5. EXPERIENCE

The word experience , originates in the Latin experientia meaning an act of trying. In a general sense experience refers to the personal events, situations, and circumstances, that flow together throughout life and how those things are interpreted by the individual. We can also refer to collective experience, or an experience that is understood to be shared by a group of people. My interest is to explore the experience of learning from various perspectives in order to reveal its diversity and presence in various contexts.

Creative Resilience: The Elements of Creativity

By Brian Alger on 09/09/2011

[Exploring Life] The essential purpose of creativity is the provision of security and sanctuary from the confluence of situations and circumstances that circumambulate our presence in this world. That is, our creative capacities are most effectively used to nurture, cultivate, and care for ourselves, the people around us, and the earth itself. Creative resilience is [...]

Posted in 5. EXPERIENCE | Tagged aging, attention, authenticity, awareness, belief, belonging, conditioning, creativity, culture, death, earth, fear, gratitude, healing, identity, imagination, impermanence, inevitables, love, nature, presence, resilience, sanctuary, security, solitude, soul, spirituality, suffering, survival, threshold, unlived-life | Leave a response

Nature of Belief: Dying to Live

By Brian Alger on 06/24/2011

This entry is part 3 of 3 in the series Nature of Belief

[Exploring Life] How do our beliefs change when we are faced with our own mortality? Our lives are fragile and inexorably transient. Our presence will transform when we die. The nature of our transformation at death is an unknown and, in spite of our proficiency in creating fanciful stories that propose an explanation and perhaps [...]

Posted in 5. EXPERIENCE | Tagged aging, awareness, beauty, belief, belonging, breathing, conditioning, confinement, death, dying, emotions, fear, impermanence, inevitables, journey, mortality, regret, spirituality, transience, wisdom | Leave a response

Emotional Terrain: Anxiety – Fear in Search of a Cause

By Brian Alger on 06/03/2011

Patricia Pearson defines anxiety as fear in search of a cause. Fear is an immediate emotional response to a perceived threat, which results in potent feelings of apprehension, dread, terror and panic. In its most intense form, the fear response is specific to a time, place, moment, circumstance, or situation. In the midst of a [...]

Posted in 5. EXPERIENCE | Tagged anxiety, apprehension, awareness, behaviour, comprehension, conditioning, confinement, confusion, emotions, fear, feelings, healing, learning, limitations, perception, presence, suffering, threshold | 1 Response

Points of No Return: On the Loss of My Parents – Last Words

By Brian Alger on 05/04/2011

This entry is part 12 of 12 in the series On the Loss of My Parents

[Exploring Life] Closure means to find a resolution to a significant event in a person’s life. With respect to the loss of a loved one, closure ultimately means to find contentment and gratitude as the final and most significant outcome of death. This is the twelfth and final entry I will dedicate to the series [...]

Posted in 5. EXPERIENCE | Tagged aging, death, dying, emotions, fear, gratitude, grief, healing, impermanence, inevitables, journey, loss, memory, point-of-no-return, presence, regret, sadness, spirituality, suffering, threshold, transience | 2 Responses

Points of No Return: On the Loss of My Parents – 11

By Brian Alger on 03/03/2011

This entry is part 11 of 12 in the series On the Loss of My Parents

[Exploring Life] A Journey Into Memory: It has now been nearly two months since my father passed away, and five months since my mother passed away. I am learning more and more about the nature and power of memory; the ways in which I interpret and explore my own memories are changing in response to [...]

Posted in 5. EXPERIENCE | Tagged absence, aging, communication, conditioning, crossroad, death, dying, emotions, fear, gratitude, grief, healing, impermanence, inevitables, journey, loss, memory, point-of-no-return, presence, regret, sadness, soul, spirituality, suffering, threshold, transience | 2 Responses

Points of No Return: On the Loss of My Parents – 10

By Brian Alger on 02/24/2011

This entry is part 10 of 12 in the series On the Loss of My Parents

[Exploring Life] As We Get Older: Macleans Magazine has published an important article entitled Don’t Seniors Deserve Better? in which Ken McQueen explores the reality of how the elderly are treated in our hospital system. In the years leading up to their deaths, part of the care I provided for my parents was to help [...]

Points of No Return: On the Loss of My Parents – 9

By Brian Alger on 02/23/2011

This entry is part 9 of 12 in the series On the Loss of My Parents

[Exploring Life] An Offering in Memory of My Parents Though you have left us Your presence echoes within the landscape of our souls; Tears caress the beauty of your memory And we know you have been released from darkness and suffering. Your absence presses on our hearts, You touch us gently in spirit. Grief has [...]