we are working on a film about the relationship between stress and pain. The film focuses on Dr. John Sarno. Jonathan Ames, who referenced Dr. Sarno's book "Healing Back Pain, on his show HBO "Bored to Death" is in the film. On Saturday I picked up his book "The Alcoholic". Last night after Phillip Seymour Hoffman had passed away I...
Today is my birthday, our birthday. My brother and I are 45. For the past six months I have been living in my childhood home with my wife and kids. It no longer feels surreal, and in fact, it is starting to feel like home. There are countless reasons that we came here. My childhood friends have children the same...
It’s been eight years since my father was hit by a car and killed. Tonight I walked down to the spot to spend some time with him. Like so many other Jews who were born during depression, and then grew up during the war and its aftermath, my father wasn’t very religious. He was an academic, and I think that...
We interviewed Dr. Schecter for our film. This is his own video that I just came upon- and thought I'd share. The key point is FEAR. Fear of continued pain often drives the problem. Think psychological- not physical- slow down and be mindful of what your body is telling you - that you often don't want to hear. ...
This video came to me via my friend Alana via facebook via upworthy via youtube via TED. We live in a world in which ideas bounce around like rubber balls on a linoleum covered floor, and I think that can be a good thing. However, it can also be extremely confusing. The focus of this video is stress, and our relationship...
As we sat down last night to watch “Her”, my friend and I briefly discussed “American Hustle”. She found it thoroughly entertaining. I almost walked out of it because I found it so stylistically annoying at the start. In the end I was able to appreciate the emotional complexity that it developed, but there was something about it that seemed...
If you live in the first world you have first world problems. When we discuss first world problems it doesn’t mean that we don’t care about the rest of the world’s ills. Today I ran into some minor first world problems and while I think it's important to let minor things go and not obsess about them, I also think...
This afternoon I clicked on one of those facebook links. You know, one of the amazing wonderous groupings of incredible things. It was a "near misses" compilation; dozens of people seemingly cheating sudden death, walking away from accidents that should have destroyed them. There were people that froze as a car tumbled toward them, only to have it hit a...
Happy Thanksgiving. A couple of days ago a friend on facebook explained that she had started to write down a list of things she was thankful for. She set a goal of 50 but easily came up with 86 items and suggested that others follow her lead and perhaps set a goal of 100. I have a lot to be...
As I have been working to promote a photobook of mine that was just published, I have been on the internet too much. I tend to avoid clicking on videos because they can be rabbit holes that become black holes. However, if 10 or 15 friends share something I realize that I need to see it. This happened with that...
I have not had the time or bandwidth to work on “Story of Pain” recently because I have been dealing with another project that has been demanding all of my energy. In fact it’s been demanding so much of my attention that the stress has led to a bout of severe pain, cramping, and numbness in my foot. As such,...
I started taking pictures in the meadow because my friend Cait, who also lives along it, asked me to make images for her mother. When I began to shoot, the meadow was filled with color and life. I liked some of the images I was making but it took me a while to find my footing. Just as fall began...