If you have ADHD or autism, you will be familiar with the term executive function. If you are not familiar, here is a definition: “the executive functions are a set of processes that all have to do with managing oneself and one’s resources in order to achieve a goal. It is an umbrella term for…
Note: This blog post is about the world in the context of coronavirus outbreak. It is not specifically about coronavirus. I want to acknowledge the sense of fear and loss of the coronavirus outbreak health crisis here at the start, because it is not what I am writing about below. Destabilised At the moment, pretty…
One of my favourite genres is a kind of non-fiction which combines research on a topic with memoir-style personal reflections of the author’s experience with said topic. (This is often the domain of female writers.) Quit Like A Woman is one such book. Holly Whitaker has taken her own experience of quitting alcohol (and marijuana,…
Over the summer there was a lot of anger towards our Prime Minister. In the middle of a bushfire crisis, he refused to acknowledge that we were seeing the effects of climate change, and then jetted off for a holiday – and lied about the fact that he was on holidays. I wrote the below…
Humans are predisposed to avoid risk. It’s how we are all still here. If we didn’t fear anything, our species would not survive. We have an interesting bias, though, to avoid the risk of change. Change is unknown, uncertain. So often we take on an attitude of ‘better the devil you know’. I come across…
Dear Finley, I have been thinking a lot about what to say to you when you are old enough to ask about the climate crisis. I imagine that, shortly after asking about the climate crisis, you will ask the inevitable question: why did the grown-ups let this happen to the earth? I imagine you will…
Photo: Seedlings in my garden “I wonder what it would be like to love the world again so much that we are unable to ignore climate change because the world is crying out for us to love her again” – Sarah Bessey (from her latest newsletter) Environmental destruction is often talked about in terms of taking…
This is the new year. And I don’t feel like celebrating. Canberra is engulfed in smoke. I feel like I am suffocating. My eyes sting and my throat hurts. I feel an uneasy, helpless protectiveness towards my son, who is also breathing into young lungs air that is literally classified as ‘hazardous‘. I am considering…
I have lived in several remote places in which deciding where to do your grocery shopping is not so much a choice but a default. Because there is only one option, whether that is Woolworths or a local store. Even for people who live in urban or rural environments, options can be limited due to…
Lately I have been learning about GDP – what it measures and what it doesn’t. I made the following lists as a form of activism: to reclaim the inherent value of how I spend my life energy when I’m not making or spending money, and how I benefit from others doing the same. I hope…
I was getting ready to write my quarterly review of my reading life for the third quarter of the year, and I realised I hadn’t published the second quarter. Later, I found it hiding erroneously in the “published” folder of my “blog” folder on my computer. Very strange. I am posting it now with only…
I have started a new series called Money Talks. I am attempting to heal my relationship with money and I am bringing my blog readers along for the ride! In Money Talks #1, I reviewed three personal finance books I have read recently. In today’s post, I am sharing what I learned from reading those…
