a daily blog on well-being and how to feel better by Mark Barger Elliott…

In 2023 I discovered a fascinating way to live each day. I began every morning anticipating an insight into how to feel better would present itself. This insight might appear in a book, on a walk, watching a movie, during a conversation with a colleague, friend, family member or stranger. I began to write about…

In an interview Michael Caine explained how someone in the theater once instructed him to “use the difficulty” whenever something went wrong on the stage. If a prop door got stuck use, an umbrella didn’t open it, an actor forgot a line, “use it.” Any difficulty could become an immediate vehicle for comedy, improvisation, etc. “Use…

I enjoy the Jerry Seinfeld show, Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. The premise is Seinfeld picks up a friend in a typically amazing vintage car and while driving, and over coffee, they discuss life, comedy, and whatever else might come up.  One of his guests was Lorne Michaels who Seinfeld picked up in a 1955 Mercedes…

John Updike was one of major novelists of the 20th century and a poet. I recently came across a poem where he lamented how future generations will likely not experience the meaning and pleasure of hoeing the ground to prepare it for new growth.  Updike wrote,  “there is no knowing  how many souls have been…

“Events are always [at] hand,” writes author John Berger. “But the coherence of these events – which is what one means by reality – is an imaginative construction.” That’s an interesting observation. What Berger is alluding to is how we arrange the sequence of events in our lives, and their relationships, and the ultimate meaning…

Did you know Monet painted the facade of Rouen Cathedral 30 time? Why? He wanted to observe how light affects a subject during different times of the day and seasons. Monet used the same approach with haystacks and of course, waterlilies. Monet’s goal, writes art historian Virginia Spate, was “embody a continuous perceptual experience.” Monet wanted,…