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Musings of a Middle Aged Man

David Olson

Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch"intrate (Abandon hope all ye who enter here)

society & culture

All Episodes

00:04:45

Moral Absolutism

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/17

Sometimes, when the weather is too miserable to be outside and my daily meditation writing has been converted to bits and bytes, I scroll through YouTube videos picking up bits and tids of interesting information. Most videos are relatively short, making it extremely easy to fall into a video vortex, losing hours that can never be recovered for future investment. One of the YouTube rabbit holes I lose myself in, centers on the increasingly common debates between theists with atheists. I find the

00:05:49

The Antichrist’s False Gospel

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/14

The Bible is rather cryptic when it comes to identifying the antichrist. End time prophecies predict there will be a single AntiChrist appearing after the rapture, the bodily ascension of believers who were spirited away to spend an eternity with the Christ. The same verse, 1 John 2:18, also claims there are many antichrists amongst the target audience long before the rapture event. I guess there could be legions of small a antichrists with an ultimate capital A Antichrist appearing coincidental

00:04:17

I Am Multitudes

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/12

Growing up in my era, it was not uncommon to hear the phrase, "Just who do you think you are?" This was not a query begging a metaphysical answer from our psyches. It was an admonishment to stay in our lane, to not get involved in certain things, not because we did not hold crucial information, but rather because our status was beneath the lofty realm in which we inserted ourselves. The question was obviously rhetorical, not one genuinely seeking an answer. It was a socially acceptable

00:04:35

Beyond Dogma, Wild Wisdom

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/10

There is an inordinate amount of inane chatter in the US claiming that the people of the country, the entire world, need healing from their fallen ways. By that, they mean that God needs to be inserted into everyday life via laws based on biblical standards so people can live moral and prosperous lives. It includes posting the 10 Commandments in school classrooms to indoctrinate the students into Christianity. They act as if words posted on a wall can make up for the bad example routinely set by

00:03:45

What the Hands Saw Wrong

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/07

It is natural for children to be afraid of the dark. The physical darkness, absent ambient light, forces them to navigate by tentative touches to get an incomplete feeling for the immediate surroundings they cannot see. Is the elephant a wall, a snake, a spear, a tree, a fan, a rope? The visual can say none of the above. The blind hold steadfast to their misaligned interpretations. It is, after all, what the hands saw and categorized for storage in their imperfect memory banks for later retrieval

00:04:09

I Travel to Remember

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/05

Our nearest evolutionary ancestors, the Neanderthals, existed for 400,000 years, during which time they successfully inhabited less than 10% of Earth's landmass. They lived primarily in Europe, Western and Central Asia, extending into southern Siberia. Their highest densities were in France, Spain, and Italy. Homo Sapiens, our species, has existed for 300,000 years. In that time, we have managed to inhabit 90-95% of Earth's land surface. The only areas safe from us are Antarctica and other

00:04:42

Rituals: Shackles or Salvation?

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/11/03

I have recently stumbled upon a BBC television series highlighting the scientific facts along with the cultural and emotional threads tying modern humans with the evolutionary past and the six other human species, born by Earth mother, that have existed over the past 300,000 years. Ritualistic behaviors were moderate in our closest ancestors, the Neanderthals with whom we interbred, as identified via intentional burials and body ornamentation with decorative pigments and feathers from specific bird

00:03:49

The Danger of Safe Art

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/31

The security in which an artist should never seek refuge is either personal or financial, which drives them to avoid provocative or innovative works, fearing backlash, censorship, or persecution with the corresponding loss of income. This can weaken the arts' impact on society because the art is safe. Safe art is not doing the job of art. Worse than that...

00:03:29

The Soul’s Last Refuge

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/29

There are several adventures that have been on my bucket list for what seems like forever, but it is closer to forty years. Two were planted in my psyche by author Colin Fletcher when he wrote books about his 1958 walk from the bottom to the top of California and his book about hiking the length of the Grand Canyon in 1963. Those books placed both the Pacific Coast Trail and a rim-to-rim hike of the Grand Canyon as life goals. Other treks I want to experience are the 800-mile Hayduke Trail through

00:03:52

The Practice Paradox

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/27

Growing up, I remember being indoctrinated into the colloquialism that 'practice makes perfect' as a way to encourage the repeated rehearsal of actions or behaviours to perfect our ability to execute them as flawlessly as possible, with the ultimate goal of perfect execution. The fundamental flaw in the expression is that practicing anything imperfectly achieves excellence in imperfection, meaning the trend is towards becoming perfectly imperfect.

00:04:05

Memory Wears a Fragrance

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/24

For a significant portion of my life, beginning from when I was eleven years old, my parental units owned a cottage in central Wisconsin lake country. Not blessed with generational wealth, we spent the majority of our vacations from the early days of tent camping, through a camper, eventually replaced by a prefab cottage, lovingly termed the summer estate, making visits easier and more frequent. Even with the cottage, I tended to erect a tent in the yard to avoid the noise of the crowded house. I

00:03:52

Embracing My Inner Cactus

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/22

I have posted over 4,500 blogs on the interweb and have written two unpublished books with a third underway, and have numerous other writings either collecting dust in journals scattered throughout my home or long lost in the scrap heaps of time. Estimating an hour per blog entry, the investment is more than 180 consecutive days of writing 24 hours a day, nonstop. Realistically, the two books written required several hundred hours each, equating to 60ish 24-hour days. Then there are the countless

00:03:27

Exiting the Door Called Birth

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/20

It is not uncommon to view birth and death as extreme opposites on a linear life continuum. But are they? This is a concept fitting the thought patterns of a Western mind indoctrinated in linear time thinking, not so much for a person inculcated into the Eastern mind viewing time as circular. Birth and Death could be envisioned as the same swinging door...

00:04:10

Eyes Aging, Hearts Closing

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/17

t is a long-standing and well-established fact that the majority of humans will experience Presbyopia beginning sometime in their 40s to 60s that will see them requiring reading glasses or some other form of near vision correction to see clearly in close quarters. By the early to mid-60s, the degeneration plateaus negating the need for stronger and stronger corrective lenses. My near vision does seem to have stabilized at a +2.75 correction. Strangely...

00:05:03

Echoes Beneath Bare Feet

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/15

My first reaction upon walking through the Chaco Canyon ruins was to be struck by awe, awe and wonder, then marvel at the masonry still partially standing more than one thousand years after the bricks were carefully laid to exacting standards using earthen mortar between the carefully shaped sandstone blocks by ancient hands. Those craftsmen are long lost to the mysteries hidden by long time. The ruins were long ago relieved of artifacts by grave robbers, both amateur (petty thieves) and

00:04:21

Where Silence Speaks

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/13

I have oft wondered at my visceral attraction to deserts despite growing up on the Midwest plains, frequently experiencing more rainfall than can be absorbed by the increasingly cement-burdened environs. I am not referring to the sand dunes comprising 20% of desert surfaces, although they do have their undulating charm despite hosting virtually no vegetation. I am referring to the other 80%, also barely hospitable, consisting of gravel plains, rocky plateaus, etc, in which dispersed vegetation armed

00:04:02

The Pattern Trap

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/10

t is a well-established fact that the human animal seeks out patterns with which to evaluate our environment. In our prehominid days, pattern recognition was crucial to surviving life on the savannah, helping our ancestors avoid predators and recognize where reliable sources of water and food could be found. As we evolved, pattern discernment enabled them to interpret social cues, including facial expressions and gestures, crucial to group cooperation and knowledge sharing. In the modern era,

00:04:20

Becoming Through Creation

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/08

I feel compelled to practice my art daily, be it planting seed quotes at the top of a blank page that will grow into handwritten essays with the pruning relegated to those later hours when my peak creativity has subsided from those morning devotions, or I am carefully laying acrylic paint on canvas when it is too cold to create outside, or composing the images that will be captured in my camera, or editing the photos to more accurately reflect my vision for their aesthetic beauty. I invest more time

00:03:44

Creation or Corruption?

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/06

Unlike in the US, where we hide our elderly in semi-permeable prisons with others of their kind visiting them as time in busy schedules permits, indigenous peoples who tended to venerate the aged kept their mature family members living with them. They were fully aware their ancient ones had earned a lifetime of wisdom from which they offered apples of knowledge for the asking, a tradeoff far outweighing any burden of caring for them as they lost motor and mind functions before succumbing...

00:04:52

Is Humanity an Asteroid?

Musings of a Middle Aged Man ·

2025/10/03

I am sure it is a nearly universal trait that humans imagine themselves as gods wishing they could magically right a perceived wrong so the world could be, if not a kinder, gentler space, then, at least, one where fairness is the ultimate outcome of all inter-species and intra-species interactions weighted slightly toward the benefit of the human playing god. Most of us outgrow this childish fantasy of being the ultimate arbiter for the planet. Some never outgrow childish ways...

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Musings of a Middle Aged Man

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