Christina Peterson Mihresel and I had a lovely talk about running, Feldenkrais and a few other things.
ConmotoPetersen · Edward ::: Slowing Down to Run Faster: Feldenkrais, martial arts, and the sport of running
Author Archives: Edward
Charles Eisenstein on mental health
“Mental illness is built into society as we know it, and therefore, to heal mental illness or to foster mental health is fundamentally a social, political, economic problem.”
-Charles Eisenstein
The institutional role of the police
“The last time a nationwide movement for racial justice provoked such a defensive posture with regard to tradition (i.e. “the good old days”), civility (i.e. absolute police power), and law and order (i.e. more absolute police power), the bodies of three missing college-aged Civil Rights organizers, Michael Schwerner, James Chaney, and Andrew Goodman, were found beneath an earthen dam in Mississippi.”
(from the article)
Click here to read my latest article (published in Medium.com).
Joel Smith interviews Edward Yu on the Just Fly Podcast
I really enjoyed talking with Joel Smith of Just Fly Podcast regarding some new and controversial perspectives on running and learning. Joel has been involved in track and field, either as a competitor and as a coach for over two decades. Click on the the play icon (triangle) to hear our conversation.
Otherwise, click here to get to Joel’s website.
“There is no freedom without being in reference to something.” -Bill Evans
The great Bill Evans on learning, improvisation, pedagogy, the importance of fundamentals… and so much more.
Learning takes time…
“It was absolutely impossible to play it at the age of twelve… because I didn’t know what to do with this half-page.”
—Valentina Igoshina
David Graeber on Bullsh*t Jobs
We have become a civilization based on work—not even “productive work” but work as an end and meaning in itself. We have come to believe that men and women who do not work harder than they wish at jobs they do not particularly enjoy are bad people unworthy of love, care, or assistance from their communities. It is as if we have collectively acquiesced to our own enslavement. —DAVID GRAEBER, BULLSHIT JOBS: A THEORY
“A self that is not fixed, a self that struggles for its own existence”
“I could say that when I was a young man, an adolescent, and I hungered for a voice, I studied the English poets, and I knew their work well and I copied their styles, but I could not find a voice. It was only when I read—even in translation—the works of Lorca, that I understood that there was a voice. It is not that I copied his voice—I would not dare—but he gave me permission to find a voice, to locate a voice, that is, to locate a self—a self that is not fixed, a self that struggles for its own existence. And as I grew older, I understood that instructions came with this voice. What were these instructions? The instructions were never to lament casually. And if one is to express the great inevitable defeat that awaits us all, it must be done within the strict confines of dignity and beauty.”
—Leonard Cohen
“The guy who said, ‘no pain, no gain’ …he’s dead”
Bill “Superfoot” Wallace demonstrates how using constraints such as those imposed by a major knee injury can lead to learning and even mastery.
“Play with it, change it, modify it so that it becomes you.”
-Bill “Superfoot” Wallace
“Education For Whom and For What”
“The goal of education, to shift over to Bertrand Russell, is to give a sense of value to things other than domination, which means we regard a child as a gardener regards a young tree, as something with a certain intrinsic nature, which will develop into an admirable form, given the proper soil, air, and light.”
—Noam Chomsky, Chomsky on Mis-Education