When we are not free, we may seek to liberate ourselves, so that we may choose our own course of action as autonomous beings. When none could eat any more, the Ivinses’ daughters asked William and ... Read More about Liberating
Weekdays
Choosing
Choices are made real through action. Ethics, morality, religion, spirituality and all our laws and decisions are products of choice. We may indeed in counsel point to the higher road, but we ... Read More about Choosing
Planning
Our human capacity to plan makes much of the good in our lives and our societies possible. Planning can be for good or for ill. It is a component of autonomy in the domain of thinking. Because we are ... Read More about Planning
Will
We are not as free to choose as people once thought. Science has brought old ideas of free will into question. However, we live as though we have free will. Ethics, morality and spirituality depend on ... Read More about Will
Autonomy
We experience the self as an entity capable of making choices. Listen to the desires of your children. Encourage them and then give them the autonomy to make their own decision. [Denis Waitley] I ... Read More about Autonomy
Well-being – Fulfillment
People prefer fulfillment over emptiness of the soul. Fulfillment, sometimes called eudaimonic happiness, or subjective well-being is primarily an emotion, secondarily a thought, and it reaches into ... Read More about Well-being – Fulfillment
Happiness
People prefer happiness over unhappiness. Hedonic happiness is an emotion, experienced as pleasure and enjoyment, which may be fleeting. Functional MRI studies have mapped the neural correlates ... Read More about Happiness
Longevity
People prefer life over death, unless other preferences are unfulfilled to such an extent that living is no longer preferable. Longevity encompasses all our preferences in the dimension of time. ... Read More about Longevity
Pleasure
In itself, people prefer pleasure over displeasure. ". . . pleasure is the starting point and goal of living blessedly. For we recognized this as our first innate good." [Epicurus, Letter to ... Read More about Pleasure