People Who Make Me Laugh Until I’m Physically in Pain…
Healing Chronic Pain Is an Inside Job
“Time is not a cure for chronic pain, but it can be crucial for improvement. It takes time to change, to recover, and to make progress.” ~Mel Pohl
Let’s face it, living with any kind of physical pain is a challenge. I understand that completely. In the fall of 2007, I contracted an extremely painful and debilitating condition, Thoracic Outlet Syndrome, a structural collapse that compresses the muscles, nerves, and arteries that run between the collarbones and first ribs.
Yet, as most of us do, I believed my condition would, naturally, clear up soon and the pain would leave. …
Why We All Need Time Unplugged
“Life is what happens while we’re busy worrying about everything we need to change or accomplish. Slow down, get mindful, and try to enjoy the moment. This moment is your life.” ~Lori Deschene
Technology is everywhere today, integrated into our lives from the moment we wake up and check our email to the twenty minutes we spend checking our Twitter feed before falling asleep.
From smartphones and tablets to Fitbits and multi-display work computers, it’s hard to use technology mindfully, and most of us spend a great deal of time throughout the day looking at screens.
Choosing to unplug, …
The Key to Happiness: Compare Less, Be More
“Happiness is found when you stop comparing yourself to other people.” ~Unknown
Stepping off the bus I was in shock.
This tiny thing? With no doors in the doorways and no glass in the windows?
This little place? With walls that looked like they were lone survivors of war?
I would’ve been sure it was abandoned if it wasn’t for the hundreds of little footprints on trampled soil making up the floor of the school. A giant field with two erect logs on either side served as goals for what was supposed to be a gym. I always thought these …
Accepting People You Dislike as They Are: How It Benefits You and How to Do It
“We often give our enemies the means of our own destruction.” ~Aesop, The Eagle and the Arrow
We can sometimes have difficulty accepting our friends, family, and loved ones as they are when their habits, quirks, or behavior annoy us. Our natural tendency is to try to change what we don’t like about them, which often leads to resentment. Nonetheless, given their importance and presence in our lives, we are usually willing to make an effort to accept them as they are.
But what about people we dislike—people who cause us grief? For example, an overbearing boss, a scheming …
The Most Powerful Tool for Healing: Tell the Right Stories
TRIGGER WARNING: This post deals with an account of sexual abuse and may be triggering to some people.
“Our wounds are often the openings into the best and most beautiful parts of ourselves.” ~David Richo
In my mid-thirties, I had what I experienced as a breakdown.
If you had asked me ten or even twenty years earlier whether I had been sexually abused, I would have said no. But in my mid-thirties, strange and scary memories started surfacing in my body—along with pieces of story and language.
These pieces of memory and my responses to them seemed to glue together …
There Are a Gazillion Little Ways to Be Kind (and It Benefits You Too)
“The place to improve the world is first in one’s own heart and head and hands.” ~Robert M. Pirsig
One day while grocery shopping I was reaching for a head of lettuce when I heard a shrill, high-pitched wail from a few aisles over. It sent shivers up my spine. It was one of those sounds that grabs your breath and pulls it to your heart.
It brought me back to a time I had long forgotten—a memory engrained in my brain from about twenty-two years ago when my children were toddlers. I remember those days of being exhausted and …
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