Blog | Simple Living

A beautiful life is a messy life

November 15, 2016 5 Comments

Here is what a beautiful life looks like to me. It’s messy. It’s not all flowers and roses. But there is absolute beauty in mess, especially the mess of our emotions. I just had my own experience of beautiful grief that I want to share with you. But before I tell you about my experience, I want you to know something important. Even though our election is what inspired my beautiful grief – this is by no means a post about politics. I am absolutely not advocating for liberal versus conservative. I think both sides have merit and shortcomings. As you may know from my last post – my grief is that someone with Mr. Trump’s character is now our role-model-in-chief. I’m sad because I want our president – liberal or conservative – to be a fabulous role model, lifting us up and inspiring us to be better human beings. […]

Mindfulness, News

Donald Trump has lit a fire in me

October 28, 2016 7 Comments

Donald Trump has inspired me. Lit a fire, to be exact. I know we’re up to our eyeballs in angry, divisive, political rhetoric and we can’t stand it for one more minute. But Mr. Trump’s Access Hollywood tape has stirred me to write about something deeply important – to all of us. I’m talking about the tape where Mr. Trump brags about sexually assaulting women. And I’m talking about the way he has demeaned both both women and men all throughout this political season. The put-downs, the threats, the demeaning talk. As human beings, we can do so much better than this. So, why would this inspire me – light a big fire? Because I write about how to simplify your life, and Mr. Trump’s demeaning talk has awakened in me the true meaning of simplicity – the heart of it all. Let me explain. Most people think that simplifying your […]

Family, Health, News, Recipes

Why you should eat a hearty vegan breakfast – and how to do it

October 18, 2016 1 Comment

I’ve been conflicted about what to eat for breakfast. Are you, too? Is it healthier to eat a vegan breakfast, even though I’m hungry shortly after eating something like oatmeal and fruit? Or is it better to eat high protein with eggs or eggs and bacon? At least that way I feel full. But is it healthy? Let’s talk about it, and then I’ll give you recipes and a plan. I just watched a great health video – Forks over Knives, and I’m also reading a book on preventing heart disease through lifestyle and diet changes, not pills. It’s called 30 Days to Natural Blood Pressure Control, by David DeRose, MD. Both the video and the book lay out a very convincing argument that a vegan diet is healthiest. What Harvard Medical School says about diet I can’t go into details here, but I encourage you to watch the video and read […]

Family, Mindfulness, News, Relationships

Should anxiety and fear make decisions for you?

September 16, 2016 No Comments

Let’s say you want to let go of something, like leaving your job or leaving a relationship that’s not working, but you feel scared or sad about it – anything but happy. Should you stay because you don’t want to experience anxious or sad feelings? I talked about this in my last two posts on getting rid of stuff – asking, should you hang on to a certain item that’s clearly not serving you – but you feel too much sadness to let it go? But what about those huge issues – jobs, relationships, places to live and so on? Should your level of anxiety and sadness make your decisions for you? What if you’ve put a lot of thought into leaving your job because the negatives are outweighing the positives in a big way, but you’re scared? You’re scared that you won’t find another job you like, or that you […]