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What Finally Helped Me Break Free from Constant Food Noise

By in Blog

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response.” ~Viktor Frankl

For years, I thought something was wrong with me.

No matter what I was doing—sitting in a meeting, walking the dog, or watching TV—my brain was busy debating food.

Should I eat? Shouldn’t I? I could just have one more bite, couldn’t I? What should I eat next? I’ve blown it today, haven’t I? I’ve failed again. Shall I just eat whatever I want and start again tomorrow?

The chatter was constant. It left me exhausted, ashamed, and convinced that …

5 Surefire Signs You Grew Up with an Emotionally Immature Parent

By in Blog, change & challenges, love & relationships

“There’s no such thing as a ‘bad kid’—just angry, hurt, tired, scared, confused, impulsive ones expressing their feelings and needs the only way they know how. We owe it to every single one of them to always remember that.” ~Dr. Jessica Stephens 

All children look up to their parents from the moment they enter this world. They have this beautiful, pure, unconditional love pouring out of them. Parents are on a pedestal. They are the ones who know what’s best! They are the grownups showing us how to do life!

We don’t think for one moment that they could be …

Work Is Not Family: A Lesson I Never Wanted but Need to Share

By in Blog

“The paradox of trauma is that it has both the power to destroy and the power to transform and resurrect.” ~Peter Levine

I was sitting in the conference room at work with the CEO and my abusive male boss.

The same boss who had been love-bombing and manipulating me since I started nine months earlier, slowly pushing my nervous system into a constant state of fight-or-flight.

When I was four months into the job, this boss went on a three-day bender during an overnight work conference at a fancy hotel in Boston.

He skipped client meetings or showed up smelling …

Letting Go of the Life You Were Told to Want

By in Blog

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ever since I was about four years old, I knew I was different from the other kids. I was always on the outside looking in. As I approach middle age, I’ve never shaken that feeling—the knowing—of being different.

We live in a noisy world where we find whatever we seek. If we’re looking for validation that we don’t belong, that’s exactly what we’ll find.

While flawed, the standard ‘life blueprint’ hasn’t quite sailed off into …

The Unexpected Therapy I Found on My Phone

By in Blog

“Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.” ~Dr. Seuss

The notification pops up on my phone: “Jason, we made a new memory reel for you.” I pause whatever I’m doing, probably something stressful involving deadlines or dishes, and feel that familiar flutter of excitement. What chapter of my life has Google decided to surprise me with today?

I tap the notification, and suddenly I’m watching years of Father’s Day adventures unfold. It started accidentally—one Father’s Day trip to the Buffalo Zoo that somehow became our tradition. Instead of buying me something I …

The Prowler in My Mind: Learning to Live with Depression

By in Blog

“There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” ~Leonard Cohen

When depression comes, I feel it like a prowler gliding through my body. My chest tightens, my head fills with dark whispers, and even the day feels like night. The prowler has no face, no clear shape, but its presence is heavy. Sometimes it circles in silence within me. Other times it presses in until I don’t know how to respond.

In those moments, I feel caught between two choices: do I lie still, hoping it passes by, or do I rise and face it? Often, …

Why Narcissistic Abuse Doesn’t Define You and How I Found the Love I Deserve

By in Blog

“When it hurts to move on, just remember the pain you felt hanging on.” ~Unknown

There was a time when I thought my heart would never heal.

I’d been lied to, betrayed, and broken by a man I thought I loved. A man who turned out to be nothing more than a beautifully packaged nightmare.

If you’ve ever been hurt by a narcissist, you know that the pain cuts deeper than most people can imagine. You know the way it seeps into your bones, the way it makes you question your worth and replay every moment, wondering if you could …

3 Surprising Causes of Burnout That Most People Miss

By in Blog

“Love yourself first and everything else falls into line.” ~Lucille Ball

The first time I experienced burnout, I was twenty-six.

I was at the height of my career in London, doing it all, and yet I somehow found myself back at my parents’ house, sobbing in my mom’s car, after signing myself off from work, not having a clue how I landed there.

Burnout isn’t just about being tired from overexertion. It’s when we reach physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion after pushing ourselves past our capacity for too long.

When we finally stop, often against our will, all the confusing …

Be Like a Paddle Ball: How to Bounce Back to Yourself

By in Blog

“Come back to yourself. Return to the voice of your body. Trust that much.” ~Geneen Roth

I may be showing my age, but here goes… It has come to my attention that I’m like a paddle ball.

To anyone born in the 21st century: for context, before handheld devices ruled the world, kids entertained themselves with simple analog toys—such as the paddle ball.

Picture a small flat paddle (like a small ping-pong paddle) with a rubber ball attached to the center by an elastic string. The goal was to hit the ball with the paddle, watch it fly out and …

When You’re Tired of Fixing Yourself: How to Stop Treating Healing Like a Full-Time Job

By in Blog

“True self-love is not about becoming someone better; it’s about softening into the truth of who you already are.” ~Yung Pueblo

One morning, I sat at my kitchen table with my journal open, a cup of green tea steaming beside me, and a stack of self-help books spread out like an emergency toolkit.

The sunlight was spilling across the counter, but I didn’t notice. My eyes kept darting between the dog-eared pages of a book called Becoming Your Best Self and the neatly written to-do list in my journal.

Meditation.
Gratitude journaling.
Affirmations.
Ten thousand steps.
Hydration tracker.
“Inner child …

How to Calm Anxiety That’s Rooted in Childhood Wounds

By in Blog

“Anxiety is a response to a nervous system that learned early on it had to protect itself.” ~Dr. Hilary Jacobs Hendel

Anxiety shaped much of my life—how I showed up, how I held myself back, and how I connected with others. For years, I didn’t even know what it was. I just knew the pounding heart, the tight chest, the trembling hands. I knew the shame that followed every “failure,” big or small, and the fear I would never be enough.

For a long time, I thought I was the problem. But anxiety isn’t a moral failing. It’s a part …

What I See Clearly Now That I Can’t See Clearly

By in Blog

“The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen… they must be felt with the heart.” ~Helen Keller

I didn’t want to admit it—not to myself, not to anyone. But I am slowly going blind.

That truth is difficult to write, harder still to live. I’m seventy years old. I’ve survived war zones, illness, caregiving, and creative risks. I’ve worked as a documentary filmmaker, teacher, and mentor. But this—this quiet, gradual vanishing of sight—feels like the loneliest struggle of all.

I have moderate to advanced macular degeneration in both eyes. My right eye is nearly gone, and my …

The 2026 Tiny Buddha Calendar Is Ready for Holiday Gifting!

By in Blog

Hi friend! As we head into the holiday season, I know many of us are starting to think about gifts for the people we love (and maybe a few things for ourselves as well). With that in mind, I wanted to remind you that the 2026 Tiny Buddha Day-to-Day Calendar is now available.

It’s one of my favorite projects every year because I include the kind of daily reminders that I personally find validating, comforting, and encouraging—some from me, some from site contributors, and some from authors I enjoy. And as the number-one bestselling calendar in Mind-Body-Spirit for the past

…

What Happened When I Stopped Expecting Perfection from Myself

By in Blog

“There is no amount of self-improvement that can make up for a lack of self-acceptance.” ~Robert Holden

Six years ago, I forgot it was picture day at my daughter’s school. She left the house in a sweatshirt with a faint, unidentifiable stain and hair still bent from yesterday’s ponytail.

The photographer probably spent less than ten seconds on her photo, but I spent hours replaying the morning in my head, imagining her years later looking at that picture and believing her mother had not tried hard enough.

It’s strange how small moments can lodge themselves in memory. Even now, when …

How to Return to Emotional Safety, One Sensory Anchor at a Time

By in Blog

“In a sense, we are all time travelers drifting through our memories, returning to the places where we once lived.” ~Vladimir Nabokov

I found it by accident, a grainy image of my childhood bedroom wallpaper.

It was tucked in the blurry background of a photo in an old family album, a detail I’d never noticed until that day.

White background. Tiny pastel hearts and flowers. A border of ragdoll girls in dresses the color of mint candies and pink lemonade.

My body tingled with recognition.

It was like finding a piece of myself I didn’t remember existed. Not the grown-up …

Healing Without Reconciling with My Mother and Learning to Love Myself

By in Blog

“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do.” ~Brené Brown

Several years ago, I wrote a heartfelt letter to my estranged mother, articulating my deep feelings about her perceived lack of empathy and care. My intention in writing the letter wasn’t to ignite conflict; it was to sincerely share my perspective.

Rather than lashing out with blame, I expressed my profound sadness about feeling parentless and the struggle of raising myself without parental love and guidance, something I desperately needed at times.

I bared my soul, detailing the emotional turmoil …

When the Person You Love Is Disappearing into Addiction

By in Blog

“Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and myself at the same time.” ~Prentis Hemphill

I thought I had seen the worst of it. I thought I knew what it meant to watch someone you love disappear into addiction. My mother taught me that lesson long before I was old enough to truly understand it.

Growing up, I saw her sink deep into heroin. I learned to read the signs before she even spoke. I knew when she was high. I knew when she was lying. I knew when she was gone, even when she was …

The Invisible Prison Shyness Builds and What Helped Me Walk Free

By in Blog

“Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.” ~Anaïs Nin

When I think back on my life, shyness feels like an inner prison I carried with me for years. Not a prison with bars and guards, but a quieter kind—made of hesitation, fear, and silence. It kept me standing still while life moved forward around me.

One memory stays with me: my eighth-grade dance. The gym was alive with music, kids moving awkwardly but freely on the floor, laughing, bumping into one another, having fun. And there I was in the corner, figuratively stomping paper cups.

That’s how I …

How a Simple Object Helped Me Slow Down and Breathe

By in Blog

“Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart.” ~A.A. Milne

It was a Wednesday afternoon, and I was sitting in my car, too overwhelmed to turn the key in the ignition. My phone had been buzzing all day with work notifications, and the mental list of things I needed to do was growing faster than I could breathe.

Somewhere in the middle of my swirling thoughts, I reached into my coat pocket and felt something smooth and cool. It was a tiny amethyst I’d tucked there weeks ago, almost as an afterthought.

I held it in

…

The Hardest Person to Be Honest with Is Yourself

By in Blog

“You cannot heal what you refuse to confront.” ~Yasmin Mogahed

At sixteen, I walked out of my mother’s house with track marks and a half-packed bag. No big fight. No slammed door. Just the silent resignation of someone who couldn’t look his mother in the eye anymore. I wasn’t leaving home—I was bailing on it. On everything.

I didn’t know the word “addiction.” Well, I knew it; I just didn’t understand it. I didn’t know that the flu I kept getting was withdrawal. I thought I was just weak. A loser. A burnout who couldn’t even use the …