Life Changes
Healing Through Storytelling: Lessons from The Odyssey
The journey of Odysseus in Homer's 'The Odyssey' offers profound insights into healing...
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- Written by: Thomas M. Sterner
Our concepts of ideal and perfect are always changing. The evaluations and judgments we make unconsciously in every second of our lives that jump-start our emotions and bring us much anxiety and stress....
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- Written by: Stan Goldberg, PhD
In the West, we place our cemeteries away from our everyday lives, as if there were an impermeable barrier separating life and death. We pretend that death will go away if we just ignore it. We know that this isn't true, but...
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- Written by: Thomas M. Sterner
Everything we do is a habit, in one form or another -- how we think, how we talk, how we react to criticism, which type of snack we instinctively reach for. Even when faced with a circumstance for the first time, we respond to it from habit...
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- Written by: Alan Cohen
The end of this year might be a good time to decide which stories you want to leave behind and which you would like to take into the new year and amplify. Some stories are worth telling and others are not worth telling. Some stories empower us and others disempower us...
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- Written by: Joyce Vissell
A disappointment can really be a blessing in disguise. We had an experience of this recently while returning home from our three week work trip in Europe. I admit, I have a big thing about seats on the airplane. Sitting next to Barry is the most important thing for me. I also like to have an aisle seat. Sometimes...
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- Written by: Ken Druck, Ph.D.
“Live in the moment!” bumper stickers cry. “Live in the now!” self-help books declare. Movies like The Bucket List preach the importance of living life in all its fullness before your time on earth is up. And yet, “being in the now” is easier said than done, right?
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- Written by: Tim Ray
To become a VIP member of Club Shouldsville, you must constantly suffer from the belief that one "should" and "should not" say and do certain things in relationships. And since reality almost never lives up to most people's expectations and ideas about how...
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- Written by: Brooks Palmer
Letting go of clutter is more than tossing stuff—it’s an emotional journey of self-kindness and permission to begin again.
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- Written by: AlixSandra Parness, DD
I encourage you to realize that the most powerful thing you can do in every moment is to choose joy. Make the shift into joy your greatest priority. When you choose joy, your joy is a flint that creates a spark that ignites the fire of unconditional love that subsequently...
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- Written by: Starhawk
Mediation is appropriate in cases of miscommunication or misunderstandings, to clear up hurt feelings and hurtful interactions. Mediation implies that we can find a win-win solution, that no one is either completely right or completely wrong and that both parties can come to share a mutual purpose.
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- Written by: Alan Cohen
I recently painted a deck on my house. I enjoy painting, a meditation in being present that doesn’t require much thought but lots of attention. Your hands may get dirty but your mind will stay clean. With just a few planks left to color I noticed I was almost out of paint...
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- Written by: Mary Anne Radmacher
Complaining draws attention away from all the good things that unfold. It's as if complaint puts a mask over our sight: too busy identifying what is wrong, all the things that are right march on by. While there are so many motivations behind complaining...
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- Written by: Lisa McCourt
What if the things you hate most about your current situation are your greatest blessings in disguise? What if everything that’s ever unfolded in your entire life has been the precisely necessary thing to bring you to this mysteriously perfect moment? If that...
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- Written by: Roy Holman
Be yourself. Just be yourself. Well, maybe this is not so easy. Does the thought of being yourself, speaking your truth, and expressing your passion stir feelings of confusion or frustration? Does it bring up fear or anger? Were there times in your life when...
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- Written by: BJ Gallagher
In her wonderful book, The Wealthy Spirit, Chellie Campbell describes how, when she was a girl, her mother taught her to play “The Glad Game.” “The Glad Game” is another name for a Gratitude List and helps you focus on what’s right in your world today, instead of what’s wrong...
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- Written by: Joyce Vissell
Whatever pain someone was experiencing, Charmaine had gone through it, and much more. With so much compassion she would talk about the power of forgiveness and the risk to bring healing to any emotional pain.
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- Written by: Linda Star Wolf
Daily dedication and a willingness to heal our past will automatically move us forward on the spiral path of transformation. When we let go of old, outworn patterns that no longer serve us, we can energetically free up space in our psyches so that learning from the future becomes not only possible but the most...
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- Written by: Marie T. Russell
Many of us find it hard to forgive. Yet, what if we had to forgive the killer of our son, or wife, daughter, husband... Would we be able to forgive in that situation? Would we want them to be sentenced to life imprisonment with no chance of parole?
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- Written by: Robert L. Leahy, Ph.D.
Self-criticism takes the form of blaming yourself (It’s all my fault), labeling yourself (I can’t believe how stupid I am), hating yourself (I can’t stand myself at times), doubting yourself... What is self-criticism good for?
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- Written by: William R. Yoder
Wayne Dyer pointed out that when you squeeze an orange you get orange juice. What comes out when you are squeezed is never the fault of the squeezer. It is only the explicit expression of what was already implicit within your mind.
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- Written by: Mary Hayes Grieco
There is a nearly universal form of perfectionism hard-wired into human nature. It is the belief that we are “falling short” of what we should be. It is the habit of feeling somewhat disappointed in ourselves. Here's how we can move past this...
