Hi, I'm Lau(Ren)
I am a writer and research scholar based out of Houston, Texas. I started this blog to build community by sharing thoughts – my thoughts, your thoughts, and the thoughts of brilliant authors I’ve read.
As a scholar, I spend a lot of time looking at data to understand the world around me. You’ll probably see me post about the daily happenings of student life, books and research I find interesting, and more.
But as a creative, I want to dive into the humanness of it all…
I’ve almost lost count of how many times I’ve heard a sentence start with “In today’s world…”, “In the times were living in…”, or “With everything going in our country…” Every time I hear this, I get confused – when hasn’t there been something going on?
In the face of climate collapse, violence, and a crisis at every page refresh, it’s hard to break out of the constant feeling of doom and helplessness. Studies and statistics and politics won’t save us, love will.
As bell hooks says “to be truly visionary we have to root our imagination in our concrete reality while simultaneously imagining possibilities beyond that reality.” Call it what you want: pretending, delusion, optimism. But I believe the only way towards freedom is imagining what it could be like to be free.
So, I’ll be sharing the books, inner thoughts, and practices that make this life a little more bearable. I hope you’ll join me as we expand our minds to make room for life’s great paradoxes.