1. Argyle Fine Art. Yes. I've been eating crow all weekend. Look, here I am on the internet letting the lovely owner of this business know (again, but publicly) that I am truly sorry for some conclusions I jumped to, for believing statements without fact-checking them, and for some actions I took. I am sincerely grateful for her selling and promoting my work when I first moved to Halifax, and sincerely thankful my apology has been accepted.
Over the past few years I've become painfully aware of the difficulties of running a private art space and I think this business owner does a terrific job and is really a caring person. The fact that she'd even have kind words for me after what I did speaks volumes to her character. Everyone should go buy something from there. Support local art. Kudos to you, Argyle owner, your assistant and your artists.
2. This quote: "The best way of proving you have a mind, is to change it". I read this on a friend's facebook account once but have no idea who was being quoted. Maybe my friend made it up. Love it though.
3. My latest Life Lesson.
I'm up to Life Lesson #3 I think.
It's a good one, I hope all parents out there are teaching it to their kids.
It is: Be aware that there are people out there who will lie to you, and manipulate you to get whatever it is they want from you.
I'm a brutally honest person so I made the error of assuming everyone is just like me and tells the truth all the time.
Plus my work/education background is in conservation biology, a field that, lucky for me, attracts really lovely people who care about community and ecology, and all living things. So, ya, took me awhile to learn this lesson. I think I get it now though. Thank you, oh givers of this life lesson.
4. Animal Farm! The book and the cartoon!
5. This public lecture titled "Who Are You?" by Dr. Deepak Chopra, 1993. It is about how we're all connected. We are! Even the ones who pretend we aren't!
6. This awesome video that is helping inspire me to cut back on the factory farmed animal products. Thanks again, NS Turkey Board for inspiring my research into the world of agri-business.
1. Galerie Beaucoop stumbled across this on twitter. They're on facebook too. Love the name, logo and the beautiful artwork; a prime example of amazing artists making Nova Scotia their home.
2. #MakeAMovieCanadian best hashtag on twitter, ever, with some hilarious movie titles that came from it. Nice example of how 'community art' is perhaps being expanded by the internet and social media: I just checked on twitter and people are STILL posting Canadianized titles. Love it. Makes me feel like everyone on twitter had a chance to play a big fun word game together.
3. "Fighting for the small-town mall". Article in Saturday's Herald. I love the thought that someone with development experience is brainstorming ways to breathe life into small rural malls.
4. The Spritual Room. What a great site with a lot of nice articles. I stumbled across this after reading this great article: "Do You Automatically Accept Authority?" by Nicole Leigh West
5. Assorted Teal Swan (formerly Teal Scott) videos. This one on raising one's frequency, this one on how to ground yourself, and this past week's video, Spirituality 3.0, The Path of Choice.
6. "What Now?" this essay on surviving scams. I think I may be nearing the end of things to read online about sociopaths. I also found this site and its forums: Psychopath Free comforting if only to know that there are plenty of other people out there who have been manipulated by people lacking conscience.
7. My conscience. In the process of going through the events that led to my big research session on sociopathy, I pinpointed a couple instances where I ignored my conscience and kept mum about some f-ed up things I was witnessing, thus switching into the role of the 'apath' in this article on sociopathy/empathy/apathy that I like so much. In doing so I learned a "Life Lesson"! Aha, yes, I borrowed Oprah's 'favourite things' phrase and now I'm blogging my first Life Lesson.
This Life Lesson is: if you ignore your conscience in favour of protecting money you were afraid of losing, don't be surprised if the dollars you were trying to cling to gets swept away from you, with a bunch of their friends, by a tornado of bullshit, leaving you with a colossal mess to clean up.
Lesson learned, sorry conscience, I'll never ignore you again. Brings me to
Life Lesson #2: when deciding to listen to your conscience or the promises of someone, or some group, who could either be permanently, or temporarily without one, I highly recommend listening to your conscience.
Wouldn't it be awesome if everyone started calling out everyone else on their bullshit and corruption as it arises! Then perhaps that 4% of people among us who have no conscience could be stopped from climbing up ladders of success in politics and corporations! Human Society could turn on a dime!
