Tiny Buddha

Category: Blog

  • 6 Questions to Help You Love Yourself More When It Feels Impossible

    6 Questions to Help You Love Yourself More When It Feels Impossible

    Sad painting

    “You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” ~Buddha

    In 2012, self-love became the most important thing in my life. After self-loathing and addiction led me to rock bottom, there was nowhere to go but up. When someone asked me last year how long I’d been on the self-love journey, I counted back from 2012. That’s when I thought it began.

    In my old journals, however, I recently found something strange and incredible—my self-love journey started long before I thought it had. Years prior to hitting rock bottom, I’d been having the same epiphanies: I need to love myself, I need to stop trying to get other people to love me, I need to be kinder to myself.

    Yet those epiphanies wouldn’t last. In fact, I habitually forgot about them as I returned to my “normal” back then—anxiety, depression, self-judgment, social anxiety, and a host of addictive behaviors that helped me escape these uncomfortable states.

    Strangely enough, when my suffering was at its worst, few people could have said that self-love was the problem. I had an outward facade of ironclad self-confidence. Most people thought I loved myself too much.

    Yet my journals tell another story. It is a story of not only silent suffering but also accidentally ignoring all my attempts to heal that suffering. Even though I was chronically self-sabotaging, I was also trying to help myself along the way.

    In a Facebook comment to one of my other posts on Tiny Buddha, someone wrote, “A lot of truth in this, but I’m so tired of the thing about loving yourself. Nobody has ever written about how this happens when you don’t feel that way. It sounds so simplistic—just love yourself first. Great, still no answers!!”

    It might be ironic to give an even more simplistic answer to this, such as “Find the answers within you.” But I think it’s important to note that there is a difference between simplicity and ease. The most important lessons in life really are simple—love yourself, find your own answers, know yourself. Yet implementing these lessons is a lifetime job full of tears, fears, and uncertainty.

    The truth is—the answers are within you, just like they were within me. It’s just a matter of discovering them and implementing them consistently.

    Your answers are within your experience. But they aren’t filed into neat folders. They’re scattered in every moment between alarm clocks, worries, and errands. They’re also not labelled by which questions they answer. You might get a bad feeling about something and that could be self-love, but it could also be fear.

    So, instead of answers, I’d like to provide some questions. Your relationship with yourself is unique and your answers will be unique. And the answers will keep changing. You can ask these questions every day, and that wouldn’t be too much.

    1. How can I better understand this experience?

    One sentence that I found frequently written in my old journals was, “Why does this always happen to me?” I said this about periods of depression as much as relationship patterns.

    When I asked this question, I wasn’t looking for an answer. My biggest mental health breakthrough was learning to genuinely ask that question. No, really, why do I always end up alone when I most need people? Why do I sometimes experience overwhelming periods of depression? Thus, I started to learn important things about myself.

    I learned that I had a tendency to never take breaks, strive for perfection, and burn myself into the ground. I also learned that I had a way of pushing people away to “test” if they’d stick around. Seeing these patterns was painful, but much less painful than believing I was broken, unworthy, and doomed to being alone.

    When you’re in the middle of criticizing or judging yourself, take a moment to shift your focus toward understanding.

    Instead of trying to fix your emotions or your reactions, how can you understand them better? What are your feelings trying to communicate to you? How can you acknowledge these messages?

    Instead of beating yourself up for saying or doing something, how can you get a more holistic perspective on your motivations for saying/doing this thing?

    When you make a conscious decision to be more curious about your experience, you will naturally stop resisting, judging, and criticizing it. The more you embrace each moment, the more you will be able to embrace yourself.

    2. Who am I beyond my behaviors, thoughts, and emotions?

    To be able to embrace the ups and downs of life without losing self-love, you must love yourself beyond those ups and downs. This is the difference between self-approval and self-love.

    Approval comes and goes. When you make a mistake, you might disapprove of yourself. This is healthy and normal. If you didn’t experience lulls in self-esteem, you might never learn from your mistakes and end up hurting others.

    Self-love, on the other hand, is something you need in each moment—especially when your self-esteem is low.

    When you don’t approve of your behaviors, ask yourself who you are beyond those behaviors. How can you accept yourself beyond the rollercoaster of day-to-day experience, so that no matter what those experiences are, you continue to think of yourself as worthy of existing?

    3. What do I need right now?

    Each day, ask yourself what you need. Like this, you can begin to nourish yourself. You can also begin to understand some of the side effects that you experience when you don’t meet your needs. Once you feed your hunger, you’ll better understand your symptoms of starvation. This can lead to profound self-forgiveness.

    Especially when you are trying to break bad habits, you can ask which needs you’re trying to meet with those habits.

    Every single self-harming action, even if it hurts you deeply, also serves you in some way. Maybe your unhealthy habits make you feel comfort, control, or even help you gain attention. The need behind each behavior is always valid, but some behaviors are more sustainable and healthy than others. By acknowledging your deeper needs, you can make a plan to consciously meet them in a healthier way.

    One thing I’ve discovered that I need is movement. I have so much energy in my body from day to day. I didn’t realize this for a long time because I expended that energy on chronic anxiety.

    When I realized that I could use my energy to be physically active, my life changed. My anxiety levels plummeted. I formulated a completely different relationship with my body. I also got a new perspective on my long struggle with eating disorders, smoking, and addiction.

    I had a basic need to control my body, to influence my physical state. I still have that need. The only difference is that, now, I’m making conscious choices about how I’m going to meet it.

    4. How can I give myself what I need?

    Once you discover what your needs are, you can begin to anticipate them and fulfill them.

    Simply to acknowledge your desires is half the work (especially if they are different from those of the people around you).

    The other half of the work is asking yourself, every day, how you can meet your needs. The key is to foresee your hunger and feed it before you feel starved. This way, you can avoid relapsing into those desperate self-destructive habits.

    5. How can I acknowledge the needs that I can’t yet meet?

    Let’s say you discover that you need more alone time than you thought. And suppose you discover this while living with four roommates. Chances are, you will not be able to meet this need overnight. However, self-love isn’t a report card on how quickly you’ve fixed your problems. It’s simply the practice of having a kinder relationship with yourself.

    You can acknowledge your frustration and your desires before taking action to address them. You can comfort yourself and assure yourself that you are going to do something about it. Remember how you’ve felt better when other people have reassured you. How can you give that kind of reassurance to yourself?

    6. How can I take responsibility for myself?

    One thing that might interrupt your journey of self-nourishing is waiting for someone or something else to save you.

    You might acknowledge your need for appreciation, but instead of taking action to meet it, you might tell yourself a story about when it will come.

    You might tell yourself to wait until some promotion, accomplishment, or event. Thus, you can lose out on valuable opportunities to love yourself.

    Start to pay attention to which needs you aren’t meeting because you’re putting them into the future or into other people’s hands. And ask yourself how you can begin to meet that need right now by yourself.

    —

    We all long to have someone be attentive to us—to really care about what we’re going through and how to make it better.

    The most beautiful part of learning to ask and answer these questions on a regular basis is this: your longing will finally be fulfilled.

    You do not need to wait for someone to make you feel like you are worth listening to and caring for. Your savior has been waiting in the mirror all along.

  • 3 Steps to a Happier Life: Interview with Kristi Ling and Book Giveaway

    3 Steps to a Happier Life: Interview with Kristi Ling and Book Giveaway

    Girl and a rainbow

    The winners for this giveaway have already been chosen. They are:

    • Stuart Dods
    • Sheldon Dwyer

    People often tell us we have to choose to be happy, but what they don’t always tell us is how.

    How do we choose happiness when we’re dealing with life’s everyday struggles and devastating traumas and tragedies?

    How can we choose happiness when we’re grappling with persistent negative thoughts and overwhelming emotions?

    What exactly do we need to do—or not do—to overcome our challenges and demons and experience more joy in our daily lives?

    Tiny Buddha contributor Kristi Ling, a renowned happiness strategist and life coach, has created an amazing resource that answers those questions.

    In her book Operation Happiness: The 3-Step Plan to Creating a Life of Lasting Joy, Abundant Energy, and Radical Bliss, Kristi shares how she rebounded from a long-term illness, a divorce, and the sudden deaths of loved ones.

    Part memoir and part how-to guide, Operation Happiness blends personal storytelling, powerful insights, and practical tools and tips to help us live happier lives.

    I’m grateful that Kristi took the time to answer some questions about her book, and also that she’s provided two free copies for Tiny Buddha readers.

    Operation Happiness CoverThe Giveaway

    To enter to win one of two free copies of Operation Happiness:

    • Leave a comment below. You don’t have to share anything specific; “count me in” is enough. But if you feel inclined, share something that always makes you happy.
    • For an extra entry, share this interview on one of your social media pages and include the link in a second comment.

    You can enter until midnight PST on Sunday, January 15th.

    The Interview

    1. Tell us a little about yourself and what inspired you to write this book.

    I’d always struggled trying to be happy until my early thirties. Then, there was a point when I became so stressed, unhappy, and unwell that I hit a wall. I knew if I didn’t do something to change, I’d stay caught in that downward spiral. So, I quit my job at that point and went on a mission to decode happiness and change my life. That mission lasted several years.

    When I finally experienced a huge positive shift after discovering that happiness is actually a skill we can learn to do, rather than just something we feel, I knew that idea needed to be shared far and wide.

    Happiness really wasn’t being talked about in this way. So, that turned into blogging, coaching, and public speaking. Things kept expanding to the point where I knew it needed to be a book, which lead to writing Operation Happiness.

    2. In your book, you wrote that happiness is a skill—something that can be learned, improved upon, and even mastered. Do you believe anyone can master this skill, even those struggling with depression and anxiety?

    Absolutely. Just as those who are suffering from depression and anxiety can learn to play a musical instrument if they dedicate themselves, they can also learn and become better at the skill of happiness through a series of new habits, mindset shifts, and practice.

    I suffered from depression and anxiety on and off all through my twenties and early thirites. I tried everything from medical treatment to yoga retreats. Some of it helped temporarily, but nothing offered the sustainable sense of happiness and wellbeing I was seeking.

    A drastic, determined, permanent change to the way I approach, view, and do life on a daily basis is what finally created the change.

    3. Why do you think depression and anxiety have been on the rise in recent years?

    Truthfully, I think in part it has to do with social media and electronic overwhelm. We’re vulnerable to more negativity, comparison, and fear energy than ever before. Not to mention hundreds of emails a week, texts, and voicemails claiming our attention and focus.

    It’s all robbing our minds of the chance to have open space. I talk quite a bit in the book about how to reduce that and turn social media and media in general into a more positive experience. Having a practice such as meditation to allow your mind time to rest and clear is more important than ever.

    I also believe the economy has been a factor these past few years. There are real struggles going on for many people. I’ve found being willing to take on some positive new habits and simple supportive shifts can be truly helpful, even in the middle of a storm.

    Happiness is always there for us, it just takes extra effort to tap into it during the tough times. Nobody wants to say that sometimes we actually have to fight for happiness, but it’s true. And, it’s worth fighting for.

    4. In your TEDx Talk, you share the story of how an illness helped you to finally find the answers you were looking for when it came to the keys for creating lasting, sustainable happiness. What was it that you discovered?

    There were two key things that created a massive shift in my happiness. One, as I mentioned, is that happiness is a skill.

    Aristotle said, “Happiness is a state of activity.” That is so true! I get a little irked when I hear the saying, “Happiness is a choice,” because I think it sends the wrong message to people who feel like they’re choosing happiness but it’s still not happening. It’s not a choice, it only begins with one—the rest involves taking action.

    The second key is the power we have to change the neuropathways in our brain to re-wire ourselves for more happiness, positivity, and self-love.

    Through focusing on and practicing these things for an extended period of time, we can literally train our minds to work that way naturally. This is called neuroplasticity, and it’s a surprisingly simple, incredible process that anyone can do.

    5. Some people make happiness look easy. Do you think some people are just naturally happy? Is it possible to become naturally happy?

    I do think some people are naturally happy, but it has much to do with lifestyle and outlook. People who are naturally optimistic are generally happier. People who meditate and exercise regularly are naturally happier.

    The good news is that by creating deliberate, positive shifts in our lives and forming habits that support happiness, we can become naturally happier.

    That’s not to say we’ll all be happy 24/7, because then we’d be robots. Even the happiest people experience sad days and occasional hard times, but the way they think about them is a bit different. They’ve developed skills to bounce back in healthy ways.

    6. Can you talk a little about the link between mindfulness and happiness?

    There is such a strong connection here. Mindfulness is about being present in the moment and paying attention to life. Noticing all that’s around us, and choosing a lens of love. Happiness is much the same.

    I truly believe that becoming more mindful is one of the most important bricks in the foundation of a happy life. There are studies that show that the quality of our consciousness and ability to be present in the moment are directly linked to the levels of happiness we feel.

    We also have the ability to choose our thoughts deliberately, and this is also part of mindfulness. Choosing positive thoughts can produce great results both physically and emotionally.

    7. You’ve experienced some major transitions in your life over the past few years, including a divorce. What do you think is the most important thing to remember when it comes to finding light during the dark times?

    That our happiness is always there for us, even under layers of darkness.

    A while back while going through a hard time, I received a fortune in a fortune cookie that said, “The cloud will rain success upon you.” This is so powerful if you think about it; because it’s not saying when the cloud is gone you’ll feel good again. It’s literally saying it will rain success upon you—while you’re under it!

    It’s about being willing to see, seek, and receive goodness when it’s still raining, even when it feels impossible. Willingness to open our hearts to love and joy when we are at our lowest points can be so supportive. It can create miraculous shifts, really. I write about this quite a bit in Operation Happiness.

    8. I think a lot of us assume if we’re feeling unhappy it means we’re doing something wrong—or that we need to change something, and fast. Do you think it’s possible to be happy all the time?

    Nobody but a cartoon character is happy all the time, and I’d even question that. I still have difficult times and even sad-for-no-reason days now and then. But, there are subtle differences for me now.

    For example, I used to feel depressed on days where I was feeling reflective. Now I feel peaceful and even joyful, because I understand the need for reflection and how important it is to examine life in order to grow. So, I embrace and honor it.

    It is true that sometimes sadness is there to tell us something important. Ignoring something that needs to be changed can sometimes bring sadness, as well as anxiety, and so can neglecting our self-care.

    I’ve learned to pay close attention to sadness when it appears. I’ve found that simply allowing myself to feel that way sometimes for short periods, rather than trying to fight it, allows it to serve its purpose and to pass. If it doesn’t pass fairly quickly, I remember what Aristotle said about happiness being an activity, and I start to take action.

    9. What would you say are the top three habits that compromise our happiness?

    This is a great question. One is looking for external things to bring happiness without first doing the work within. Yes, external things can sometimes contribute to happiness, but it’s only temporary unless we’re at peace and emotionally fit within, so this is where to focus.

    I’d say another is overlooking gratitude for what is. Gratitude is a huge source of joy, and when we’re too focused on the next accomplishment or thing, we lose out on the happiness we can feel in this moment by simply feeling grateful for what we already have. It’s very powerful.

    Finally, I’d say to take a look at your eating habits. Crappy food doesn’t just lead to feeling crappy physically, but emotionally as well.

    What we eat is directly linked to our happiness. Foods have the power to affect our brain chemistry as well as physical energy. I think this is so important that I included an entire chapter on it in my book. When we learn which foods help boost happiness and make us feel better across the board, it makes a huge difference. And, it becomes so much easier to say no to the junk.

    10. If someone is looking to be happier in his or her life, where is the first place to begin creating change?

    I think we’ve covered quite a bit here, but I’d say the best place to begin is with your mornings. The way we experience our mornings is the way we will experience life. So, focusing on those first couple hours of the day and making them positive and healthy will support you in feeling great for the rest of the day.

    Also, just focusing on those first couple of hours seems so doable, right? I love the simplicity in this concept. For me, changing my mornings truly did change my life. And, it’s something anyone can do.

    You can learn more about Operation Happiness and grab a copy on Amazon here.

    FTC Disclosure: I receive complimentary books for reviews and interviews on tinybuddha.com, but I am not compensated for writing or obligated to write anything specific. I am an Amazon affiliate, meaning I earn a percentage of all books purchased through the links I provide on this site. 

  • When You Can’t Stop Thinking About Your Past Relationships

    When You Can’t Stop Thinking About Your Past Relationships

    Woman lost in thought

    “You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.” ~Jon Kabat- Zinn

    Over the years I’ve talked to a lot of people about that one love, the one who got away, the one who it didn’t work out with, the one with whom the timing was bad.

    I’ve had these conversations with people from all age groups, including people in their seventies. I’ve had my own journey with all of the above as I traveled toward finding a life partner.

    It seems whether you stay together or not you’ll likely be in each other’s minds for quite some time in the form of thoughts, memories, or dreams. If you’re lucky they’ll be sweet, but sometimes they’re sad, hurt, confused, or angry dreams.

    Some people really struggle with this. They want their ex-lovers out of their heads forever, relegated to a dark and distant part of their minds.

    It’s as though they want them stored away in a box in their mind that they never have to open again. And I get it. Who wouldn’t want to be able to mentally exorcise a person who is associated with a painful and confusing time of your life?

    Some people are frightened or confused by the thoughts, memories, and dreams that occur, as they think remembering on old relationship means they’ve made a mistake in their current partner choice or that they haven’t moved on.

    In my case, I had daily thoughts about a couple of old relationships for about eighteen years. Yes, you read correctly, eighteen years. The thoughts would often take the form of self-recrimination or sense-making.

    “Why did that happen? Why did I do that? Why did I put up with that for so long? Why did I go back to him?”

    Essentially, these thoughts seemed to be focused on the question “What was wrong with me?” Others would be about an ex and all his decisions and choices—essentially asking “What was wrong with him?”

    Some thoughts would be re-doing the past—how I could have handled it, what I should have done, what could I have done better.

    Sometimes they would just be memories, triggered by going to certain places or someone asking, “Have you ever been here, done that,” etc. Sometimes my mind would wonder what it would be like if it the relationship had worked out.

    I’ve generally been accepting of thoughts, memories, or dreams of past relationships popping into my head. I’ve never seen it as a sign of not being ready to be with someone else, and rarely have I tried to get rid of the memories. Mostly I think it’s because I accepted that this is what minds do when something major happens.

    Getting vulnerable, intimate, and allowing yourself to form an attachment to someone is a major event for your mind. When it doesn’t work out, your mind interprets it as threatening.

    Your mind recognizes the hurt feelings associated with a breakup as a threat and then starts a plan to protect you from ever experiencing such a hurt again. So it throws it thoughts, memories, and dreams at you from time to time—in part to help you process the relationship but also to remind you to be careful to not get in the same situation again, in order to protect you from hurt.

    Also, minds tend to believe that by thinking and worrying they can make sense or find a solution to the breakup, the “what went wrong” of it all. Again, the mind is always looking for the facts to protect you in the future. Sometimes it’s helpful, sometimes it’s just seems annoying and repetitive.

    What can you do to handle thoughts and dreams about past relationships?

    1. Accept that it is normal and natural to have thoughts, memories, and dreams about your exes.

    Don’t read too much into it. Just see it as what minds do.

    2. Avoid acting on thoughts, dreams, and impulses associated with exes.

    Don’t call, message, or make a decision to get back together based on random thoughts or dreams. This is probably not a sign; it’s just your mind doing what minds do.

    3. If you feel strong emotion with the thoughts, memories, or dreams, write it down.

    Writing it down allows us to take one step back and defuses the emotion somewhat. Then engage yourself in something fun or interesting. Get busy.

    4. Know that eventually you will think less and less about it.

    In the acute stage of a breakup you almost can’t stop thinking about the relationship, but over time the thoughts become less prominent and less painful. Trust that this will continue to happen over time. This will happen more quickly if you don’t engage regularly with your ex. Let the distance help you disengage.

    5. Avoid punishing yourself with self-critical thoughts.

    Like “how could I not see that, I’m stupid,” etc. Remind yourself that it is normal to want to be loved.

    6. Reflect on the positives the relationship gave you.

    All relationships teach you something. Remind yourself it was not a waste of time; it was just time, it was just part of your story.

    One of my significant relationships ended with a great deal of hurt because of cheating and lies, but I don’t regret it. I learned a lot in that experience—life lessons that I keep with me even today.

    For example, I learned that I could survive betrayal and the emptiness that comes with the loss of love—that the pain lessens in time. I learned that when the cost is too great, you must let go of love, even if a part of you may not want to. And I learned that in addition to love and attraction, you need to have shared values.

    Still, knowing that I’ve learned from all my relationships doesn’t make it any easier to stop thinking about them.

    For example, I spent quite a bit of time wondering why someone said, in breaking up with me, that he needed to spend more time with his dog. (Yes, that really did happen.) That memory came with a special combination of disbelief and hurt for some time. These days I think that story is kind of funny in a “was that the best you could come up with?” kind of a way.

    These thoughts, amongst others, are now faded memories that I take with me in life, the good and the bad. I see them each as just another chapter in my story. They are part of me, but they don’t define me.

    Some relationships endings are particularly painful. If you are significantly troubled by an old relationship—if you have difficulty disengaging from an ex-partner or have been affected by serious relationship trauma such as domestic violence—it’s a good idea to see a psychologist or relationship counselor to help you work through the letting go and moving forward.

    No matter how hard your breakup, one day it will be just another chapter in your story too.

  • Meeting Grief with Mindfulness: How Embracing Pain Opens the Door to Joy

    Meeting Grief with Mindfulness: How Embracing Pain Opens the Door to Joy

    North of Blue Girl

    “We shake with joy, we shake with grief.  What a time they have, these two housed as they are in the same body.” ~Mary Oliver

    Mindfulness is a way of relating to our experience that opens us to the totality of it—that is, we learn to embrace it all, the joy and the heartache. But some experiences are harder to be with.

    It’s difficult to be with physical or emotional pain, and we often retreat to the mind in search of distractions. But when we are able to fully be with our experience, something that feels like magic happens.

    It was a Thursday morning at 5am when I received news of my mother’s illness. She was septic and in the ICU at her local hospital.

    I knew that sepsis was serious, but also that it’s treatable, especially for someone her age (sixty-nine). So after speaking with my aunt, who was with her, I went about my day.

    I nagged my kids to put on their shoes, as per usual, then got them off to school and ate breakfast. I had a lot to do that day. I also had plans to help a friend move some boxes to her new apartment. The thought of my mom in the hospital accompanied me like a curious stranger throughout my morning.

    It was an odd day in late April. The sun was out, but it was colder than what is usual for that time of year.

    I was standing outside near my car as my friend and her husband hauled some of their boxes up to the stairs to their new apartment. The quality of the air caught my attention—it was so clean—and I wandered over to a small field between two houses.

    Standing there, I thought of my mom and the gravity of her situation. It saturated my body, and mind and seemed to demand my full attention, as if imploring me to stay and be it.

    For a moment everything fell silent. Looking out at the field, it sparkled from tiny flakes of snow that had touched its surface and liquefied. There were a few goats munching contentedly on grass.

    I breathed in deep. I felt my feet on the ground and the breath entering and leaving my body. My eyes filled with tears and there was a deep knowing about the seriousness of my mother’s condition, despite overwhelming belief from others that she would get through it.

    “I feel like this is it,” I cried to my husband the following day.

    The evening before, her cardiologist had come bounding into her room while I was on the phone with my aunt. We had been weighing whether and when I should travel there, but we’d decided to wait a couple of days to see how the infection responded to treatment.

    When her doctor came in he was nothing but optimistic. “Her heart is strong!” he bellowed, loud enough for me to hear through the phone. Despite his unwavering optimism, something was off. She was almost completely unresponsive, despite her stable vital signs.

    “Your mom always seems to get better,” was my husband’s response. And he was right. She’d had poor health for many, many years. Nothing terminal, but a lot of chronic, autoimmune conditions.

    “I think she’s going to be fine,” he said.

    “I don’t know. This time feels different.” I said.

    I booked a ticket to the US to leave a day later. The plan was to stay one night with my dad, then pick up my little brother in Chicago, and together we would make the six-plus hour journey down to El Paso, TX, where my mom had been living for the past two years to be closer to her sister.

    The morning after arriving in Chicago, as I was organizing myself to leave to pick up my brother, my aunt sent a text asking me to call her immediately. My mom had gone into cardiac arrest. “They’ve been trying to resuscitate her for the past twenty minutes,” she said “Do we keep trying?”

    Suddenly I was there, standing in my body inside of that moment I had so feared as a child. Not only was I facing the death of my mother, but I had been given the gavel to make the decision to release her from life. It wasn’t a difficult decision, just utterly heartbreaking. I could hear every sound in the room, including the sound of my own heart beating powerfully.

    “Let her go,” I managed to say.

    I hung up the phone, told my dad she was gone, and went outside to fall apart.

    A few minutes later, my aunt called back. They’d managed to bring her back, though it wouldn’t be for long. Their hope was to keep her alive long enough for us to say goodbye. So my aunt had both my brother and I talk into each of her ears from two different phones.

    We could hear each other speaking as we told her the last things we would ever wish her to know. The hissing and beeping sounds of the ventilator and heart monitor played in the background.

    “Mom, I promise you, Aaron will never be alone,” I cried. (She had always worried so much about him.) “I am and will always be his family. I love you and I will miss you, and I promise that my children will know you. Please know that you can go now, if you need to. We will be okay.”

    “Mom,” my brother cried, “Thank you for making me the man that I am today. Man, I’m going to miss you so much. I love you, mom.”

    She was gone, but our trip to Texas was still ahead of us. I must have cried in every shop, restaurant, airport check-in, airport terminal, and bathroom we went that day.  

    At the airport in Chicago, while waiting to board our flight to Atlanta, I studied a woman sitting across from me. She was sitting perched at the edge of her seat, holding an iPad. Her hands were older and painted with liver spots and wrinkles that revealed their character.

    They reminded me of my mom’s hands, which were always adorned with mismatched rings of turquoise and fake gold. I had even taken a picture of her hands once so that I would always remember their contours.

    I imagined this woman as my mother—the version of her that was alive and healthy and traveling to see me in Switzerland, which is something that in my eight years here she would never do.

    I held onto my brother and cried. In silent moments, I thought of her and I thought of the difficult life she had lived, and I cried. I faced the truth, and I cried.

    Grief is such an urgent and forceful energy. It’s immediate and demanding when it arrives. In fact, it is so powerful a human emotion that some cultures have rituals around grief that enable them to confront and express it, and the storm within our bodies and minds that it stirs up. 

    The truth is, grief is the word that we use to describe the indescribable, visceral heartbreak we feel in the face of loss. The pain of that loss is so big that it demands expression.

    “How about unabashedly bawling your eyes out. How about grieving it all one at a time.” These are lyrics from a song that speaks to this experience. “Thank you, India,” by Alanis Morrisette.

    The questions in the song are rhetorical invitations to consider what it might be like if we were to embrace it all—the pain, the sadness, the love, the joy, the grief. All of it. Without the evaluation of our experience, without our thoughts adding layers of guilt, shame, or embarrassment when the urge arises to express it. Despite the thoughts that tell us that to be strong means to not break down.

    The truth is that a powerful emotion, when embraced, is the stuff of magic.

    And yet there’s really nothing magical about it. It goes something like this: The energy of an emotion begins to build within us and we have a choice: meet it at the door and engage with it, or turn our backs to it. Turning our backs doesn’t make it go away.  

    When we can meet grief at the door with mindfulness, the grief is allowed its full expression. We experience the emotion just as it is. Our bodies become animated by it; our chest rises and falls, our eyes fill with salty tears that soak the clothing we’re wearing. Like a wave it rises and rises, only to fall away again.

    The thing is, our body is actually calmed by the expression of grief, if we allow it. And the calm that follows is like a return to the flow of life and has the quality of magic, but it is also a real physiological phenomenon.

    Some people turn grief away at the door, while others invite it in to make itself at home in our lives. Our ability to work with grief mindfully means to simultaneously meet the powerful force of grief when it arrives, and let it move through us, unimpeded by the thoughts that would turn it into a story about our sadness.

    Behind each wave of grief that I met with mindfulness was this vast space that opened up around my experience; and beyond the grief was this sense of joy and gratitude for this precious life.

    In the end, the infection broke my mother’s heart. For a woman who could “never be loved enough,” this was not insignificant. Her death was painful due to the numerous medical interventions they’d attempted to save her in the last days of her life. She suffered a lot, both mentally and physically, in her life and in her death.

    There were, in fact, many truths about that experience that were very painful to be with. So many moments during that trip that brought me to my knees. I was between devastation and celebration, anger and frustration, and utter acceptance over the events of my mother’s life and death. But all of these truths I held at once in the presence of mindfulness.

    The wide open space of experience that mindfulness made possible taught me how inadequate any definition of what she was to me seemed.

    Stories that had told of both the good and bad aspects of being in relationship with a person were turned on their heads, and the good and bad seemed to blend into something much more nebulous and value-free. A rich tapestry of a life lived on this planet and all that comes with that experience.

    Some months later, grief still comes to the door now and again seeking expression. It follows an image, or accompanies a song. I meet it with mindfulness and allow it what it needs. And once it has passed through me, it’s no longer blocking the doorway. I can see out to where joy is still standing.

  • How to Start Loving the Parts of Yourself You Don’t Like

    How to Start Loving the Parts of Yourself You Don’t Like

    Love yourself

    “To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

    The sun was breaking into my living room as I was sitting at my dining table, viewing a video that I had just recorded for my Facebook group. It was the first one I took, two minutes long, and there were ten more waiting to be recorded.

    I had just pressed the play button to see how I look and sounded, and boy, was I in for a surprise.

    I kid you not, I felt like I was watching Gargamel from The Smurfs and not me. The only thing I could see, over the entire screen, was my big, bumpy nose. The bump was distracting enough that I literally didn’t hear a word I said.

    All I could hear was my inner voice, loudly ranting, “Oh my goodness, look at that nose! Do I really look like that?! This is horrible! Hideous! I can’t look like that in all of my videos, I just can’t! Eeww!!” I was shocked.

    I snapped out of it and thought, “I need to fix this!”

    I marched straight to my bathroom, took out my makeup bag, and started searching though my eyeshadows and foundations like a maniac.

    I had never tried contouring in my life. I had seen only two video tutorials, and thought “damn, that’s a lot of work,” but this was obviously one of those “there’s a first time for everything” moments.

    Trying to remember how to do it, I took some light shades, some dark ones, and started applying. Put a little here, a bit there, and after ten minutes of playing around… Mamma MIA! Will you look at that? I fixed my nose. I am A GENIUS!   

    I proudly cat walked into my living room, sat down in front of that blinking camera, and recorded a new video with my new, straight, slim nose.

    It looked fantastic while I was recording. Then I pressed play to watch the video and was in for another surprise.

    Again, I didn’t hear a word I said in that video. Then, anger took me over. I was disappointed in myself.

    My inner voice kicked in again, louder than before: “This is not you. This is not the person I know. It’s a nice nose, but… Where am I? This is not me. And what’s next, are you gonna fix your lips for the next video so they look bigger?”

    I didn’t care about my nose anymore. I didn’t care about the perfect lines, nor the perfect lighting. The only thing I could think was that I’m someone who encourages others to practice self-love, and yet here I was, in shame, trying to camouflage the part I didn’t like just so I could feel better.

    This isn’t loving yourself. This isn’t embracing all parts of yourself. This isn’t living authentically. 

    I pressed stop and thought “Scr*w this!” Then I went to the bathroom and cleaned my face with the biggest grin on. Seeing the real me in the mirror, I felt pride because I could be me. Freely.

    I calmly walked into my living room one last time and recorded the most honest, openhearted, all natural video. Me and my bumpy nose. I posted it straight away—the first take. No editing, no pimping. And the responses I got from them were beautiful.

    I think a lot of us feel the way I did way too often, which is why I want to share with you what I shared with them: How to turn the parts you don’t like about yourself into your most beloved ones. How to love and accept them.

    On days when you feel like this, here’s what you can do to feel better and more loving.

    1. Realize that you took the wrong turn.

    My reaction came from the urge to hide my imperfection. I felt ashamed of how I looked and I wanted to cover it.

    I wanted to look prettier, but not because I felt the need, like we all do, to feel great or look amazing for some special occasion.

    Had my desire to put on makeup come from me wanting to emphasize my gifts, look a bit different, and play with my beauty, I would be okay with that.

    But that wasn’t the case. I rejected myself. I told myself I was hideous. I wanted to be fixed. Like I was broken and there was something wrong with me. This wasn’t the first time I did this.

    For a long time, I was ashamed because I “felt too much.” People constantly told me, “Oh, you and your emotions! You’re such a cry baby!”

    It took me a while to accept that part of me, to accept that I am highly emotional. Today I can say I simply love my emotions, good and bad. I made them my number one guiding system through life. They always tell me if something’s right or wrong for me and always help me to make right choices and decisions.

    We can feel such shame. But for what? What good does it bring us?

    If you come from the place of “there’s something wrong with me,” know that it’s a sign you took a wrong turn—you turned to shaming and blaming yourself.

    Realize that there is nothing wrong with you. We all feel like there is once in a while.

    Befriend yourself with the thought that we are all perfect just as we are, with our imperfections. Some imperfections we accept, and some we use as opportunities to grow. My nose or wild mood swings, your smile or silly quirks, her lips, his chin, our fears, our dreams—it’s all as it should be. Unique and perfect in their imperfection.

    2. Hear the words you say to yourself.

    It amazes me how mean we can be to ourselves. The words we say in our minds can be the cruellest. Would you ever tell a friend (or anyone, actually) “OMG, look at you! You look horrible! You are hideous!”?

    You wouldn’t, would you?

    If your friend was feeling ugly that day, you would probably remind her how amazing she is, tell her that her beauty is way deeper than her skin, and that you adore exactly the parts of her that she didn’t like (just like my closest friend told me “I love your nose!” right after she saw my video). Because this is how you talk to your loved ones.

    So, why don’t you try talking to yourself the same way—like you’d talk to a loved one?

    Look in the mirror and say something like, “I am aware that you feel ugly/stupid/alone/(insert your own) today. So sorry to hear that. You remember that day when you were glowing, and felt so good, even your friends told you, ‘What’s up with you today, you are shining!’ That’s you as well. Know that you are beautiful inside and out, whether you feel it today or not. I love you nonetheless.”

    Go on, give it a try.

    Because how you feel comes from what you say to yourself.

    Start practicing kind conversations with yourself. You are a kind person, I’m sure, so I bet there are a lot of loving things you could say to yourself.

    3. Know that it’s okay to have good and bad days.

    Some days, when you catch a reflection of yourself, your first thought is going to be “Oh, hello there good looking!!” And you’ll smile, maybe even wink.

    But on some days, you will wake up in the morning, look at your reflection, and say “Awful!”

    Both of these days are perfectly okay.

    We can’t be 100% self-loving and self-accepting every day of the year and every minute of our day. That’s life.

    Loving yourself is a continuous practice. It’s a way of living. It’s something that you cultivate every day. On days when you don’t like yourself, know that it’s just that—a moment when you don’t feel so good. It’s not the first time and it certainly won’t be the last time.

    Instead of adding insults and making yourself feel even worse about it, acknowledge it and remind yourself that it will pass. Perhaps blow your reflection a kiss. A kiss always feels nice.

    Trust that it will pass. Because now you’re practicing kindness and self-love (loving all parts of you). You’re working on it. You got this.

    4. Decide that it’s a matter of a choice.

    When we reject a part of ourselves, we deepen that sense of unworthiness. Every time you do this, you cut the wound deeper and fall further into a hole of self-loathing.

    I wasn’t going to let myself fall deeper down that hole.

    I looked at my imperfect self in the mirror and said, “Today I hated a part of me and it was my nose. Now, I choose to own, love, and accept that part of me. Today, I love and accept myself just as I am.”

    In that moment I felt immensely self-loving. I felt free from judgments and self-criticism.

    Some days I don’t feel that way. I say these words and I don’t feel that instant rush of love. It might happen to you as well. And that’s okay.

    On days like those, you can say: “Now, I am willing to try to accept and love that part, too. I am willing to try to accept and love myself just as I am.”

    —

    I hope my story and this post will inspire you to start looking at the parts of yourself you don’t like in a different light—not to push and hide them away, or be ashamed of them, but to completely love and accept them. For I am most sure they are the parts that make you lovable exactly as you are.

    Which parts are you willing to own, love, and accept today?

  • 8 Ridiculously Easy Ways to Get (or Stay) in Shape

    8 Ridiculously Easy Ways to Get (or Stay) in Shape

    “The secret of living well and longer is: eat half, walk double, laugh triple, and love without measure.” ~Tibetan Proverb

    For a lot of my life, my weight was a source of great stress.

    Growing up, I was the frequently taunted chubby kid in class. Unlike my sister, who always chose strawberry-flavored everything, I leaned toward chocolate and spent way too much time sitting in front of a TV.

    I had a potbelly (which made me look like a pregnant eight-year-old) that only slightly deflated when a growth spurt shot me up to the towering height of 5’1½”.

    In my adolescence, teens, and early twenties, I struggled with bulimia—a misguided attempt to reclaim my self-esteem through thinness and control the only thing I felt I could control, my weight.

    In the years since I recovered, I’ve learned to value my body, not just for how it looks but also for what it does for me, and to take good care of it.

    When we take care of our bodies, we feel stronger, more energized, and more capable. We breathe and sleep better. We decrease our risk of developing certain diseases, increase our life span, and improve our mood and focus.

    We also open ourselves up to a world of possibilities. When you’re fit, you’re free to weigh your options based on what excites you, not based on your physical limitations.

    Rock climbing sound interesting? You can give it a try and see! Considering a dance class? Why not! Dreaming of doing a marathon or walking tours through your favorite European cities? Sure, you can handle it!

    There’s little more liberating than knowing that you can do what you want to do—that you have the strength, energy, and stamina to experience something that may blow your hair back and make you feel exhilarated and alive.

    That’s what being fit does for us. And that’s why I now do my best to move every day, and also to eat a mostly healthy diet.

    Since this is a popular month for implementing a new exercise plan, I thought it would be the perfect time to share some of my own fitness practices. Perhaps one or more of these will help you get moving and get (or stay) in shape.

    1. Get your 10,000 steps without leaving your living room.

    I first learned about the benefits of walking 10,000 daily steps—the default goal for Fitbit users—back when I worked in mobile marketing. As part of a promotion for pedometers, a team of us covered the country on foot over a three-month period.

    Prior to that time, it had never occurred to me that walking was a viable way to stay fit and healthy (or that it could be fun and exciting). It just seemed too low impact to count as exercise—but count it does!

    Not only does walking improve our overall health and decrease our risk of heart disease, it can also boost our mood and energy and reduce stress, since it has a meditative quality.

    While I prefer to walk outside, since I find it calming to be in nature and enjoy seeing the houses in my neighborhood, there are days when I just can’t make it happen. On those occasions, I find short bursts of time throughout my day to walk in place.

    Most often I’ll do this while working on my laptop or watching a show, if it’s the end of the night and I’m unlikely to do anything else. Is it the best workout in the world? No. But it’s something, and something is always better than nothing. That leads me to my next suggestion…

    2. Give yourself permission to do an incredibly short workout.

    If you’re an all-or-nothing person, like me, you may feel like it’s not worth going to the gym unless you’re going to do a full workout, whatever that looks like for you.

    For me, that would include at least thirty minutes on an elliptical, weights, crunches, and a couple of leg machines. But there are some days when I don’t have the time or energy to do all of those things.

    Recently I’ve been telling myself it’s okay to do fifteen minutes on the elliptical and crunches, and call it a day. Oftentimes I end up doing more than that, but giving myself permission to do the bare minimum helps get me out the door.

    3. Pair exercises with daily activities.

    I know this might seem like an odd recommendation from someone who promotes mindfulness, but I have found it very effective to multitask certain activities that I do daily. For example, I usually do squats while drying my hair.

    This ensures I do multiple reps, since I have several minutes to work with, and also decreases the likelihood that I’ll forget to do my squats, since I’ve linked them to an activity I do every day, without fail.

    Some other ideas to consider:

    • Before putting your Swiffer or broom back, use it as an oblique bar and do a set or two of ab twists.
    • Before cooking, use cans, bottles, bags of rice, or other food items as weights; hold one in each hand and lift your arms out to the side twenty-five times.
    • If you have stairs in your home, every time you need to go up, come down and go back up again, doubling your steps climbed.
    • Do leg lifts or squats while brushing your teeth.

    4. Look into a standing desk.

    Whether you work from home, like I do, or do any kind of computer work in the evening, a standing desk ensures you spend less time sitting. And as they say, sitting is the new smoking. No, I didn’t make that up. “They” really do say it!

    We’re spending far more time sitting than ever before, between driving, working in offices, and binge watching Netflix at night; and it’s increasing our risk of developing a host of different illnesses, such as cancer, heart disease, and Type 2 diabetes.

    If you can’t afford to buy a standing desk, you can easily make your own by piling a bunch of boxes on your dining room table and placing your laptop on top.

    I use this same set up when exercising on a portable elliptical machine—a small piece of equipment that cost me about $100, takes up very little space, and offers a nice alternative to walking in place.

    5. Trade your office chair for a stability ball.

    You may or may not be able to do this at work, but at the very least, you can consider this a viable alternative to a standing desk at home.

    Sitting on exercise ball ensures you keep your spine long, since that’s crucial for balancing, and it also tones your core. Experts recommend using a stability ball in place of a chair for twenty to thirty minute increments, since sitting on a ball puts increased load on your lower spine.

    If you’re anything like me, you may also prefer using a stability ball for crunches to lying on the ground. You work more core muscles balancing on a ball, and it’s a lot easier on your spine, since it’s soft.

    6. Combine exercise and stress relief.

    When I first found yoga in my mid-twenties, I quickly got hooked. After every class I left feeling dramatically calmer, less anxious, and more at peace with myself. And the benefits of class bled into my daily life. When situations arose that would ordinarily cause me stress, I was able to cope with far less internal drama. When your workout simultaneously eases your mental anguish, it’s pretty easy to make it a habit.

    If you think yoga could be a good fit for you, there are tons of different options to meet your individual needs, from hot yoga (far more intense) to restorative yoga (a much gentler practice). You can practice at a studio, in a gym that offers classes, or even find some videos on YouTube to try at home.

    Whether you do a ninety-minute class or a ten-minute video, you’ll see benefits, and will likely get hooked!

    7. Give up the good parking spots.

    I always enjoy integrating easy exercise into my daily life, whether that means taking the stairs instead of the escalator or walking instead of driving.

    When I’m going somewhere specific, it doesn’t feel like a chore—just a way to get from A to B. And I generally enjoy walking outside, since there’s always something around me that catches my interest.

    One easy way to get a little extra exercise is to leave a little early, wherever you’re going, and park a fifteen-minute walk away. This ensures a total of a half-hour of walking. And the best part, you can’t bail on the second half—at least not if you want to get home!

    8. Plank your way to a tighter core.

    I loathe crunches with a passion. As I mentioned, I mind them less with a stability ball, but I don’t have one at home, since my space is limited. So on days when I don’t go to the gym, I plank to tone my core.

    I started by holding the plank for just fifteen seconds, and then every couple of days increased the time by five seconds until I eventually got up to two minutes.

    My stomach isn’t back to what it was before I had fibroid surgery several years back (and it may never be), but the combination of planks, oblique twists, and crunches has dramatically tightened my core.

    —

    I’m a big fan of mixing up my exercise routine, allowing myself lots of options—from hiking, to biking at the beach, to doing yoga or cardio at the gym, to moving in my own home—and I think that’s been the key to my consistency.

    When you give yourself choices to meet your varied moods and needs, you’re far more likely to move regularly. And at the end of the day, that’s all that really matters: that you do something, every day, to get your blood pumping.

    When you do this, you’re far more likely to feel strong in mind and body, good in your skin, and capable of doing whatever you want to do.

  • How to Set New Year’s Goals You’ll Actually Enjoy Pursuing

    How to Set New Year’s Goals You’ll Actually Enjoy Pursuing

    “Intentions and goals are tools for liberation. But when we use goal-chasing like a hammer, it can beat up on our self-esteem, relationships, and creativity.” ~ Danielle Laporte

    Every year, we set out to reach new goals and change our lives. This may mean finally meeting that girlfriend or boyfriend, achieving the dream body, or increasing our salary. Or maybe it’s all three, and a bit more. Whatever combination of goals we have, they help us see how we want to live out our year.

    But we can get obsessed with reaching them, so much so that we start to lament that we aren’t already where we want to be. Goals may inspire us, but they can just as easily drain us.

    Over time, I’ve come to realize that this isn’t because goals are wrong. It’s because, for many of us, our approach to them is completely misaligned.

    My Story with Conventional Goals

    For four years, I struggled using standard goal setting ideas that got me nowhere. I experienced psychological pressure and pain from always feeling like I would never be enough, until I reached some magically self-created utopia through achieving my goals.

    I never ended up accomplishing most of them.

    I remember desperately working to be fit for a fitness test; training so hard that I ended up giving myself a chronic heel injury that I still have to this day. In reaching for my goals like they’d somehow make me complete, I pushed myself past my limit. With every goal I had, this theme would repeat itself. I went after each goal like it’d make me or break me.

    Maybe growing up in a home with domestic violence, year after year, made me go after my goals with the idea that achieving them would heal me. Maybe feeling out of place every time I visited my divorced father’s home left its mark on me.

    Perhaps it was these early experiences that unwittingly forced me to pursue goals in my adult years with the sentiment that they’d make me “complete.” That I’d finally be okay after I reached X, Y, or Z.

    But eventually, after nearly half a decade, I realized that goals aren’t about belonging, or reaching a safe place. They’re not there so that I can prove myself to anyone, even myself. They’re just there to help me move forward, to grow, and become a better person, however simplistic that may sound.

    It’s through my failures, pains, and wins, and countless hours of study on this topic, that I’ve learned various remarkable secrets to achieving your New Year’s Goals.

    Compass Goals Changed Everything For Me

    Over the course of 2016, I managed to achieve several different goals. They include reading over seventy books, improving my income, traveling to various countries, and reaching something that’s a lot closer to my dream body.

    But more importantly, I achieved my goals in a far more grounded way. Compared to previous years, I felt more excited throughout my journey. I didn’t feel like I was grasping and yearning helplessly, with flailing arms, for my goals. The beautiful side effect of that was that I was less wrapped up in my own bubble, which meant I was finally able to forgive someone who hurt me deeply.

    I share all of this to show you that positive internal change is more than possible, even with the deepest experiences of disappointment—year after year. No matter how many times you’ve felt like a failure before. No matter how many times you haven’t stuck to your goals.

    With a more optimal approach, you can move happily toward your goals with an acceptance of the present—and the recognition that you don’t need to prove who you are to yourself. That will extend itself beautifully to the benefit of those around you.

    Compass Goals vs. Traditional Goals

    A goal becomes a compass goal when it improves your present in a meaningful, exciting way. It’s there to teach you something about yourself and the world, but you’re not too attached to the outcome you’re going after.

    With a series of compass goals, life becomes a mixture of interconnecting wormholes that move you toward greater growth and fulfilment.

    Pursuing goals is a lot like riding a bicycle toward different destinations. You need to know when to speed up, based on the terrain that’s in front of you. You need to know when to slow down, based on the obstacles you eventually come to face. And you have to make those decisions while remembering that you want to get to those various places on time—while maintaining your sanity throughout the journey.

    Even more importantly, you need to know if a goal or destination is even worth going for in the first place. You can’t take a trip to a planned destination lightly, and some goals will take longer to reach. The exploration we’re about to delve into will show you exactly how to decide which of your goals are worth going for, and how to go about pursuing them.

    But first, let’s make something clear.

    Your Life Will Always Be About the Climb

    There’s this idea in our culture that suggests that we’ll magically “make it” once we achieve a certain milestone. It could be anything from releasing a viral video, winning American Idol, or joining an NBA Team.

    Through the slipstream of celebrity culture, with rap songs with lyrics “mummy, I made it,” we’ve been subtly co-opted into this idea that our very sense of self-worth, and who we are, is dependent on reaching some magical dreamland.

    But this is merely an illusion. One that, I regret to say, I succumbed to for over four years. But while reaching a goal can radically improve the quality of your life, it’s not the end-all and be-all.

    Let me use four big goals to show you why you will never “make it” and why you should be thankful:

    • After reading x amount of books in a year, it will be your job to internalize the lessons from what you read so that they lead to an improvement in your character.
    • You’ve gained ten pounds of muscle and feel great. Now you need to make sure you maintain your muscle mass, which means you’ll have to continue training at the gym, in some form, for the rest of your life.
    • Now that you’ve doubled your income, you’ll have to keep working at the same level to maintain your salary.
    • Meeting the love of your life has countless benefits. But now you’ll have to put in time and effort to help make that relationship thrive.

    Every goal achieved brings with it a new set of responsibilities. Life keeps moving forward, regardless of which destination you reach. Once you understand this, you can take goals off the pedestal, so to speak, so that you get after them with greater confidence.

    Qualify your Goal to see if it’s a Compass Goal

    While the destination does matter, compass goals, by their very nature, value the journey just as much. So, whenever you set yourself a goal, imagine you’re about to jump on a bike to set off to a new destination and ask yourself these four questions, before kicking your foot on the pedal:

    The Compass Goals Checklist:

    1. Is this goal something I can see myself pursuing with excitement, despite its difficulty? Does it give me rewards along the way?

    2. Can I write a set of daily or weekly actions that I’ll stick to consistently, adjusting them when necessary until I reach my goal?

    3. Do I have a way of measuring my progress? (Compass—more on this later)

    4. Will I be okay with not getting the outcome I want because I recognize how much value this journey will provide me with regardless?

    The last question (being okay with not reaching the result) helps you relieve an enormous amount of pressure. If you’re okay with not getting the result you want in advance, you don’t live in a make-it-or-break-it paradigm. Instead, you live in a playground that leaves you free to achieve something if you’re willing to do what it takes.

    It’s okay to have burning desires, but they only help us if they’re tempered in the right way. Paradoxically, it’s only by letting go of the outcomes we seek (while working toward them) that we’re freer and likelier to achieve them.

    If you answered yes to all these four questions, then you have successfully created a compass goal.

    Looking back, it’s easy for me to see why I didn’t achieve a lot of the goals I went after. I would have relieved myself of continual heartache had I asked myself these four questions before setting my goals.

    How Many Compass Goals Should You Have?

    You’ll want to pick between no more than three to ten compass goals per year, across the different areas of your life. The tricky part is making sure they’re all aligned with each other. So, as an exaggerated example, you can’t travel across the world for six months and aim to double your income the same year.

    Common Goal Categories

    • Wealth
    • Health
    • Love
    • Knowledge
    • Travel
    • Community

    Compass goals don’t work nearly as effectively unless you write them down with a planned completion date and assign a category to them. You also want to make sure you can see them every day so that you’re continually excited about them.

    Develop a Map for Each Compass Goal

    Writing the goals you want to go for and qualifying them with the four-question checklist is one of the secrets to achieving your New Year’s goals. But for every destination, you need a map.

    Let’s explore three examples to demonstrate how to build a map for each of your goals.

    If it’s your compass goal to burn five pounds of fat, then your map could look something like:

    • My Why: To feel light and athletic
    • Action 1: I eat three cups of vegetables and drink at least eight glasses of water per day
    • Action 2: I go to the gym three times per week and do one cardio session every Saturday
    • Compass: I weigh myself every Monday to keep track of how much weight I’m losing

    If it’s your compass goal to read fifty-two books by the end of the year, then your map might look something like:

    • My Why: To become more knowledgeable on areas that will help those around me
    • Action 1: I listen to an audiobook on one of my commutes to work every week
    • Action 2: I carve out thirty minutes each day in the evening to read
    • Compass: I use Goodreads.com weekly to keep track of the books I am reading

    If it’s your compass goal to increase your salary by $500, then your map might look something like:

    • My Why: To help improve my sense of freedom
    • Action 1: I try to sell three things in my home each month
    • Action 2: I spend one hour a week looking for freelance roles
    • Compass: I write down how much I’ve earned every two weeks to see how much more money I’m making

    There might end up being more to it than that. For the weight loss goal, for instance, you might try to sleep more. For the reading challenge, you might make a list of books you want to read. For the income goal, you might end up negotiating your salary.

    Yet all you need to do is define your compass for each goal (your measuring tool) and write two of the most important actions you’ll be consistently taking, along with your why (your intrinsic motivation)—the rest will happen naturally.

    The four-step plan (map) you outline at the beginning of the year for each of your compass goals is the plan that will get you started. But the closer you get to achieving a goal, the likelier you’ll have to adjust your actions to make continual progress.

    Obstacles may inevitably intervene. You may feel like you’re running out of steam. You might have to take a detour. But by continually using your compasses, you’ll remain ready to make the appropriate adjustments to steer you back in the right direction.

    Why You Need a Compass for Each of Your Goals

    A compass lets you see how close you are to your destination so that you can make adjustments that will take you to your goal faster. Without one, you won’t arrive where you want nearly as quickly, and you might even get lost along the way.

    Using a compass regularly reminds you to stay motivated and on track throughout the year. It encourages you think of creative ideas on how to reach your goals more effectively.

    With the common SMART goals approach, you’re told to set a deadline for each goal so that you’re stretched. But developing a map and compass for each of your goals is more important than having a planned completion date.

    Alas, use deadlines, but use them to fuel your goals rather than constrain you. Also, make sure you don’t give yourself too much time to achieve a goal in a year. The journey, similarly to riding a bike, is a lot more fun where you go faster—and that’s why deadlines are useful.

    To Summarize the Main Takeaways…

    1. Understand the value of your goals; while the achievement counts for something, who you become along the way is more important. Don’t let your goals run you, run your goals.

    2. Realize there is no end-point; achieving goals doesn’t mean “you’ve made it.” You’ll always be striving for growth in different areas of your life.

    3. Every goal achieved brings with it a set of new responsibilities, so be willing to take those responsibilities in advance. Don’t choose a goal lightly.

    4. Qualify your goals with the four questions to determine if you have a traditional goal or a compass goal. A traditional goal will prod at your self-esteem and make you feel unfulfilled along the way. A compass goal is lighter and makes you enjoy the journey.

    5. Pick between three and ten compass goals for each year and categorize them—e.g.: health, wealth, love—so that you can see where they influence your life. Read them daily so that they’re always there to energize you.

    6. Develop a map for each of your goals by deciding on your why, two consistent actions, and your compass. Adjust your actions at the appropriate time if you stop seeing progress through your compass.

    7. Use your compasses for your goals either weekly, or biweekly to continually assess how close you are to reaching them.

    My Last Words

    Many of us make goals more important than sharing love with those around us, living by our values, and appreciating what we have. Over the last half a decade, I’ve come to learn that goals are only worth having if they can enrich our lives right now. Because how we consistently experience the present will always determine the beauty of what we reap.

    I hope this piece helps you go after your goals this year with a renewed sense of vitality and excitement.

    The philosophies in this article were shaped by my life but also by some great authors. I’d like to especially thank: Scott Adams, James Clear, and Danielle Laporte for the way they’ve influenced my thinking.

  • A Little Appreciation Can Go a Long Way in Your Relationships

    A Little Appreciation Can Go a Long Way in Your Relationships

    Couple on the beach

    “There is more hunger for love and appreciation in this world than bread.” ~Mother Teresa

    I’ve been in a relationship with my boyfriend for over four years. We’ve had our fair share of great times and not so pretty moments, but this summer our relationship was put to the test.

    During that time, I went through some major transitions with my career and personal development, all things that needed to happen for me to be the best version of myself.

    Those months were filled with long hours of working and being alone, solely focusing on creating the future I wanted. I was in deep, chasing my dreams, and wouldn’t let anything get in my way.

    As time went on, I noticed that my partner was slowly slipping away.

    It wasn’t that he wasn’t coming home or was nowhere to be found. He was responding to the fact that I had lost focus on him.

    I was failing my partner in the following ways:

    • I didn’t say thank you for all the little things he did for me.
    • I didn’t ask him how his day was. Instead, I was eager to share how my day went.
    • When I faced an obstacle with my goals, I would be rude and short with him.
    • Instead of greeting him with a smile when he arrived home, I treated him as if he was a burden getting in the way of the work I needed to do.
    • Rather than planning and spending time with him, I would work late into the evening.
    • Lastly, I wasn’t present with him. When I did spend time with him, all I did was think about work.

    My actions and behaviors were so self-centered that I stopping thinking about how he was doing, how his day went, and what he needed support with.

    The end result: he withdrew.

    At first I thought he was no longer interested in me, but I eventually came to realize that I wasn’t even close to meeting his needs. And what he needed was simple: appreciation.

    He had hinted at it several times in his own way, but I’d had blinders on.

    After months of neglect, my boyfriend and I sat at our kitchen table making small talk and slowly tiptoeing into the conversation of what was and wasn’t working in our relationship.

    He said, “All I ever want is for you to appreciate me. I don’t need you to cook for me or get all dressed up or buy me things. All I want is to be appreciated.”

    His honest and vulnerable declaration brought me to tears. I realized then that I had been causing my partner significant pain and suffering for no reason.

    So, with my heart on the table, my eyes swollen from crying, and a common ground of love to move forward on, I told him this: “From now on, I will appreciate you—the big, the small, the silly, and imperfect. I will appreciate it all. I may not be perfect in my practice of appreciation, but I am committed to it, so much so that I have added it to my morning routine.”

    Much like the gratitude journal I write in every morning, I now have a journal dedicated solely to all the things I value about my partner.

    Every morning I set aside time to think of three things I appreciate about him. I do this even when I’m not feeling up for it. I take my time and feel every emotion that comes up as I write down my list of three items.

    I also make an effort so show my appreciation in action. My partner’s love language is “acts of service,” meaning actions speak louder than words. He feels loved when I do things for him coupled with expressing my feelings for him, so I now strive to show him that I love him with acts that require planning and thoughtfulness.

    The Value of Appreciation

    I never thought that simply reminding myself how much I appreciate my partner would cause a ripple effect in how I interact with him, but it has.

    Since starting my appreciation practice…

    I easily forgive his mistakes, such as forgetting to do something I ask him to do to support me, or not being sensitive enough and open to my feelings when I feel overwhelmed. I’ve grown to love his mistakes because they remind me of what it is to be imperfect. After all, I’m not perfect, and I can’t expect him to be either.

    I appreciate his faults and quirks. Like hitting the snooze button when he needs to get out of bed. And forgetting to eat throughout the day because he’s too busy teaching college students. And running behind schedule most of the time. We all have faults. His reminds me all over again why I fell in love with him. In all reality, we complement each other nicely.

    I appreciate his smile and his one of a kind laugh.

    In recognizing all that my partner does for me and my future, I feel a love so powerful that just thinking about it brings me to tears.

    My partner feels appreciated and cared for. He is more eager to engage with me, and more willing to be open and expressive with me. And he talks about the future more than ever.

    What Happens When You Don’t Appreciate the People in Your Life

    When you don’t appreciate others, your relationships suffer in the following ways.

    • The other person feels unimportant and may withdraw from you.
    • When your partner feels unappreciated, any talks of the future will be met with resistance. Would you want to build a future with someone who doesn’t appreciate you?
    • Animosity may build up in the relationship, on both sides.
    • The person feeling unappreciated may find other places, things, or people to seek appreciation from.
    • Being unappreciated can lead to unnecessary arguments and resentment.
    • Lack of appreciation may completely ruin and end the relationship.

    How to Start Appreciating the People in Your Life

    If you’ve recognized that you could make a little more effort appreciating the people in your life, dedicate a notebook solely for this purpose. Start your day by jotting down three things you value about this person. At the end of thirty days, give them your notes of appreciation. Rinse and repeat.

    But appreciation doesn’t just live within the mind. Sure, it’s wonderful to think about all the things you value about someone, but when you don’t vocalize or show your appreciation, it means nothing.

    You can start appreciating others in your life by:

    • Leaving them notes thanking them for who they are and what you appreciate about them.
    • Saying thank you and acknowledging the little things they do every day.
    • Giving specific examples of what they have done and how that has enhanced your own life.
    • Appreciating their flaws and quirks. The little imperfections are what make people unique. They may feel insecure about them. Let them know how you appreciate their imperfections, and why.
    • Giving someone a hug when they help you out or put a smile on your face.
    • Doing something unexpected; brighten their day by buying them a cup of coffee, or stopping by to let them know that you love them and appreciate them for being in your life.

    Like Tony Robbins said, “Trade your expectations for appreciation and your whole world changes in an instant.”

    Appreciation strengthens the bonds you have with others, no matter the relationship. It replaces a mindset of not having enough with being grateful for everything you have. And most of all, it creates space to be thankful for the little things in life.

  • 3 Free, Life-Changing Events to Check Out in January

    3 Free, Life-Changing Events to Check Out in January

    inspiration quote,New year new your cloud text on blue sky and sun rise at morning time,Motivational typographic.

    As the New Year approaches, many of us are making lists of ways we can improve our lives and better ourselves.

    If you’re looking to transform your body, calm your mind, or push yourself outside your comfort zone, you may benefit from participating in one of these three free events from Tiny Buddha friends and contributors.

    Transform Your Body

    On Tuesday, January 10th, at 7:00pm EST, Tiny Buddha contributor Rena Greenberg is running a free webinar, entitled The Fastest and Easiest Way to Remove Subconscious Obstacles to Weight Loss and Feel Great Fast in 2017.

    In this webinar you’ll learn:

    • How to stop the endless cycle of dieting by tapping into the wisdom in your subconscious
    • How to lose weight without feeling deprived, by changing the way you subconsciously think about food
    • Quick and easy ways to change your behavior and eliminate overeating, binging, snacking, and emotional eating
    • How you can lose weight and get healthy with powerful self-hypnosis technology

    About Rena Greenberg:

    Since 1990 Hay House author Rena Greenberg has helped over 200,000 people, all over the world, lose weight and achieve optimal health. Her groundbreaking wellness seminar for weight control has been reviewed and sponsored in over 75 hospitals and in 100+ major corporations such as Walt Disney World and Home Depot.

    Her clients often say they “owe their lives to her,” because she finds the fastest and easiest ways to help people release subconscious blocks to losing weight and find lasting health, happiness, and freedom.

    Sign up for Rena’s free weight loss webinar here.

    Calm Your Mind

    No practice can improve your state of mind more effectively than meditation. It can reduce stress and anxiety, enhance your focus, increase your resilience, and even improve your physical health.

    From January 2nd through January 4th the non-profit Heartfulness is offering three free online video masterclasses in meditation, conducted by the teacher of Heartfulness, Kamlesh D. Patel.

    The masterclasses will be available online, starting at midnight, and will be accessible throughout the day. Each class runs about one hour.

    About the Masterclasses:

    January 2nd: Relax

    In the first class, learn Heartfulness relaxation for physical well-being, as well as the Heartfulness guided meditation on the source of light within your own heart

    January 3rd: Rejuvenate

    In the second class, be guided through a simple rejuvenative technique to unwind the mind at the end of the day, let go of stresses and emotions, and simplify your life.

    January 4th: Connect

    In the third class, learn to connect with your inner self by listening to the heart’s voice. Observe your deepest feelings, make wise choices and weave your destiny.

    Sign up for the Heartfulness free meditation masterclasses here.

    Push Yourself Outside Your Comfort Zone

    Do you wish you could do more with your life, but hold yourself back because you’re afraid of rejection?

    Whether you’re seeking new friends, a new job, or any other new possibility, you’d likely benefit from getting comfortable hearing with word “no.” Every “no” is one step closer to a “yes.”

    Tiny Buddha contributor Jacob Sokol’s free comfort zone challenge can help.

    About the Challenge:

    If you’re up for playing, the game will help you…

    • Expand your assumptions about what you think is possible in your life
    • Develop the skill of asking for what you really want
    • Overcome your fears of rejection and develop more courage

    The goal of the game is simple: collect NOs by asking for things you’d like.

    As a side effect of playing, you’ll stop taking things so personally and start to rewire your nervous system to feel rejection-proof.

    Once you get told no, you’ll want to come share about it in Jacob’s super engaged free FB group. The group shower you with celebration and share their own stories of getting NOs.

    The challenge will begin on Jan 1st, 2017 and will run until the end of January. It’s completely free, and you can join at any time.

    Join the free comfort zone challenge here.

    I hope you enjoy these wonderful events!

  • Seeking Outside Approval Is Giving Our Power Away

    Seeking Outside Approval Is Giving Our Power Away

    Oil Painting Texture

    “When you do not seek or need approval, you are at your most powerful.” ~Caroline Myss

    Back in the winter of 2012, I was devastated by a sudden near-deaf experience (90% hearing loss), which led me to a dead end in my IT career.

    “You’ve been overworked. Rest is the only way to recuperate,” said every single doctor.

    Leaving my corporate sales job left me feeling like a total failure.

    I felt lost, confused, and frustrated as darkness swallowed my self-esteem.

    “Why did you have to work so hard and not get the credit you deserved?!” 

    “Is deafness all you got in return for striving toward excellence all these years?!”

    “You are worthless!” 

    As an overachiever and a perfectionist, I felt overwhelmed by a shame storm.

    I was caught up in bitterness and a sense of injustice until one day I realized that I was battling with myself, and the self-loathing quotient went off the chart.

    “What do you want, Universe? Don’t you see that I’m suffering?” I ranted out loud like a mad victim.

    Even though spirituality wasn’t my thing at that point in time, I literally “heard” a clear voice: “Own it. Take stock of your life now, Jen.” This triggered me to start asking why in heaven I had gotten myself into this mud hole.

    Connecting with My Younger Self

    With my eyes closed I saw a seven-year-old girl, the little me. She was taught to be very self-disciplined academically, as she was told to excel and work hard.

    Her sole goal was for her parents to put her on a pedestal for being good and intelligent.

    Since she came from a family where praise was like a foreign language, validating children for trying hard hadn’t been the parenting style in the house. Instead, there was often an attitude that the children could do better—they could work harder to achieve more.

    Hearing her parents give random compliments to other kids at the same age irritated her. She could only draw this conclusion: “Doing my best is not good enough, so I need to try even harder, or else I won’t be worthy of love and attention.”

    From then on, she constantly craved compliments and approval.

    “Jen, great job, keep up the good work!” Those simple comments were like water to her thirsty soul.

    Years later, she became masterful at overachieving, perfecting, and competing, which helped her gain “confidence” through compliments from other people.

    If she ever heard a negative comment, it could ruin her whole day. She’d go home discouraged and mentally lash herself for not doing well enough.

    She didn’t know what to say without first checking other people’s facial expressions. She lived on their compliments as the life stream of her self-worth. Until one day, she realized she’d lost it all. Her physical and emotional wellbeing had gone bankrupt, but worse her authenticity had gone down the drain.

    Even now, I can still feel her pain, the insecurity, the fear of rejection, and the strong need to be loved wrapped underneath a people-pleasing mask.

    Path of Returning to the Truth

    Deep down in my core, I knew that my mother and father, just like many other typical Asian parents, wanted their children to have better lives, and they believed that would come from in excelling in school so they could get better jobs, make more money, and be prosperous.

    I still thought that they should’ve done better, because they weren’t mindful enough to give me the emotional support I needed in my childhood. I got stirred up about it, and I even wanted to confront my parents with a letter to tell them what I thought after all those years.

    Just before I was about to take action, I heard something from inside saying, “They did you wrong, didn’t they? They didn’t give you what you needed, did they?”

    “They sure did!” I replied.

    Then the voice asked, “How do you think you would’ve done if you would’ve been in their shoes, with three kids to raise, with a business to run, with aging parents to take care of, and with a load of family chaos to be sorted out?”

    This conversation changed my perspective. I realized that my parents had done the best they could with what they had. They couldn’t give me what they didn’t even have themselves. I began to feel ashamed of my immaturity and selfishness.

    This time, the shame level was way stronger than it was when I left my corporate job involuntarily and felt worthless.

    Blaming is like putting a Band-Aid on a bullet wound; it never works. I realized that I was the one not letting anybody off the hook while busy swimming in the pool of victimhood.

    Lessons Learned

    Regaining my hearing after two months was a divine miracle, but I’m grateful that the silence taught me the following lessons about understanding others and releasing the need for approval.

    1. Stop seeking validation from others.

    It’s great when people believe in us, cheer us on, and make us feel valuable. We love when our partners compliment us or a friend is there to give encouragement.

    But you cannot become so dependent on people that you derive your worth and value from how they treat you. It’s easy to become addicted to compliments, addicted to encouragement, addicted to them cheering you on.

    But if other people change their minds and stop giving you the compliments you crave, then you’ll feel devalued. If they don’t meet all your expectations, you’ll get discouraged and feel inferior. You’ll start working overtime, people-pleasing to win their approval.

    At some point, like a mother weans a baby off a bottle, you have to break your need for external validation.

    You no longer need people complimenting you to keep you encouraged. Praise is nice to hear, but you can develop self-sufficiency.

    2. Have compassion for others.

    The truth is, our friends and family members have their own problems. They are not responsible for keeping us happy and making us feel good about ourselves. Don’t put that extra pressure on them. It’s unfair to the people who are in our lives.

    Moreover, sometimes when people don’t give us what we need, it’s because they don’t have it, because nobody gave it to them. If they weren’t raised showing affection to people, and we keep trying to get it from them, we’ll likely end up frustrated.

    Maybe they did the best they could. They may have made a decision that we don’t understand, and we may feel like it has put us at a disadvantage, but at least we didn’t have to walk in their shoes.

    3. Start approving of yourself.

    What people do, or don’t do, doesn’t determine our worth. Our value doesn’t come from another person; it comes from ourselves.

    People may not encourage us, but we can encourage ourselves. People may not make us feel special, but we can make ourselves feel special. We’ll have better relationships if we start validating ourselves instead of becoming needy and waiting for other people to give us our approval fix.

    Learn how to compliment and validate yourself. Practice affirming: I am strong. I am healthy. I am highly favored. I am beautiful. I am lucky. (Be creative!)

    4. Don’t give your power away.

    When a person walks away, wrongs us, or even makes hurtful comments, we need to learn to shake off that disrespect.

    Don’t believe the lies that we are not talented enough, attractive enough, or good enough. They don’t determine our value. They can’t lessen our self-worth. The only power people have over us is the power we give to them.

    We don’t have to play up to people to try to win their favor. If they don’t want to be in our lives, it’s actually their loss, not ours.

    —

    If you learn this principle of not relying on people for your worth and start generating your own approval and acknowledgment, you won’t feel crushed when somebody doesn’t give you what you expect.

    The less we depend on people for validation, the stronger we’ll become and the higher we will go.

  • You Don’t Need to Have Your Whole Life Figured Out Right Now

    You Don’t Need to Have Your Whole Life Figured Out Right Now

    Thinking girl

    “On any one day you can massively change the direction of your life.” ~Jim Rohn

    Have you ever felt as though you needed to have your whole life figured out right now?

    When we’re young, we are often encouraged to consider the same common careers such as being a police officer, firefighter, doctor, lawyer, or teacher. Then in high school, we feel pressure to make a decision because we’ll have to major in something in college.

    We may love music, writing, or something that people associate with struggle, only to get bombarded by advice to do something that will make money.

    People constantly ask us what we are going to do with our lives. The pressure on all of us is huge.

    In college, this pressure only increases, because with a major, now everyone wants to know what you’re going to do with it. For example, I majored in sports medicine and Hispanic studies, and people would constantly ask me about my plans. When I said I wanted to be a physician, there was even more pressure from people. This creates stress and anxiety, and can push someone toward burning out.

    There is a certain expectation that we need to pick a traditional career path, especially when we speak to older individuals who chose a career and stayed there until retirement.

    The older I get, the more I realize there are many things I want to accomplish in this life, and I have no desire to stick to one career and be defined by it.

    There are parts of me that are strategic, other parts that are itching for me to take crazy risks, and others that tell me I want to be the best doctor. There are so many things to fulfill that I am not quite sure what I want to do for the rest of my life.

    I know there are other people who feel the same way. If that’s you, I want you to know that…

    It’s okay to not know what you want to do, or to have a plan for a lifelong career.

    There is time. Time to look at different careers and do as we please. No longer do we have to follow the traditional route of getting a job right away and sticking to that one job right for the rest of our lives. If we want to change, there is a way to do it.

    After graduating from college, I traveled around Europe, took some classes, worked in the entertainment industry, and grew as an individual as I was exposed to different areas of life.

    I met many different types of people who all provided different perspectives. The amount of learning and knowledge that I absorbed throughout these meetings was more than I could have gotten from any type of formal education.

    Currently having my vision set on being a physician is great. I love medicine, and as of now, I want to be a doctor. However, I am not defined by my title of physician, because later on I may change careers. I may decide it’s time to open a business or join a jazz band and travel the United States.

    I’m not sure what I will be doing for the rest of my life, but I know that if I continuously remind myself to have a smile on my face, I will be happy.

    You don’t need to worry about other people’s opinions.

    One of the things I struggle with is worrying about what other people think. The majority of people I met while working at a hospice center told me they were not afraid of failure or afraid of doing what they truly wanted with their life; they were afraid of what people would think of them.

    This was eye-opening, because I realized how often we limit ourselves based on what other people say we should do, and that their opinions don’t matter because they are not living our lives.

    The people who tell you no and criticize are often the ones who are not following their own dreams. They may have been knocked down by not succeeding and may have become jaded by the world. You don’t have to live your life based on what they say.

    When I tell people that being a doctor is only a fraction of what I will accomplish in my lifetime, more than half of them make a comment or show through their body language that they don’t believe in my plan.

    It’s frustrating how even the people closest to me do not support some of my views on life, and they make sure to let me know it. I am still learning to not be affected by this because it’s challenging, but I urge you to do the same.

    Tell more and more people about what you want to do with your life because then it will become your truth, which will make it much easier to stick to your plan.

    At the beginning of my undergraduate career, there were over 100 people interested in the pre-medical track. By the end of my college experience, there were around twenty who were still dedicated to the pursuit of medical school.

    Time and time again, people told us how hard it was going to be, the sacrifices we were going to have to make, and how there were always people better than us. Those opinions discouraged the majority of my peers. As hard as it has been, sticking through it has been the most rewarding experience ever.

    You can create a worthwhile future while enjoying the moment.

    When we get wrapped up in believing we need to know what we’re going to do, we can lose sight of the present. I know many people who are constantly worried about the future. They’re afraid things won’t work out, and they never truly live in the moment.

    We need to think about the future in order to create it, but we can actually do that most effectively when we focus primarily on the present.

    People who diet often talk in terms of the future and how much weight they need to lose, but if they were to focus solely on the day and what needed to get done, before they know it, the results would show!

    This kind of focus can be challenging, as this requires us to engage in positive habits every day in order to find success in what we desire. However, when we become conscious of what we must do every day, we can then relax knowing that in due time, the results of our consistency will show.

    —

    It’s okay to not know what you want to do for the rest of your life. I see a negative stigma associated with people who do not have a clear plan for their career path, but there’s nothing wrong with going with the flow and allowing yourself to grow, evolve, and change.

    What is life if you make it to the end and do not have any exciting, crazy memories to look back on and remember with a smile on your face?

    We should all go out and explore many different fields to see what we truly love—and we may need to do this several times throughout our lives.

    Whether it’s working from a remote location, working with children, or becoming a missionary, do it all and see what you like best!

    At any time we can change the course of our lives. It might not always be easy, but all we have to do is put one foot forward, knowing we’re creating a change that will bring us more joy in life.

  • Why Striving For Perfection Is Actually Holding You Back

    Why Striving For Perfection Is Actually Holding You Back

    “The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.” ~Anna Quindlen

    I used to strive for perfection in every aspect of my life. I thought perfection would make me “acceptable” to others.

    Deep down, I felt inadequate, insecure, and not enough. And subconsciously, I decided that if I could just achieve perfection with myself, my body, and my life, than I would finally feel the deep love and inner acceptance I longed for inside of myself.

    As a kid, I demanded a perfect report card: only straight A’s would suffice. I spent hours upon hours studying in high school and college, doing extra credit, attending office hours any chance I could get, all in a desperate attempt to maintain a 4.0 GPA.

    As a young adult, I agonized over what career path to pick, wanting to pick the perfect job that would be my dream career. I was desperate to be the best, wanting to be the perfect employee, and giving nothing less than 150% in every project I worked on and presentation I did.

    I was terrified to make a mistake and required excellence in every task. I was afraid of others judging me. I didn’t see it my mistakes as learning experiences; I saw them as a way of others seeing what I didn’t want them to see: that I was flawed, imperfect, and somehow not enough.

    I demanded perfection in every part of my life. But the area I struggled the most with was the desire for body perfection.

    As a teenager, I decided that 110 pounds was the “perfect” body. I spent years trying to whittle my body down with exercise, diets, and restriction in an attempt to get the figure I deemed flawless.

    The pressure I put on myself to be a size 2, to eat only 1200 calories a day, to spend at least 45 minutes at the gym daily was agonizing. I lived and breathed this obsession of needing and wanting to be perfect.

    Looking back, I can see how detrimental this drive was to living and enjoying my life. In my chase for perfection, I put unnecessary pressure on myself to be something I was not. I wasted hours and hours trying to be someone different and wishing I was somewhere other than where I currently was.

    But the biggest lesson of all was that in my quest for perfection, I wasn’t really living.

    The reality is that striving for perfection holds us back. We spend so much time doing, striving, achieving, in an endless quest to get it all “perfect,” and we end up missing out on what life is really about: being in each moment and experiencing life where we are, as we are.

    I vividly remember New Year’s Eve in 2007. One of the dear friends I had met living abroad in Thailand was in town and wanted to see me. She wanted to do dinner with a group of people, then head out dancing for the ball drop.

    I agonized over this decision to go or not. I remember wanting to meet up with her, but feeling so awful about my body not being “perfect” that I didn’t want to go out and have to “hide” my body in baggy clothes.

    It pains me to say that I didn’t go. I gave up a chance to catch up with this dear friend, to have fun with others, and to dance the night away because I was unhappy with my body. I stayed home that night and ran on the treadmill in my parents’ basement.

    It was the ultimate low in my quest for body perfection: I decided that I needed to burn off what I had eaten that day and work to “fix” myself into a smaller size.

    The anxiety I felt about eating more calories at a restaurant, when I already felt “fat” in my body, pushed me to stay home and run on the treadmill. It was a moment of life that I missed out on because I was desperately pursing a perfect body.

    When we’re caught up in the pursuit of achieving the perfect body, finding the perfect mate, landing the perfect job, or being the perfect person, it actually hinders us from seeing how beautifully our journey is unfolding right before our eyes.

    Perfection detracts you from the incredible life path you’re on and prevents you from seeing the gifts that are always in front of us. So the next time you get caught up in the endless pursuit of perfection, here are three things to remember:

    1. Perfection isn’t attainable.

    We try so hard to achieve an ideal in our lives that is next to impossible. There really is no perfect body, perfect job, or perfect life. It isn’t possible to have our lives be happy, joyous, and 100% problem free. Unexpected tragedies happen. Something doesn’t turn out as you hoped it would. Someone you love disappoints you.

    When you understand that perfection isn’t actually something you can achieve and maintain forever, you can let go of the never-ending quest for your job, your body, your parenting skills, or your relationship to be perfect.

    Letting go of this unattainable goal is a huge sigh of relief. We don’t have to try to be perfect, because it’s impossible anyway! Once we relax into the idea of letting go of perfection, life becomes easier, less stressful, and a lot more fun.

    Perfection leaves little room for error and joy, and while life can sometimes be messy, it’s during these times where we learn and grow (and have some adventure along the way).

    2. Perfection isn’t authentic.

    When you’re always striving to be perfect, you miss out on showing the world who you truly are. Years ago, when I was in the throes of dieting and restriction, trying to be “perfect” in my eating and my body, I wasn’t being true to myself. I was hiding from the world, desperately trying to conceal what I thought were imperfections.

    In the drive to be perfect, I never allowed myself to be vulnerable—to show up and let myself be seen. I thought when I’d reached perfection, I’d find approval and acceptance. But since the pursuit of perfection is an endless chase, the approval and acceptance never came.

    It was only when I had the courage to drop my unattainable goals and bring my true self to the world, imperfections and all, when I began to find the inner acceptance I had wanted all along.

    It was scary to show up as who I was without wearing a mask or pretending to be someone I was not. But I began making decisions for and from me.

    I quit my job and traveled for a year without an agenda (giving up a well-paying, secure job in the process). I ended a relationship that was no longer serving me (letting go of a man who was also my best friend). I took Spanish classes, wore a bikini to the beach without a cover up, told friends I wasn’t into partying anymore, and began to speak up for what I wanted and what I thought.

    It wasn’t easy or comfortable, but it was incredibly freeing. I felt vulnerable and naked, but as I began to express my honest opinion to others, voice what I needed or wanted, follow my own preferences instead of what was expected of me, and show more of who I was to the world without hiding, it got easier and easier.

    Your imperfect self is enough. Allow yourself to show up in the world as you are. When we’ve demanded perfection from ourselves for years, it can be scary to let go of our ideal and let the world see us as we are. But this is where your true, authentic beauty resides. Not in perfection, but in bringing all of who you are to the world.

    3. Perfection is stagnation.

    No one is meant to be perfect in any area of life, whether it’s your body, relationships, personal growth, habits, or your career, because in a “perfect” world, everything is stagnant. There is no growth and no evolution. It is only through mistakes, missteps, and experimentation that we learn and grow. 

    Looking back on my life, most of my decisions that seemed irrational or didn’t make sense in the traditional way ended up leading me to a path that was a perfect fit for what I needed and wanted. Life is funny that way.

    I quit a stable job, but had incredible adventures traveling South America for a year. I left my hometown to move cross county without a plan, but ended up starting a business that is my true passion. I mistakenly got thrown into a role that I didn’t want at a job, but learned so much about fundraising and development that I ended up enjoying it.

    These “mistakes” allowed me to see how perfection would have actually held me back. If I had followed the “perfect” path, the path without risk, without chance of failure, and the path that felt safe and easy, I never would have had these life-changing personal growth experiences.

    Many people who are striving for perfection in their life path, wanting to plan it all out and have it go exactly how they think it should, end up missing out on some of life’s best surprises and most meaningful moments.

    It is a refreshing way to view life. To allow ourselves to make mistakes is a relief, whether it’s messing up our food plan, getting into a fight with a family member, expressing emotions to a close friend and having it come out all wrong, or experimenting with a new hobby knowing you’ll likely mess up trying to master it. It’s these “mistakes” that allow us to incorporate feedback and chart a new course.

    If we’re constantly striving for perfection, we end up missing out on the lessons we most need to learn. In the pursuit of being flawless, our eyes are always looking three steps ahead of where we are. And as we’re consistently living a few steps ahead, we end up missing out on life’s most precious moment: now.

    Perfection isn’t something you can achieve because it doesn’t actually exist. So the next time you find yourself striving to be a more perfect version of yourself, remember that the imperfect, flawed, vulnerable you is perfectly enough.

  • The Benefits of Meditation: 10 Minutes to Peace, Clarity, and Focus

    The Benefits of Meditation: 10 Minutes to Peace, Clarity, and Focus

    “Meditation teaches us to cure what need not be endured and endure what cannot be cured.” ~Unknown

    Do you feel overwhelmed at times? Or slightly lost? Do you struggle with anger, anxiety, or low self-esteem? Are you left with a mind that doesn’t seem to want to slow down?

    If the answer is yes, rest assured that you are not the only one. There are many who feel the same way.

    This is exactly how I felt five years ago. I was working hard as a musician, and I felt like I’d hit a brick wall. The harder I pushed with gigging, practicing, and writing, the more I felt my creativity take a dip and my overall happiness decline.

    I remember feeling exhausted, and my life feeling heavy and serious. I felt burnt out, and the worst part was that the harder I tried, the more disconnected I felt. It was a classic case of burning the candle at both ends.

    I was trying to be more creative and found that the opposite was happening.

    Overwhelming, worrisome thoughts and feelings would arise, and I wouldn’t know what to do with them. One after the other, they kept coming.

    I was very critical of myself at this time. I felt frustrated, stressed, and often, very low, with fear constantly knocking at the door.

    I started wondering, “Am I the only one feeling like this? Why do I feel this way? What’s going on?”

    Society had taught me that once I achieved what I wanted, I would be eternally happy. But I met people who had achieved their goals and amassed great wealth, and were still hugely stressed and unhappy. How could this be?

    In Our Lowest Moment Lies an Opportunity for Personal Transformation

    I recognized then that I was constantly blaming the outside world for things not going the way I wanted. I believed that life should make me happy. I slowly began to see this was far from the truth.

    One day, I said, “Enough! Stop blaming other people and circumstances and take a good long look in the mirror.” This was hard at first, as a part of me still wanted to point the finger, but I knew this wasn’t going to serve or help anyone, least of all me.

    I started reading a load of books, taking courses, and researching human behavior, covering topics such as psychology, self-help/development, emotional intelligence, spirituality, biology, and more.

    After all this research, I realized that in order for me to be happier and more productive and have a better quality of life, I had to take a step back and realize that being busy isn’t cool, it’s a lack of priorities; that being stressed and feeling sorry for myself wasn’t the right path; that happiness is actually closer than I may have thought. The journey had begun…

    An Inner Win to a Greater Outer Win

    I have discovered that we can overcome our negative thoughts and feelings and deal with all of our challenges with a greater understanding and a sense of ease.

    The secret is that first we must feeling centered within (our thoughts, feelings, and emotions), and then we can move to what our outer purpose is. This enables us to deal with challenges from a place of inner calm.

    If the mind and body are working together, we have a much greater chance of knowing what we want and how to face it, rather than constantly trying to fill the void within with external gratification. External gratification can be beautiful, but first we need a strong foundation, anchoring our drive so that it can serve us and the people around us in an authentic way.

    You deserve to live an amazing life. You deserve to be inspired. You deserve to be free and to live a life on your terms. And you can do all these things.

    Transformation starts with ourselves, so in order for us to move into a happier state of being, we first need to be kind to ourselves, and to have a little bit of discipline and the willingness to awaken our greatest selves.

    Creating Some Well Deserved Headspace

    Imagine you’re watching your favorite play. During the show many different scenes occur; there’s a love scene and moments of anger, tragedy, and betrayal, along with a whole load of excitement.

    Now, imagine that during the play, you run onto the stage and cause a load of confrontation because you don’t like one of the scenes and want to stop it.

    Once you jumped up there you’d probably feel a little foolish, and might leave with your tail between your legs, feeling baffled and confused after turning and seeing an angry audience now wanting their money back.

    Well, what if you viewed the mind in the same way? Let’s say you’re sitting at home, minding your own business, when an angry thought suddenly arises.

    It may have a character and there may be a storyline within it—something that happened that bothered you or something someone did that upset you. What do you do? A lot of the time, we get sucked into our negative, angry thoughts and are left feeling worse than we originally felt.

    We have metaphorically run onto the stage in our minds, and the angry audience is usually our close family or friends.

    Now what if I told you that you don’t even have to go into the angry thought? You can simply watch it and let it play, like you would at the cinema or the theater. You simply see it, with little judgment, and let it pass. The seeing of the thought is the beginning of liberation.

    This is one of the first major steps toward a healthier, happier mind. By simply seeing the thought, we begin to disassociate with it, leaving space for it to pass while we continue with our day.

    Mindfulness Meditation

    Mindfulness is the day-to-day seeing of the mind, called “awareness” in many circles. If we are mindful, we see our thoughts and let them come and go like scenes in a show.

    By simply seeing the thought, we are then left with a choice: to let it go or hold onto it. We then need to ask ourselves, do I want to react angrily, or do I want to let it go and deal with the situation constructively?

    Meditation is training for situations like these. This can simply be a ten-minute space in your day where you may sit, or a part of the day where your attention is focused entirely on what you are doing.

    You may have already had moments like this when you exercise, when you are in an intense state of creativity, or when you’re entranced by a beautiful sunset.

    You are focused, present, and not distracted. If we can develop this in our practice, we’ll be better prepared to handle challenges in our everyday life.

    Meditation can be seen as a little woo woo. The thought of a bunch of monks in robes come to mind, or maybe lit candles, bells, gongs, and floating off to some eternal bliss. We need to let go of the clichés to realize how much benefit it really has. The value it can add to your life is immense.

    Who Is Using It and What Are The Benefits?

    Mindfulness and meditation have really taken off in the west, with major businesses, military centers, schools, and celebrities all getting involved. The big question is “why?” Why does a major company like Google have its own meditation rooms and courses?

    Let’s dig a little deeper into the health benefits so you can see the potential of just taking ten minutes out of your day for your great self.

    10 Ways Meditation Benefits Your Day-to-Day Life, Work, and Relationships

    1. It lowers your stress level and improves your focus and attention.

    2. It reduces worry, anxiety, and impulsivity.

    3. It increases empathy and helps you develop positive relationships.

    4. It can improve your information processing and decision-making skills.

    5. It increases positive emotions.

    6. It improves your memory.

    7. It enhances your ability to set aside mental chatter.

    8. It decreases feelings of loneliness and helps reduce social isolation.

    9. It increases feelings of compassion.

    10. It increases grey matter in keys areas of the brain associated with compassion and awareness.

    Getting Started

    What do I do? Where do I start? What type of meditation do I do?

    I asked all these questions when I sat down to do my first meditation. There’s so much information out there, and it can be overwhelming at times, so I want to keep it simple and actionable.

    First, find a comfortable place to sit; it can be a chair or the end of your bed. If you can find somewhere that has few distractions, that will be helpful. Next, close your eyes and begin to focus on your breath.

    Write on your to-do list when you intend to meditate, or couple it with something you do regularly (i.e.: brushing your teeth, before/after a shower). This will help you make meditation a habit.

    3 Tips for Once You Begin Meditating

    1. Expectation

    Don’t expect the mind to stop. The point of meditation is not to stop your thoughts, but rather to clearly see the mind with clarity and non-judgment.

    Think of your thoughts as passing cars on the road or clouds in the sky. Remember, it’s a skill, so at first you may be a little shocked by how many thoughts there are. But don’t worry—this is perfectly normal. The mind will, with time, begin to free up a little and the thoughts will lessen. Ahh, peace!

    2. Effort—Finding the Balance

    We can’t force our mind to be quiet. Think about when you can’t sleep, so you say to yourself, “I can’t sleep,” and you start to try harder. What happens? Ironically, you struggle to sleep. So the idea is to have a nice amount of attention and focus but an equal balance of relaxation and rest.

    3. Unveiling Happiness in the Now

    Once we have a healthy balance of expectation and effort, we can then move to the realization of stillness. This is the realization that happiness is already here, in this moment now. This will become clearer once you are into regular exercises.

    Rather than trying to create peace within, we simply realize it’s already here. This is one of the first steps toward internal mastery.

    When Should You Do It?

    I normally recommend you do it first thing in the morning, but that’s only if that works for you. Everyone has different schedules, so choose a time when you know you’ll have ten minutes free.

    Common Road Blocks

    Watch out for the classic excuses, such as “I don’t have time to do it.” Yes, you do! As Tony Robbins once famously said, “If you don’t have ten minutes, you don’t have a life.” If you want to awaken your greatest self, give yourself that well-deserved mini break, so when you come back to your routine you’re rejuvenated and ready for the rest of the day.

    “I’ll do it tomorrow” is another classic, and it never happens. There is no time like the present, so just do it!

    And finally, the ultimate excuse: “This all sounds to be good to be true; this will never work for me.” We now have so many scientific studies to back up the benefits, so give it a go, follow it along, and enjoy them.

    Whatever the excuse may be, I promise you that slowing yourself down for ten minutes can begin to change your whole world dramatically.

    I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t like a bit more peace, focus, and clarity in their life, and it’s all here for us, right here, right now.

  • The Importance of Doing Nothing (and No, You’re Not Too Busy)

    The Importance of Doing Nothing (and No, You’re Not Too Busy)

    Relaxing

    “Doing nothing is better than being busy doing nothing.” ~Lao Tzu

    Whether it’s chores or children, to-do lists or bucket lists—let alone work—modern life moves at a demanding pace. It’s a hamster wheel and, unlike our beloved family pet, we’ve decided it’s not fun.

    But as a society we revel in being busy all the time. We consider those who do nothing on the weekend to be dull or lazy. We don’t have time to chew the cud. If William Henry Davies thought his lot “had no time to stop and stare,” he should turn in his grave and see what’s happened since.

    Somewhere along the lines, it’s become more than acceptable to live at an unhealthy pace—it’s become “cool.” Instead of saying, “Very well, thanks,” when people ask how we are, today we roll our eyes and reply proudly, “Hectic!”

    Where we live, lots of mothers rock up at school, claiming they’ve had four hours of sleep, have no time to walk the dog, and have already been to the gym at 6am. They set the bar high! I feel inadequate if I’m not still replying to emails at 8pm. My phone stays on all night next to my bed in case someone needs me. Every day. Even on holiday. Especially on holiday.

    Our house burned down a few years ago—moments after we’d left with our new baby. The fire started in our bedroom where her cot was at the end of our bed.

    A lot of the very important stuff we’d gathered around us was lost—clothes, photos, furniture. We knew our attachment to our losses would cause us pain, despite having walked our spiritual path for years.

    Buddhism teaches us that attachment causes suffering, so our lesson here was to let go. Our belief system helped avoid the useless “Why me?” type questions that plague us when things don’t seem fair.

    No one was hurt. We dug deep, counted our blessings, and tried to go with the flow of things. And we realized (because it was months before we missed “that pair of shoes” or “my favorite” CD) that most of the things we battle for, in the end, we don’t miss at all.

    I also realized that much of what I busy myself with all day does matter, but much of it does not. If I don’t do it, it makes no difference. No one notices! But for me, and many people I know, because our poor addled brains are never allowed to switch off, we are often unable to see which is which.

    This way of living is not good for us. Trying to juggle everyone’s balls is not good for me! Coloring with my five year old is—if I’m doing it wholeheartedly, mindfully, rather than keeping half an eye on the clock and the other half on the mobile attached to my side. She can color inside the lines; I can’t because I’m not concentrating.

    Cortisol, the stress hormone, is as addictive as adrenaline and long been indicated in serious diseases like cancer and stroke. It keeps you awake at night, depletes the adrenal glands, and leads to chronic fatigue.

    My husband, once a gym obsessed high-flyer in the corporate world, collapsed burnt out before he was thirty.

    He had to completely reassess the demands he made on his body and mind and dramatically scale back both his work commitments (which saw him constantly flying all over the world) and his fitness regime. He learned to relax, something he was not good at.

    It has taken him years of practice to heal, and he still suffers chronic fatigue if faced with long, stressful situations.

    A wise man once told us, “The mind is like a bucket of dirty water. The more you stir it, the harder it is to see what is in there. If you stop stirring and let it settle, the muck will fall to the bottom and you will be able to see the clear water.”

    But admitting that you want to settle isn’t easy in a society that only respects those who can keep it up 24/7. When everyone else is competing to see who’s the busiest, it’s hard to say, “I’m not doing anything this weekend.” People think we’re rude or that something’s wrong.

    But it’s vital to rest your brain and body. So here’s my advice. Start small. Start now. You have five minutes to spare. (Yes, you do). Only five minutes of meditating can help calm your mind so you can comfortably relax and do nothing, without feeling anxious.

    Meditating is as simple as breathing. You can do it before breakfast, in the bathroom, in your garage. Focus on the flow of breath in and out of your body, the movement of air, the rise and fall of your chest.

    When a thought creeps into your head (and it will), acknowledge it and release it. Bring your focus back to your breath.

    The more you practice this technique, the easier it will become and the longer you will go without such thoughts bothering you. At some point they will slow down and the quiet space between them will grow. You can do it anywhere, whenever you sit still for five minutes—on the train, in the bath.

    Breathe and watch the muck fall to the bottom of the bucket.

    Learning the precious art of being un-busy will calm you. It will give you greater clarity, focus, and concentration for times when you need the energy. It will improve the health of your mind and body, and probably even your bank balance.

    So, do you have five minutes?

  • How to Forgive When You Don’t Think You Can

    How to Forgive When You Don’t Think You Can

    Angry Couple

    “The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward.” ~Steve Maraboli

    Have you ever had a relationship, friendship, or marriage that ended so badly it took years, a decade, or even longer to heal? Have you ever wished you could forgive someone but just didn’t think it was possible?

    Fifteen years ago I was twenty-six and in a relationship with a man that was destructive. After an intense romance in his home country, I made the poor decision that he should come to live with me in San Francisco—a decision that, in hindsight, was immature.

    Three months and one visa sponsorship later, we were living together and immediately fell into the challenges of modern day multicultural relationships.

    Aside from the fact that my boyfriend was jealous, obsessive, and immature—a trait I hadn’t seen clearly in the beginning—he couldn’t work legally, we didn’t have a common fluent language between us, and he was far away from his family for the first time in his life.

    The worst and most difficult part, however, were our cultural differences. My boyfriend was jealous, obsessive, and controlling, whereas I was a young, driven, independent woman.

    He would become despondent, accusatory, suspicious, and sometimes even fly into a jealous rage whenever I left the house.

    Our relationship became emotionally abusive, yet I was scared to leave. He was financially dependent on me, he couldn’t work and didn’t have anywhere else to go, and he didn’t have any family in the United States.

    I was riddled with guilt and felt horrible, because I had brought him to the US and felt responsible for him.

    After a year of struggle, he moved out and I settled into numbness, not wanting to begin to unearth the emotions that needed to be processed in order to recover. I was emotionally scarred and suffered years of nightmares.

    Time passed and I pushed the hatred in my heart deeply out of awareness. We never spoke, until a few years ago.

    I had just been through a traumatic family experience, and had begun a Metta, or loving-kindness, practice as a means of understanding the circumstances taking place in my life. Surprisingly, the practice enabled me to find forgiveness in my heart for my ex-boyfriend.

    Metta is a traditional Buddhist tool for cultivating loving-kindness. In the practice, we sit as if in meditation and let the energy of love into our hearts.

    We repeat a mantra in which we hold in mind a life without danger, with mental and physical happiness and ease of well-being.

    We start by imagining happiness and compassion for ourselves, and then, progressively, we extend love out into the world, to a benefactor, a friend, a neutral person, a difficult person, groups of people, and finally to all beings.

    I sat in the Metta practice for ten minutes daily, and I picked my ex-boyfriend as my “difficult person.”

    At first I had difficulty when I held him in mind and wished him a life of happiness and well-being, as I didn’t really feel he deserved that. However, over time it became easier and my resistance subsided.

    One day, after about a month of the practice, I was sitting at my computer and on a whim decided to look him up on Facebook. I looked at some pictures of him rock climbing, and a smile came to my lips.

    I saw some images he had posted, of cliffs, mountains, and people bouldering, and by and by I came across a girl, a baby a few months old, words of congratulations, a graduation, and more congratulations.

    Lots of memories came flooding back, and this time I didn’t block them out. I remembered our tears, his pain at losing me, the very different places we had been at in our lives during the time we were together, how naive and young we both had been.

    I came to the realization that I had as much to forgive myself for during that time as I did him. The tears brought about relief and then happiness, as I found myself truly happy for all of the good things that had come to him after we parted, evidenced by what I saw on Facebook.

    Then some good memories came to me; I had blocked them out over years of resentment and the inability to see anything good in him.

    I remembered what he had given me, how he had opened my eyes to a new culture, helped me explore a new country, revived my love of the outdoors, and supported me during my foibles with Spanish.

    An image flashed through my mind of a day we finished a pitch on a long climb in Yosemite, and I remembered that day with true and genuine fondness.

    This experience moved me and was the final step in my full healing from the wounds of many years before.

    Letting go of my negativity and resentment toward him brought about a lightness. He no longer appears in my dreams; I am able to look at everything that happened as a learning experience.

    The Metta practice served as a tool for me to discover the compassion in my heart, for him but mostly for myself, enabling the pain to surface, be processed, and dissolve.

    How can we use the healing power of loving-kindness in our daily lives? Especially when we don’t feel ready to forgive, when the effects of abuse go too deep, or when we simply don’t feel the other person deserves to be forgiven?

    Like the Metta Practice, there are tools we can use to overcome our own blocks to forgiveness, even when our minds and hearts aren’t ready.

    Here are some tips to remember:

    We are the primary beneficiaries of the practice.

    Despite the fact that during the Metta practice we focus on others, we are always the primary beneficiaries of our efforts.

    We can forgive someone and it doesn’t require getting in touch with that person or making them aware of what we are doing in any way. Just as when we hold hatred in our hearts we are the ones who suffer from it, when we find love in our hearts we benefit.

    It is best to start by cultivating love and compassion for someone we already love.

    Often the easiest place to start is not with ourselves but with someone for whom we already feel great love—a child, a dear friend, someone we admire or who has helped us in our lives.

    Even if we never extend our practice beyond this point, we already reap the rewards of the process itself. We are the ones who feel the great energy in the heart when we focus on our true desire for another to be happy and free from physical and mental pain.

    We must forgive ourselves for not being willing to forgive.

    Some human experiences are simply so destructive, some abuse so acute that we may not have the energy to process it. In this case, we can still benefit from forgiving ourselves for whatever negativity we hold toward ourselves for not being able to forgive or fully let go of the pain of our experience.

    Choosing to keep debilitating resentment and pain out of our awareness so that we can function in the world can also be a positive choice, if we stop feeling guilty about it.

    We can always choose to go at our own pace.

    We are always in charge of our own pace of change. We might not feel like forgiving now, and this doesn’t mean that we can’t choose it in the future. In the same vein, we can let go of our fear of forgiving by remembering we can always go back and harbor some resentment if we want to.

    We do not deserve to suffer.

    One of the illusions that we must let go of is that if we stop suffering, our aggressor will somehow benefit or be better off for it. This couldn’t be further from the truth. We hurt ourselves, when we deserve our own compassion. Even when a person doesn’t deserve to be forgiven, we certainly do not deserve to continue to suffer emotionally over them.

    Before beginning a forgiveness practice, we can ask ourselves, “What do I have to gain from this?” and “How is holding this resentment harming or benefitting me?”

    There is always love and openness to be gained from forgiving, from processing our pain and grief, but when and how much we do is always of our own choosing.

    In choosing to forgive we choose ourselves and take back our power. It doesn’t mean that we need to befriend our difficult person or that we should begin spending time again with someone who has deeply harmed us in the past.

    In the case of my ex-boyfriend, we did not end up becoming friends again. However, I did end up sending him a Facebook message in which I shared that I had been engaged in a loving-kindness practice and that despite all our troubles, I had forgiven him and truly hoped he was happy.

    Almost immediately, there was a response. He was indeed a new father, living in his home country with his wife. He had forgiven me long ago, he said, and he had always felt grateful to me, for bringing him to the United States.

    After we parted, he went on to achieve some of his life’s dreams; he had climbed El Capitan, he had gotten his master’s degree, found a good job, and eventually moved back to Colombia with his wife to have a family.

    He was happy to know that I, too, was happy and successful in life, he’d always known and hoped that I would be. And truly I am.

  • If You Want To Know Love, Stop Lying

    If You Want To Know Love, Stop Lying

    young couple in love outdoor,illustration,digital painting

    “Lies may make people feel better, but they do not help them to know love.” ~Bell Hooks

    I was once a liar. I didn’t know I was a liar at the time. I didn’t consciously tell an untruth. Instead, my entire being did.

    Lying isn’t just something that is done with words. We can lie with our actions. We can lie with our silence. We can lie with our complicity. We can lie by pretending to be who we aren’t.

    I was the lie.

    I played dress up for most of my life. It didn’t happen all at once. I didn’t walk into someone else’s closet and come out with a new wardrobe. It happened slowly, over time.

    Each time I said or did something that didn’t get approval from the world around me, I chose to pull a garment from the imaginary closet of people who are lovable. By the time I was twenty, my true self was so far hidden that even I didn’t know where she was.

    It first began by disappearing. I felt rejected by my peers in grade school. It felt like so much work to be liked and popular. So I decided to give up trying. But instead of just being myself, I decided to hide away. Being unnoticed seemed easier than being seen for who I was.

    College was my opportunity to reinvent myself. But when I got there I found out I couldn’t force myself into being outgoing or easily likable. So I turned awkward. I was hyper self-conscious that I was not being myself, but I didn’t know how to let myself just be. So my body got stiff, my movements fidgety, and my voice uncertain.

    I began to watch other people and would, in the slightest ways, begin to mimic them. I’d adopt someone’s laugh, another person’s style, and someone else’s slang. This mishmash of what I thought it meant to be likable only kept me further away from the truth of who I really was.

    I had friends, but no one really knew me. I was lost and lying about who I was. I pretended like I had it all figured out because admitting that I was clueless would mean my world would come crashing down.

    When we build identities for ourselves we can’t risk allowing them to crumble. So we lie. We create more masks to wear and keep ourselves further from the truth. Our egos know that if one brick loosens, everything we’ve worked so hard for will be ruined.

    When we choose to deny who we truly are, we are lying. Lying is a choice, one that deeply harms ourselves and oftentimes, those around us. And even though it is a choice, it’s one that is very easy to hide from. In our search for love we will do almost anything to attain our goal even if it means denying ourselves the truth.

    The irony, though, is that love itself is impossible without honesty. If you find yourself desperate to know what love really is, take a deep breath and look at how honest you are about you.

    Do you really know yourself? Do you share who you are with the world? Are you overly concerned with what other people think about you? Will you change yourself to be accepted by others? These are all great questions to help you recognize how comfortable you are with your true self.

    Uncovering yourself is part of the path. It’s okay to share with people that you don’t know. That you’re confused. That you’re lost. That you feel pain. That you’re in the process of getting to know yourself.

    You don’t have to use all your energy to put on the facade that you’ve got it all figured out. It’s okay to not have it all together. When you begin to open up and communicate with others about who you truly are, you begin the opportunity to discover what love is.

    The people who open their hearts to you will create a beautiful container for love to grow. Those who are triggered by who you are will move their own way. Let them go. Stay connected to your truth and keep sharing with the people in your life.

    As I began to test the waters in my friendships I started to open up about my feelings of shame and guilt.

    I have one memory of sitting at the kitchen table with a girlfriend and telling her something I had never told anyone. I could feel the space opening between us as she acknowledged my feelings and matched them with her own experiences of similar feelings.

    Sharing ourselves allows us to know love. Love makes us feel safe and wanted. It makes us feel connected and like we belong.

    We often lie when we’re afraid of the truth. When we lie about who we are, we tend to be afraid that who we are isn’t lovable. If we show our true selves and we aren’t loved and accepted, we don’t know how we’ll recover.

    We recover by loving ourselves. But you can’t love yourself if you don’t know who you are. You can’t love yourself if you’re using all your energy to put on an act for everyone else. And other people can’t love you when they don’t know who you are.

    So if you want to know love, show yourself. Take off the mask. Let go of all the energy it takes to be someone else and use it to discover who it is you truly are. Love that person up and watch as the world loves you back.

  • Stop Focusing on Your “Flaws” and Let Your Light Shine Bright

    Stop Focusing on Your “Flaws” and Let Your Light Shine Bright

    Glowing woman

    “Vulnerability is about having the courage to show up and be seen.” ~Brene Brown

    When I was twenty-seven someone told me I had old looking skin.

    Up until I heard this comment, I had never given much thought to my skin. Ever since, however, it’s been the only thing I see when I look in the mirror.

    Lately, I have been diving deeper into the inner areas of my life that still need further integration. Making themselves most apparent as top priorities are self-love and acceptance.

    A good friend recently told me that she has started to look at herself in the mirror every day and say “I love you,” and really mean it.

    She said when she first started this exercise, all she could see was the line that was between her eyebrows. Her one flaw.

    Before my friend mentioned this line in her face, I had never really noticed it.

    My friend has big, beautiful, blue eyes, and those are all I see every time I talk to her.

    This conversation was quite eye opening. It made me admit that I do the same thing.

    The only things I see in the mirror are the lines in my face, and I think, “maybe I need to get a facelift.”

    I am committed to loving and accepting myself fully and changing this behavior pattern.

    My friend said, “Polly, you have to see your lines in a different way. Your lines tell the story of who you are! Your lines show all of your many adventures, all the time you have spent outside kayaking, surfing, and cycling. This is the story your lines tell. Your lines have made you who you are. Love your lines!”

    AMAZING!

    Love my lines! Really?

    Love my biggest insecurity? Accept my flaws as they are?

    What if I loved my lines? What if I saw them like she did?

    They are the story of who I really am.

    I have not been wrapped up in cotton wool, sitting in a cubicle, and my face shows it.

    What if I even honored my lines and said thank you?

    Thank you for taking on the elements.

    Thank you for protecting me and allowing me to do all the sports I love outside for hours in the sun.

    Thank you, lines!

    Well, this is revolutionary!

    Self-acceptance, gratitude, compassion, and forgiveness are my practices today. I forgive myself for letting someone else’s opinion of me dominate me. For giving away my power, and allowing my sense of self to come from outside of me.

    In his book The Presence Process, Michael Brown says:

    “The behaviors we generate in order to feel safe and accepted in the world are a substitute for real peace and aren’t who we are. By embracing responsibility for our experiences, we embrace the capacity to change them.”

    In taking responsibility for my life and experiences I can see that I have allowed my worth and value to be dictated by one person’s superficial observation of my appearance.

    I now take back my power. I now change my story. I can choose a different path. I can love and have gratitude. I can forgive this person and myself. I can focus on my gifts instead of my imperfections.

    It is commonly believed that the eyes are the mirrors of the soul.

    When I talk to people I always look in their eyes. When I look at myself I hardly ever look in my own eyes.

    Why? What would I see if I looked beyond the surface? What have I been distracting myself with by only focusing on my skin?

    What if I saw who I truly am? What if I saw my own soul? What if I let my light really shine?

    Digging deeper, I see that perhaps Marianne Williamson is right when she says,

    “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be?”

    If I fully accept and embrace my imperfection, and believe Marianne Williamson, then what?

    Is my deepest fear that I am powerful?

    Does my light scare me?

    What if I truly let my light shine?

    What an amazing gift this would be! To myself and to the world.

    This is all I really want.

    To be my most authentic, whole, true self. To let my light shine. To be comfortable in my own skin.

    I believe this is the point of life, and that my inner work is to see beyond my lines—to see who I truly am.

    I now am showing up and having the courage to really be seen. Lines and all!

    I know that if I honestly allow this, I will be free.

    That no one outside of me can do this for me.

    I have begun to edit video footage that I took of myself last year, when I was on a self-searching walk by myself. I spent thirty-two days alone in the wilderness and recorded my journey on video. I haven’t shared these videos because I was self-conscious about my skin, and, as a result, I have been holding back the potential of letting my light shine.

    Letting my light truly shine means following my heart and inspiration. Allowing my gut instinct to rule, even when I don’t know why. Smiling big. Saying hello to people with my heart open. Seeing others as a reflection of myself. Asking, “What can I give?” rather than “What can I get?” and being present with everyone I come into contact with.

    If I feel like dancing, I get up and dance.

    Shining my light means sharing my gifts with generosity, and getting out of my own way. Putting myself out there and allowing my voice to be heard. Through writing, dance, film, art, and by simply being my whole, authentic, true self.

    It is well and truly time. Time to get over the insecurity, the reverse vanity, and practice self-love and acceptance.

    The only one who needs to love and accept me is me, and I know that once I do this what you think of me really doesn’t matter.

    We can all let our light shine bright—you too.

    Stop focusing on your perceived imperfections and recognize your inner light.

    Look yourself in the eyes in the mirror and say “I love you” or “You are amazing,” and really mean it!

    See yourself as your friends see you (without honing in on physical flaws).

    “Show up,” however that looks for you, and allow yourself to be seen.

    Call back in your power—from all people, places, and situations where you may have given it away.

    We owe it to ourselves and to the world to step into our full power, and shine our full brightness. Allowing ourselves to be, express, and create gives others the room to do the same.

    Our unique, authentic selves are here now, ready, and waiting for our permission to shine!

  • When It’s Hard to Trust: 5 Reminders to Soothe New Relationship Anxiety

    When It’s Hard to Trust: 5 Reminders to Soothe New Relationship Anxiety

    Couple ice skating

    “The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them.” ~Ernest Hemingway

    “I’m happy. That’s all you need to know.”

    These were the final words I spoke to the first person who ever broke my heart and nearly broke my spirit along with it.

    He came into my life unexpectedly, and with a ray of light so radiant it uplifted me and gave me hope in the midst of a dark and challenging year. But after only a few short months, that light burned out as he cast me aside quietly, slowly, for reasons I will always struggle to fathom.

    The emotional struggle and plethora of mistakes I made in the aftermath of that separation was profound.

    I lost weight, cried more than any one person should cry, maintained a painful and dysfunctional involvement with this person, full of blurred lines and manipulation, found myself being referred to a psychiatrist I could barely afford to see, stopped reading books, stopped taking care of myself, lost myself, gave parts of myself away, and eventually made an honest attempt to pick myself up off the ground and do the work of getting my life back together.

    It wasn’t easy. It took months of heartache and grief that ultimately came to a head when this person said something very cruel to me after I tried to express my pain and disappointment to him, thus twisting the knife deeper into our damaged relationship. After that incident, I became fed up in all the ways I needed to be.

    I minimized contact. I placed my time and energy elsewhere. I made a point to get out at least once a week and do something that made me feel happy and good about myself.

    Things began to look up, and my heart began to heal. I was taking steps in the right direction, but I still had a painful attachment to him that I couldn’t seem to break. Until, on a typical and fortuitous afternoon, I met someone else.

    Although I didn’t immediately recognize him, I eventually remembered that we went to high school together. I also remembered that he had a crush on me in tenth grade, although I later learned that it lasted for years more than that and his affection ran much deeper than the average high school crush. So when he saw me again that day, his feelings resurfaced and word got around to me about it.

    After our first date, I could already feel the chapter with my ex coming to a close.

    I had someone wonderful right in front of me—someone who set the standard for how I wanted and deserved to be treated, someone who saw and believed in my worth from the moment he laid eyes on me a decade prior, someone who taught me to let go and let be.

    And although love was the very last thing I was looking for at the time, I was nonetheless given the flash of insight I needed to make emotionally healthier choices.

    “I’m happy. That’s all you need to know.”

    And I was happy. I was happier than I’d been in months. But what I didn’t reveal was that I was also anxious and full of doubt.

    Escaping a toxic and dysfunctional relationship and entering one full of promise and longevity can be challenging. There’s a sense of collateral damage. There’s a sense of unease and defensiveness.

    The nature of my new relationship was different and better in every way, but I still found myself thinking, feeling, and acting out in ways I knew were unhealthy, likely making my partner feel as though he needed to fix me.

    After the initial newness wore off and the relationship progressed into something stable and exclusive, I put him and perceived shortcomings under a microscope.

    When he told me how great and special I was, I thought he was exaggerating. When he was having an off day or didn’t shower me with a steady flow of attention, I turned resentful and passive aggressive. When he expressed his desire to spend a lifetime making me happy, I broke down in tears of fear that he would disappoint me.

    Every day I feel almost entirely certain that it will be the day he realizes I’m damaged goods and he’s wasting his time. The slightest trigger will leave me feeling anxious and discouraged, and the slightest misunderstanding will leave me feeling defensive and ready for impact.

    No matter how many times he convinces me that he loves me deeply, is doing the best he can, and wants to be with me for as long as possible, I can’t help but poke holes in his words and actions.

    Perhaps it’s a defensive mechanism. Perhaps it’s a fear of my own flaws. Perhaps it’s an ugly scar.

    My last relationship broke me down and chipped away at my ability to trust. It wrecked my heart and my mind. It instilled thought and behavioral patterns that have proven to be difficult to break.

    Because of my past, the relationship I’ve always dreamed of having has fallen under unnecessary stress. And although my partner has yet to complain about it, I know that if I don’t work on reprogramming my mind and adjusting my behavior, our connection will eventually suffer in ways that can be so easily avoided.

    If you too are suffering from new relationship anxiety and trust issues planted by a past relationship, you may need these five essential reminders that have helped me on my own journey.

    1. Your current partner is not your ex-partner.

    It can be tempting to compare the two, whether internally or aloud, but it’s important to remember that your new partner is an entirely different person waiting to play an entirely different role in your life story. Don’t give your past a single reason to sabotage your future or dirty up a perfectly clean slate.

    2. Pause before you react. 

    This is a hard one for me, but before you assume anything or unduly react to any type of perceived conflict, pause and reflect on where your thoughts and feelings are coming from. Could insecurity, fear, or trauma be at play? Is the conflict real or imagined? 

    Being preoccupied is not the same as ignoring you. Making a lighthearted and harmless comment is not the same as intentionally trying to hurt your feelings. Showing frequent love and affection is not the same as using you for personal gain.

    Separate your emotions from your ego, and consider the rationality of your behavior before you react or respond to anything.

    3. Expectation is the root of all disappointment.

    Keep your expectations in check. When a relationship goes south, we often tend to carry residual expectations and disappoints into the next one. If you experience disappointment over something your partner said or did, ask yourself what you expected them to say or do instead. Then consider whether or not that expectation is fair and justified.

    For example, expecting your partner to listen to your concerns and honor your needs is fair. Expecting them to read your mind, wait on you hand and foot, or make you the center of their world is not. Unfair expectations can poison a relationship if you don’t strive to recognize and release them.

    4. Fix yourself before trying to fix your partner.

    Be mindful of your tendency to project your flaws and insecurities onto your partner.

    Projecting is a common mistake in many relationships because pointing the finger at the person closest to you is easier than turning it to yourself and being honest about whether or not your own internal dialogue is the actual source of the problem.

    Before you decide to change something about your partner, consider what you might need to work on within yourself.

    5. Trust is the glue that holds it all together.

    I can’t even tell you how many times my partner has stressed the importance of trust after a misunderstanding or moment of doubt and insecurity on my end. Time and experience has taught me that trust is vital to the success of any relationship, but it’s something I clearly need to work on after years of being hurt and misled.

    While trust may not be an easy thing for many couples, it helps to remember that if your partner is someone worth being with, they will never give you a reason not to trust them.

  • 7 Strategies to Stay Sane This Holiday Season

    7 Strategies to Stay Sane This Holiday Season

    Gingerbread men

    “Accept what is, let go of what was, and have faith in what will be.” ~Sonia Ricotti

    It’s that time of year again. The fresh scent of an evergreen fills the house. Strains of “Silent Night” and “Jingle Bells” permeate the airwaves. Once again, I unpack the fragile, ceramic Santa that I made as a gift for my mom when I was five. Suddenly, I’m transported back in time—for better or for worse.

    The holidays should be joyous times filled with family and friends, but sometimes the very traditions that give meaning to this season also trigger old fears, hurts, and anxieties. (And if you’re prone to Season Affective Disorder (SAD), the lack of warmth and sunshine can zap your goodwill toward men, and women, too.)

    Then last year—after lots of recovery and mindfulness practice—I determined to navigate the holidays in a healthier manner. I decided to accept the reality of my Christmas crazies and choose to respond differently when things (inevitably) became stressful.

    Since I was so good at making lists of gifts to buy others and errands to run and obligations to fulfill, why not make a list of ways to manage my emotional well-being? If you’re like me and tend to succumb to the holiday crazies, these strategies may help maintain your sanity, too.

    1. Stock up on sanity savers.

    When I went through my divorce, my therapist had me make a list of things—such as taking a hot bubble bath or calling a good friend—to do when I became anxious. Even when I’m not in all-out crisis mode, this form of self-care helps me maintain a more peaceful perspective. By thinking of these soothing activities ahead of time, I know exactly what to do when stressful situations appear.

    2. Reel in expectations.

    Repeat after me: “There is no such thing as a perfect holiday.” Something will go wrong. My brother-in-law will say something inappropriate at the family dinner. Gifts will get lost in the mail. The turkey will be raw in the middle. The ornaments will not all be evenly spaced on the tree—and it will be okay.

    3. Keep a meltdown journal.

    When something or someone inevitably pushes my buttons, I make note of it in my “meltdown” journal. I include details about what occurred before my meltdown and record if I was hungry, tired, lonely, or hormonal. Writing it all down helps me recognize patterns and also serves as a safe way to vent my frustrations.

    4. Check motives at the door.

    Do not, I repeat, do not give anything to anyone if you expect so much as a “thank you” in return. Seriously. One of the worst holiday meltdowns I’ve had in recent years was when a friend didn’t express (what I felt was) the proper amount of gratitude for my gift. This year, my presents may be decorated with ribbons, but they will not come with strings attached.

    5. Own your inner Grinch.

    If you’re feeling cranky because it seems like you always give more than you receive, or visa versa, set a limit for spending or call a truce on personal gift-giving. My very generous friends and I did this years ago, and it immediately improved my holiday spirit because I didn’t have to fret that my Christmas gifts were “good” enough.

    6. Break up with tradition.

    If you’re doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome, you’re going to become nuttier than a fruitcake. (Albert Einstein wasn’t necessarily talking about the holidays when he coined the definition of insanity, but it applies.)

    Hearing “Jingle Bells,” the smell of gingerbread, or seeing your friends’ cheesy family photo holiday cards may inspire warm feels, or be cruel reminders of stressful, lonely times.

    For example, when I was single, it was hard being the third-wheel at New Year’s Eve dinner parties, so rather than accept invitations that made me uncomfortable, I established a new tradition. New Year’s Eve became a time for quiet contemplation. (And now share that tradition with my honey.)

    7. Be mindful for goodness sakes.

    When anxiety strikes, it’s easy to stuff feelings, along with a mountain of sugar cookies. Over the holidays I double my effort to stock up on healthy snacks and non-alcoholic beverages. Then I post the question “Why?” on the fridge to help remind me of my motivations before I indulge. If I really want that treat, then I proceed; but if I’m eating because I’m anxious, I try to sooth myself with a more healthy activity. (See Tip 1.)

    —

    Simply reflecting on this list, makes me aware of how the holidays can affect my mood, and helps me reclaim the festive season. Now I can revision the season as a time to be grateful for all the positive aspects of my life, and the progress I’ve made since I made the decision to release the ghosts of Christmas’ past.

  • Why No One Needs “Fixing” or Wants Unsolicited Advice

    Why No One Needs “Fixing” or Wants Unsolicited Advice

    Woman chatting

    “People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they’re not on your road doesn’t mean they’re lost.” ~Dalai Lama

    Have you ever felt the urge to fix someone? And by fix I mean observe their circumstances and tell them what you think they’re doing wrong and exactly how you think they should fix it?

    We’ve all done it. We’re all guilty.

    Especially with close friends or family.

    “If he would only listen to me and do what I say then everything would work out just fine!”

    Sound familiar?

    I was having tea with a good friend the other week (let’s call her Sally), and she was relating with much exasperation the story of how her sister was wasting her life in her corporate job when she was SO creative and should be working for herself in a creative role. And then she would be happy (according to Sally). Which apparently she’s not (according to Sally).

    Sally went on further to say (with as much exasperation) that she had called her and conveyed this opinion to her sister. Because Sally felt she was right and that her sister needed saving. Not surprisingly, it was not very well received. In fact, Sally’s sister was pretty miffed. And didn’t take the advice. Or speak to her for ages.

    I’m willing to bet Sally’s sister didn’t even consider the advice. Not for a minute. And not because she disagrees but more likely because she’s offended at being told what to do. After all, she didn’t ask Sally for an opinion.

    And there’s the first problem.

    If someone doesn’t ask for your opinion, they’re likely not open to it hearing it.

    It’s quite simple really.

    When you ask a question it’s because you’re interested in hearing the answer.

    Which means you’re interested in the topic being discussed.

    Which further means you’re going to consider the answer with interest and (hopefully) decide from an unemotional stance as to whether you agree with it or not.

    The opposite applies when an opinion—however well intended—is provided without your consent.

    Had Sally’s sister called and asked for advice, the outcome may have been quite different.

    In my early twenties I remember having tea with my mom and enthusing excitedly about a new business idea I’d had. Now, my mom was from the “old school” where job security was your first priority, and in her world it was safest to find a “nice” job in a “nice” company and stay there until you retire or die (whichever comes first).

    Unsurprisingly, her response to my idea was one of complete skepticism and doubt. Which she verbalized immediately. Very loudly. And critically.

    In those days I didn’t have the awareness I have now. I didn’t see that this was simply her own fears being transferred onto me and had absolutely nothing to do with me. Nope, I reacted. Badly. And took it personally.

    After all, I hadn’t asked her for her opinion. I was just sharing an idea.

    I had expected her to be enthusiastic about my enthusiasm. To be supportive. To trust my judgment.

    Instead, I felt incredibly crushed. And I started doubting myself.

    And I felt a lot of anger toward her.

    But most importantly, I stopped sharing my dreams with her. And over the years I told her less and less. Because I knew she’d give me her (fearful) opinion. For which I had never asked.

    The second problem is, you’re assuming the person needs fixing, that what they’re doing is “wrong.”

    Our journey in this lifetime is our own. We’re the only ones who know what is best for us. And only we have a full perspective of all the elements of our lives and how they serve us.

    Even when we’re facing challenges, they are ours to face down. Our way. And when we see fit.

    Yes, we need to take responsibility for any fall-out, but isn’t that where our growth lies? Making choices and then dealing with the consequences? Good or bad?

    Maybe Sally’s sister is comfortable in her current corporate position. Maybe she feels secure with her stable income. And maybe she uses her creativity in a different way within her current position.

    Maybe from her perspective she doesn’t have a problem.

    My parents had a terrible relationship. At least that’s what I always told myself.

    They argued. Constantly.

    There was little or no affection. Ever.

    I always wondered why they stayed together. Surely they would both be happier apart? This relationship was simply wrong.

    In my view it epitomized the very essence of all the things you shouldn’t do or be in any relationship. And I told my mom this. Even though she hadn’t asked.

    Shortly after they both retired they moved to the coast to be closer to their grandchild. My dad had always been a workaholic and in his career he had travelled a lot. Not surprisingly, this really suited my mom. She loved her own company. Now in retirement he was home. All the time. And followed her around like a puppy.

    She was unhappy. Incredibly so. And would vent this to me at any opportunity.

    From my perspective, the answer was obvious. It was time to end this sham of a union. And I told her just that. With abundant justification and a healthy dose of righteousness.

    It was simple. If she would just Do. As. I. Say.

    But she didn’t. I don’t even think she really heard me. She did what we all do when we get uninvited “solutions” to our perceived problems: She got defensive. Really defensive. About her marriage and my dad.

    And we argued quite aggressively and loudly. And then we didn’t speak for many weeks as we both simmered in quiet indignation. I absolutely believed I was right.

    And yet, now that I’m older and wiser, I can look back and see that in my parents’ world it was right.

    For them.

    It worked.

    For her. And him.

    We can never know how someone else’s circumstances (however bad they seem) will serve them in the bigger picture of their life’s journey.

    We can never know what someone else’s perspective is around an event that we may judge as bad. Or wrong.

    Maybe in their world it’s right. Or good.

    It’s hard (really hard) to watch people we love go through hardship. Our instinct is to help. Or fix.

    But remember.

    In any relationship our only obligation is to show up and bear witness. Unconditionally. That’s all. We only ever want to fix someone because ultimately it’ll make us feel better.

    Why do we feel uncomfortable when someone close is facing challenges? Maybe that’s the question we need to ask ourselves.

    Sometimes feeling discomfort is what provides the momentum that’s needed for that person to make some changes. In their own time. Not ours.

    Trust that their judgment will serve them irrespective of whether we agree with it or not.

    Respect their journey.

    Try it next time you feel the urge to fix.

    That’s your growth right there.