books arranged on a curve

My favorite reads of 2020

I’ve been getting excited about writing up my annual review of the best books I read last year … this is my fifth such annual review, and I have so much great stuff to share with you this year! According to Goodreads, I read 139 books, totaling 39,970 pages, in 2019. My reading productivity benefited …

yin and yang

Defense against the liberal arts?

** With apologies to Harry Potter fans for butchering the line. I spend about six hours a week staring at a video feed of myself whilst holding virtual office hours (which I call drop-in student hours, because not everyone knows what “office hours” means). During that time, I typically have very few students actually swing …

a solitary bench

Remembering RBG

At 6:34 pm (central) on Friday, September 18, my cell phone pinged to alert me to an incoming text message. I glanced at the screen. My pulse accelerated rapidly at the two words that appeared under the name of a former student–one with whom I traveled to Washington, DC, last May for a two-week learning …

A person holding a paper cut-out heart

Empathy at work

I recently blogged about a variety of things clustered around emotion at work — psychological safety, leadership in challenging times, etc. — and did so in a vague-ish way, because I’m painfully aware that I’m not in a position to speak freely about some of the trickier aspects of my work life. You can deduce …

meerkats

No hard feelings…?

I’ve wanted to write this blog post for a long time. Maybe as long as a year — maybe more. But when I read the book No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotions at Work, by Liz Fosslien & Mollie West Duffy, I knew it was time. But any time you want to …

explosion

A meditation on bliss

Follow your bliss … and doors will open where you didn’t know they were going to be Joseph Campbell As a high school senior, the Joseph Campbell quote about following your bliss spoke to me. I couldn’t now say where this instinct originated; what about my first 18 years suggested that my bliss would lead …

Why Bother?

Disclaimer: I’m a bit of a Jen Louden #fangirl. It’s possible I’d like to be her new BFF… but I promise, that aspiration is a result of reading her book, and not the reason I’m about to gush about it. In tackling an important but challenging topic, Jen Louden brings a tricky balance of hard-won …