Tag Archives: dailyprompt

PROMPT: Three Books

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List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?

Steven Kotler’s The Rise of Superman changed the way I looked at mind-body development.

Water Margin [a.k.a. Outlaws of the Marsh] convinced me a sprawling epic could be worth reading if it was done well, it kicked my love of Chinese Literature into high gear, and it started me on the path of learning Chinese.

Self-Reliance and Other Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson had a major influence on my early philosophical development — especially the titular essay.

Now, I’m thinking I should’ve pushed one of these out for Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman, but perhaps another time.

PROMPT: One Simple Thing

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Daily writing prompt
Describe one simple thing you do that brings joy to your life.
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A walk in the park. Most things in life are no walk in the park, but you can’t say that about a walk in the park.

[This message brought to you by WALK IN THE PARK.]

PROMPT: Unplug

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Daily writing prompt
How do you know when it’s time to unplug? What do you do to make it happen?
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There are many levels to this. At one end is getting up and moving for a half hour or hour. At the other end is going for a ten-day hike in a part of the planet that has no cell service whatsoever. (Yes, such spaces still exist, but are continually getting smaller — mostly valleys of large mountain ranges.)

This is probably not as big a challenge for me as for many because I find it neither that enjoyable nor that necessary to be jacked in.

PROMPT: Friend

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What quality do you value most in a friend?

The ability to converse intelligently on a wide range of subjects.

“The Snow Man” by Wallace Stevens [w/ Audio]

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One must have a mind of winter
 To regard the frost and the boughs
 Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time
 To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
 The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
 Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
 In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
 Full of the same wind
 That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
 And, nothing himself, beholds
 Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

PROMPT: Before the Internet

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Daily writing prompt
Do you remember life before the internet?
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Yes, yes. We read these things called books. They hurt much worse when you dropped one on your toe (but much less than the stone tablets of the preceding generation,) but at least you wouldn’t be out $1,200 (USD) if they took a bad bounce.

PROMPT: All

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What does “having it all” mean to you? Is it attainable?
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Health, food, air, water, love, and thought… that about covers it.

Sure, why not?

PROMPT: Talk

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Daily writing prompt
Who would you like to talk to soon?
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I’d like to be able to talk to anyone in Mandarin soon, unfortunately my pace of learning is so glacial as to preclude talking “soon” — at least on broad and undefined topics. [Note: When I say “anyone” I mean anyone who speaks Mandarin and has interesting things to say.]

PROMPT: Belongings

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Daily writing prompt
What personal belongings do you hold most dear?
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I do have a jō (short wooden staff) of which I’m fond. I crave books, but since I could care less whether I read them as paper or on a screen and gladly give any but those with long-term reference value away after reading, I don’t think they count.

Being fonder of ideas than anything material, I like the story about Diogenes the Cynic who, upon seeing a boy drink from cupped hands, threw away his cup in self-anger for being such a hoarder.