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Jump Off the Busy Train for a Simpler, More Passion-Filled Life

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“What you do today is important, because you are exchanging a day of your life for it.” ~Unknown

A few years ago I was on the busy track. I was working a corporate nine-to-five job, studying at night, and trying to keep up a busy social life. I thought I was achieving it all by doing so many things at once, but really, I was just burning myself out.

My life was a busy blur. I’d start my weeks feeling tired and end them completely exhausted. Time was a constant challenge. I was always rushing from one thing to the …

A Place to Release Your Secrets and Shame: Share Your Truth in the Forums

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Ten months ago when I launched the Tiny Buddha community forums, I hoped they would better enable us all to connect with and support each other.

Since then, I’ve been amazed and inspired to see the love and compassion people extend there, without any agenda beyond helping others feel less alone and more at ease in our uncertain, often confusing world.

There are now over 10,000 active forum members, and there have been more than 1,600 conversations on a wide range of topics related to spirituality, self-esteem, relationships, purpose, parenting, health and fitness, and more.

Whether you’re an active …

How to Avoid Drama: Stop Taking Things Personally and Needing to Be Right

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“Concern yourself not with what is right and what is wrong but with what is important.” ~Unknown

I remember quite distinctly the point where my rational self, less invested in the discussion, took a step back and pointed out that I was descending down the path of needing to prove that I was right.

It was precisely when I started seeing the other commenter as needling my position and attacking the ideas as mine.

What started out as an appeal to respect cultures that celebrate death as a normal part of life, turned into a mud-slinging event the moment I …

How to Respond to Negative People Without Being Negative

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“Don’t let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.” ~Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama

A former coworker seemed to talk non-stop and loudly, interrupt incessantly, gossip about whomever wasn’t in the room, constantly complain, and live quite happily in martyrdom.

It seemed nothing and no one escaped her negative spin. She was good at it. She could twist the happiest moment of someone’s life into a horrendous mistake. She seemed to enjoy it, too.

At first, my judgmental mind thought her behavior was quite inappropriate. I simply didn’t approve of it. But after weeks of working with her, …

How to Overcome Envy So It Doesn’t Poison Your Relationships

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“Enjoy your own life without comparing it with that of another.” ~Marquis de Condorc

I struggled to offer a tight smile to a friend who had achieved a life-changing career break.

Although I was thrilled and excited for my friend, I was sad and disappointed in myself. I, too, had worked hard and waited patiently, but unlike my friend, my work and my wait continued, unacknowledged and unrewarded.

At first I didn’t notice I had been bitten by envy. But its invisible poison infected my bloodstream, polluting my future interactions with my friend. I was guarded, afraid of being hurt …

3 Questions To Ask Yourself Before You Enter A Relationship

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“Love does not obey our expectations; it obeys our intentions.” ~Lloyd Strom

Recently, I did something radical; I entered into a relationship with the intention of extending love. I consciously set the goal of peace.

It’s with the intention to experience more peace than ever before that the relationship began, and it’s with that same intention that we decided to end the relationship. In between it all, I felt deeply connected, heard, and loved.

What did I do differently this time that allowed me to experience a new level of peace and love? What about this relationship created the …

Getting Unstuck: Work Through Fear and Change Your Life

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“When you become comfortable with uncertainty, infinite possibilities open up in your life.” ~Eckhart Tolle

We’ve all been there. Feeling stuck is very distressing, and it can often make a situation feel even more difficult than it already appears to be.

Many of us may have felt trapped in a job, a relationship, a place; any unfavourable situation, really, that we see little way out of can leave us feeling deeply discouraged.

The uncertainty of it all becomes overwhelming and, over time, paralyzing.

I have felt the frustration, the sadness, and the hopelessness that accompany this predicament many times.

In …

Forming Healthy Habits: 3 Tiny Choices That Create Huge Change

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“It is better to make many small steps in the right direction than to make a great leap forward only to stumble backward.” ~Proverb

Seven years ago I was a sedentary, over-caffeinated, unmindful, somewhat neurotic meat-eater with a bit of a drinking problem. My meals came out of boxes with chemical compounds for ingredients and had little in the way of anything that grew outside or came from a field.

I made excuses for not exercising, but in reality I was so insecure that I didn’t think I was strong enough to be athletic. I was afraid of making an …

How to Move On When You’re Hurt and Waiting for Closure

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“Letting go gives us freedom and freedom is the only condition for happiness.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Ah, closure. That feeling of vindication, or a sense of completion—it can be very enticing!

There are times when seeking resolution is really important. If we are having an argument with our partner, settling it can help strengthen our relationship. If we are having a disagreement over a contract, determining the outcome may be required to continue with the project at hand.

In these types of situations, seeking resolution is very relevant.

That said, there are loads of situations that occur in life …

Why Bad Things Happen to Good People: How Is This Supporting You?

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“This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival… Be grateful for whatever comes. Because each has been sent
 as a guide from beyond.” ~Rumi

Yesterday my boyfriend’s father told me that he doesn’t believe that everything happens for a reason. He explained, “Where I can’t get on board is, if that’s true, then why do bad things happen to good people?”

It touches close to home for their entire family because not only does one of their sons’ girlfriends have a rare and terminal form of cancer, she met their son because he successfully removed a …

The Power of Kindness: Life-Changing Advice About Creating Happiness

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“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” ~Winston Churchill

It was a beautiful winter’s day in Sydney. Having returned home after working for two years in Singapore and traveling through Asia, I felt like I owed it to myself to do something I loved.

My heart has always been in fitness and travel. When there was a job opening at my local travel agency, I applied, went for the interview, and got the position. I was a happy girl—but only for a short while.

Two months into my job, it …

3 Ways to Be Kind and Make Someone’s Day

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“The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest intention.” ~Oscar Wilde

It’s the small, everyday things that can make or break a day for us.

While we celebrate the role models who inspire thousands (in person or on Facebook!), for most of us everyday moments—a stranger jostling us in the shops, a driver cutting us up at a light, someone pushing in front of us in line at the post office—can upset us out of all proportion.

But the flip side is that we can also be disproportionately pleased by the small actions of a stranger.

On …

4 Questions to Ask Yourself When You’re Unhappy with Your Work

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“What you do today is important, because you are exchanging a day of your life for it.” ~Unknown

In my working lifetime, I have been the poster child for seeking work-life balance. I have spent hundreds of hours curled into complex yoga asanas, breathing into the resistance and unexpected openness.

I have meditated sincerely, flowering into a quieter mind. Add to that a happy, growing relationship, stable social connections, and purposefully cultivated hobbies, and you would think that I go humming and beaming to work each morning.

The startling truth is that for every minute that I have spent …

Life Happens When You Listen: Let Yourself Learn from the Moment

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“Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are.” ~Jose Ortega y Gasset

Something magical and wonderful happened to me over Christmas. For the first time in my life I was able to make sense out of a string of seemingly random events that made no sense at all, that is, until I bothered to stop, listen, and check in with my heart.

My family and I were staying in a hotel in Brisbane, Australia, for three nights over the Christmas period. It was a special Christmas this year because it was my big …

How to Find Clarity When You’re Confused About What to Do

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“Nobody can give you wiser advice than yourself.” ~Cicero 

You know that state of confusion where you feel really unsure about what to do—you’re talking about it with all of your friends, making lists, weighing options, lying awake all night?

As confused and unsure as you may feel in those moments, you’re not. You have much more clarity than you think.

Re-read that last line again. You have a lot more clarity than you think. You see, clarity is what you are. It’s what you’re born with, it’s your true nature, and it’s what is always there underneath the …

How Stepping Outside Your Comfort Zone Can Help Reduce Anxiety

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“What you do today can improve all your tomorrows.” ~Ralph Marston

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been an anxious person. My grandfather died when I was four years old and some of my earliest memories consist of panic attacks whenever I was left alone. In my mind, I had to keep my loved ones in sight at all times, so there would be no chance of them disappearing, just as my grandpa did.  

From that point on, I slowly began to overcome my fears of separation from family. However, new anxieties began to take its place. Whether …

6 Ways Your Mind Tries to Control Your Life

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“I know but one freedom and that is the freedom of the mind.” ~Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Our mind is a funny thing. On the one hand, it’s awesome. But on the other, it can pulverize us more quickly and ruthlessly than anything else.

Our mind is inherently scared. That’s its job, to be cautious—to keep us alive, to have us cross roads safely and not get eaten by a lion. But left unchecked, it can become paralyzed with fear and meaner than a cornered crocodile.

And it’s incredibly bossy.

The mind’s tendency to want to control is so strong …

Identity Crisis: When You Aren’t Sure Who You Are or How You Fit In

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“Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be.” ~Alan Watts

In another life, not too long ago, I was an actress.

I fell into acting when a catalogue showed up on my doorstep for UCLA Extension summer classes, and in my boredom I started flipping through it to see what was on offer. For whatever reason (synchronicity? my intuition?), the Acting 101 class jumped out at me, and something in me said yes.

At the time, I was living in West Los Angeles, only a few years out of college after graduating …

6 Lessons from Nature on Living a Peaceful, Fulfilling Life

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“Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.” ~Lao Tzu

Five years ago, I was feeling really stressed (like millions of other people in the world). I was working full time in a job that was draining me of every single ounce of energy I had.

I had nothing left to give to myself or those I loved at the end of each working day; life had turned into an incessant cycle of getting up, going to work, coming home, working, and going to bed.

During this time, I read about so many people who were also unhappy with …

Vulnerability Is a Sign of Strength, Not Weakness

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“I now see how owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do.” ~Brene Brown

I was raised to be determined. I was raised to put my head down and solider on during tough times, and I was raised to never be vulnerable, because being so meant you were weak.

Whether these were the intended lessons, it’s hard to say, but somewhere deep inside that is how I interpreted the messages from those who had influence in my life.

Throughout most of my life I carried these messages like suits of …