How does awe transform us? By quieting the nagging, self-critical, overbearing, status-conscious voice of our self, or ego, and empowering us to collaborate, to open our minds to wonders, and to see the deep patterns of life.*
Dacher Keltner

We have it within our power to induce in ourselves a state that is ideal for learning, creating, and engaging in other kinds of complex cognition: by exercising briskly just before we do so.**
Annie Murphy Paul

How important awe is to finding
our place within life, and life
within us;
Humans have such power,
Yet without awe –
In the universe, in nature, in people, in ideas, in accomplishments
(awe is all around us) –
We can misuse and abuse this horribly.

*Dacher Keltner’s Awe;
**Annie Murphy Paul’s The Extended Mind.

Enjoy your obscurity while it lasts.*
Austin Kleon

If you follow the way of integrity far enough, you life may go beyond our culture’s definition of “normal” – not because you’re departing from reality, but because you’re connecting to it.**
Martha Beck

Obscurity can be a wonderful place for
exploring and playing,
To come up with something new that would
not be possible in the
limelight.

When we know the kind of place obscurity is,
We can visit, or
replicate it, when we
want to or need to.

*Austin Kleon’s blog: A message for graduates;
**Martha Beck’s The Way of Integrity.