Essays on freedom and personal fulfilment by Chris Barclay
One day around sunset, Zhuangzi dozed off and dreamed that he became a butterfly. He flapped his wings and sure enough he was a butterfly. What a joyful feeling as he fluttered about, he completely forgot that he was Zhuangzi. Soon though, he wondered if the butterfly was really Zhuangzi who dreamed he was a […]
Continue ReadingIn my recet post, “How to be an expert“, I talked about passion as being key to finding fulfillment in what we do. Yet so often we invest our passion into a hobby, because we can’t fully express it through our work. As hobbies rarely pay for themselves, we learn to live with spending the […]
Continue ReadingThe Thai don’t shake hands, they wai each other; putting their hands together in a prayer-like fashion. They do this for greetings, thanking, apologizing and taking leave. They also wai statues of Buddha, temples and other things that don’t wai them back. Who wais who first and how high you put your hands are all […]
Continue Reading“If you are rich and are worth your salt, you will teach your sons that though they may have leisure, it is not to be spent in idleness; for wisely used leisure merely means that those who possess it, being free from the necessity of working for their livelihood, are all the more bound to […]
Continue ReadingThe man I am writing about is not famous. It may be that he never will be. It may be that when his life at last comes to an end he will leave no more trace of his sojourn on earth than a stone thrown into a river leaves on the surface of the water. […]
Continue ReadingIn an upcoming post, I’m going to write about how to monetize a hobby. I feel I’ve achieved some success in this area, to the point where at the age of 42, I don’t have to go to work anymore; I pursue what I love and find a way for it to pay for itself. […]
Continue ReadingYou are perfect. I mean it. And not in a stereotypical American way of heaping praise on people to make them feel better about themselves. If your immediate response to this is, “nobody’s perfect”, this is what most people say, because we have been taught that we all have our weaknesses and must work on […]
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