Each of us has a default mode of engaging the world around us, a lens through which we see the people, places,and things with which we interact each day and which guides how we behave. Call it a stance, a […]
A driver cuts you off on the highway without signaling. Your spouse makes a snippy comment about your eating habits over breakfast. An old friend behaves like a jerk, insulting you in front of friends at a party. A co-worker […]
Archimedes famously boasted that, were he to have a lever long enough and a place to stand, he could move the Earth. A bit over-dramatic, perhaps, but he was (theoretically) correct – with a properly-placed lever, many seemingly-impossible tasks become […]
A few weeks ago I posted here on dealing with negative thoughts, and the response was significant: most of us deal with negative thoughts every day and find them distracting and, in the worst cases, debilitating, so it’s no wonder […]
This July 4th, Americans celebrate their Independence Day, the day we formally declared our separation from England in 1776. We remember the enormous sacrifices required to turn that declaration into true freedom and to maintain that freedom over the last […]
by Lisa Lombardi The other day, I went into retail: I threw a yard sale with three neighbors. Woohoo, I thought as I tagged my merchandise ahead of time, I’m finally going to unload the crap that’s weighing me down […]
My mother passed away last year at age 95 after a years-long physical decline and struggle with dementia. We had many conversations during that time, most of them simple and present, focused on who and what was immediately in front […]
It’s a well-known factoid that 60% to 70% of our daily thoughts (give or take) are negative (see, for example, a Psychology Today article on the topic). And upwards of 90% of those negative thoughts are just retreads from the […]
I didn’t laugh out loud when Tony asked me to write a guest post for “Declaring Freedom.” I knew he was graciously offering a platform to a neighbor who’d had just enough success as a writer to declare writing their […]
For millennia, retreats have been used by sages, scientists, and saints to refresh and refocus, and have often been the occasion for profound personal transformation. The founder of Buddhism, Gotama Buddha, recommended his followers spend the 3 months of the […]
