thing I learned in my early days in the trenches as a self-publisher is, pushing my colleagues’ work costs me nothing, and it is good both for my readers – that discover something new and interesting – and for the colleagues, because this way they my reach a new audience.
And I cash in some good karma.
So, I will start pushing my friends’ work here, once in a while – new books, Patreon pages and what else. And right now I will start with something really different – Francesco A. Pizzo’s Patreon page for his Ghamak project.
Take a look at this…
Continue readingSecond day of the Stoic Week, and things get complicate with the arrival on the scene of Marcus Aurelius, emperor and philosopher, and the question whether we should seek fulfillment within ourselves or through external factors. The instigating quote is…
Continue readingIf you can find anything in human life better than justice, truthfulness, self- control, courage […] turn to it with all your heart and enjoy the supreme good that you have found […] but if you find all other things to be trivial and valueless in comparison with virtue, give no room to anything else, since, once you turn towards that and divert from your proper path, you will no longer be able without inner conflict to give the highest honour to what is properly good. It is not right to set up as a rival to the rational and social good anything alien to its nature, such as the praise of the many, or positions of power, wealth, or enjoyment of pleasures.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 3.6
The first day of the Stoic Week thing I’m doing requires me to take three moments during the day to meditate and reflect on the concept (and practice!) of happiness.
The seed for this is a quote from Cicero, that brings back high school memories for me:
The wise person does nothing that he could regret, nothing against his will, but does everything honourably, consistently, seriously, and rightly; he anticipates nothing as if it is bound to happen, but is shocked by nothing when it does happen …. and refers everything to his own judgement, and stands by his own decisions. I can conceive of nothing which is happier that this.
Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 5.81
But what this exercise brought back was also a much closer memory.
Continue readingAfter I mentioned Stoicism a few posts back, I downloaded an interesting little handbook from the Modern Stoicism website – the handbook of the Stoic Week 2018, that was held in October. And because I am a curious person, and I’m interested in strange things, I decided I’ll take the week routine, in the next seven days, and see what happens to me. We start tomorrow.
As I said in the past, Stoicism is a philosophy that grows in popularity in times of confusion, and, well, as far as confusion is concerned, we’re living through very interesting times.
Continue reading
Karavansara 