A famous quote from Confucius reads: “the man who asks a question is a fool for a minute, the man who does not ask is a fool for life.” I’ve always liked that quote, but I think there’s even more to a question than just getting smarter.
Read MoreWhat a wonderful day to be a teacher. What a wonderful way to get to know the Earth better - through the eyes of a child. What a gift to have a boyfriend who is a wonderful father to wonderful kids - to have a glimpse of life in this role.
How easy it is to get caught up in the stress of managing it all and doing it all “right” - Life that is.
Read MoreAbout 3 years ago, Jaime and I led a mini workshop in NYC about Wellbeing. Dad came to show his support (he was always really good like that.)
Read MoreStillness is something I’ve always aimed for, but a practice I find immensely difficult. It’s the same flaw that so often gets me into trouble with the bees.
Read MoreRight here.
Right now.
At this moment.
I stand.
My feet are on the ground.
Breath enters my nose.
I hear.
Read MoreThis week I had one thought that stayed with me all week.
When I was 16-18 years old, I knew a girl called Mira. We used to study Maths together, she knew statistics, and could explain it to me. She found me really funny - she would laugh hard- with tears coming out, and she was good looking.
When I got to 17 or 18, any girl who paid attention to me was gonna get my attention back.
Neuroscientist Irving Biederman (University of Southern California) and his colleagues have identified a mechanism in human brains that leads us to one clear conclusion: we are designed to be ‘infovores’.
This is because we have a reward system that associates the release of innate opioids with acquiring new information. I have always been a very curious person, and indeed I am my happiest when I’m finding things out.
I had one of those driveway moments a couple days ago—listening to Frank Oz interviewed on the New Yorker podcast about his new documentary, “Muppet Guys Talking.” Oz was the voice of iconic muppets like Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Cookie Monster, Bert, Grover, and Animal. He also brought a little character called “Yoda” to life. He’s also directed a dozen or so feature films (Little Shop of Horrors, Bowfinger, The Score).
Read MoreMy sister took my awesome blender with her to her apartment in NYC while I was at college last year. She didn’t ask me if she could borrow it in the first place so I didn’t know she had it at all. The plan of leaving me out of the know would have worked out just fine for her had she not totally forgotten it under the train seat coming back from Manhattan.
I recently told that disappointing occurrence to my boyfriend Chad.
Read MoreJulie Sun wrote a powerful piece about being “busy” and how, in Chinese, the word itself was a 2-part word that read separately meant “heart dying”. At the recent Road Makers gathering, we were talking about the idea of being busy in a few of our groups. The always wonderful and thoughtful Reed Lowenstein offered that he avoided the word “busy” because it meant someone “did it to me” rather than “doing it to myself”.
Read MoreI’m not so sure people want us to give them answers and advice,
As they want us to ask them good questions.
And for us to hold a safe space for them.
We each have a natural set point, a place we feel most comfortable.
We might be seers who can imagine, out of whole cloth, a future.
We might be doers who need to be neck-deep in the work to come to conclusions that mean anything to us.
We might be analyzers who see the whole field of play and can visualize which pieces need to be moved in what ways to tilt the field.
Read MoreI started running when I was a freshman in college. And once I started, I couldn’t stop.
When I moved to Chicago for school, I started running along Lake Michigan as a substitute for the competitive tennis I once played, but soon began to appreciate the solitude. Being an introvert on a social campus exhausted me and running became my surefire way to get some alone time with my music every morning. I quickly became addicted.
Read MoreA couple years ago I heard the following working definition of patience:
“Patience is the willingness to remain in discomfort”.
When I heard this definition I immediately ceased asking others to be patient. As Priscilla suggested in repeating my logic back to me, asking others to be “patient” might be equivalent to saying “suffer in silence”. ;)
Read MoreHave you hear this old Joke? When you and your friends are out in the wilderness and you’re confronted by a bear, you don’t have to run faster than the bear. You just have to run faster than your friends.
While that advice might work in the forest, in business it tends to be trouble.
I wrote blog #27 about the kindergarten class I am interning with. As I mentioned, the kids don't have the widest selection of books, or the most pristine furniture, and they don't have perfect families or backgrounds and I worry about their life after school that I probably don't know enough about BUT… I do know one thing for sure. And that’s that they DO have an incredible teacher to learn with every day.
Read More“Is this what it was like to live in Colonial times?” my 11-year old daughter asks, golden firelight flickering off her face in our living room on Wednesday night.
The power was out in our house and in our neighborhood, thanks to the late winter storm weighing down trees under layers of ice and wet, heavy snow.
Read MoreWhenever we do forward folds in yoga the teacher reminds me to "lead with your heart and then let your head follow." It's an incredibly important reminder, because of what a difference it makes.
It's funny. I've been practicing yoga for years, yet no matter how many times I reach down to touch my toes, I almost always force my forehead towards my knees, using my hands to brace the back of my legs so that I can pull just a little bit closer. I'm determined to stretch as deeply as possible. My back curves, my chest contracts, my forehead wrinkles, and my shoulders shrug up into my ears. I feel tighter than ever.
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