Piano Juggling!
I am in awe of the unique talent this man possesses. If you enjoyed this, you’ll enjoy the several other ones at pianojuggler.com!
The Greatest Act of Love Is Letting Go
“Accept what is, let go of what was, and have faith in what will be.” ~Sonia Ricotti
I was brought up in a family and culture that was riddled with fear.
My elders were terrified of the world and always on the defensive for something bad to happen. They believed that love meant closely protecting others from the dangers of the world and the pain of life.
This smothering behavior kept me small, and left me totally ill-equipped and ill-educated for living in the real world.
With this as the root of my upbringing, breaking free and learning to …
How to Practice Self-Compassion: 5 Tips to Stop Being Down on Yourself
“If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete.” ~Jack Kornfield
I never wanted to see a therapist. I imagined settling onto the storied couch and seeing dollar signs appear in concerned eyes as I listed the family history of mental illness, addiction, and abuse. I feared I’d be labeled before I’d ever been heard.
But after experiencing the emotional shock of witnessing a murder, I knew I needed a space to grieve. So I gathered all of my courage and laid myself bare to a very nice woman who had Don Miguel Ruiz’s The Four Agreements on her …
Encourage, Don’t Criticize; Help Instead of Trying to Fix
“You must love in such a way that the person you love feels free.” ~Thich Nhat Hahn
When you think you’re an evolved and conscious woman and your partner tells you in no unclear terms that you’re “hard to be with,” it does a number on you.
Those words landed like a well-aimed boulder, smashing the immaculate vision I’d created of evolving myself: an exemplary girlfriend who was “doing the work” to grow, to become generously loving, spiritually awake, and to wholeheartedly support and encourage her beautiful partner to open to his fullest potential.
We met under messy circumstances. Both …
The Antidote to Criticism: Turn Others’ Doubt Into a Standing Ovation
“Criticism is something you can easily avoid by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.” ~Aristotle
Gangly and skinny, I never attracted much attention from the opposite sex during high school. I was the friendly and funny sidekick to the popular girls—fun to hang out with but not to date.
When an older guy approached me during my last year of high school, I thought it would be a normal high school romance.
It turned out that our relationship wouldn’t be anything close to “normal.”
As I began to get to know him, everyone around me started to object to …
You’re Not Behind; You’re Just on Your Own Path
“To wish you were someone else is to waste the person you are.” ~Sven Goran Eriksson
Endlessly comparing ourselves to others and idealizing their best qualities while underestimating our own are self-defeating behaviors, and they hurt our self-esteem. Yet in the competitive nature of our world, many of us do this.
As a result of my own self-defeating thoughts, throughout my life, I’ve repeatedly felt like I was five years behind where I “should” be.
After high school graduation, many of my peers went away to school and into a new wave of social experiences.
I stayed home, worked, and …
The Labels We Take On: How They Limit Our Potential
“Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be.” ~Alan Watts
We live in a society of labels. Everyone will try to label you, including yourself. It’s been happening since the beginning. It takes some honesty and objective reflection to see it, but take a moment or two and really think about it.
Eventually, we each begin to subconsciously believe those labels and we start to feel as though to be whole, to be someone in this world, we need to appease our egos and the voices around us by “fitting-in somewhere,” …
Meditation Remixed: Movies, Pop Culture, and Inner Peace
DJ/VJ and Audio Visual Artist Brett Belcastro created an awesome remix video using over 80 scenes from movies and TV shows to entertain and inspire viewers to find peace within their minds. And entertain and inspire it does!
As a huge movie buff, I appreciate how Brett used pop culture to share the power and importance of meditation.
From the Vimeo page:
“The idea for this video remix came to mind about a year ago while I was listening to a guided meditation by the Deepak Chopra. I was so inspired after attending his ‘Seduction of Spirit’ seminar this …
How Simple Mini Habits Can Change Your Life
“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” ~Alan Watts
It was late 2012, just after Christmas, and like many others I was reflecting on the year.
I realized that I had ample room for improvement in too many areas of my life, but knowing that New Year’s Resolutions have a poor 8% success rate (University of Scranton research), I wanted to explore some other options. I knew I wanted to start before January 1st too, because arbitrary start dates don’t sit well with me.
On December …
4 Ways to Know If You’re Ready for a Simpler Life
“Be who you want to be, not what others want to see.” ~Unknown
Growing up in a consumer society has its obvious advantages—technology is abundant, restaurants are everywhere your eyes can see, and grocery store shelves are always full. All of this leads to the illusion that everything is available, in quantity, all of the time, and for the most part it is.
I was born and raised in a consumer culture and I thought I had it all; the ability to buy whatever I wanted and needed was deeply ingrained in my psyche. In my childhood I had …
Finding a Good Match: Know What You Want and Need in a Relationship
“You’ll never find the right person if you never let go of the wrong one.” ~Unknown
I recently left a relationship that I was not happy in. Although my ex was definitely an unconditional lover, it painfully bothered me that the man I loved was not taking care of his responsibilities.
Since I’ve entered my twenties, I’ve been looking for more than just a good time; I need a stable partner who will be able to meet our shared expenses and obligations in the future. So, I was faced with the crucial, inevitable decision of calling it quits.
I cried …
A Lasting Romance Is Built on Flaws: 6 Tips for a Strong Relationship
“Let our scars fall in love.” ~Galway Kinnell
We all bring our own baggage to any relationship. I know that my past relationships have shaped my approach to love and romance. When we seek out that special someone to share our life, the disappointments of our past relationships tend to get in the way of new discoveries.
It’s human nature to size up a potential partner by drawing from past experience.
There are so many ways to catalog the possible flaws: He’s too short. She’s too tall. Too fat. Too thin. Not enough education. Too much education. Or you become …
We Have the Strength to Move Through Pain and Uncertainty
“Suffering is not caused by pain but by resisting pain.” ~Unknown
Earlier this year our beloved puppy got sick. Not just a poorly tummy kind of sick, but proper, life-threatening, blood transfusion-requiring sick. Suddenly. Unexpectedly. She was at death’s door.
The vet was talking to us in quiet and kindly tones. Using words like “grave.”
Her illness was apparently unusual in a dog her age. Her prognosis was uncertain. She would require months of treatment that may or may not work. We were to watch her for signs of deterioration. Note changes in her appetite and energy levels.
And then …
4 Tips to Help You Keep Going When You’re Filled with Doubt
“Begin doing what you want to do now. We are not living in eternity. We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand-and melting like a snowflake.” ~Francis Bacon Sr.
“Just research, research, research. That’s what grad school is.”
It seemed as though that was all I was hearing from my professors, and it wasn’t helpful.
Since returning to school to get my master’s degree, I had maintained a 4.0 average, but I also hadn’t taken more than two classes at a time. Until now.
When I enrolled for the fall semester, I chose to take twelve …
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