New Yorker

Advice for Giving Advice

I was dismayed to see MYSELF in the brilliant, funny New Yorker piece “Wait but have you tried?” about the advice-giving that is everywhere. It pulled me up short and got me wondering what an antidote for this rampant habit might be?

Will Real Self-Help Please Stand UP?

After reading a New Yorker article on America’s biggest selling books, many of which are “self-help” I realized I’d read many of them and none helped me help myself (although plenty of other things in my life have). Soon after, I stumbled on the penultimate self-help advice.

Exceptional Life Hacks from Strangers

New Yorker staff writer Emily Nussbaum posed this question on Twitter: What is your best LIFE HACK?? Most were amazingly wise and/or useful. Here are our favorites:

How to Redeem Life’s Spoilers (Andy Goldsworthy and Hala Alyan)

For over a week, the work of a poet and an artist seemed to be in conversation,
helping us understand a fearsome part of living.

How to Indirectly Help New Ideas Grow

We recently re-discovered “Eating Grapes Downwards” a poem we’d loved and somehow lost track of. Christian Wiman describes the mysterious creative process we cannot control, and often aren’t even aware of, but that is part of every life. With instructions for how to navigate…

Risk Equivalents of Common Activities (Roz Chast)

At the New Yorker, cartoonist Roz Chast takes on the kind of equation we are seeing everywhere, of “experts” assessing the level of risk in commonly enjoyed activities of human existence.

A Wounded Cello’s Lesson in Navigating Change in Things We Love

When a virtuoso cellist found his rare, beloved cello changed after massive repairs, he had to find new ways to elicit its unique sound — a lesson in navigating change in things we love.

The Metaphysics of Mayo + Fast, Delish Ways to Transform Storebought

Poet, critic and theorist Fred Moten’s insights into the true nature of mayonnaise got me thinking about my favorite ways to jazz up storebought Mayo

Why Walking Helps Us Think (Rilke + Ferris Jabr)

Science has proven what painting, poetry, and our own experience know: walking helps us think, and be.

How to Maintain a Kind of Summer in the Horribleness of Winter

Roz Chast’s January New Yorker cover “Cruellest Month” made us laugh out loud. “I wanted to show just the horribleness of January.” Chast says. And she did. Then we thought of ways to change our winter mindset.

Sublime Murmuration of Starlings, ‘The Great Scarf of Birds’ (Updike)

Scientists have found many ways to explain what remains largely mysterious: the astonishing murmurations of starlings Jan van IJKen captured in this sublime short video. The best description of that mystery is John Updike’s The Great Scarf of Birds.

Listening to Scents, Falling Asleep to Their Descriptions, Laughing

Deciphering the fragrance notes in the perfume samples I order from Twisted Lily is akin to listening with every sense. It is incredibly fun, as is reading their dreamy descriptions, and the New Yorker’s brilliant riff.

3 Rules for Writing and Life (Denis Johnson)

From The New Yorker ‘s brief, compelling tribute to novelist Denis Johnson, who passed away last week at the age of sixty-seven: his three rules for writing that ANYONE can use.

Sara Berman’s Closet: The Tenderness of Creating Your Own Life

A tiny yet extraordinary exhibit at New York’s Metropolitan Museum is evidence that we “are free to change at any age”.

Tying the Devil: A Turkish Practice for Finding Lost Things

In response to Kathryn Schultz’s very moving ‘When Things Go Missing, Reflections of Two Seasons of Loss’, Yesho described a unique Turkish practice for finding lost things.

Aretha: How to Be A Soul Survivor

Soul Survivor, David Remnick’s moving profile of complex, mysterious, brilliant, notoriously infuriating singer Aretha Franklin, sent us looking for videos of the great diva in action. We stumbled on this rough beauty of seventy-something Aretha playing piano herself, in a mode that was more churchlike gospel – her roots — than theater performance. If you’re tired or troubled, or need uplift to your day, her groove will hearten you.

Roz Chast Channels Marie Kondo

Roz Chast’s “Wonderland” describes the rabbit hole the internet can be, enticing us to follow the trail of astonishing treasures we never knew existed. In true Chastian fashion, she illustrates each discovery and their additive nature, shouting “I COULD NOT STOP LOOKING….”. Chast almost seems to be channeling Japanese de-cluttering philosopher Marie Kondo…

Why The Glass is Always Totally Full

In response to A New View of Losing Years of Work, a reader named Ann sent us this perfect cartoon and commentary: I’m not sure this link* will take you to the place I intend. I want to link you to the cartoon that shows a man tied to a chair while masked men steal…

Role Model: Mr. Clean Enough (Roz Chast)

The great Roz Chast’s recent New Yorker cartoon really hits home. Having once been quite a serious neat-o-phile, I’ve learned over the years that the principle of “enough” can be quite liberating. It’s a variation of a philosophy I first learned from a therapist friend…

7 Empowering Quotes from Nelson Mandela

Artist Kadir Nelson who painted the New Yorker cover of young Nelson Mandela said that creating Nelson’s portraint maid him feel “empowered and proud like the man himself.”
That’s how seeing the cover makes us feel. As do Mandela’s empowering words.

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