I really enjoyed this video (about 30mins) about how SpongeBob lives a simple life that he is happy with. He cooks burgers for a living, and is excited to do that in the best way he can. He thoroughly enjoys simple activities with friends. And, while he is imperfect, he has high optimism.
With social pressures and forces these days, I do believe these kinds of simple ways and values may lead to one of the healthiest kinds of lives.
While I technically graduated this past September, I finally celebrated the official graduation ceremony this past Friday, May 9, 2025. Here is a photo of myself and my advisor, Erich Dietrich, who hooded me as a Doctor of Education 🙂
Funny, before the ceremony when I was in the bathroom, it hit me: I look just like Erich! Meaning, our gowns were essentially the same. This was a realization that I am on the same degree level as him now, as well as being on the same level as my other professors. It’s a pretty amazing realization. And during the ceremony he sat next to me in the audience and walked on stage with me – again signifying this equal level of education attainment. Of course he has much more experience, research, etc., but the degree levels are the same. It really helps me understand where I am at in regards to education, position, and potential.
Here are a few other photos from May 14, 2025, the NYU celebration Grad Alley, where the streets around campus are blocked and filled with food, carnival games, music and entertainers, and other fun things to celebrate graduation. It was raining plenty but I wanted to celebrate, and celebrate I did =D
Dr. Orlando Fernandez
Ever looked into someone’s eyes and seen complete understanding? A short talk on the experience of the eyes:
Allowing / Appreciating versus Pulling / Feeding:
If I find myself energetically feeding on someone, whether feeding through their body or some other way, and I tell myself and get myself to stop, I find that it equates to a change from taking to allowing. And inevitably that allowing transforms into or invites my appreciation.
So that got me thinking: if I did more appreciating of how things turn out and allowing instead of pulling, then I’d be more open to how Life wants to turn out, and I think I would be more aligned with the purpose and meaning of Life, which may be to: be surprised and enjoy it.
A deep and beautiful talk on the healing, fulfilling, and transformative power of authentic human connections.
I ran into this very nice talk, and included some great quotes below:
“…for a life to be meaningful, you cant keep looking at the life. You have to see how that life is placed in larger, broader context.”
“…a life that is rich in happiness and rich in meaning….theologian Frederick Buechner I think would label that: finding your calling.”
“Your calling, Buechner says, is that place where your deep gladness, and the world’s deep hunger, meets. Your deep gladness is about you, about what makes you engaged and alive.”
“Finding your calling is discovering what it is that makes you feel alive. And then taking those gifts and skills and moving them out into the world to feed the world’s hunger.”
“…the tension we feel between what we want and what the world needs, is in fact something we don’t want to eliminate, but instead we want to encourage and cultivate.”
“When the world pushes and presses and prods and occasionally pummels you, it is in those moments that you can begin to imagine something different. You need the world and all its adversity, just as desperately as the world needs you.”
“To lead a happy and meaningful life, is to understand the tension that exists between what we want and what the world needs, and to recognize that tension as the gift that it is.”
-Mark Hébert
Happy with what you have now,
is a precursor to having what you want…
“Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.”
-Nathaniel Hawthorne
“Be open to all the universe has for you.
And be confident that you’re ready.”
-Zoraida Diaz