Tiny Buddha

Tag: wisdom

  • 7 Ways to Manage a Break Up and Work Through the Pain

    7 Ways to Manage a Break Up and Work Through the Pain

    Break-Up

    “Most of our troubles are due to our passionate desire for and attachment to things that we misapprehend as enduring entities.” ~Dalai Lama

    Some breakups are so bad that they make you hate the sunshine. It’s up there gleaming, looking down on you, being all sunny despite the fact that you feel like a slice of hell. The suffering is relentless. The sky is ugly.

    The ending of my last relationship was awful. I think it hurt as bad as it did because this wasn’t some random young woman who had just walked into my life. This was someone whom I’d been aquatinted with for years.

    I know her family. I had a business relationship with her and we had been performing together as part of a musical group. It also wasn’t my choice to end things.

    I once read that the pain of the death of a loved one, the pain of the end of a relationship, and the pain of a child losing a teddy bear are no different. Pain is pain.

    And to the one who experiences pain, it can be all consuming and can seem like the end of the world.

    I don’t like it when some people think that just because your relationship only lasted a couple of months you should hurt less than if the relationship had been longer. Again, pain is pain. No one has the right to judge it, put limits on it, or qualify it.

    Sometimes, it’s hard to imagine that you’ll ever feel better. So, what do you do? You can hate it if you want, resent it, resist it, or wish it wasn’t happening.

    The fact is that it’s happening. I wish I could tell you that I’d found the secret to making the healing from the breakup of a relationship easier or faster. I haven’t.

    I do know that when all of the flirting, smiling, hand-holding, and special times on the couch are over, somehow you have to find a way to put the pieces of yourself back together.

    I think the way to do this is different for everyone. Here are some things that I’ve found helpful. (more…)

  • When Thoughts Cause Stress: Steps on the Path to Mindfulness

    When Thoughts Cause Stress: Steps on the Path to Mindfulness

    “Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.” ~Charles Swindoll

    The notion that how we feel is directly caused by events around us, or directly involving us, is a scourge of our modern times. To believe that the external world and its perceived relationship to us is the major determinative factor in how we feel (“I can’t believe he/she said that to me—that’s so outrageous!”) is disempowering and self-destructive.

    We impose our “shoulds” on what we perceive as “the world out there,” and then when it fails to live up to our arbitrary and abstract standards, we pout, mope, grumble, and complain that it “should” have been different.

    Rather than tweaking our perception, we demand that the thing we perceive should tweak itself!

    When people fail to conform to our whimsy, we often fall into yet another error avoided by the mindful: we replay upsetting events (events that we perceived as upsetting) and our emotional responses to them in our heads over and over, further upsetting ourselves.

    Many people like to imagine how they would have responded differently to an unpleasant scenario—perhaps with some pithy and scathing repartee to put the aggressor in their place, or some supremely composed nonchalance in the face of adversity.

    But these mental rehashings and rehearsals have various detrimental effects. For one, they further worsen your state of mind, which, if sustained, simply serves to draw more people and events to you that correspond to your bad mood.

    The remedy?

    First, we need to drop our “shoulds” in the moment, adopt a more “go with the flow” mindset, and accept that there will always be things that crop up that we won’t necessarily be overjoyed about.

    Believe that that is okay (and that it may ultimately be in your best interest), and, as Niebuhr said, try to cultivate the serenity to accept the things you cannot change.

    Next, we need to learn not to RE-act unconsciously to stimuli, rehashing our established habitual response to some perceived stressor. (“I can’t believe you’re doing this to me again!”)

    Instead, we need to develop a modicum of detachment and learn to observe what is occurring without identifying with it. That goes for both external processes and internal thought processes.

    People forget that no matter what happens, there is always a multitude of angles to view it from, all of them complimentary. Too easily do we adopt the idea that our own personal viewing angle trumps any other. (more…)

  • Giveaway and Interview: Seeing, Knowing, Being by John Greer

    Giveaway and Interview: Seeing, Knowing, Being by John Greer

    Note: The winners for this giveaway have already been chosen. Subscribe to Tiny Buddha for free daily or weekly emails, and to learn about future giveaways!

    The winners:

    Regardless of our individual beliefs, we all want to feel a sense of wholeness to experience the present moment with peace and connection.

    It’s the foundation of spiritual practice, however we define that individually: We want to stop feeling a need to fix ourselves, and instead awaken to the infinite beauty of who we already are.

    In his powerful new book Seeing, Knowing, Being, meditation teacher John Greer explores insights from a wide range of spiritual traditions, inviting us to challenge our perceptions and thought patterns to access our inner knowing and experience oneness with the world around us.

    Laden with evocative metaphors, the book breaks complex ideas into understandable parts, inviting us to challenge what we think know for a greater awareness of what actually is.

    I highly recommend Seeing, Knowing, Being to anyone looking to explore or deepen their understanding of non-duality.

    The Giveaway

    To enter to win 1 of 2 free copies of Seeing Knowing Being: A Guide to Sacred Awakenings:

    • Leave a comment below
    • Tweet: RT @tinybuddha Book GIVEAWAY & Interview: Seeing, Knowing, Being http://bit.ly/O9HQWS

    If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can still enter by completing the first step. You can enter until midnight PST on Sunday, July 29th. (more…)

  • The Beauty of Nothing: Reflections on Impermanence

    The Beauty of Nothing: Reflections on Impermanence

    “Everything flows and nothing abides, everything gives way and nothing stays fixed.” ~Heraclitus 

    I’m reclining on a pebble beach, my bag tucked under my head, a can of Fanta to the right of me, above me, the sky and before me, the sea. It’s a few miles out.

    I came here alone. Friends had no time for me today. I’ve been reading instead, the cast of Anna Karenina filling the places where friends should be, and eating rich Italian ice cream, fudge flavored, even though it’ll give me an upset stomach later.

    The sun is scorching everything today, partner-in-crime with the wind. I arch back to look at a heap of discarded oyster shells. A sign reads: DO NOT REMOVE. The shells are recycled back into the oyster beds, keeping the nursery alive and sustainable.

    I roll my spine into the pebbles and wonder what oysters taste like; I don’t eat animals, fish, crustaceans, or insects.

    A couple strolls down the concrete slipway on my left, stopping before the slippery green of the sea’s memory becomes a hazard. The guy is distracted; the woman looks bored and isolated.

    You see, her partner has a video camera, one of those expensive HD ones. He’s looking at the world through it—the waning of the afternoon and the hot sun coming to settle atop the horizon.

    The people, the beaches, the bustle, the oyster shells; all are turned into a copy and later that copy will become a copy too. In the meantime, this moment will, and already has, passed.

    I look at the woman through the secrecy of my sunglasses. Her hands open and close around a bottle of water, and she lets her shoulders roll forward, creating cupped shelves from her collar bones. The sun sits in them. She’s very beautiful, very bored. She’s in the moment, but so alone.

    Her partner continues to look at the world on the screen until her hints of moving on filter through the peripherals of the camera. They leave as they came. (more…)

  • Change Your Beliefs, Change Your Life

    Change Your Beliefs, Change Your Life

    “He who has health has hope, and he who has hope has everything.” ~Proverb

    As I start a new day, grateful that I am pain-free, healthy, and strong, I reflect on the true meaning of health and how I ended up in this wonderful place.

    An outsider looking in might say I worked hard in the gym and spent thousands of dollars on treatments and services.

    I would simply say that I believed and continue to believe—and that is all.

    Four years ago, I was defeated by a diagnosis called Sacroiliac Joint Dysfunction. What this means is that abnormalities in the joint which connect the spine to the pelvis were causing pain.

    This was the Webster’s definition I needed to describe why I had been suffering for years with low back, hip, and leg pain that prevented me from living—truly living.

    When the doctors told me there was no cure, it was the excuse I needed to stay trapped in depression and pain. 

    As a stay-at-home mom of two young children, I spent my small amount of free time feeling sorry for myself and taking a variety of pills to cope. I rang in each New Year with a new doctor, physical therapist, and plan that failed before it started.

    Sadly, by the time Valentine’s Day rolled around, the hope I placed in others to fix me quickly dimmed to sarcasm and disappointment. The reality was I was getting worse and more depressed with each failed attempt.

    It was not until I understood that my focus needed to change that I was able to make the strides I needed to get better.

    You see, I was the perfect mom. I felt that my worth came from doing everything for everybody else, in spite of my physical condition. I was a volunteer addict and a perfectionist when it came to everything except me.    (more…)

  • How Worrying Makes Life Less Joyful

    How Worrying Makes Life Less Joyful

    “Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow. It only saps today of its joy.” ~Leo Bucaglia

    As I stood on the street corner, tears streaming down my face, I called friends for confirmation that what I had just been told wasn’t true.

    My meeting with my “friend” had gone horribly wrong. And when I say gone wrong, that’s because she was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong!

    But what if she wasn’t wrong?

    What if her words, which stung so badly that I couldn’t stop myself from crying publicly, were true?

    Two weeks prior to this fateful day, three families had gotten together for what was supposed to be a wonderful reunion of friends and a celebration of the beginning of summer.

    One family lives on a beautiful property with a huge man-made pond. Spending time at their house is just the way you would envision the perfect childhood summer.

    With acres of green grass and a beautiful blue sky as a backdrop, you hold onto a rope, swing off a landing, fly through the air, and plunge into the pond. The sound of birds chirping tickles your ears, and the smell of fresh air fill your lungs.

    Ah, the idyllic beginning to a wonderful summer.

    Since we would be outside, it seemed the perfect place to bring our dog, Sunshine. Sunshine is part Australian Shepard, which means she has spent many an afternoon desperately trying to herd my kids together.

    As the afternoon progressed, the kids ran around. Sunshine barked and barked and barked some more. My son was so anxious that she would run off.

    Several times at home, Sunshine had escaped through the front door. Although we always caught her, the moments watching her chasing squirrels, oblivious to our offers of treats, were a little nerve-wracking for me and my son! (more…)

  • Creating Peace by Finding a Connection to the Earth

    Creating Peace by Finding a Connection to the Earth

    “You get peace of mind not by thinking about it or imagining it, but by quietening and relaxing the restless mind.” ~Remez Sasson

    In a world that constantly barrages us with information, it becomes a daily struggle to unplug and find peace. The “need to” and “should do” and “must do” of our ever-frantic lives overwhelms us and creates a stress that threatens to unravel.

    As a child my happiest days were those spent outdoors. Even then, peace came while watching the flowers bend in the wind and the clouds stretch across the sky.

    As an adult it became a struggle to unplug and “justify” time to do these simple, fulfilling activities that truly are life’s happiest moments. Even hiking in the mountains close to home, I couldn’t get away from myself and my thoughts about “hurry up and get back to”… the email, business, website, or whatever was waiting on my desk.

    So in order to find true quiet I ventured to the ends of the Earth. The answer for me to find this peace was to become an explorer, seeking peace over the edges of the world, the literal edge of human existence. My soul sought the extreme.

    There is a line that marks the edge of the survival zone of our species. I found that stepping over that edge is both the scariest thing in the world and the most peaceful. The knowing that I am “beyond” allows me to release all “human” thoughts and concentrate on simply “being.”

    In my search, I have found four of the most incomparable and inhospitable places on earth that represent “over the edge” for me. Being in these places, means truly disconnecting with “man’s world” and fully embracing and connecting to the natural world and its rhythms.

    It is immensely powerful and a strange dichotomy, balancing on that line, more alive than ever, yet so near to possible death.    (more…)

  • When You Fear Making the “Wrong” Decision

    When You Fear Making the “Wrong” Decision

    “Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth.” ~Pema Chodron

    For the past three weeks, I’ve been trying to decide whether or not to move to Korea for a year. Some days I’ve completely made up my mind to take the trip. I get excited about teaching myself Korean and spend hours and hours online learning about the culture.

    Other days, I’m an emotional wreck, terrified that I’m making the wrong decision.

    What if I get homesick? What if I’m supposed to be doing something else? What if I don’t like kimchi? What if? What if? What if?

    And then there are those days where my mind resists all attempts to make any kind of decision at all. I’m immobilized, unable to push through the debilitating fear.

    Being the self-reflective (over-analyzer) type that I am, I decided to dig deep within myself to find the root of this pesky little emotion that has been sabotaging my efforts to move forward, or in any direction, for that matter.

    I realized that the issue isn’t about being afraid to go to Korea. The real issue is that I have an overall fear of making the “wrong” decisions in my life.

    Interestingly enough, I also realized that this brand of fear directly coincides with my decision to live a more purposeful and spiritually centered life.

    (Record stops.)

    Huh? I embarked upon this journey hoping to find inner peace, bliss, rainbows, and unicorns, and I actually seem to be experiencing more negative emotions than before. Seems counter-intuitive, right?

    Not exactly. (more…)

  • 6 Tips to Tame Negative Thoughts (So You Can Live a Less Limited Life)

    6 Tips to Tame Negative Thoughts (So You Can Live a Less Limited Life)

    “You are your choices.” ~Seneca

    Lately I‘ve been feeling a bit down in the dumps. A few things have happened at work to make me feel like nothing’s going my way.

    I’m guessing that pretty much everyone experiences weeks like this from time to time. You know, where it feels like the whole world is against you. No matter what you do, nothing goes right.

    This has been my life for the past few weeks.

    And my initial reaction was to feel sorry for myself. To retreat to the safety of self-pity where nothing’s my fault—it’s simply the world ganging up on me.

    And then like a lightening strike out of the blue, amidst my dark cloud of pity I had an epiphany:

    I have a choice. 

    Instead of reacting in a way that renders me helpless, I have the choice to pick myself up, dust myself off, and turn those negative thoughts into positive ones.

    When it comes to filtering our thoughts, even though at times it may not feel like it, we do have a choice.

    Just because some of our thoughts are negative doesn’t mean we have to listen to them.

    Did you know that our brains produce 70,000 thoughts every single day? Just imagine trying to take action on every single thought—all 70,000 of them. It would be pretty much impossible, right?

    In fact we actively “filter” our thoughts pretty much all the time. Our brains are constantly deciding which thoughts are useful and which ones to ignore. So when a negative thought pops into our heads, we do actually have a choice.

    Either we listen to the thought and allow it to trigger a whole host of other negative thoughts, or we decide that we have better things to do in life and we ignore it. (more…)

  • 8 Reasons to Buy the Tiny Wisdom eBook Series (Available Now!)

    8 Reasons to Buy the Tiny Wisdom eBook Series (Available Now!)

    Since Tiny Buddha launched in 2009, I’ve written hundreds of “Tiny Wisdom” blog posts. In the beginning, I kept these short and peripheral.

    Over time, I started putting more of myself into them and giving them a lot more love and attention. Suddenly, these posts became far more popular than I ever thought they’d be.

    They aren’t lengthy how-to posts with lists of action steps. They’re short reflections on the little things that make a huge difference in our daily lives. They’re reminders of what matters and how to embrace it, right now, instead of focusing on all the things that only bring us down.

    They’re concise. They’re focused. Most importantly, they’re relevant to the challenges we all face every day.

    In recent months, I’ve received countless emails from readers asking me to compile some of these posts into an eBook—so I decided to do something even better.

    I created 5 short eBooks with posts on the following topics:

    • Self-Love
    • Happiness
    • Mindfulness
    • Love
    • Pain

    These eBooks are all available today, individually or as a complete package. On it’s own, each eBook costs $4.97. The full package of five costs $19.97—which essentially means you get one free if you buy the whole series.

    (more…)

  • A Letter from Your Calling

    A Letter from Your Calling

    “Every calling is great when greatly pursued.” ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

    It’s me. The one who keeps talking to you about that thing. That project. That possibility.

    I know you think you couldn’t be the one for the job, but honestly, if you weren’t the one for the job, I wouldn’t have come to you with it.

    I wouldn’t have come knocking at the door of your mind. I wouldn’t have come into your dreams, into your imagination, into your heart.

    I wouldn’t have made it so compelling to think about me.

    I wouldn’t have planted in you the frustration with what is.

    I wouldn’t have planted in you the vision of what could be.

    You say you want more meaning, more adventure, and to have a greater impact.

    I’m offering you all of that, but you keep telling me I’m silly, unrealistic, too big, when here I am, ready to give you the greatest adventure of your life.

    I don’t take it personally, but I do weep about it.

    I weep for the joy you are missing out on. I weep because you aren’t getting to witness your immense strength and brilliance. I weep for what the world is missing out on too.

    When I took this job, they told me much of it would be waiting. Waiting on you.

    I want to make sure you know, I’m here, close as breath, waiting. I’m waiting for you to say yes.

    We can do this. Together, we can do this thing.

    It’s true, part of my job is creating challenges and dark moments along the way—but only enough of them to teach you the most beautiful lessons you’ll ever learn.

    I need you. Your hands. Your heart. Your mind. Your circumstances. Your strengths. Your weaknesses. Your wounds. Your wit. Your tale.

    I need you, just as you are.

    Say yes?

    Love,

    Your Calling

    Photo by Ben Fredericson

  • Why We Need to Keep Growing: Lessons from Firewalking

    Why We Need to Keep Growing: Lessons from Firewalking

    “Our lives improve only when we take chances and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves.” ~Walter Anderson

    I recently ran across a chat site called “Why Grow Up?” Their tagline reads:

    “Why Grow Up? Why be responsible? Why act mature?

    Why play by rules? Why eat healthy? Why sleep early?

    Why become a doctor? Why this? WHY ME? WHY WHY WHY?”

    I laughed aloud when I read that remembering something I had said 18 years ago to my husband, Jake: “I just want to retire and garden.”

    I was tired of pressuring myself to keep a business going. I was tired of doing anything that did not fit my ideal of just living out the rest of my life in peace with him, our pets, a lovely garden, working with wildlife rescue, and frequent walks in nature.

    Why Grow?

    This was something of a turning point in our lives. I wanted to withdraw and Jake wanted to grow—to create something meaningful, together—and he was concerned that if he continued to grow, and I didn’t, he would grow beyond me and then we would grow apart. But I was tired.

    Hadn’t I already done a lot of personal work in the years before? Weren’t my past many years of meditation retreats and remarkably good psychotherapy enough? Couldn’t I just rest on my laurels?

    To be more honest, in addition to feeling tired, I think I was afraid. I was afraid of pushing myself beyond my comfort zone, letting go of the safe, familiar shore I was clinging to. What helped me get over my fear and woke up my curiosity was a ten-year-old girl who I met at a firewalk.

    Yes, of all things, a firewalk! And in anticipation of the firewalk I did not sleep much for a week. I had fantasies of lying on the couch with my burned feet in the air, bandaged, in unbearable pain, as my friends visited me to tell me how stupid I had been to even try such a thing.

    But finally the event arrived, and as they were preparing the fire, I met this little 10-year old girl who said: “There is nothing to be afraid of.” She said she had done this many times, in her (little) life.  She said, in fact, she was prone to going over the fire numerous times during each event.  (more…)

  • Stay Safe or Risk Opening Your Heart?

    Stay Safe or Risk Opening Your Heart?

    “When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it’s bottomless.” ~Pema Chodron

    As a child I learned boundaries. I learned what I wasn’t allowed to talk about outside of the family. I learned how far I could go with my parents before I faced their disapproval. I also learned that this boundary was unpredictable.

    Because it was unpredictable, I honed the ability to sense when it seemed safe to do something, and when I couldn’t, based on the emotions of those around me. It kept me safe for the most part. And, I learned to always be on guard around certain people.

    As a result of some of these experiences, I was reluctant to let people into my inner world for fear that I would get hurt.

    I used this ability to read others throughout my life, especially in my career. I could walk into a room and read the mood of the group or individual to ensure that I understood how far I could go.

    For a few people in my life, these boundaries were appropriate. But I used them almost all the time.

    Setting these boundaries also cost me.

    It cost me because I didn’t trust others.

    It cost me because I learned not to expect things from others or I would end up disappointed.

    It cost me because I thought I needed to only rely on and trust myself.

    What I saw in other people was really a reflection of my own lack of trust in myself.

    All the time that I held firm boundaries, I thought they were about respecting myself. But they were really about fear.

    I was afraid of letting others in. I was afraid of letting myself in. And, I discovered that I was main person who didn’t treat myself with respect. This was a difficult lesson.

    It is a lesson I am still learning.

    On the one hand, the skills that I honed in childhood served me well. They kept me safe. They kept me in what little control I had over my life. I couldn’t control much, but I could control what I let others see about me. I could control whether or not I let people in. (more…)

  • The Power of Acceptance: Stop Resisting and Find the Lesson

    The Power of Acceptance: Stop Resisting and Find the Lesson

    “Of course there is no formula for success except, perhaps, an unconditional acceptance of life and what it brings.” ~Arthur Rubinstein

    Sometimes you’re an observer of other people’s lives and you think you’ll never experience what they’re living, whether it’s a positive or negative situation. You think, “That will never happen to me.”

    Part of the real beauty of life is that it’s unpredictable. Nothing is permanent, everything changes, and of course, a lot of things can happen that will transform who you are and have an impact on your life. The problem is that we need to cultivate the ability to truly accept whatever comes and embrace it.

    We need to develop the habit of looking at whatever happens through a positive mindset instead of a negative, defeatist one.

    Of course, life will bring many challenges, such as the death of someone we love, and it’s not easy to embrace them when we’re suffering and wishing those things would have never happened. But if we start cultivating acceptance in our lives right now, we’ll likely cope with future crises in a different way and view them from a different perspective. We will accept instead or resisting.

    I am big fan of Deepak’s Chopra’s The Seven Spiritual Laws of  Success. He dedicates one complete chapter (Law #4) to how we need to receive with open arms what happens to us, because if we fight and resist it, we are generating a lot of turbulence in our minds.

    He explains that we might want things to be different in the future, but in the present moment we need to accept things as they are. That’s the way you can make your life flow smoothly instead of roughly.

    During the last year of my life I have learned the true power of acceptance.

    The first lesson I learned was last year when my boyfriend broke up with me after three years together. Even though I was reluctant to believe he wouldn’t give me a second chance during the initial months, I eventually realized I had no option but to accept his choice and move on with my life. (more…)

  • Scaling Back to Propel Yourself Forward in Work and Beyond

    Scaling Back to Propel Yourself Forward in Work and Beyond

    “Your work is to discover your world and with all your heart give yourself to it.” ~Buddha

    Let me paint a picture for you, instead of clouding this post with emotion. To be more specific, I think I have Asperger’s Syndrome, and even if I wanted to cloud it with emotion, I would probably fail to convey the correct ones.

    I was born in Zimbabwe to well-educated and financially comfortable parents, which is as lucky a background as some people on this continent get to have. Unfortunately, my parents were also incredibly emotionally distant, and my earliest memories include several instances of domestic violence.

    Fortunately, they very rarely lived in the same house at the same time; we were usually a two-household family.

    My father, in the end, died of AIDS, and I’m not in contact with my mother or any reatives because they don’t want to talk about the abuse, the disease, or anything that happened within our family.

    I’m happy to accept that they are uncomfortable talking about it. After several years of struggle, I have learned a lot about my parents that teaches me what amazing people they were—and I am grateful to have been born into this family, because there was an incredible flip-side.

    Although my parents were emotionally distant, they pushed me intellectually more than any parents I have ever met.

    My mother relates a story of having purchased a VHS player in the United Kingdom when we lived there. At the time I was apparently around two or three years old.

    I pestered them about where the cartoon characters were, because I wanted to play with them. They dismissively told me that the cartoon characters lived inside the video machine. I waited until they were gone, and I remember painstakingly prying that VHS player open, so that I could have someone to play with.

    Instead of being annoyed or angry, my parents were amazed. From then on, they pumped me full of intellectual material. I remember reading Hemingway and Cousteau to my mother while she obsessively cleaned the house before I was even in middle school. It was incredible.

    It wasn’t surprising, therefore, that I chose to study medicine, or that I succeeded. (more…)

  • How to Feel Less Stressed About the Uncertain Future

    How to Feel Less Stressed About the Uncertain Future

    “The quality of your life is in direct proportion to the amount of uncertainty you can comfortably deal with.” ~Tony Robbins

    “Uncertainty” may be one of the least popular places to hang out.

    I hear this all the time from my clients, friends, and truth be told, from the voice inside my own head. Certainty is almost always preferable to uncertainty. Humans like to know.

    I wanted to know when our house was on the market last year. Would it sell? When would it sell? How much would we get? Should we start packing up closets now, or wait until the offers start rolling in?

    I found it difficult to be in the moment with all of that uncertainty swirling around. It felt so difficult, in fact, that I found myself creating action steps that were not yet necessary—such as packing up closets—in an attempt to distract myself from the uncertainty-induced anxiety I didn’t want to feel.

    Similarly, I really wanted to know when I was forming my business a few years ago.

    Rather than revel in the excitement of the unknown, I wanted certainty. I wanted to know what it would look like in one year and in ten years. Where would my clients come from? What would my days feel like? I wanted to know exactly how everything would fall into place.

    Mostly, I wanted a guarantee that it would “work” the way I hoped it would. Faith wasn’t going to cut it. The thrill of anticipation? No, thank you.

    I had no interest in fuzzy details or that wide open place where you’re not sure what’s happening but anything is possible. I would have taken certainty any day of the week.

    Wide open views and unlimited possibilities aren’t all they are cracked up to be.

    Most of us, it seems, want to know. We want to know where we’ll live, what our next career will look like, and how it will all go down.

    It almost doesn’t matter if what we know is accurate, beneficial, or true.

    We aren’t searching for truth or clarity or insight as much as we’re simply searching for something reliable to grab ahold of.

    But the more I’ve worked to foster inner peace and the more I’ve tested the uncertainty waters with curiosity and a little less fear, the more I  think uncertainty gets a bad rap. Maybe it doesn’t have to be so bad.

    Here are four steps we can take to make uncertainty bearable. Exciting, even. (more…)

  • How Pain Can Guide Us and Make Us Whole

    How Pain Can Guide Us and Make Us Whole

     “Life’s challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they’re supposed to help you discover who you are.” ~Bernice Johnson Reagon

    We all internalize our suffering to one extent or another. Some of us instinctively take it to a point where it manifests as various physical aches and pains. When I was little, my body learned to carry the burden of the pain that was too big for my heart.

    In some ways, it’s served me very well. It let me compartmentalize enough to function beautifully in certain areas. I have an Ivy League education, many work accolades, and all that jazz.

    But oh, the cost to my dear body has been high. I’ve had chronic pain since I was 16, which has amplified over the years into to difficulty walking, standing, heck, even sitting. I’m physically limited in where I can go, what I can do, and how much energy I have on a daily basis.

    It has been a tremendous price to pay, and I have been so resentful of my body for the life experiences I’ve missed out on.

    I’m in my 30s, and there are 70 year olds who can dance circles around me. It has only been lately that it’s dawned on me how grateful I am for the sacrifice that I unknowingly made. I got through what I needed to, and it’s gotten me to a place where I have the safety to stop, lay my burdens down, and heal.

    Separating from my pain and storing it in my body allowed me a container to put everything I wasn’t able to consciously hold. It also provided a buffer to keep my life experiences from damaging my soul, my faith in humanity, and my spirit. That is exactly what I needed way back then.

    I don’t need it anymore.  (more…)

  • 5 Meditation Myths and the Benefits of Starting Today

    5 Meditation Myths and the Benefits of Starting Today

    “Freedom is instantaneous the moment we accept things as they are.” ~Karen Maezen Miller

    My personal rock-bottom wake-up call came a few years ago when, despite having achieved all of my personal and business goals, I found that I still wasn’t content or experiencing peace of mind.

    Feeling frustrated, I realized that I could no longer rely on my future to fulfill me. I knew continuing to work so hard to accomplish bigger and better goals wasn’t going to relieve my eternal itch that there must be more to life than this.

    To make matters worse, my increasing frustration led to a rocky time in my relationship, which inevitably ended with my partner leaving. Along with the beautiful child I’d been raising, the great house I was living in, the fancy car I was driving, and the pile of money we’d jointly secured as projects fell away too.

    Rock bottom, needing peace, I started exploring alternative ways of thinking, being, and living.

    It was around about that time when I met a group of meditation teachers that changed my life. I saw in their eyes a peace and joy that I had rarely seen before. And the more I spent time with them, the more it became obvious to me that their inner peace was consistent.

    Hungry to experience the same, I packed my bag and headed off to meditate with them for a few months. I spent ten weeks on the island of Patmos in Greece, followed by a further fourteen weeks in the mountains of Mexico.  

    During my time meditating I had a total turnaround in thinking. I discovered the real cause of my persistent problems had never been my failings at “thinking positively.”

    Instead, my habit of thinking was the ultimate cause of my problems. When I was busy thinking, I was missing the peace that’s always present. And by learning to think less and be present, I found life much more enjoyable.

    Meditation serves many purposes, from stress relief to self-awakening. Personally, I started meditating because I was fed up with my mind working overtime. I wanted peace, and through meditating regularly I have become less focused on the movement of my mind and more aware of the pristine peace that is always present. (more…)

  • 4 Easy Steps to Deal with Difficult People

    4 Easy Steps to Deal with Difficult People

    “There is a huge amount of freedom that comes to you when you take nothing personally.” ~Don Miguel Ruiz

    It seemed like a simple task. Please switch my gym membership from gold to silver level. I’m not cancelling, just switching.

    That was now the third time I repeated my request, each time a little more calmly and a little more slowly, despite the beginnings of blood boiling feelings.

    The person on the other end of the phone could not have been ruder. It was as if I was asking for a kidney instead of a membership change. A harsh tone and harsher words ensued. Why, I still have no idea.

    You have undoubtedly met them. You have maybe been one, once or twice.

    Why are some people continually difficult to deal with? What makes Joe easy to get along with and John such a struggle? Here are the major reasons and what can be done about it.

    1. We feel triggered when our needs aren’t met.

    We love it when we are acknowledged. We may not be crazy about when we are criticized, but it beats Option #3: being ignored.

    Being ignored is a terrible feeling for humans and one that we avoid like the plague. When this occurs, some people revert to “problem child” mode. These are the set of behavioral responses that are so ingrained that it is a reflexive series of actions. It is the default mode.

    When you find yourself in such a situation, ask the big question: What is my positive intention here? What am I trying to accomplish? (Or: What is the other person trying to accomplish?)

    If you can leave enough of the heated emotions aside, clearing enough space for some patience and I dare say, compassion, the root cause of the behavior often becomes crystal clear.

    What are you trying to accomplish? Great. Let’s find a way of getting what you want in a healthy fashion… (more…)

  • Living in the “Yes” of Life

    Living in the “Yes” of Life

    “In chaos there is fertility.” ~Anais Nin

    The word fertility formerly had a one-dimensional meaning for me, but I’ve come to broaden its definition.

    In my time living in Seoul, Korea, it has played a big part in defining my experience. You see, my husband and I have been trying to conceive since 2009 and have not been lucky.

    There’s a long story behind this that includes testing and monitoring and modifying our diets and trying acupuncture. And, for about a year, I became that person I did not want to become—swallowed up by the pain and stress surrounding this issue.

    In the meantime, we’ve taken on forging new paths in our professional lives. Having been a teacher for 15 years (10 of those international), I finally heeded a different call.

    It started out as a whisper and then grew in volume until I could no longer ignore it. I was burnt out on education and came to see my love for creating spaces and interiors. This was a natural consequence of making “home” in several countries.

    After some soul searching, I enrolled in an online interior design program while still working as a teacher. It was the step I needed to feel creatively challenged and to envision a wider future.

    Yet, as this happened, my desire to start a family intensified. It has been a very difficult place to be emotionally. What’s more, is figuring out how to deal with the negative form of the word: infertility. It feels large, empty, and desperately sad.

    People, having the best intentions, offered advice:

    “Just relax. Have fun with the process of trying.”

    “Try not to focus on it. I know someone who, once they stopped trying, got pregnant.”

    “What about some fertility treatments, or adoption?”

    These words sounded hollow to me. They didn’t resonate with my core being. (more…)