There Is Ecstasy in Paying Attention

The Generosity of Focus

THE ECSTASY OF FOCUSING

When I challenge white supremacy, someone protests, “You’re ignoring class oppression! You’re not intersectional enough!”

When I write about global warming’s effects on coral reefs, someone replies, “Why don’t you mention deforestation or plastic pollution?”

When I speak up about police brutality, someone yells, “Why don’t you talk about domestic violence or human trafficking?”

When I share a piece about the suffering of factory-farmed pigs, a commenter retorts, “What about the children starving in Gaza?”

When I celebrate women reclaiming their bodies from centuries of shame, someone says, “But what about men’s mental health?”

When I critique corporate greed in Silicon Valley, a critic says, “But Wall Street is worse! Why ignore them?”

I regard such accusations as ungraceful and counterproductive.

Why?

When we speak, we carve a small sculpture out of the infinite. Every utterance is a narrowing, a slice of attention through the great blooming, buzzing confusion of existence. To say anything is to choose, and to choose is to leave out.

“It’s not possible to say EVERYTHING every time you say ANYTHING” is an epistemological truth and a spiritual hygiene principle. It reminds us that focus is not exclusion; it’s the price of coherence.

If we try to mention all suffering every time we name one, all beauty every time we praise one, our speech collapses under the weight of impossible inclusivity. The result isn’t compassion but paralysis.

Our culture’s moral discourse often mistakes breadth for depth. Many believe that mentioning every possible angle proves fairness or intelligence.

But deep justice work and deep artistry depend on specificity. Each act of attention—to a person, a wound, a species, a joy—honors the sacred particular. To name one injustice isn’t to erase the others; it’s to hold one glowing fragment of the world’s pain and say, “I see you. I feel you.”

The quote “It’s not possible to say EVERYTHING every time you say ANYTHING” also protects against a subtle form of ego inflation. The fantasy that one could ever speak for everything is the voice of the inflated savior or the anxious perfectionist.

Real wisdom, like real love, knows its limits. It trusts that other people will carry the stories we can’t. It believes in the ecology of attention—the idea that when each of us tends one corner of the garden with sincerity, the whole Earth is nourished.

So when critics cry, “But what about all the other injustices?” the answer isn’t defensiveness, but clarity: “Yes, they matter too. And now, I’m speaking to this one in particular.”

Focus isn’t neglect. Focus is fidelity.

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The Ecology of Attention

Attention is sacred. When you love one thing deeply—one forest, one injustice, one beloved body, one gorgeous bird—you’re not abandoning the rest of existence. You’re affecting the whole.

In the Ecology of Attention, every act of focus feeds the web. When you sing to the crows, the mountains hear you. When you repair a torn friendship, peace ripples through the wider tribe. When you speak out against one specific cruelty, compassion’s mycelium carries your intention across the land.

The illusion that we must name all things in order to care for all things is a spell of exhaustion, cast by the cult of overwhelm. That spell says, “If you can’t fix everything, you should fix nothing.” But the counterspell is this: Love something particular. Feed it with your awareness. Let your devotion radiate outward through the underground rivers of resonance.

Each of us is a cell in the planetary nervous system. We don’t all have to do everything. One person can tend bees. Another can free prisoners. Another can teach tenderness to those who forgot it was allowed. Another can write poems that remind leaders to be merciful.

To say anything truly is to honor the Everything that shimmers behind it.

To speak with precision is to join the chorus of specificity that keeps the universe coherent.

The great task is not to juggle the infinite but to become a living root through which the infinite can sip. Your focused care is not a diminishment of the Whole—it’s the Whole, momentarily incarnate in your gaze.

So when you hear that accusatory voice—“Why this and not that? Why now and not always?”—smile with compassionate amusement and reply:

“Because the world speaks in billions of tongues, and right now, this one is speaking through me.”

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Links to all my other stuff: linktr.ee/robbrezsny

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY

Week of October 23

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Many cultures regard obsidian as having protective powers against negative energy. This makes it popular for healing talismans. Obsidian mirrors have often been used to scry for visions and prophecies. Because obsidian is so sharp, ancient peoples incorporated it into tools used to hunt for food, like knives and arrowheads. In modern times, obsidian is used for its beauty in tabletops, tiles, and architectural components. Do you know how this precious substance is formed? It’s born in the shock between elements: molten lava meets water or cool air and hardens so quickly that crystals can’t form, trapping a mirror-dark clarity in volcanic glass. I propose we make it your symbolic power object in the coming months, Scorpio.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Medieval alchemists engaged in literal laboratory work as they attempted to create elixirs of immortality, concoct medicines to heal diseases, and metamorphose lead into gold. But the modern practice of alchemy is primarily a psychological effort to achieve awakening and enlightenment. In the early stages of the work, the seeker experiences the metaphorical “black sun.” It’s a dark radiance, the beginning of creative decay, that fuels the coming transformation. I suspect you now have the potential to call on this potent asset, Sagittarius. It’s wild, though. You must proceed with caution and discernment. What worn-out aspects of yourself are you ready to let rot, thereby fertilizing future growth?

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): In Japan, shakkei refers to the practice of “borrowed scenery.” The idea is to create a garden so that surrounding features become part of its expansive context: distant mountains, an expanse of sky, or a nearby body of water. The artistry lies in allowing the horizon to merge gracefully with what’s close at hand. I recommend this approach to you, Capricorn. Frame your current project with a backdrop that enlarges it. Partner with places, influences, or long-view purposes that augment your meaning and enhance your beauty. Align your personal actions with a vast story so they send even more potent ripples out into the world.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Computer scientist Radia Perlman is the “Mother of the Internet.” She invented the Spanning Tree Protocol, a component that’s essential for the flow of online data. Despite her work’s splashy importance, hardly anyone knows of her. With that in mind, I remind you: Some revolutions unfold with little fanfare; positive transformations may be inconspicuous. How does that relate to you? I suspect the next beautiful or useful thing you contribute may also be veiled and underestimated, at least at first. And yet it may ultimately generate a shift more significant than you can now imagine. My advice is to trust the long game. You’re doing good work, though its recognition may be late in arriving.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): The mystical Persian poet Hafez wrote, “Fear is the cheapest room in the house. I’d like to see you living in better conditions.” Picture that shabby room, Pisces: cramped, dim, damp. Now imagine you have resolved to never again live in such a place. In fact, sometime soon you will move, metaphorically speaking, into a spacious, high-ceilinged place with wide windows and skylights, fresh air flooding through. I believe life will conspire on your behalf if you initiate this bold move. You now have extra power to exorcise at least some of your angst and embrace liberating joy.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): I bet your upcoming night dreams will include marriages, mating dances, and sacramental unions. Even if you are not planning deeper mergers with trustworthy allies in your waking life, your subconscious mind is musing on such possibilities. I hope this horoscope inspires you to make such fantasies more conscious. What collaborations and blends would serve you well? Give your imagination permission to ponder new and exciting connections. Visualize yourself thriving amidst new connections.

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TAURUS (April 20-May 20): In winemaking, malolactic fermentation softens a wine’s tart malic acid into gentler lactic acid. This process imparts a creamier and rounder mouthfeel, while preserving the wine’s structure. In accordance with astrological omens, I invite you to adopt this as your metaphor of power. See if you can refine your intensity without losing your integrity. Keep things interesting but soften the edges a bit. Introduce warmth and steadiness into provocative situations so they’re free of irritation and easier to engage with, but still enriching.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): The coming weeks will be an excellent time to practice the art of strategic disruption. One way to do it is to interrupt your patterns so they don’t calcify and obstruct you. Just for fun, you could eat breakfast for dinner. Take a different route to a familiar place. Talk to a person you would usually avoid. Say no when you’d normally say yes, or vice versa. Part of your brain loves efficiency, habits, and well-worn grooves. But grooves can become ruts. As a rousing spiritual experiment, you could do things differently for no reason except to prove to yourself that you can. Playful chaos can be a form of prayer. Messing with your standard approaches will unleash your creativity.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): In Shinto mythology, Ame-no-Uzume is the goddess of mirth and revelry. In one story, she seduces the sun out of its hiding place by performing a humorous and provocative dance. I am sending her over to your sphere right now in the hope that she will coax you out of your comfort zone of retreat, control, and self-protection. While I’m glad you have taken this break to recharge your spiritual batteries, I think it’s time to come out and play. You have done important work to nurture and process your deep feelings. Now we would love you to express what you’ve learned with freewheeling panache.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Ancient cultures in Sumeria, Egypt, and China used willow bark as a pain reliever. Many centuries later, in 1828, European scientists isolated the chemical salicin from the bark and used it to create aspirin. What had been a folk remedy became a widely used medicine all over the planet. Is there a metaphorically comparable development unfolding in your life? I think so. Something you’ve known or practiced could be evolving into its next form. The world may finally be ready to receive wisdom, a technique, or an insight you’ve used for a long time. Consider refining and upgrading it. Share it in ways that meet the present moment’s specific need.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): In honor of your special needs right now, Virgo, I am coining a new English word: edge-ucation. It’s like “education” but with an extra edge. Though book-learning is included in its purview, it also requires you to seek out raw teaching in all possible ways: on the streets, the bedroom, the natural world, everywhere. To properly pursue your higher edge-education, you must hunt down provocative influences, thought-provoking adventures, and unfamiliar stimulation. Make the whole world your laboratory and classroom.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): When I began writing horoscopes years ago, I had greater empathy with some of the signs than with others. But I worked hard to overcome this bias, and now I truly love and understand every tribe of the zodiac equally. I attribute this accomplishment to the fact that I have three Libra planets in my natal chart. They have propelled me to develop a warm, affectionate, fair-minded objectivity. I have a deeply honed capacity for seeing and liking people as they genuinely are, without imposing my expectations and projections onto them. The coming weeks will be an excellent time to tap into these qualities in yourself, dear Libra.

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THE NIRVANA FALLACY

“The nirvana fallacy is the belief that because something is not completely perfect, it is deeply flawed or even broken. It is very common in economic and political discourse.

“The nirvana fallacy compares actual things with unrealistic, idealized alternatives. It can also refer to the tendency to assume that there is a perfect solution to a particular problem. A closely related concept is the perfect solution fallacy.

“By creating a false dichotomy that presents one option which is obviously advantageous—while at the same time being completely implausible—a person using the nirvana fallacy can attack any opposing idea because it is imperfect.

“Under this fallacy, the choice is not between real world solutions; it is, rather, a choice between one realistic achievable possibility and another unrealistic solution that could in some way be ‘better.’”

More: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy

Art by Catrin Welz-Stein

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