Helpful reminders and guideposts, from my heart to yours…

One of my favorite teaching stories from the Jewish tradition is about this prayer. Hillel was a highly respected and impactful scholar and teacher. One day, a smart aleck student challenged him, saying "If you're such a great man, I dare you to recite the entire Torah while standing on one foot!" Hillel smiled, calmly raised one foot, said "Do unto others as you'd have others do unto you. The rest is commentary," and put his foot back down. As we ...
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How good are you at taking a compliment? Do you find yourself deflecting with some version of "Oh, this old thing?" or "Seriously? I look exhausted, barely slept last night!" When you look at yourself in the mirror, what thoughts arise? Do you take time to truly look into your eyes and smile? Give yourself a compliment? For so many years, I'd look in the mirror or at photos and see only my flaws (as I imagined them to be). My father ...
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For years, personal growth and business gurus have been urging us to "play bigger!" Don't play small! Go for the gusto! Dream big and reach for those dreams with everything you've got! Create your vision board and watch those visions become reality! I tried playing this game for too long, thinking it's what I needed to do to have a happier life: if only I could build my practice so I could reach and help more people, and make more money too! I invested ...
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For those of us on a spiritual path (and I believe all humans are, conscious or not), the road is filled with bright neon signs beckoning us to many variations of truth. Some of them take us down truly helpful paths, and some of them take us down rabbit holes. And they can be huge, deep, "this feels so right, I've found my true path, OH NO, crap, how do I get out?!" rabbit holes. I've been down a few of those. Yes, ...
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I loved going to the skating rink as a kid, even if it got kind of boring going round and round. And I proudly earned my skating badge in Girl Scouts. It was even more fun when I rented them and tooled around at the beach while in college in San Diego, so I treated myself to this gorgeous suede pair one year with my big $125 tax return. Yes, that's me, shooting the duck while playing around on campus. I always had a naturally good sense of balance ...
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I was speaking with a dear healer friend this morning in our monthly Zoom visit. Since she's in NC and I'm in NY, we started doing this before everything in life got moved online. Our conversations always go deep and wide, but I'd been in such a pandemic quarantine funk this week that I didn't feel I had anything light or good to contribute. But then, Suzannah's way of listening and reflecting had me shift unexpectedly into a Kabbalistic perspective ...
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Remember the last time you longed for a retreat from the world?

• Maybe a weekend with your oldest friends, with plenty of great food and laughter.
• Maybe a yoga or spa retreat with a favorite teacher.
• Maybe a hiking or rafting trip to a place you've always wanted to see.

Now you are in it, unplanned, unexpected, threaded through with tons of worry, fear, and uncertainty attached. Not exactly the restful, rejuvenating respite you'd envisioned. Not even close ...
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Whoa, wait a minute. Do those words even go together? How can compassion be fierce? What I've found is that it takes a great deal of fierceness and awareness to be kind towards yourself. Think about the last time you got called into your boss's office, or heard a certain tone in a friend's voice. I'll bet your first thought was "Oh crap, what did I do?" or some variation of that line of thinking. That YOU did something that made someone mad, sad, or ...
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Corona virus, politics, climate change, oh my! Just when we think life can't possibly get more stressful or crazy-making, the volume goes to 11. How are you doing with all of this, especially the fears around this virus that's spreading across the globe? It might seem that staying informed, following the news, and keeping up with statistics is helpful, but what I find is that most of that does exactly what we don't want -- raises our stress levels, makes us feel ...
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