All posts by: Cal McDonnell

01 Aug 2022

The Problem with Problems

By Cal McDonnell / No Comment

As we move through our lives we will encounter problems. A large part of navigating life is our ability to problem solve. Being an adult means being a problem solver, and many of us might indulge in a secret satisfaction at our abilities to problem solve at rapid pace. For some, our work is all about the speed and accuracy with which we solve problems. If you're a parent, raising children is about showing them how we solve life's problems from learning to ask for what you need, becoming skilled at different tasks and managing the

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31 Jan 2021

Zugzwang: Herald of the Endgame

By Cal McDonnell / No Comment

In Homer's Odyssey, Odysseus must pass between Charybdis, a treacherous whirlpool, and Scylla, a horrid human-eating, cliff-dwelling monster.

And so was born

that cliched term, ‘caught between a rock and a hard place’, implying the difficulty of choice when no outcome appears to be advantageous. In fact, at times, the choices available to us are blatantly awful and our thoughts are consumed with what we know will be lost. We don’t always know when something is going to turn out positively for us, but we tend

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16 Jan 2021

Kindness

By Cal McDonnell / No Comment

Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth. What you held in your hand, what you counted and carefully saved, all this must go so you know how desolate the landscape can be between the regions of kindness. How you ride and ride thinking the bus will never stop, the passengers eating maize and chicken will stare out the window forever. Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness you must travel

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