I’ve come to pretty fundamentally believe that some things cannot (and should not) be discussed outside of personal experience. That might sound odd coming from someone with a relatively traditional education in western philosophy. But… here I am. One of the keenest examples of that is gun violence. The way I see it: despite the … Read More
Sometimes, there aren’t sufficient words for a moment or a season or a feeling. The other side to that coin is that sometimes the wild, the unexpected, or inexplicable … serve the blessed purpose of breaking the words we are used to using and inviting us to make something new from their pieces. This is … Read More
The way I hear it used, the word “celebrity” almost always comes with a tinge of disdain. In fact, I was recently interviewing a band about their relatively wild public success and used the word “celebrity” to ask a question about how it felt to have the kind of influence they’d garnered. Boy oh boy … Read More
You know that friend who gets to the gym 7 days every week. I think we all have that friend (if we’re not that friend). I don’t think I’ve ever heard a friend like that called “weak” for working out regularly. Quite the opposite. Sometimes that friend gets called “obsessive” or something like that (often … Read More
In his Legendary book “The War of Art” Steven Pressfield writes:“The professional arms himself with patience, not only to give the stars time to align in his career but to keep himself from flaming out in each individual work. He knows that any job, whether it’s a novel or a kitchen remodel, takes twice as … Read More
A number of years ago, I sat in on a reading by the poet Gregory Orr. Gregory Or was then (and is now) a favorite poet of mine. In fact, he’s a favorite writer of mine. He was maybe five or six pieces into this reading when a conversation struck up between two of the … Read More
During studio sessions with younger or inexperienced musicians, my dear friend and music producer Masaki Liu would often be asked questions like “What do you think about our chances?” Or “Do you think we can make it?” And, more often than not, he’d consistently respond with an intentionally cryptic piece of encouragement that went pretty … Read More
Close to 20 years ago, I sat in a park near my place in The Bay Area, talking with Dave and JJ about their hopes and dreams. Having spent the first few years of their musical career between Arizona and California, they were right on the edge of a move to Nashville. They wanted to … Read More
In the 8th chapter of the biblical book of acts is a fascinating story about a man named Philip. Philip, a member of the early Church, hears what the writer of the story names as the voice of God saying “Go south.” So, he does And as he does, he comes across an Ethiopian eunuch riding … Read More
The @ Sea podcast started out to be (and I hope continues to be) a helpful and hopeful guide through sometimes murky or turbulent cultural waters. Some of what that looks like is talking to people I don’t align with politically, ideologically, culturally,… Not because it’s enough to simply “celebrate diversity” but because the discipline … Read More
