You Are Strong, Beautiful, and Wise
How to Instantly Calm Yourself in Stressful Situations
“Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” ~Viktor Frankl
There’s a big lie we tell ourselves during stressful times.
It keeps us feeling lost, afraid, and unloved, like we’re being picked up and carried away helplessly by a storm.
Our heads can fill with scary images, words, and stories about the cause and who is to blame for our unwanted pain.
Sound familiar? If it does, you’re not alone. You’re normal. This is how humans biologically respond to stress.…
Book Giveaway: Tiny Buddha’s 365 Tiny Love Challenges
UPDATE – The winners for this giveaway are:
- Melissa Ballinger Dees
- Julie C. Perry
- Bobby Irion
- Michael Jon Piper
- Hannah
Sometimes the world can feel like a lonely place. There are billions of people on the planet, and many of us encounter hundreds in the course of our daily lives. Yet it’s easy to feel disconnected from most, if not all of them.
The many strangers we pass on a given day, who may avert their eyes to avoid awkwardness, can start to feel like part of the scenery—like cars parked in a lot or leaves floating in the wind.…
10 Surprising Reasons To Stop Trying To Please Everyone
“Lean too much on other people’s approval and it becomes a bed of thorns.” ~Tehyi Hsieh
Let’s be honest with each other.
You’re a people-pleaser
So am I.
And so is Oprah, the President of The United States, and the guy next door.
We’re all people-pleasers to some extent. And that’s okay. Wanting to be approved of—and loved—is as natural as wanting food and shelter.
It’s when you try to please everyone that it becomes a problem. In fact, more than a problem, a disease. Harriet B. Braiker called it “the disease to please.”
And …
How to Promote Yourself Authentically to Gain New Opportunities
“If you really put a small value upon yourself, rest assured that the world will not raise your price.” ~Unknown
I have always been a smart, dedicated, hard working person. I was raised to believe that those were characteristics required for success. So imagine my surprise to reach the working world and find unexceptional colleagues getting promoted above me.
There’s one memory that particularly stands out.
When I was twenty-five, I was on a team that consisted of amazingly smart, ambitious, hardworking people, plus one mediocre guy, Tom. His mediocrity stood out amongst a high-achieving team, but Tom thought …
The Benefits of Minimalism: 7 Reasons to Declutter Your Life
“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” ~ William Morris
Have you ever noticed that every time you move you need a bigger truck than the last time you moved?
People love to collect things, and we have a tendency to keep collecting things in order to fill the available space in our homes (and sometimes beyond).
I’m a firm believer in the idea that material possessions do not equate to happiness, so I recently started to explore the idea of living a minimalist lifestyle, to see if …
Why We Don’t Need to Apologize So Often & How to Do It Well When We Do
“The ability to apologize sincerely and express regret for the unskillful things we say or do is an art. A true apology can relieve a great deal of suffering in the other person.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh
My life has been full of apologies. I’ve been on both the receiving and giving end of the good, the bad, and the ugly apology.
Just recently a dear friend who I hadn’t connected with in a long time reached out and asked if we could meet for coffee. I sort of backhandedly blew her off and told her I would try to meet …
The Power of Doing Nothing When You’re Frustrated or Anxious
“This ‘doing nothing’ is not a cold, passive resignation, but is a luminous, sacred activity, infused with presence and a wild sort of compassion. It is a radical act of kindness and love.” ~Matt Licata
I am storming home after work.
The important men in my life are driving me bonkers—they’ve been self-important, disrespectful, condescending jerks.
My dad doesn’t see the value in the work I do, and my partner blew off our date to take an important phone call. My younger brother leapt off of the phone with me, which he’s been doing every time I’ve called in the …
3 Relationship Myths (and Why We Need to Stop Believing Them)
“Love isn’t always perfect. It isn’t a fairytale or a storybook. And it doesn’t always come easy. Love is overcoming obstacles, facing challenges, fighting to be together, holding on and never letting go.” ~Unknown
When I started dating, I idealized love. I had many false notions about relationships, which I formed from my friends, watching movies, and reading romance novels. Many of the beliefs I had about how relationships should work caused me pain and disappointment because reality turned out to be different from what I expected.
Dating became a journey of resetting my expectations and letting go of false …
Do You Constantly Think and Worry About Your Relationships?
“When you say ‘yes’ to others, make sure you’re not saying ‘no’ to yourself.” ~Paulo Coelho
Sometimes it’s easy to define ourselves by our roles and relationships.
We can look at ourselves as a daughter, or someone’s employee, or so in so’s husband. These things mean a lot to us, and we often subconsciously use a variety of behaviors and mental constructs to protect these roles and relationships.
It can take form in innocuous ways, like buying clothes you don’t really want or feigning interests in order to fit in. (Go sports team!) But it also affects more serious things, …
What to Do When You’re Having Trouble Making New Friends
“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.” ~Albert Einstein
I’m sitting on the couch by myself watching Dexter reruns on Netflix. But I can hardly focus on the show. I’m freaking out because I still haven’t made any friends, even though I moved here over a month ago.
I keep thinking to myself: “Will all my Saturdays look like this?” “Will I actually be able to make new friends and build that social circle I was so excited to have?”
Let me rewind just a bit.
It’s a hot and sunny summer day in Southern California.
After hours …
How to Prevent Fear and Insecurity from Ruining Your Relationship
“Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” ~Jack Canfield
Buried deep within the broken heart of every great loss is a nugget of wisdom. I experienced the greatest grief of my life just a few months ago, and with it came an opportunity to uncover ugly truths about myself I’d been hiding from.
In facing my pain, I have discovered that underneath the conscious, big-hearted, beautiful person that I am lives a small girl who is terrified of being misunderstood and abandoned by those she loves most.
The surface signs alerting me to these fears looked something …
4 Things You Need to Know When Pursuing An Ambitious Dream
“So many of our dreams at first seem impossible, then they seem improbable, and then, when we summon the will, they soon become inevitable.” ~Christopher Reeve
Have you ever decided to pursue something that excited you, that seemed really hard to do, and then had your will tested and almost crushed? I have, many times, most recently this year.
As you may recall, I shared a blog post in January about the newly formed Tiny Buddha Productions, a film company I started with my fiancé, fellow screenwriter Ehren Prudhel.
If you haven’t read that post yet, you may want …
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