the four agreements

mini-review, my take I am a fan of self-help books, partly because they each give a different perspective on how the human mind works and how to optimize it. And partly because I am an endless seeker of information. I read the Four Agreements recently, which was not one of my favorites, but it did…

twinkling christmas lights 2017

Raleigh / Triangle Christmas Lights What better way to focus on the moment than to check out twinkly lights, the real-life manifestation of the holiday spirit in the Triangle? I’ve updated my Christmas Light map for 2017, and am revising it as we visit some of our favorite lights. I am a bit of a…

the skeleton woman

Currently I am slowly savoring the book Women Who Run With the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D. It is a quite long and philosophical book that discusses some stories and myths about the Wild Woman archetype. Beyond the typical rescued-by-a-prince fairytales, these tales teach us through oral history how to nourish our souls and…

all i want for christmas

Shopping can tend to get exhausting and feel at times unimaginative. I think sometimes having to come up with creative gift ideas for everyone all at the same time can lead to being overwhelmed and also feeling like you are contributing to the culture of consumption. What are some gifts that the ladies in my…

Gratitude

A few hours after Thanksgiving dinner, after the period where we went around the table and shared some things that we were all thankful for, an insight emerged. Various family members splayed across couches, feeling comforted by each others’ presence and lazy but happy under the influence of turkey’s tryptophan. My son said, “You know…

it is what it is

zen wisdom from unexpected places Hubs and I had a number of improvements done to the exterior of our house a year or so ago. We needed a lot of siding and rotted wood on the outside of our house repaired, so we worked with a contractor to get the work completed and then have…

the beginning

Setting the Scene Being hit by so many combinations of positive and negative messages onlineĀ  and in the news gets extremely overwhelming. My friend feed scrolls by, filled with images of happy people frozen in time, on vacation, sharing moments with their children, and carefully curated media telling stories sympathetic to my views. Some of…