This week I gave my first Toastmasters speech in several years, as part of a new club. I spoke about being weird, and how being different attracts attention. I learned this when I learned how to ride the unicycle as a kid. Unicycling isn’t a normal activity (shocker!), and when…
Your Mountain
I’ve been on a steady diet of endurance sports stories and documentaries the past year or so. I’ve been fascinated and challenged by athletes who battle great landscapes and extreme conditions to perform great feats, testing the limits of their own strength and resolve. The latest of these epic stories…
Adventure Awaits
Our desire for adventure and our desire to be safe and comfy are often at odds. Of all the adventure stories that we hold dear, most of them only really start once something fails to go according to plan. Yvon Chouinard probably put it best: It’s not an adventure until…
Loaves and Fishes
I was introduced to the work of David Whyte recently. In reading his poetry, I came across a beautiful little poem called Loaves and Fishes. This is not the age of information. This is not the age of information. Forget the news, and the radio, and the blurred screen. This…
The Oxbow
One year ago, in the midst of training for my first marathon, I heard about some crazy people who’d run 50KM – 8KM longer than a marathon! – in the Spruce Woods on the first weekend of May. At the time, a marathon was an impossibility in my mind, what…
Conversing with the Land
What’s the difference between a trail and a road? Trails, our original routes of travel across the land, follow the contours of the landscape. Along the winding stream, around rocks and trees, weaving up the side of a hill. Roads, on the other hand, cut through a landscape. They carve…
The Old Tamarack
There’s a small green space near our house, in what has been called “the last piece of original bush” in our town. This is one of my favourite places to go for a morning run, or a walk with the family. Care to join me on a little walk? We…
Ennui
Seth used a great word in a recent blog post. I’d heard it before, but I don’t think I’d ever looked up its meaning. Ennui (än-ˈwē): a feeling of weariness and dissatisfaction : boredom The French loanword ennui comes from the very same Late Latin word that gave us annoy…
Three tools
In middle school jazz band, I learned that good jazz wasn’t produced through an abundance of notes, but a few well-placed ones. Teenagers enthralled by the capabilities of our newly-acquired instruments and rudimentary skills, we each were tempted to compensate for our lack of skill by playing a flurry of…
The Magic of Too Much
Some days it’s all a bit much, isn’t it? The inbox is a treadmill set one notch too fast. The kids all want, no, neeeeeed, something right now. Before you can put the phone down, it rings with another request. Information overload, work overload, you know the feeling, right? Catch…
Hi, I'm Brent! I write about creativity, curiosity, design, and wonder.
Check out my newest book Pay Attention.
© 2020 Brent Manke