This is the second part of my controversial interview with Ken Goldberg. He’s gone through many phases in his life. Today, Ken talks about the gun range, being a lawyer, and more struggles with substance abuse. You can also watch the video of his appearance on the Ali G Show (and no, he didn’t know it was a fake interview.)
Ken Goldberg: Once I got my law degree, I started practicing law with the same population, in large part, I’d been social working to.
Jennifer Barry: That makes sense. You understood them and knew they needed a lot of legal help.
KG: I was perfect for it. Juvenile cases, criminal cases, it didn’t matter, I could smell b.s. from a mile away. I could bust my client’s bad story, I could bust a witness’ bad story. I was bright, although I wasn’t successful, and then I met Gerry Spence. He taught me trial law in 1994, and then I became a minor star in my own little world. I learned what was wrong with my technique, and I became monstrously good. But I wasn’t interested. My history is that when I become really good at something, I lose interest. Continue reading From Gunslinger to Monk, Part 2
After a short break from the computer, I’m back with another controversial interview. Ken Goldberg has gone through many phases in his life from runaway to lawyer, and yes, Buddhist monk. With all the violence in his life, it’s amazing that he’s still here at age 58. Ken is proof that it’s never too late to reinvent yourself if you really want to.
Jennifer Barry: Thanks for agreeing to the interview. You’ve had an amazing life, starting at a very young age. I know that you spent a lot of time on the streets in Chicago.
Ken Goldberg: I started out in an affluent Jewish family, and I started running away when I was 13 from a physically abusive dad. I tried to poison my father when I was 10. I finally left home on a regular basis at the age of 15. I would come back home when I was too sick to cope with the streets anymore. At 17, I moved out for good.
I hung out mostly in the ghetto in those years because white, middle class families didn’t want a runaway hanging around. But black families said, “Don’t make any trouble or any noise, and you can go to sleep in that room over there.” Continue reading From Gunslinger to Monk
When people learn I’ve been studying Spanish for four years, so many tell me they wish they could do the same. When I ask them why they don’t learn the language of their choice, I get one (or more) of the following excuses. Today I will help you by blowing up all these excuses so you can cross this off your bucket list.
1. I don’t have the money for classes - If you are trying to learn a rare language that isn’t spoken near you, it’s true, you may be out of luck. Immersion in a program or a visit foreign country may be best, but it’s not cheap.
But for most of us, we are trying to learn a tongue that’s spoken by millions around the world. For a major language like German or Mandarin Chinese, check your local library for CDs, dictionaries, and even children’s books. Radio Lingua has free podcasts in over 20 languages. My favorite resource, iTunesU, has free online classes in everything from Armenian to Urdu. Continue reading 5 Language Learning Excuses and How to Get Past Them
Here’s my third interview with a travel blogger (check out Phil and Shannon if you haven’t yet), but this time you get a two for one! Jack and Jill just started on their global adventure, but they are already having fun. Fortunately, they are travel veterans so they have a realistic though optimistic view. I want to thank them so much for giving me time while they’re on the road!
1. To Jill: Tell us a little about your background. Why did you leave Indonesia?
I was born and grew up in Indonesia until I was 16. Then we had that big riot in Jakarta where they were targeting the Chinese minority? Well, my parents had always wanted to send me abroad for college, but decided to do it a couple of years early because of the riot. But instead of sending me to cool, multicultural cities such as Melbourne or Sydney, they sent me to podunk Adelaide instead (no offense, I ended up really liking Adelaide).
But I guess it turned out for the better. There was only one other Indonesian in the whole school and it forced me to pick up English much faster than I would have if I had gone to one of the bigger cities.
After I graduated high school in Aussie, I studied art in Seattle and graduated. Then I realized I missed science and decided to go study engineering in California. Which is a very nice segue to your next question.
Are you worried about natural disasters, crime or terrorism? Neil Strauss was. He tried to prepare for everything, but ended up finding himself.
Emergency: This Book Will Save Your Life is an informative, funny, and sometimes disturbing memoir. It details the transformation of the author, Neil Strauss, a music critic and writer who admittedly has few practical skills at the beginning of the book. Strauss’ family lived in a high rise apartment building, so he never learned about nature or how to fix things. By the end of the book, he’s able to care for both himself and loved ones in areas ranging from wilderness survival to hand to hand combat.
The book immediately draws you in with Strauss’ moral dilemma of whether to slaughter a goat in his quest for survival skills. Emergency then bounces back and forth in time, from location to location, and from factual narrative to analysis. This stylistic choice holds the reader’s attention, but is confusing at times. Continue reading Just In Case
This is another post I’ve meant to do for a while. Raam did a post called 7 Pieces of Advice for My Younger Self back in July, and I found out that Abubakar and Farnoosh were organizing a whole series on this subject. Then I promptly forgot until Bryan at ElevationLife wrote his letter to his teenage self.
Even though I didn’t finish this soon enough to be in the ebook on this subject, I recommend you check it out. It’s free!
————————————————————————————————————————————————
Dear Jennifer,
First of all, break up gently with your boyfriend. I know he’s your first serious relationship, but he ends up costing you a lot of time and money, and the relationship goes nowhere. You make innumerable decisions on what to do and where to go because of him, many of which don’t make any sense in hindsight. Continue reading Advice to My 18 Year Old Self
I’m proud to say that today is the one year anniversary of Live Richly. I didn’t know if it would last this long. I started it as an experiment to learn about social media and marketing, but it turned out I really liked blogging for its own sake.
I continue my interview with Adrian S., a married man with a family who sold most of his possessions in search of a better life. He is disturbed about the direction the US is taking, politically, economically, and socially. Links to earlier parts of the interview can be found at the end of this post.
Jennifer Barry: So, do your kids have plans to go to college at some point, or start their own business? What do they think they want to do in their future?
Adrian S.: I’m definitely promoting the idea that life is not about getting a good job. I’m promoting the idea that being able to be entrepreneurial and finding out how to satisfy people’s needs is a better way of going about life.
I’m trying to be honest with them about college too, because I think the landscape of the world has changed. It’s not like a college degree is absolutely essential to have a fulfilling life. And that was the way it was always presented to me, but I suspect that they will want to go to college, but I just want them to go knowing why they’re there. I went to college just because it was just the thing you do after high school. My parents never really explained to me what the point was. Continue reading Stranger in His Own Land, Part 11
I continue my interview with Adrian S., a married man with a family who sold most of his possessions in search of a better life. He is disturbed about the direction the US is taking, politically, economically, and socially. Links to earlier parts of the interview can be found at the end of this post.
Jennifer Barry: As I remember it, you had moved to that suburban town because it was supposed to be a good school district.
Adrian S.: I guess it was at some level, but I didn’t like the way they treated my kids. I guess what I’m saying is I don’t think any of these school districts, or any of the schools are good, because they are throttling the creativity of these children, showing, I think that schooling has become very scientific. This is one of the things I remember reading from John Taylor Gatto.
JB: Oh yeah, I’ve read his stuff.
AS: I don’t think public schooling is doing many of these kids any favors. One time we went to a fast food place because we were hungry, and Karen needed change. There was some confusion about our bill, and she swapped an item for another. And this poor kid could not do the math even when he took out a pencil and paper, he literally gave up, and he handed it to her, and she figured out what her bill was. And this guy was probably 19. Continue reading Stranger in His Own Land, Part 10
This is the second part of David Rostcheck’s guest post. Trained as a physicist, he became a software engineer and has worked in IT for 18 years. David is employed by a security company who sent him to Singularity University in October.
All kinds of other revolutions are fomenting in biology and medicine. Genetic engineers are able to create entire organisms (like bacteria and yeast) from scratch, modifying them to do functions we want, such as produce pharmaceuticals or fuels. Biologists are cataloging the vast diversity of microbial life, finding naturally occurring varieties that do useful tricks from repairing massive radiation damage to producing glue that repairs cracks in concrete. Neurologists are achieving breakthrough maps of the brain’s wiring – a fundamental step to understanding human consciousness.
New Comments