Happy New Year, wonderful humans! I had a wonderful, restful Christmas holiday. I didn’t travel to see family, though we did share a Zoom meal together on Christmas Eve. I didn’t even attend a party, just one church service. On Christmas Day, I made some cookies and...
In the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to make exercise a higher priority than it’s been in the past year. My gym location closed due to COVID, which meant my master’s swim group lost its space to gather. The pressure of starting a business ate into the time I would...
“When your mind turns to judgment, instead turn to wonder.” This was one of the guidelines for behavior at a retreat I attended years ago. It really grabbed my attention and caused me to reflect. My habit of judging others’ behaviors, choices and mistakes is deeply...
I’m conflicted about the holidays, but not for the reasons you’d expect. I’m not stressed out about holiday cooking and shopping; I gave most of that up years ago. I’m not anxious about holiday travel; I’m not doing that anymore either, thanks to COVID. I’m not...
I really never intended to be a time management guru. What I really wanted was to help people identify their dreams, then coach, train and support people and organizations while they implemented those dreams. Over the years, I’ve coached lots of people through change....
I am not a crafty person. I’ve often envied people who can bring knitting or crochet into a meeting and absentmindedly work on a project while occasionally and appropriately interjecting into the conversation. I am in awe of the attention to detail people pay to bead...
I swear I had nothing to do with it ending this way. It just so happened that on the last Saturday of my August Birthday Month of Abundance, I completed a two-year rewatch of the 2004-2010 ABC series Lost. I joined up when I discovered The Storm Podcast was...
I don’t know about you, but my mind rushes to judgment at the tiniest provocation. My worst judgment erupts while I’m driving. It gets triggered by everyone who is jumping across lanes to get where they want, blocking me from changing lanes, driving too fast/too slow,...
Even though I liked to learn and did pretty well in school, I felt pretty nervous every year before starting class again. The anxiety amped up in middle and high school. I dreaded seeing students who picked on me. I was insecure about my body in gym class. I was...
Late in July, I absentmindedly turned the wheel of my car, hit a curb and tore a hole in the tire. My car limped along while I struggled to find a parking place on the narrow streets in an older part of Columbus, Ohio. Now sweltering in my car, I used the AAA app to...
Confession: I did not want to write this blog this week. I’m exhausted. I’m grumpy. I’m discouraged. My meditation practice this morning only took the edge off my funk. I’m glad I work and live alone so that others don’t have to put up with me right now. (Apologies in...
Even though my mother claimed I could sleep through lawn mower noise outside my window as an infant, that blissful sleeper ceased to exist sometime in early childhood. Once I had my own room, every foundation-settling creak, wild thunderstorm or nightmare would launch...
I have chanted the sound Om before and after yoga classes thousands of times. When I felt and heard the sound of Om reverberating off the walls in the actual room of my home yoga studio in Columbus, Ohio, for the first time in more than a year, I was awestruck. The...
Inadequacy covered me like a smothering blanket. Typing up the description to our first-ever foray into teaching a Mindfully Embracing Anti-Racism series, I heard the whispers of nagging voices in my head saying, “Who are you to do this?” and “You don’t know what...
I don’t remember much from sixth grade, but I have vivid memories of my teacher’s after-lunch reading ritual. The ritual was simple: We’d read our way through a book, a chapter at a time each day after lunch and recess. I’m terrible at remembering details, but somehow...