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Category “happiness & fun”

Let the Energy of Unhappiness Power Your Purpose

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“The obstacles of your past can become the gateways that lead to new beginnings.” ~Ralph Blum

The summer of 2007 was simply terrible. I wish I could find something positive to say about it but there really was nothing that I can think of. I was underemployed, the economy was tanking, and I was in a shame spiral of depression and self-hatred.

Following a fight with my husband, I found myself driving aimlessly, snot and tears running down my face. I’m not comfortable saying I was on a mission to stop living, but the thought had definitely crossed my mind.…

When You Don’t Have a Clear Purpose: 4 Helpful Mantras to Adopt

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“Don’t take life too seriously. You’ll never get out alive.” ~Elbert Hubbard

I have always defined my life by my career. I think that was my first mistake.

For the last six years, I worked at a publicity firm in Los Angeles.

It was a job where your email is the first thing you check in the morning before getting out of bed. A job where you are on your phone while eating your dinner. A job where your boss calls you out of a funeral in order to send out a press release. Frequent travel, evening events to attend, …

How to Be Happy Now (Because Future Happiness Never Comes)

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“Remember that sometimes not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.” ~Dalai Lama

I used to think I was falling behind. Not on my rent or my taxes, but in life.

One moment, things were progressing fine. I had friends. Good teeth. A boyfriend. I even had my own did-I-really-do-all-that-study-to-be-doing-this first job.

But then it all went away. I became ill. And as the years went by, I watched from my bed as my friends led a version of the life I’d expected for myself.

It was as if everyone had gotten on the …

10 Ways to Enjoy More: What’s Your Guilty Pleasure?

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“Happiness consists of living each day as if it were the first day of your honeymoon and the last day of your vacation.” ~Leo Tolstoy

For as long as I can remember, I’ve had an epic list of guilty pleasures.

As a young girl, my top three guilty pleasures included dressing up and dancing in my living room to Madonna (“Annnnd…VOGUE!”), watching over-the-top nighttime dramas with my mom over bowls of Breyer’s vanilla ice cream (“Kevin…I’m pregnant! And you’re not the father!”), and penning addictive, soap-opera-worthy novellas about the kids in my fifth grade class (they’d line up and beg …

How We Can Embody Abundance Regardless of What We Have

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“Our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world as being able to remake ourselves.” ~Mahatma Gandhi

Embody abundance. I heard someone say those two words the other day. What does that mean, really? To truly embody abundance, do we need to have everything we want? Or can anyone who holds space for truth experience a way of being that is free of lack?

Maybe to embody abundance is to recognize the realness that underlies the illusory film that covers much of what we see in our day-to-day lives. Maybe abundance is always there, but we …

Good News: Bad Moods Don’t Have to Be So Bad

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“Most of the shadows in life are caused by standing in our own sunshine.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

How many times have you heard “Follow your heart” or “Let emotion be your guide”?

Too many to count, I’d bet.

It’s generally good advice; it’s certainly wiser to follow your own feelings than to blindly do what other people think you should do.

But reading into your emotions can also lead you astray.

You see, you are always feeling your thinking. You are not necessarily always feeling “the truth,” or even your own personal truth.

Every emotion, feeling, or mood you experience …

Why We Need to Create Our Own “Normal”

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“If you are always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be.” ~Maya Angelou

I had a glimpse of normal when I was a child. It looked like bright splodges of paint on pieces of cheap paper, animals made from bits of wool and odd buttons, and many, many books. Normal was taking exceedingly long suburban walks while pestering my father to supply me with mental arithmetic, to sate an insatiable love of numbers.

The most normal place in the world, my sanctuary, was the library. I loved the plastic covered window seats that would …

After Tragedy: 3 Reasons And 21 Ways to Find Joy Again

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

My brother died suddenly, at just thirty-nine years old. One moment he was in the midst of a regular working day. Half an hour later he was gone. Twenty-four hours later he was buried.

With things happening so fast, I found myself alternating between paralysis and intense waves of pain, anger, guilt, sorrow, and devastation. I guess we all felt this way. Only it didn’t quite look like we all did/

In between waves of sadness and silence, my brother’s …

5 Lessons from Death to Help You Create Joy, Passion, and Meaning

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

Death is something many of us fear. Perhaps not so much our own death, but the mere thought of losing a loved one can be heartbreaking.

On Sunday May 5th, my grandma had a large stroke. She’d baked her last cake, shared her final story, and within the blink of an eye, she was gone. Six days later her life ended, in a hospital bed, surrounded by her loved ones.

She was not only my grandmother, but also the grandmother to five others, …

The Dangers of Staying Quiet: Learning to Ask For Help

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“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.” ~Elbert Hubbard

My right leg lay twisted, broken and disconnected. As I regained awareness, I could hear a primal scream.

It took a while to register that it was coming from me.

At the time, I was supposedly living my dream, but in truth I was drowning in my loneliness. So I had stood almost directly behind a horse I knew was prone to kicking and pulled her tail.

She wasn’t malicious; if she was, I would be dead now, as I had …

9 Ways You May Unwittingly Deprive Yourself of Love and Fulfillment

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“Your task is not to seek love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~Rumi

Do you want to let go and live life fully?

If you feel that you are missing out on fulfillment and happiness, but cannot put your finger on why, perhaps there is something deeper going on.

Believe it or not, anyone can develop an unconscious habit of self-deprivation. Usually this habit begins in childhood.

Here’s how mine developed.

When I was younger, if anyone approached and tried to attend to my needs, I’d make …

Don’t Let Anyone or Anything Dim Your Inner Light

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

I was born with it. I know I was. There was a light within me that showed in my smile, my dancing around the house, my love for life, for friends, for family, and my bright future.

I don’t remember the exact day it happened, I don’t remember the last event that did it, but my inner light went out. I was no longer the happy-go-lucky girl I once was; I became lost in an abyss of darkness and sadness. Happiness …

How Simple Little Happy Habits Can Make a Huge Difference

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“Happiness quite unshared can scarcely be called happiness.” ~Charlotte Brontë

Habits are a double-edged human habitual practice—they can be healthy and unhealthy, and can bring us happiness and unhappiness.

We’ve all read about the importance of healthy and successful habits, and how to choose and practice them. But I’ve also recently read about how healthy and successful habits alone don’t necessarily lead to good health or real success. There’s more to it.

What I’m reading now shows that happiness appears to be just as important to well-being and success as lifestyle choices, that happiness alone may actually lead to the …

Say Goodbye to Your “I” and Hello to Freedom

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“More important than the quest for certainty is the quest for clarity.” ~Francois Gautier

It’s the last place in a million years I ever thought I would find myself.

Stuck in a day job I had originally taken to fund my art and still feed my family when times were lean. It all sounded so logical back then.

Except that after several years, this “I” that was showing up to work had zero passion, was totally unmotivated, and not exactly someone I was too proud of.

Which was very strange since I was always so committed with my dedication to …

Improv(e) Your Life: Lessons on Risks, Gifts, and More

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“Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.” ~Eckhart Tolle

Improv comedy is something I’ve always enjoyed. I thought it would be fun to try, so I eventually took a class. Countless classes and many laughs later, I’ve learned that improv is a lot like life. In fact, applying what you learn in improv can actually improve your life.

Risky Business 

Showing up at an improv class for the first time might prove intimidating or anxiety provoking for some.  I felt some nerves when taking my first class, …

Knowing Better and Doing Better: How Are You Fortunate?

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“Give thanks for a little and you will find a lot.” ~Hausa Proverb

Gratitude, the level of gratitude that one has, varies greatly by person. You have those that are grateful for every single thing in their lives, and those that know what the word means on paper yet never practice it in their own lives.

Then you have so many others (like myself), I call them the “in-betweeners.” We are grateful for so much but often forget this because life takes over, or so many other things are going on at once that you barely have five minutes to …

Slow Down: Join the Stillness Revolution for More Peace and Joy

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“There is more to life than increasing its speed.” ~Mahatma Gandhi

I recently treated myself to a retreat in the mountains, with the intention of pulling out of the busyness of every day life so that I could spend time healing and in reflective writing.

Setting off, I anticipated an easy drive as traffic looked light, but when I reached the mountain pass, I experienced something I had never experienced before:

I was completely blind to my surroundings.

In fact, I realized I had driven into the clouds themselves, engulfed by a pure white energy.

Not fog. Not mist. Just

…

Why It’s Okay to Live a “Boring” Life If That’s What You Want

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“Remember that sometimes not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.” ~Dalai Lama

Some people know from the time they are small what they are going to be “when they grow up.”

I, at various times, was going to be an archeologist, paleontologist, veterinarian, famous rock musician, famous film director, actor, studio guitar player, music production engineer, choir teacher, choral composer, less famous film director, film editor, screenwriter, alpaca farmer, or cattle farmer.

As of this writing, I make wedding films and assist my wife with wedding photography. There is no fame, enough money, but no riches …

Is Optimism Hard-Wired? 6 Ways to See the Glass as Half Full

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“If you don’t like something change it; if you can’t change it, change the way you think about it.” ~Mary Engelbreit

My best friend called me on the phone last night. Of course, it’s not unusual to get a call from your best friend. But this call was one that really got me thinking about myself and the way I view life.

Kent has been my best friend since we were eleven years old. We met during summer camp the year after his dad died. We didn’t even like each other at first, as he was a tall, gangly geek …

Why We Need to Accept That Some People Just Won’t Like Us

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“If you are always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be.” ~Maya Angelou

I’ve been a world-class worrier about what other people would think about me for a long time.

The clothes, the hair, the shoes. The books I read, the movies I liked, the music I listened to. The hobbies, the people I hung out with. The things I liked and the things I disliked.

They all got scrutinized under the “am I doing the right thing?” filter.

Am I being exactly the right amount of cool? Am I being reasonable and responsible? …