My mother read me lots of books and taught me how to read before I went to Grade One. I loved reading so much that I read anything I could find. I recall the Bobbsey Twins as a favorite book series. The story I remember most from my childhood is Dr. Goat by Georgina. Later, […]
Read post »As I reset and rebalance with summer R & R (relaxation and rejuvenation), I am giving you some blog R & R (reusing and recycling). Many of this summer’s blogs are past favorites. May you use them for your own R & R (review and refocus). Hope these R helpful! P.S. – What’s a pirate’s […]
Read post »There’s a quick and easy question! How would you answer it? Life lessons are one of 52 questions I’ve been asked weekly since my last birthday almost a year ago. That’s when our daughter, Jen, gifted me a subscription to Storyworth. The service is designed for older family members to answer a weekly question […]
Read post »Santa can now relax after his big night. Hope the kids in your life aced their big performance review and rated highly on his naughty-nice scale. The Holidays are a good time for the pause that refreshes — even without drinking a little glass bottle of Coca-Cola as Santa did in those old commercials […]
Read post »One of my holiday traditions is watching various movie versions of Charles Dickens’ much-loved classic, A Christmas Carol. Last weekend when two of our grandkids had a sleepover, we watched my favorite version, The Muppet Christmas Carol. To ensure a more restful sleep for all, we skipped over a few of the scarier, ghostly parts. When Les […]
Read post »Too many appointed leaders sit on the line and wait rather than taking the initiative and stepping up to make things happen. They follow someone else’s lead. Some slip down below the line and wallow in hopelessness and pessimism — which they’ll often call “being realistic.” They may be called “leaders” by their position. But […]
Read post »Last of a Six-Part Series on The Tempting Ten Wallow Words (Links to previous parts below) Most of the Wallow Words in this series have a common cause. Fear. In the depths of the Great Depression, U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt famously declared in his first inaugural address in 1933, “The only thing we […]
Read post »Part Three of a Series on The Tempting Ten Wallow Words (Click to read Parts One and Two) Does this sound familiar… “Nowadays, people don’t ask you how you are, they say, ‘Are you busy?’ meaning, ‘Are you well?’ If someone actually does ask you how you are, the most cheerful answer, of […]
Read post »Part One of a Series on The Tempting Ten Wallow Words Carl Sandburg, the American historian, poet, and novelist who won two Pulitzer Prizes, once said, “There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud.” With today’s urgent streams of […]
Read post »In a small pub in the highlands of Scotland, a group of fishermen gathered one afternoon to swap tales over a round of ale. One of them stretched his arms apart to show the big one that got away. At that very point, a server walked past carrying a tray of full ale glasses. The […]
Read post »Julia was exhausted. Business was outstanding. Her team was scrambling to keep up and she was stretched thin. They had trouble finding enough good people to fill the new positions that were being created by the company’s rapid growth. During a family gathering she talked about her crazy-busy life and shared her frustration with a […]
Read post »Life isn’t fair. The world is full of injustice and inequality. Billions live in horrible poverty. Brutal wars kill and maim millions of blameless people. Corrupt governments destroy entire countries’ quality of life. Crooked leaders bilk thousands of investors out of their life savings and drive economies into ruin and throw people out of work. […]
Read post »The light dawned. I was in a meeting with my colleagues, reviewing the rapid changes in our training and consulting business and sorting through our priorities for the coming quarter. We had doubled our already substantial business over the past 18 months. While the growth was exciting, it was also exhausting. We were piling on […]
Read post »Brian’s head was starting to throb as he scrolled through the two-dozen new voice and e-mails messages on his phone while walking to his cubicle. Looks like another crazy day in the hamster cage, he muttered to himself. Brian was growing increasingly frustrated. Despite working 50 hours and more per week (with an increasing amount […]
Read post »The lotus flower is an ancient and widely used symbol for growth and beauty blossoming from the mud. It’s an example of drawing new life and beautiful growth from decay. My last post asked are you green and growing or ripe and rotting? Sometimes it’s not easy to recognize the symptoms of slow decay. We […]
Read post »As a gardener, I love this time of year. My office looks over our back gardens. After looking at a brown, dead landscape for the past months, the garden is alive with spring flowers and vigorous green growth. The 19th-century British theologian and essayist, John Henry Newman once said, “Growth is the only evidence of […]
Read post »With this fall’s release of Peter Jackson’s documentary series, Get Back, and Paul McCartney’s book, The Lyrics, I’ve enjoyed hearing more about The Beatles’ groundbreaking work. As a long-time fan, it’s fascinating to get more background and context for some of this iconic music. Year-end is a time for reflection. And after a year like […]
Read post »A really helpful feature of Google Maps is the ability to zoom in and out. Often pulling back to see the bigger picture gives a better sense of where we are now and where we’re going. In these crazy times, it’s so easy to get stuck at street view. We rush from one task to […]
Read post »In his recent Globe & Mail column, “The Benefit of Silencing Our Own Egos,” Harvey Schachter writes, “Columbia University psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman observes on the Scientific American blog that media debates he watches these days want to make his head explode: ‘All our egos are just too damn loud.’ And those out-of-control egos we […]
Read post »Stanford University professor of psychology, Carol Dweck, has become well-known for her work on the power of a growth mindset. Her research shows this is vital to success and fulfilling our potential. Spring is a great time for gardeners in the Northern Hemisphere to reflect on growth. I enjoy perennial gardening in our yard. As I […]
Read post »