“I wouldn’t have done it that way, but that method has your name written all over it.”
PROMPT: Best Compliment
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Category Archives: Philosophy
PROMPT: Cross-Country
Daily writing prompt
You’re going on a cross-country trip. Airplane, train, bus, car, or bike?
Could be any or all of the above, plus camel, foot, or snowmobile — depending on the country, of course.
I can’t say how I’d take a cross-country trip without knowing which country it is that I’m crossing. Vatican City frowns on you driving a bus through it, Russia is too long to do entirely on cross-country skis, and one can’t transit Bolivia in a ferry.
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PROMPT: Negative Feelings
Sakshi Bhavan, the dispassionate witness, giving feelings one’s full attention without allowing rumination that compounds the effect.
Not technically a strategy, but I think it’s on point.
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PROMPT: Superstitious
Nah. I’d say I’m normal-stitious, possibly even substitious.
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Illusory [Free Verse]
Nothing is what it seems,
or as it feels it should be.
The world is full of
smoke & mirrors --
neither here nor there...
And yet everywhere...
& everywhen.
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Vagabond [Lyric]
![Photograph of a statue of a young vagabond taken at Fo Guang Shan [佛光山,] near Kaohsiung, Taiwan.](https://berniegourley.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/img_0378.jpg)
Each Soul contains its Vagabond
- Who yearns to travel light & free -
But they load too much baggage on,
Then tether him to a big tree.
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Nameless / 无名 [Lyric Poem]
![Photograph taken in Hualien, Taiwan at the Hualien Temple and Dongjing Temple (花蓮寺東淨寺) [Buddhist.]](https://berniegourley.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/img_1218.jpg)
They call me Nameless,
Well-known as fameless.
My plans are aimless.
My faults are blameless.
My chess is gameless.
My disgrace, shameless?
But my glasses are framed.
My passions are inflamed.
My wild horses are tamed,
And my arrows are aimed.
All due credit is claimed,
And nothing else remains.
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PROMPT: Fate/Destiny
I don’t believe. I don’t disbelieve. I have insufficient data on which to draw a conclusion.
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PROMPT: Biggest Challenge
Daily writing prompt
What is the biggest challenge you will face in the next six months?
I certainly have my ideas, but I’m not going to jinx it or create a self-fulfilling prophecy on the matter. Sometimes the easy is hard and the hard comes easy, and — above all — people suck at making predictions (except in the case of self-fulfilling prophesies.)
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PROMPT: Teenage Self
Be your authentic self.
And stop touching yourself so much.
But the first advice wouldn’t be understood, and the second would be ignored, so I’m not sure that it would be a productive undertaking.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 