By Guest Blogger on January 17, 2012
Do you know the ADD love song?
I love you; oh I love you. La la la. You’re so beautiful. … Is that a quarter?
Between your to-do list and that pile of papers over there, can you see that great idea you have? That’s the one that’s going to change everything. Or it won’t. At this rate, you’re never going to find out. How are you supposed to get anywhere when you spend your days moving from Facebook to your to-do list and back again? Bonus points if you create with a baby on your boob.
Your meanderings from point-A to anywhere but point-B are not your problem. They’re definitely a problem, but they’re not the problem. They’re also what makes you awesome. Banker types don’t spin in circles like this, but they’re also not as creatively juicy. You need the banker types; they need you.
Dance with your distractions
Give thanks for your enthusiasm and curiosity. They will take you places no to-do list ever will. What you notice you notice with. That means that if you’re looking at all the shiny objects, it’s because you’re full of shiny goodness. If you’re in the shiny object camp, appreciate the objects for what they are: interesting. But don’t sacrifice your long-term desire for short-term excitement.
Productivity is like a diet
The diet’s not the point. If you change the amount and type of food you eat without changing why you eat it, no diet is sustainable. Same thing with productivity. Lists and project management techniques and special software are nice, but they’re incidental. Your idea won’t happen until birthing it is more important than following your distractions.
Cast a spell to make it happen.
1. Be specific.
What is it you want to happen? If you don’t know or feel stuck, it’s because you’re misbelieving something in your noggin. You’ll recognize your intention because it will be clear, to the point and positive.
Like this: I intend to go through my email and delete everything I don’t need. 15 minutes. When I’m done, I’ll reply to the most pressing. 15 more minutes.
See how that’s totally different from cruising in and out of your inbox in between starting a new blog post and then checking Facebook? Same principle applies to any scope of project.
- I intend to write the very best shitty first draft I can. I’ll give it everything, knowing there’s plenty more where this came from.
- I intend to zone out on TMZ.com for 15 minutes. Setting a timer now.
- I intend to pay attention to this meal by feeling and tasting the food in my mouth.
If you don’t know what you want, that’s fine. Trying to get specific will show you where you’re fuzzy. Infuse your spirit with gratitude, and creativity will flow. You’ll figure it out.
2. Seal the deal
Blow out the candles; wave your wand: abracadabra; make an imaginary X in the air, saying, “It is done.”
3. Lift your spirits
Now, prime your pump with love. Imagine someone you love easily doing something lovable. Think: your kittens snuggled in together or your baby finding your nipple in the middle of the night. Let the feeling that comes up with that memory grow really large. That’s love. It’s the most powerful thing in the Universe. Send a shot of that power to wrap around your project. You don’t have to love what you’re trying to do, but you can wrap it in love, and it will work just as well.
Sarah Wagner Yost is a mind-body life coach. She runs the Shiny Object Project School. If you can’t get “your thing” done, she can help. Working with her is better than Valium.
Photo credit: Carolyn Sewell
Read More By Rolf Gates on December 29, 2011
I have had a good year. The fact of it keeps surprising me because I am so used to problems. And recently I have been experiencing longer and longer stretches without problems. Life just seems to be unfolding without them. In their place have been a lot of things to appreciate. Not only have things felt really fun and worthwhile, I have also not had the sense that sometime soon the other shoe will drop and life will get all crappy again.
This “fun goodness” is so noticeably different from much of my experience that it has forced me to consider its cause. As far as I can tell, there are two basic reasons my problems have been replaced with worthwhile opportunities.
I have stopped thinking in terms of problems. I wake up, there is stuff that I have to do, and that is pretty much that. It happens every day and shows no sign of stopping until my last breath. My mantra for the stuff that comes up each day is “What else did you have planned?” The long version would be “I thought you were here to have a human life. You know, one where you have stuff to do for 70 to 80 years, then you are done doing stuff. What else did you have planned?” When did having a life become a problem?
Since becoming a parent and a dedicated meditator, I have developed the habit of considering my motivations before taking an action. The most important questions seem to be ”Am I about to take an action based on faith?” and “Am I about to take an action based on love?” If I am, the action seems to contribute to “fun goodness.” If not, the action seems to create problems. It really matters why I am doing what I am doing in terms of how the results affect my life.
My teachers suggest that we not make a burden of our duties. Who needs problems, anyway? They just create a negative charge around something we have to do and might learn from and profit from, if we don’t expend all our energy making life a problem. The energy we don’t waste having problems can be poured into actions taken from a place of faith and love, and life can start feeling sacred and sweet.
For more information on how to optimize your health, visit RolfGates.com.
Photo credit: Alex Bartok
Read More By Guest Blogger on December 5, 2011
God, do I love to dance.
I love the way music feels in my body. It’s like the boom, boom ka of a drumbeat calls my cells to celebrate, which call to my bones, which call to my muscles, and before you know it, I am movin’ and groovin’ with pure abandonment.
I loved to dance so much that, in 4th grade, I decided that was it. Move over Jennifer Beals: There’s a new flash dancer on the way. The boom boom ka and I were going to be wed forever.
I spent countless hours in dance studios, pointing, stretching, turning, and jumping. However, at around 16 years old, the magical rhythm of the music that once soothed my soul turned into the ringing of Pavlov’s bell. It became the signal that I needed to work harder, turn faster, be thinner, jump higher, and plie my way to perfection.
I spent several years moving my body with one intention. Do better.
Even getting hired to tour with a renowned dance company didn’t quiet the, “This isn’t good enough” voice that joined me every time I slipped into my dance shoes.
But in 1996, while I was battling it out with myself in dance class, my mom was presented with her own battle. She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.
She took on the challenge like a warrior goddess presented with the task of climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. Determined. While she did what her doctors told her, being a child of the 60’s, peace love and everything in between, my mom employed her family as part of her healing team.
We went to meditation and tai chi classes, changed our diet, and found a way to love each other on a deeper level.
My mom was certain that the way to heal her body was through a whole lotta love and tenderness.
So, strange that at the same time, I was certain that the only way to get my body to what I wanted it to do was to beat it into submission. If I didn’t crack the whip on myself, wouldn’t my lazy butt end up on the couch, eating ice cream and watching hours of television?
My mom’s approach was the opposite. She allowed herself to have days of “Well, this really sucks” that were always followed by days where she would paint on her eyebrows and proudly walk out the door. When asked how she was doing, she said, “Gettin’ better every day.” And she meant it.
My mom’s healthy vibrant cells won out over ovarian cancer.(They won out again over breast cancer six years later! A miracle indeed. ) I learned that she did not win because she beat, prodded, forced, or made herself do anything.
She was kind to herself, every step of the way.
When I finally took on this approach in my own life, not only did my body change, but my whole life changed. The extra pounds I hung onto melted away. The self-criticism that spilled into other areas of my life was transformed to a sweet, steady voice reminding that I am doing pretty damn good.
If you’re looking to make radical changes with your body, whether it’s to heal, lose weight or even train for a marathon, it starts with radical kindness and compassion.
Here are a few radical ways to move your body:
1. Get on the love train: We choose our thoughts. You can’t get to destination I love my body by riding the I can’t stand my ______ (insert body part) train. That train ride will only lead to one place: where it is dark and murky and the sun rarely shines.
It starts with love and absolute appreciation for what you are able to do today.
Do whatever it takes to make appreciation for what you can do your primary thoughts. You might have to slow down to access these thoughts, or you might need to ramp it up, but be determined to catch that love train.
2. Set your intention: Instead of jumping on the treadmill or into your favorite exercise class with the intention that you have to burn off the calories you ate the day before, try something different.
Try sweating with the intention that you are going access your power. Intend that you are going to open your heart. You are going to heal. You are going to shine. You are going to become more of who you are meant to be.
This philosophy can be applied to any kind of physical activity you’re doing.
The more you sweat with love, the easier it becomes to be loving even when you are not exercising. This new behavior changes your brain chemistry, which, without doubt, spills into all areas of your life.
3. Add affirmations: I created a playlist and recorded spoken affirmations over it so that when I go for a walk, a run, or even dance around my apartment, I am moving with specific intentions.
I started sharing the playlist with my clients and friends, who love to incorporate it into their workouts.
It’s one thing to think affirmations. It takes it to a whole other level when you are moving and saying them to the rhythm of music. The affirmations become a part of your muscle memory, and they get embedded into your cells. This is where the real change happens.
Bottom line: Decide today that you are moving to celebrate your life. Let the boom boom ka fill you with joy as you move to any rhythm, cherishing the body you’re in and all that it does to support you. It’s has taken you this far. What a blessing.
Money-back guarantee that your body will change, your life will change, and moving will feel more like the final scene in Flash Dance … What a feeling!
Erin Stutland is a life coach, personal trainer and fitness instructor. She is the creator of SHRINK SESSION: 30 Days To Tighten Your Body + Rewire Your Mind and Air In Sculpt. She is one of four Premiere Intensati Leaders in the world.
Read More By Peggy Drexler PhD on November 22, 2011
Petting dogs has been proven to be good for health.
It was one of those days in our house where an argument was hanging in the air like a gas leak — just waiting for a spark.
Like most houses, the combustion — when it inevitably came — was not the kind that lifts the roof off. More like a sustained rumble of muttered asides and one-word answers.
Then my daughter walked in and asked a question that changed everything: “Where’s Polly?”
Polly is one of the two yellow labs who share our home with us — the other is her brother, Stuart. Unlike Stuart, who knows a good thing when he sees it, Polly tends to heed the call of the wild. All it takes is an open door, and the wolf-voice says, “Go for it.”
After a quick and fruitless check under the table, we scrambled like fighter pilots to find Polly. Check the upstairs; check the yard; get the leash; call the neighbors; grab the dog treats. Move, move, move!
My last snappy comeback in the ebb and flow of our suspended argument was shelved. I made a note to save it. It was good.
As usual, Polly turned up an hour or so into our frantic search, not too far from the house. She bounded up to us with great surprise and joy — “It’s so cool that we would run into each other like this.”
It’s amazing how these limpid-eyed, flop-eared creatures change a family.
What is it about the light snoring at the foot of the chair, the chorus of alarm that a squirrel has breached the perimeter, or the clip, clip, clip of paws across a kitchen floor?
I have my own theory.
As a parent with a son on his own and a daughter tumbling into her teen years, dogs are like having eternal two-year-olds around the house — everything is love, everything is great, and every toy — even one with the squeaky long ago ripped from its innards — is a wondrous discovery.
Of course, there are more scientific thoughts on the matter.
Perhaps it’s simply biophilia — an oddly scary term for an interesting idea: We are genetically programmed to interact with nature. It’s an instinctive search for connection with other living things. It’s the reason we run back into a smoke-filled house to save the hamster.
It might explain the soothing effect of a dog in our lives: why petting them has been proven to lower blood pressure and elevate moods; why a major study showed that heart-attack patients with dogs were eight times as likely to be alive a year later than patients who are dog-deprived.
Maybe it also explains why dog slobber is not as disgusting as it should be and why we trail dutifully behind them, plastic grocery bag at the ready. It’s all part of the natural order of things.
With Polly safely back under the table, Stuart sprawled out on the floor, and things returned to normal, I was ready to stoke the argument with that snappy comeback I had saved for later.
The problem was, I couldn’t remember it.
For more by this author, visit PeggyDrexler.com
Originally published on HuffingtonPost.com.
Photo credit: monggoy
Read More By Guest Blogger on September 20, 2011
It’s December 2010. My 74-year-old mother had just made it through her grueling battle with stage-2, aggressive HER2-positive breast cancer. She had her lumpectomies, her radiation, her chemo, and she had come up clean. She had tested negative for the gene that my sister and I could have potentially inherited, so I wasn’t particularly worried when the doctor found a lump in my cystic right breast that very week.
But as fate would have it, I was wrong. Woefully wrong, and I was diagnosed with my own, different, non-inherited breast cancer —stage-1, estrogen-positive.
As I embarked on my own year-long journey — the lumpectomies, radiation, ovary removal — how was it that I could get breast cancer the same week my mother was calling to tell me she was all clear? I chalked it up to incredibly bad luck. If my 74-year-old mother could make it through a far more aggressive cancer than I, a very healthy and fit 50-year–old, had, then I could, too. And I did. We worried for my sister Kathy — she was three years older than I, but could she be next? I don’t remember a moment of my childhood, growing up in the ’60s and ‘70s, without my sister in it. She called me “sweetie,” and I called her “Dee-dee.” I worshipped her and believed her wholeheartedly.
She was the sunny, happy girl I looked up to but looked nothing like. She was blond, green-eyed, fair–skinned, pug-nosed, happy and quick-witted. I was dark, dorky, one-eye-browed, miserable, green-skinned, gawky and occasionally funny.
She could have been a total bitch, lauding her beauty over me, and yet she was brilliant to me. She loved and protected me. I was her baby sister, dammit, and she was my champion.
I’m sure people wondered if it was hard to be the ugly duckling little sister of such a beautiful, kind older sister, to live in her shadow, but I can honestly say she made it easy for me. Because she loved me so fiercely, it meant I was as worthy as her.
We grew up. We married and had our two daughters within weeks of each other. Although we lived on different coasts now — she still on Long Island and me in L.A. — our girls were close and spent their summers together at the same summer camp
She was as fierce a mother to her two girls as she was to me. So when I was diagnosed, she braved her fear of flying, found someone to watch her own troubled child, and raced to my side. When it was determined I had to be put into menopause so I could take Arimidex to battle my cancer, she threw me a “Very Merry UN-Ovary Party.” She talked me back down from the ledge many nights as I worried — Did the cancer spread? Will I live? If so, will I still be attractive? Newly divorced and in a new relationship, would my man stick with me? “Yes,” she assured me. “Yes, he will love you. Yes, you will live. Yes, you are still beautiful.”
I believed her.
A year later, I am through the worst. I tested clean on every test and was vain enough to want to fix all the damage to my radiated right breast with a debilitating but necessary nine-hour operation that removes the old breast and replaces it with muscle and tissue from your shoulder. Not fun. Then a second operation to form a nipple and lift up the other breast to match.
That morning, as I groggily drive home from carpool, I notice a missed call on my cell phone. It’s from Kathy’s husband, Scott, who, in all the 20 years I’ve known him, has never called me. His voice sounds anxious and tired. He tells me to call him immediately. When he answers, he tells me to pull over the car. This is not going to be good.
As my heart beats out of my chest, and all time stops, he says the one thing I have never let myself imagine —Kathy has two brain tumors that are making her brain swell. She is in the emergency room. That persistent cough she had wasn’t just a cough. My sister, a non-smoker, had lung cancer that had spread to her brain, her liver and her bones.
“How could this be?” I thought. “What ancient family curse has befallen my father, my mother, my sister, and me?”
Not Kathy. Not my golden-haired idol. Anyone else but not her. She of the easy laugh and the kind heart and the fierce loyalty. Surely someone who is a mass-murdering rapist and not my beautiful sister deserves to have stage-4 lung cancer!
I am devastated. But I know what my job is now. Now I have to be the big sister. I have to be the one to lead, encourage, love, guard and teach. So I do. I take everything I’ve learned on my journey, and I pour it on my sister. Every book, every supplement, every website, every doctor, every resource.
It looks bad for my sister, but I know my sister. If there’s a glimmer of hope, she will find it. She regales me with hilarious stories from the emergency room. How the nurses couldn’t get over how her hair was done and she was clutching her Louis Vuitton purse while her brain almost exploded. How the steroids they gave her to control the brain swelling make her boobs look really good.
Cancer and all, we can still make each other laugh ‘til we get weak in the knees. She looks beautiful, and she is happy despite everything. She has the best attitude until someone forgets to read through an article they send her – one they’ve carelessly downloaded from the Internet. Then I can’t find her, and when I do, she is on her bathroom floor sobbing. It is me who picks her up, crumples up the article, comforts her and talks her back down from the ledge.
I fly back to L.A. and go through my own grueling nightmare mastectomy rebuild. We speak on the phone every day. We wish we were on the same coast, in the same bed like when we were little and we could cuddle together and ‘sleep’ with our eyes open. We talk through our doctors’ appointments, our kids, our affinity for pain meds and how maybe I could revive my ancient acting career by going on “Celebrity Rehab.” Although I know hers is a far worse struggle than mine — I am over the hump and doing reconstruction work and she is in the trenches fighting for her life — I make my struggles as bad as hers to somehow lessen her pain, to let her know I am literally going through this all with her. No longer the little shadow and her big sis, but two frightened but strong women who will get through this journey as we always have — together. With my sister’s hand in mine.
Hilary Shepard is in remission and living in Newport Beach, California. She co-invented three board games with Daryl Hannah called “LIEbrary”, “Famous Last Lines” and “Call it!” The games are available at Barnes and Noble, Nordstrom and Amazon.
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