Chris Barkley - On writing, Wonder, and Taking the Middle Path

In this episode, I’m joined by writer and novelist Chris Barkley, author of The Man on the Endless Stair.

We talk about Chris’s journey as a writer — from early manuscripts and rejection, to publication — and use that as a starting point to explore bigger questions: how stories shape our understanding of the world, how trauma influences perception, and why certainty can sometimes be more dangerous than doubt.

Our conversation covered metafiction, journalism, Buddhism, quantum physics, phenomenology, and psychology, touching on ideas like the middle path, synchronicity, and the role of wonder in a meaningful life. We also talk about Chris’s time working in an alternative school, how that experience shaped his writing, and why listening — rather than prescribing answers — matters so much.

This is a wide-ranging, reflective conversation about creativity, humility, and what it means to participate in reality rather than trying to control it.

Resources mentioned:

• The Man on the Endless Stair — Chris Barkley
• If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler — Italo Calvino
• Six Memos for the Next Millennium — Italo Calvino
• On Writing — Stephen King
• Steering the Craft — Ursula K. Le Guin
• Bird by Bird — Anne Lamott
• On Becoming a Person — Carl Rogers
• Analytic Idealism in a Nutshell — Bernardo Kastrup
• Biocentrism — Robert Lanza
• Atom and Archetype — Wolfgang Pauli & Carl Jung