Derek Beres
Derek Beres is a freelance writer. Based in Portland, Oregon, he has served in senior editorial positions at a number of tech companies and has years of experience in health, science, and music writing. He is the co-host of the Conspirituality podcast and co-author of Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracies Became a Health Threat.
Compassion is an important concept, and even more important practice to integrate into one’s life. Like all ideas, layers underlie the meaning. One of the most fascinating is what Tibetan […]
Two recent announcements—well, one announcement and one pronouncement—are making the rounds: popular self-help author Marianne Williamson has thrown herself into the political ring by running for the congressional seat in […]
Last week I received an email asking me to appear on a radio show called ‘The Yoga of Money.’ After listing their street cred with high-end instructors who’ve guested on […]
In 1837, the Royal Danish Society sponsored an essay contest, asking participants to tackle the following question: Are the source and foundation of morals to be looked for in an […]
Fabrizio Goldstein made a splash earlier this summer when offering homeless people Spin classes on freshly minted Citi Bikes in New York City. Comedian by trade—this Vice clip in which […]
‘All man’s miseries,’ wrote the French mathematician Blaise Pascal, ‘derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone.’ Silence can do sinister things to a human being. […]
I learned about last week’s fire in Seaside Park through a conspiracy theory. It read simply: ‘And I’m sure this was an accident.’ Given Jersey’s long history of questionable accidents—just […]
The top rung of Patanjali’s eight-limbed Ashtanga ladder, Samadhi, has been defined in numerous ways. Usually associated with the last step before enlightenment, it is translated as ‘ecstasy,’ and has […]
When Jaleesa Martin brought her seven-month-old child, Messiah, to the Cocke County Chancery Court in August, she was waging a battle with her son’s father for rights to his last […]
The end of the world has been coming for quite some time. As Reza Aslan points out in Zealot, Jesus Christ was not the only End Times preacher with stock […]
In The Power of Myth, a book-length interview conducted by Bill Moyers with Joseph Campbell, the mythologist said ‘It’s the Christ on the cross that’s lovable.’ He was responding to […]
Two weeks ago, after turning onto Route 10 from Santa Monica, a truck sped by in the center lane. A hand truck flew from the back as it hit a […]
I first practiced Bikram Yoga over a decade ago in SoHo. The heat punched through me like a lead fist. Although a few years experienced in Vinyasa, the thick atmosphere […]
“The hero was a big man; the celebrity is a big name,” wrote historian Daniel J. Boorstin in his 1962 book, The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-events in America. The […]
In their book Surfaces and Essences: Analogy as the Fuel and Fire of Thinking, Douglas Hofstadter and Emmanuel Sander remind us that the way we view the world is necessarily […]
One of the reasons Joseph Campbell’s work in comparative mythology continues to resonate—some, myself included, would argue grow—is due to his ability to synthesize religious and spiritual traditions from around […]
“Sure, today’s Olympics are corrupt, rife with cheating, and riddled with scandal, but at least today’s games aspire to the noble ideals of the ancient Greeks—amateurism, fair play, and peace,” […]
In traditional Sufism, a seeker would find a teacher and study under him for a number of years in a particular order, or turuq. During that time the seeker would […]
This week’s Supreme Court decisions have been the main topics streaming into my Facebook and Twitter feeds (along with a few heartfelt thoughts for Nelson Mandela). Escaping a thumbs up […]
Superman may have originally been envisioned as a telepathic bald villain bent on world destruction, but he was quickly transformed into a beloved hero of Depression-era America, with his all-American, […]
The self-help movement has come quite a way since Samuel Smiles (actual name) published Self-Help in 1859. Considering the opening sentence invokes God and the help He offers, the tone […]
In the last month, two people that I’ve critiqued in this column have replied and created fruitful dialogues. J. Brown, a teacher whom I respect for his intellectual fortitude, just […]
Last week was a big one for assumptions. There was Wolf Blitzer asking an Oklahoma tornado survivor if she was thankful that the Lord spared her life. Then that brief, […]
While in Joshua Tree this weekend for another event, my friend and I swung by Shaktifest, the sister festival of the more popular Bhaktifest, which takes place every September. Both […]
Last week two articles were published stating that meditation is not necessarily a component of living a spiritual life, as well as that we generally don’t recognize what real meditation […]
One of my first yoga instructors used to say, ‘Suffering is optional.’ In the immediate he was referencing the struggle to remain in challenging postures—our mindset could shift from one […]
After her uterus nearly erupted, Vyckie Garrison was rushed to the hospital to give birth to her seventh child. The emergency caesarean section nearly killed her. Her doctor warned the […]
Man suffers only because he takes seriously what the gods made for fun.—Alan Watts Yesterday the NY Times published an article about the importance of play in the evolutionary development […]
For the foreseeable future, ‘terrorism’ will be the default term immediately applied to any act of public violence. While some warned against jumping to conclusions in regards to yesterday’s tragedy […]
Prayer effectively deals with sympathetic magic—the notion that your thoughts can alter reality from a distance, or influence outcomes in your life which you have no conscious control over.