Empathy begins the process of connecting us with others, as we share their emotions. Our own life experience enables us to understand something of the life experience of others. That emotional understanding is the distinction we call empathy: “. . . the capacity to share the feelings of others . . .” “Empathy is a complex capability enabling individuals to…
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Value for Tuesday of Week 08 in the season of Dormancy
Concentrating
Concentrating is an aspect of order in the domain of thinking.
- I never could have done what I have done without the habits of punctuality, order, and diligence, without the determination to concentrate myself on one subject at a time. [attributed to Charles Dickens]
- My advice to other disabled people would be, concentrate on things your disability doesn’t prevent you doing well, and don’t regret the things it interferes with. Don’t be disabled in spirit as well as physically. [Stephen Hawking]
- And it comes from saying no to 1,000 things to make sure we don’t get on the wrong track or try to do too much. We’re always thinking about new markets we could enter, but it’s only by saying no that you can concentrate on the things that are really important. [Steve Jobs]
“Concentration and tranquility usually co-arise with mindfulness during mindfulness practice and in daily life and may potentially contribute to mental health . . .” “Concentration is one of the most influential decisive factors in student’s learning quality.”
Real
True Narratives
- Johann Hari, Stolen Focus: Why You Can’t Pay Attention – And How to Think Deeply Again (Crown, 2022): “Hari breaks down the many causes of our lack of attention into two categories: too much and too little. Too much information, stress, surveillance and manipulation, and ADHD diagnoses. Not enough sleep, novel reading, navel gazing and nutritious food.”
- Jamie Kreiner, The Wandering Mind: What Medieval Monks Tell Us About Distraction (Liveright, 2023), “shows that the struggle to focus is not just a digital-age blight but afflicted even those who spent their lives in seclusion and prayer.”
Technical and Analytical Readings
- Roy Bailey, Improving Concentration: A Professional Resource for Assessing and Improving Concentration and Performance (Routledge, 2017).
- Kam Knight, Mind Mapping: Improve Memory, Concentration, Communication, Organization, Creativity, and Time Management (Routledge, 2012).
Photographs
Documentary and Educational Films
Imaginary
Fictional Narratives
Poetry
Music: Composers, artists, and major works
Alvin Lucier experimented with sound, emphasizing snails-pace changes in oscillations and other musical components. “His experimental music was rooted in the physics of sound and might yield unpredictable results — in one instance a Beatles song emanating from a teapot.” He explained aspects of his technique in an album entitled “Music in a Sitting Room” (1981) (45’). To derive the most from his music, listen with concentrated attention.
- “Music for Piano with Slow Sweep Pure Wave Oscillators XL” (1990) (approx. 40-65’)
- “Music on a Long Thin Wire” (1980) (approx. 75’)
- “Navigations” album (2021) (57’)
“William Basinski is an experimental composer, sound sculptor, and video artist based in Los Angeles, California. He is a relentless experimentalist obsessed with reel-to-reel tape decks, splicing tape and spindling it. His musical signature is evidenced, interestingly enough, by deeply emotional sounds filled with multiple tones, drones, textures, and shades that are as hauntingly beautiful as they are somber.” “His melancholy soundscapes explore the temporal nature of life, resounding with the reverberations of memory and the mystery of time.” Though less experimental and less challenging than Lucier’s work, Basinski’s many albums also invite and reward intense and focused listening.
- “. . . on reflection . . .” (2022) (42’)
- “Lamentations” (2020) (58’)
- “On Time Out of Time” (2019) (49’)
- “Selva Oscura” (2018) (39’)
- “A Shadow in Time” (2017) (43’)
- “Cascade” (2015) (40’)
- “Nocturnes” (2013) (69’)
- “Vivian & Ondine” (2009) (45’)
- “92982” (2009) (63’)
- “Variations: A Movement in Chrome Perspective” (2008) (119’)
- “Untitled 1-3” (2008) (78’)
- “Shortwavemusic” (2007) (59’)
- “El Camino Real” (2007) (50’)
- “Silent Night” (2004) (60’)
- “Melancholia” (2003) (47’)
- “A Red Score in Tile” (2003) (45’)
- “Disintegration Loops” (2001, 2002, 2008, 2011) (354’)
- “The River” (2001) (94’)
- “Watermusic” (2001) (60’)
- “Watermusic II” (2003) (133’)
Other albums:
- Third Coast Percission, “Quartered” (2020) (25’): “Quartered is a percussion quartet for live ensemble or for playback as a four-way sound installation. The instrumentation includes glass bottles, wood planks, ceramic tiles, metal pipes, electric toothbrushes, and resonant metallic instruments called sixxen. When performed live, each performer receives a headphone feed of one of four distinct metronomes. The independent clocks relate to one another differently throughout the piece, sometimes maintaining a proportionate relationship, and at other times flexing and contracting to dictate phasing events. Sustained, ‘irrational’ composite rhythms sometimes result, as the metronomes/performers play all together in the same tempo but out of synch with one another.”
Music: songs and other short pieces
Visual Arts
Jean-Paul Laurens, The Old Scientist, or The Alchemist
