We do not know everything. Awareness of this fact is an important first step in the intellectual domain. The psychic task which a person can and must set for himself, is not to feel secure, but to be able to tolerate insecurity, without panic and undue fear. [Erich Fromm] Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those…
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Value for Friday of Week 37 in the season of Fulfillment
Being Sensitive
Sensitivity is an art we can cultivate. It allows us to appreciate others more deeply, and thereby activate the Truth force.
- We cannot be more sensitive to pleasure without being more sensitive to pain. [Alan Watts]
- Beauty of whatever kind, in its supreme development, invariably excites the sensitive soul to tears. [Edgar Allan Poe]
- I suspect music is auditory cheesecake, an exquisite confection crafted to tickle the sensitive spots of… our mental faculties. [Steven Pinker]
Sensitivity enhances empathy. Brain activity in highly sensitive people, as measured on fMRI, is “associated with stronger activation of brain regions involved in awareness, empathy, and self-other processing.”
- “Sensitive responsiveness refers to parents’ ability to recognize and respond to infants’ cues and has been linked to parental empathy.”
- “. . . maternal sensitivity (is) positively related to children’s empathy, children’s compliance, and children’s emotional helping.”
- “Human rights sensitivity (HRS) is essential for social workers advocating for and providing services to people with mental illness.”
- “. . . humanization in nursing is closely related to moral sensitivity, cognitive empathy, and prosocial behavior. This facilitates a helping, caring, and understanding attitude toward patient needs, but without the affective flooding that affective empathy can lead to.”
Sensitive people feel pain more keenly but they also experience joy more intensely. “‘If you are a sensitive person, your body and mind respond more to the world around you,’ . . . ‘You respond more to heartbreak, pain, and loss, but you also respond more to beauty, new ideas, and joy.’”
Real
True Narratives
Historian Rick Atkinson uses his gift of storytelling to bring history down to the level of the personal experiences of those who lived it. Having completed a trilogy on World War II, he is now embarked on a history of the American Revolution.
- The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777 (Henry Holt & Company, 2019): “A powerful new voice has been added to the dialogue about our origins as a people and a nation. It is difficult to imagine any reader putting this beguiling book down without a smile and a tear.”
- The Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780 (Crown, 2025).
Technical and Analytical Readings
- Jenn Granneman & Andre Sólo, Sensitive: The Hidden Power of the Highly Sensitive Person in a Loud, Fast, Too-Much World (Harmony, 2023).
- Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You (Citadel, 1996).
- Dorothy Ward, Sense and Sensitivity: Why Highly Sensitive People Are Wired for Wonder (Sheldon Press, 2020).
- Courtney Marchesani, Four Gifts of the Highly Sensitive: Embrace the Science of Sensitivity, Heal Anxiety and Relationships, and Connect Deeply (Hay House, LLC, 2021).
Photographs
Documentary and Educational Films
Imaginary
Fictional Narratives
Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband’s death. It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing. Her husband’s friend Richards was there, too, near her. It was he who had been in the newspaper office when intelligence of the railroad disaster was received, with Brently Mallard’s name leading the list of “killed.” He had only taken the time to assure himself of its truth by a second telegram, and had hastened to forestall any less careful, less tender friend in bearing the sad message. [Kate Chopin, “The Story of an Hour” (1894).]
Novels:
- Patrick Ness, A Monster Calls: A Novel (Candlewick, 2011), “is brutally honest, yet so loving towards all its flawed characters, in a way that is hard to find . . .”
- Hiruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood: A Novel (Turtleback Books, 2000), “is set in Japan during the late 1960s/early 1970s, and follows a young man named Toru Watanabe, a university student living in Tokyo following the suicide of his only friend in high school, Kizuki.”
Poetry
Music: Composers, artists, and major works
Mitsuko Uchida is a classical pianist who is known especially for her sensitive approach to Mozart’s works. In her approach to other composers too, this “characteristic interpretive sensitivity (exposes) a dynamic range of colors and textures.” Here is a link to her playlists.
Violinist Janine Jansen is known for her musical sensitivity. Here is a link to her releases.
Rudolf Kempe was a Classical/Romantic conductor known for his musical sensitivity. “Throughout his career – on which he embarked as a pianist and oboist – Kempe also continued to perform regularly as a piano soloist in concertos, and was much in demand as a partner in chamber music and as a lieder accompanist. It is the experience in these more intimate fields that, in his view, enhances more than anything the musical sensitivity and the sense of ensemble that make the true artist.” One reviewer noted that “Kempe’s sensitive balancing of tempi and texture means that the music builds inexorably throughout.” Another opined that “Kempe is a master of phrasing and balance.” “He was at his best -- lively, incisive, warm, expressive, but never even remotely self-indulgent -- in the Austro-Germanic and Czech repertory.” Here is a sample of his conducting, and a link to his playlists.
As much as or more than any other composer, Heitor Villa-Lobos composed from within. The most famous example of this is the haunting melody in the aria of his Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 but his entire series of Chôros (approx. 209’) and Bachianas Brasileiras (approx. 176’) displays this quality. “In the Choros series, Villa-Lobos synthesized the popular music of Rio de Janeiro to create what has been described as 'one of the most important manifestations of Brazilian musical folklore.'” “Heitor Villa-Lobos’s Bachianas Brasileiras demonstrates how the composer achieved his own Brazilian neoclassical style in a group of works, nine suites in total, that is arguably one of the best examples of homage to J.S. Bach’s music in the twentieth century.”
- Chôros No. 1, for guitar, W. 161 (1920) (approx. 3’)
- Chôros No. 2, for flute and clarinet, W. 197 (1924) (approx. 3’)
- Chôros No. 3, “Pica Pau”, for piano, W. 198 (1924) (approx. 4’)
- Chôros No. 4, for chamber ensemble, W. 199 (1924) (approx. 6’)
- Chôros No. 5, “Alma brasileira”, for piano, W. 207 (1925) (approx. 4-5’)
- Chôros No. 6, for orchestra, W. 219 (1929) (approx. 25-26’)
- Chôros No. 7, “Settimino” (Septet), W. (1924) (approx. 9-10’)
- Chôros No. 8, for orchestra, W. 208 (1925) (approx. 18’)
- Chôros No. 9, for orchestra (1929) (approx. 25’)
- Chôros No. 10, for orchestra, W. 210 (1925) (approx. 13’)
- Chôros No. 11, for piano and orchestra, W. 228 (1928) (approx. 57’)
- Chôros No. 12, (1929) (approx. 35’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 1, for at least 8 cellos, W. 246 (1930-1938) (approx. 19’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 2, for orchestra, W. 247 (1930) (approx. 22’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 3, for piano and orchestra, W. 388 (1938) (approx. 28’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 4, for piano (orchestrated in 1941) W. 264 (1930-1941) (approx. 25’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5, for voice and at least 8 cellos, W. 389 (1938-1945) (approx. 7’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 6, for flute and bassoon, (1938) (approx. 9’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 7, for orchestra, W. 432 (1942) (approx. 29’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 8, for orchestra, W. 444 (1944) (approx. 25’)
- Bachianas Brasileiras No. 9, for chorus or string orchestra, W. 449 (1945) (approx. 10)
Isata Kanneh-Mason displays a gorgeous, soft, loving touch on piano. Here are links to her releases, and her playlists.
Robert Schumann’s works for cello put his heartfelt romanticism fully on display. Here are recordings from Ella van Poucke and Gabriel Schwabe.
Philippe Gaubert, flute sonatas “are mainly of a melodious, lyrical nature. The sometimes romantic, orchestral colouring is a challenge for the piano accompanist. Their style is clearly neo-romantic and impressionistic.”
- Flute Sonata No. 1 (1917) (approx. 15-29’) (list of recorded performances)
- Flute Sonata No. 2 (1924) (approx. 14-16’) (list of recorded performances)
- Flute Sonata No. 3 (1934) (approx. 12-13’) (list of recorded performances)
John Field’s alcoholism may have made him a more introspective composer. His sensitivity is on display in his 18 Nocturnes for Piano (1812-1836) (approx. 86-90’). Performances are by O’Conor, Spada, and Roe.
Tenor Cyrille Dubois has recorded Gabriel Fauré’s complete songs (2022) (233’). The songs are in the style of late French romanticism, and Dubois’s gentle voice suits them well.
Albums:
- Andrew Rathbun Large Ensemble, “Atwood Suites” (2018) (94’) is “set to the poetry of the renowned Canadian novelist Margaret Atwood”.
- Walter “Wolfman” Washington, “My Future Is My Past” (2018) (49’): Washington “slides into his after-closing-time voice, a deep, mellow yet still pliant instrument that can rise into a falsetto. He finds a comfortable-yet-evocative middle ground between blues and jazz on a series of standards and deep cuts.”
- Carolyn Sampson & Joseph Middleton, “Album für die frau: scenes from the Schumanns‘ lieder” (2021) (72’): sensitive readings of Robert and Clara Schumann’s songs
- Irina Kulikova, “It’s About the Touch” (2020) (73’) “is the 38-year-old guitarist’s most personal musical statement to date, featuring selections that shaped her musical personality as a child in Russia.”
- Jakob Bro & Joe Lovano, “Once Around the Room: A Tribute To Paul Motian” (2022) (39’), is a “. . . deeply felt and utterly original homage to a common inspiration and beloved colleague . . .”. “From the impressionistic resonance of ‘As It Should Be’ emerges ‘Sound Creation,’ a collective improvisation that seances Motian's thrill for spontaneity. It's an orchestral meander, each player regarding the other, waiting on the other to complete his thought and then add his own.”
- Bach Aria Soloists, “Le dolce sirene” (2023) (52’) is a sumptuous, sensitive, masterfully sung and played disc of music by “Johann Sebastian Bach, his contemporaries, and those he inspired”.
- Elena Papandreou, “Paper Moon: Songs by Manos Hadjdakis” (2023) (73’): “Elena Papandreou's poetic playing makes you think you are hearing the words, even though there is no vocal part. . . The recording captures every nuance of Papandreou's playing: as sweet, one might say, as the smell of jasmine.”
- L’Antidote, “L’Andidote” (2025) (48’): “This trio unites the Lebanese pianist Rami Khalifé, Albanian cellist Redi Hasa and Iranian-French percussionist, saz and zarb goblet drum player Bijan Chemirani to explore a domain of sensitive acoustic composition. L’Antidote invest folk forms with a neo-classical air, playing with their surrounding space and savouring the creation of delightfully calming atmospheres. They make collective music that has room for individual expression.” “. . . the cello speaks, the percussion articulates, and the piano converses . . .”
Music: songs and other short pieces
Art songs by various (named) composers:
- John Dowland, “Weep You No More, Sad Fountains” (lyrics)
- John Wilbye, “Draw On, Sweet Night” (lyrics)
- Franz Schubert, “Die Leiermann” (The Hurdy-Gurdy Player) (lyrics), from the song cycle Die Winterreise
- Samuel Barber, “Sure on This Shining Night” (lyrics)
Visual Arts
- Thomas Gainsborough, Philip James de Loutherberg (1778)
Film and Stage
- Birdy, about one traumatized soldier helping another escape from madness, adapted from William Wharton’s novel
