TRACY DUBIN, MA
Tracy Dubin is an international science and humanities university lecturer, ethicist, essayist, and poet. She’s a psychology and neuroscience researcher with numerous postgraduate certifications from the Medical University of South Carolina, an MA from the University of California at Irvine, and a BS and BA from the University of Southern California. Her research interests are brain stimulation and severe addition mechanisms. She holds publications in the Harvard Gazette, MacDirectory Magazine, and the journal Addiction Neuroscience.
You can find her lecturing nationally and internationally to andragogic audiences on literature, AI, psychology, and addiction. When she’s not, she’s either writing or hanging out with her giant African Sulcata tortoise, Fredrick Bartholomew, who resides in her (renovated for reptiles) living room.
You can read her academic research projects and presentations on ResearchGate at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tracy-Dubin, and personally converse with her by emailing TDubin@usc.edu. She will be elated to network with you! She welcomes lectureship opportunities, speaking engagements, and creative collaborations.
Lagom
(Photograph, 96 dpi, 4032 x 2268 px)
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
- T.S. Elliot, “The Hollow Men”
Between the alarm clocks and time constraints to contain work plus socialization, between the need to pay for gas and groceries plus lay your head to rest, the flow of life seems to have currently curtailed creative flourishing in lieu of necessary survival machinations. Is this what we want? Is this how we must live?
Los Angeles traffic parallels the congestion of my to-do lists that have birthed their own subsets of sequential demands to address. My ego whispers, “Apply to this; add one more notch to your resume.” My body responds, “I am tired; can I really handle it?”
Life is very long; our shadows will ultimately one day fall.
Recently, I missed two deadlines that were very important to me – or so, I thought. Normally, I’d beat myself up over something like that – I mean, I messed up. But honestly, I also didn’t, because we choose our priorities, consciously and/or unconsciously (I’m a conscious thinker), and my relationships with others and myself (we cannot forget the self!) are now taking a forefront position over monetary, vocational consumption and prestige. I feel like in the pursuit of living, we can sometimes miss life.
I took this photo on a respite to Palm Desert. The view profoundly reminds me that there’s productivity in stillness: the world continues to move; we don’t die when we rest, when we miss a deadline. Maybe we’re meant to relax, to pause, to reflect, to know when tackling something extra is too much and we should simply watch the sunset instead. Maybe, we truly have all we already need. Maybe, our greatest contentment lies in appreciating – not striving for – satisfaction. Watching this San Jacinto mountainous skyline is pleasure beyond measure, and it’s free.
I’ll end my rant by quoting Dictionary.com’s definition for the Swedish philosophy of lagom. Lagom is “The principle of living a balanced, moderately paced, low-fuss life. Those who achieve lagom routinely take time to appreciate their surroundings, take several breaks during the workday, dress from a minimal and versatile wardrobe, and treat others with respect and kindness.” This ending is my beginning of learning how living less, is living more.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tracy-Dubin