Lately, I've been thinking a lot about minimalism and how to live minimally. As my client base gets fuller and my life and relationships more precious, I find myself pining for simplicity and time in the mountains.

However, what has always puzzled me about minimalism is the immense abundance of nature. As I strive to make a dent in my positive impact on the environment by recycling or being mindful of purchases, a part of me simultaneously seeks MORE... more mastery, more health, more fun, and lavish abundance. Did you know that our brains are wired for more?

Have you ever had a friend or co-worker fill the air with complaints? Do you catch yourself complaining too much and wonder if you can ever stop complaining and be happy? Has negative thinking become a bad habit?

Life can feel like we're scrambling to escape an avalanche of demands and endless to-do lists. When we're stressed, it's easy to find fault or pinpoint what's wrong, but if we get in the habit of complaining, it starts to create a dark cloud around us and our lives. So how do we give ourselves an emotional reset?

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

All of us have habits. We speak of healthy habits and unhealthy habits, but most often we associate habits with something negative or trying to overcome a pattern. (Think of smoking, watching too much TV, unhealthy snacking between meals, yelling at the kids...) The truth is that anything we do repeatedly—whether negative or positive, unhealthy or healthy—becomes a habit. Isn't it time to use positive, healthy habits to create the life you want? But how long does it take to break a habit? Is there a way to reset the brain?

People pleasing is a habit for many; it was a way of life for me. Then one evening, I was brainstorming topics for a school paper with my daughter. It's enjoyable generating ideas; I love collaborative ventures. However, she quickly torpedoed my ideas for one reason or another. After a while, I started feeling disheartened and said to her, “If all my suggestions get rejected, what’s the point of me giving ideas?” What she said next turned my world inside out.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

When you wake up in the morning, is your mind racing? Do you fret about what other people think of you? Do you feel anxious, no matter how hard you try to stay calm?

Are you impatient with your impatience?

Luckily, the idea that you should always feel a sense of well-being and inner peace is a misconception. Life happens. Your spouse works late. Children get sick. You get a flat tire on your way to work. A friend hurts your feelings. You lose a pet or a loved one.

Feeling peaceful or having emotional well-being has nothing to do with what happens to us; it’s about learning the art of [...]

My first experience with visualization was in high school as a springboard diver. My coach requested me to switch from a jackknife (or pike) dive to a layout dive, which had more difficulty and higher points in competition. As you probably know, a layout dive requires the diver’s body to be an unbending plank. My coach was extremely frustrated with me for weeks because no matter how hard I tried to stay straight, I’d bend at the top of the dive. (A diver gets docked in their score for this error.) Every day after diving practice, I’d go home exasperated with myself.

Then the summer preceding [...]

Years ago, I attended an out-of-state business training and was chosen to be a part of an interactive exercise that the facilitator conducted. The exercise required us to take steps along a tightrope, maintaining balance while also ensuring that our team members before and after us were safe and secure. It was a difficult task. The experience gave me practice firsthand in balancing while simultaneously striving to accomplish a distant goal. 

What echoes in my mind from that day is the frustrated colleague directly behind me who barked, “Just take small, manageable steps!”

Estimated reading [...]