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Accepting & Loving Ourselves in 10 Simple Steps

By in Blog, love & relationships

“Why compare yourself with others? No one in the entire world can do a better job of being you than you.” ~Unknown

The idea of loving yourself often seems cliché. We throw around the phrase, but do we really understand what it means? Do we actually know how to love ourselves? Or what the process of self love even looks like?

I really believe that everything in our lives is directly affected by how much we love ourselves, but I’m often at a loss for words when trying to articulate what is really all about. In my attempts to …

On Planning Less: How to Let Go & Enjoy the Ride

By in Blog, mindfulness & peace

“Don’t seek, don’t search, don’t ask, don’t knock, don’t demand – relax. If you relax, it comes. If you relax, it is there. If you relax, you start vibrating with it.” ~Osho

As I drove home today, I embarked on a familiar exercise: planning out, in ridiculous detail, the next week, month, and year of my life.

To be clear, I’m not suggesting that planning is bad. In my world, a complete lack of planning would be anarchy. And anarchy equals anxiety. So I try to avoid it—both the anarchy and the anxiety.

But, historically speaking, I plan to a …

Authentic Communication: 3 Tips for Receiving in Conversations

By in Blog, love & relationships

“As for the future, your task is not to foresee it but to enable it.” ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Have you ever heard the expression everyone loves a cheerful giver? While there’s a great deal of truth in the philosophy of offering without hopes attached, what about the flip side?

Sometimes we become so focused on providing antidotes or anticipating what we perceive to be the other person’s needs that we steamroll a conversation, taking center stage in our interactions.

In my own day-to-day life, pauses and hesitations in conversation used to make me uncomfortable or even anxious. I would …

Growing through Challenges: How Intentions Shape Our Lives

By in Blog, change & challenges

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

The last five years of my life involved a lot of self-inflicted stress and tremendous spiritual growth.

In 2003 I made a decision that would have a major impact on my life without realizing my true intentions.

While knowing the financial safety net was not securely in place, I decided to remain at home with my daughter instead of returning to work. Previously, when I left our first child in the care of someone else at ten months old, I …

How You Made Tiny Buddha Beautiful This Year: Our 2010 in Review

By in Blog, Giveaway, mindfulness & peace

“We may not have it all together, but together we have it all.” ~Anonymous

Before September 2009, I thought I wanted to run a personal development blog—a place to share the lessons I’ve learned and generally build a community around the idea of teaching people to improve their lives. Then I realized that wasn’t my vision.

There were a couple reasons for that.

I feel the biggest challenge isn’t gaining new information; it’s learning to apply it.

Instead of trying to build authority, I wanted to embrace my humanity—to be both strong and vulnerable, willing to share what I’ve learned …

5 Lessons about Being Present: Freedom is Where My Feet Are

By in Blog, mindfulness & peace

“Let us not look back in anger, nor forward in fear, but around in awareness.” ~James Thurber

As I begin each day, I must remind myself, “Erin, stay where your feet are.”

If I keep my attention on the place where my feet reside, I have a better chance of remaining in the here and now. What’s here and now is all there is, so we’re told.

Most of us know this in our heads, but integrating it into our daily living is another thing. It’s a practice, one that must remain a part of our awareness if we hope …

The One New Year’s Resolution That Creates Lasting Change

By in Blog, happiness & fun

“If you focus on results, you will never change. If you focus on change, you will get results.” ~Jack Dixon

I originally started to write a post offering tons of different New Year’s resolutions and tips to stick to them to create lasting change.

After all, that’s what we bloggers do around the end of the year: share our best practices for improving our lives as December rolls into January; compile well-researched suggestions to change, and do it consistently, despite knowing most people give up on resolutions within weeks of setting them.

Then I realized that didn’t feel authentic to …

Overcoming Perfectionism: The Joy of Just Okay

By in Blog, happiness & fun

“The amount of happiness that you have depends on the amount of freedom you have in your heart.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Yesterday I was talking to my dear friend Erin about all the pressures to be perfect—to be more than just enough. To always be striving to be 100%.

I realized later that this has been going on all my life. Haven’t we all felt it?

In grade school, the importance of getting those A’s, being on the teacher’s list, always getting the gold star.

In high school, being popular, being smart, being a jock—whichever lane we chose to fit …

Cracking Your Comfort Zone: How to Face a Fear

By in Blog, change & challenges

“One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it’s worth watching.” ~Unknown

I’m about to write something that’s freaky and a bit philosophical, but true. Really take this in: You become your comfort zone.

Getting out of your comfort zone is crucial to actualizing your aspirations.

If you want something that you don’t already have, there’s a good chance you’ll have to do things that you haven’t already done.

Doing those things may not feel natural to you. You may even feel uncomfortable and awkward. But ultimately, behind the frightening facade of fear is a bigger version …

Review & Giveaway: The Power of Receiving

By in Blog, Giveaway, happiness & fun

Sometimes in the name of being good we forget to be good to ourselves. We put so much energy into meeting other people’s needs that we fail to meet our own. And yet that doesn’t change that we have needs; it just pushes us to deny them or to find manipulative ways of getting them met.

For the longest time, I felt certain that good people put everyone else first. They stretch themselves, bend over backward, and even completely exhaust themselves if it means making everyone else happy.

I also thought giving would naturally invite reciprocity. Inevitably, after months of …

Does Life Just Happen to You?

By in Blog, change & challenges

“The more light you allow within you, the brighter the world you live in will be.” ~Shakti

Does life just happen to you?

Would it be safe to suggest that a lot of people wake up each morning, shower, get dressed, eat breakfast, go to work, come home, eat dinner, watch television, go to bed, and repeat the same course of events Monday through Friday, without ever being fully conscious of what they’re doing?

The events listed above may differ for some people, but the point is still the same. Does life just happen to you, or do you consciously …

Having Faith: Why Do We Expect the Worst in Tomorrow?

By in Blog, change & challenges, letting go

“Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security.” ~John Allen Paulos

Over the past few years, as I’ve settled into my late twenties, life seems to have opened the flood gates to a number of lessons and realities. With each of these hardships or challenges I’ve overcome, I’ve taken with me a lesson of new wisdom, deeper compassion, self-awareness, humility, and empathy for others.

On that same note, I have also noticed that with each experience, I seem to begin treading more carefully in my approach to future situations, treating …

How to Love Your Authentic Self

By in Blog, mindfulness & peace

“You, yourself, as much as anybody else in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” ~Buddha

In our personal development-focused, life coach-dependent world, it’s all too easy to think you need to change. Not just the things you do, but who you are.

It’s one thing to invite transformation for the sake of growth, improvement, and new possibilities. It’s another thing to feel so dissatisfied with yourself that no amount of change could possibly convince you that you’re worthy and lovable.

This type of intrinsic self-loathing formed the basis of my adolescence and some of my …

5 Steps to Achieving Your New Years Travel Resolutions

By in Blog, meaning & passion

“Travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living.” ~Miriam Beard

Next year, I plan to visit two countries as part of my New Year’s “Travel Resolutions.” First is Indonesia, as I’ve always wanted to see Borobudur and, of course, Yogyakarta, center of Javenese culture.

In the second half of the year, I want to reward myself with a big overseas trip because by that time, I’m hopefully done with my master’s thesis (woo-hoo!). It’s a choice between Europe and Egypt.

I will visit at least …

Mindfulness Giveaway: Win Awake at the Wheel Mindful Driving CDs

By in Blog, Giveaway, mindfulness & peace

Update: This winners for this giveaway have already been chosen.Subscribe to the Tiny Buddha List to learn about future contests!

When I was twenty-one years old, I got into a series of car accidents just after getting my license.

The first time, I drove the wrong way down a one-way street. The second time I side-swiped a double-parked car trying to get around it. And the third time, I hit a Channel 7 news van while looking at printed directions in the middle of Big Dig construction madness (not my proudest moment).

In all of those instances, I was …

Dealing with Other People’s Road Rage & Letting Go of Anger

By in Blog, mindfulness & peace

“You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger.” ~Buddha

It happens all the time…

You’re driving, listening to music, just enjoying life and the feel of the road. Then a car roars past you and the driver promptly swerves and cuts you off, seemingly oblivious to anything but his own destination.

Or, you come to a full stop at a stop sign and the driver behind you lays on the horn, impatient for you to get moving. Glancing in your rear view mirror, you see him flailing his arms and punching a raised …

Let Go of Negative Feelings: 3 Ways to Watch Them Disappear

By in Blog, change & challenges

“Some people think it’s holding that makes one strong–sometimes it’s letting go.” ~Unknown

I’m the divorced mother of two teenage girls. Holidays are split; the girls have Thanksgiving with their dad and Christmas with me on even-numbered years, and vice versa on odd number years. It’s hard on all of us, but it has been especially hard on me this year.

This year I had Thanksgiving with my girls the weekend before Thanksgiving and asked if they wanted come over on Black Friday to set up the Christmas tree, as was the tradition before. They said sure.

I called them …

Productivity and Happiness: Why Are We So Busy?

By in Blog, mindfulness & peace, work fulfillment

“Life is what happens when you are making other plans.” ~John Lennon

There have been times in my life when I believed all my happiness revolved around how busy I was. If I was busy, I was using time wisely. If I was busy, I was proving to myself that I was valuable. If I was busy, I was creating the possibility of a better life in the future. Any threat to my productivity was a threat to my sense of hope.

Being busy didn’t make me feel happy, but it created the illusion that I was somehow …

5 Tips To Help You To Discover Your Maximum Potential

By in Blog, change & challenges

“You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you.” ~Eckhart Tolle

Don’t doubt yourself. You are more than enough.

You are good enough. If no one else tells you that, I will reaffirm that you are good enough to do whatever you want in life. Life is too short for you to paralyze yourself with doubts.

I used to doubt my capabilities, and I was so unhappy and frustrated with life. I tried to bury myself in self-help books to find the answers to achieve success and happiness. One …

Starting a New Life: The Courage of a Seed

By in Blog, change & challenges, meaning & passion

“When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.” ~Lao Tzu

At lunch the other day, a new friend and I were discussing changes in our lives and how everything feels very new and different.

I remembered the most beautiful description Mark Nepo wrote in The Book of Awakening. Mark is a poet, and he sees the world through such a lovely light. His work opens my heart to images I’ve never thought about that are so compelling.

I can see the way Mark describes the process of change in my own life. He …