“The Great Awkward.” I stopped and clicked quickly on this title while scanning through researcher and storyteller Brené Brown’s “Dare to Lead” podcast list the other day. She and her sister Barrett Guillen, who work together, shared raw and honest reflections on...
The other day, I put my car key fob in a sweatshirt pocket and washed it with the laundry. Fortunately, the fob still worked after I dried it out and put in a new battery. The next day, I went to the grocery store only to discover that I left my wallet at home. The...
Packing and preparing to get out of the apartment was a slow, arduous process. I used to be a lean, mean, packing machine. But for this work trip, my first in two years, I put my suitcase out three days before I had to leave because I wasn’t sure how long it would...
Pay attention, and tune into hope. That’s what I’ve been asking people to do in my weekly yoga classes and my Mindful Advent Yoga Series. So I thought I’d put my hope-filled reflections out there, too. Here are five things (plus an honorable mention) that have...
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...
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...
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...
You’ve probably walked down the hall at the office and inwardly braced yourself when that person walked by. You may have avoided a project not because you don’t want to do it, but because the team working on it is so dysfunctional. You may choose the same one or two...
I gathered my snacks, my Oscar ballot and my remote control then settled in to watch the telecast of the 93rd annual Academy Awards with more anticipation than usual. My effervescent reaction was not typical of this troubled time for movies — most people were not...
“Peace can be difficult to feel because of the chaos that surrounds us.” I wrote that line more than a year ago for my 2019 Mindful Advent series, but is really true now. Everything in this year feels like chaos — the disruption of a pandemic, the helplessness created...
Pandemic time bears a striking resemblance to airport time. I have long theorized that time spent in airports and airplanes exists in some strange liminal space — not really here nor there. If I spent enough time in an airport waiting for delayed or cancelled flights...
Starting a new spiritual practice can feel upside down. These are practices that are supposed to ground you, focus you, center you. Ironically, the beginning of a new practice (or starting anything, really) does not feel that way. Starting meditation, yoga, or prayer...
You may only know that Lent is a Christian season during which practitioners, “give something up,” as a spiritual practice. You may even know it is a season for preparing for Easter, or a big change more generally. This Lent which began for Christians on Feb. 26 has...
Losing all the activities and communities I love in one fell swoop was too much. First, we moved the YoWo (Yoga + Worship) class I teach online. The same day my yoga studio closed for operation. A few days later, the YMCA closed. Churches closed for public...
Fear, anxiety and confusion may be taking an unhealthy grip on us. Already we were immersed in an anxious, divisive culture, and in walks the corona virus, threatening us, our loved ones and the most vulnerable among us. Yes, there’s lots to be anxious about. Here’s...