For those longing to make a lifestyle change in this New Year, here are four evidence-based actions from the science of habit formation and goal attainment to help you be successful. Decide it. Behavior change is hard.  It works when you make a decision. You can build an optimal relationship with your everyday behaviors so...Read More

  Well-being is realized by small steps but is truly no small thing. – Zeno Founder of Stoic Philosophy (334 BC-262 BC) I’ve been taking Robert Sapolsky’s biology course on YouTube on how stress impacts health.  Here is a fun fact to help us frame the holidays during a pandemic: Naked Mole Rats live in...Read More

All the good stuff is on the other side of tired.     Andre Agassi It is a messy moment we are in with competing pandemics colliding with each other.    Its ok to be operating at 60 percent.  A deep sense of weariness seems to be setting in,  interspersed with very real anxiety.  It would be good...Read More

A fresh look at Abraham Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’ offers wise guidance in these tumultuous times.  It turns out that the pyramid of needs(below) was only created after Maslow’s death. He never imagined a ladder of needs that one climbs, but rather that our basic food, safety and belonging needs (and can we add strong WiFi?)...Read More

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” — Carl Jung As we slog through the dog days of summer in the Northern Hemisphere, most of us are growing weary of living in a pandemic and our shaky, unknown future, with no solutions or end in...Read More

There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.                    Nelson Mandela In January 2017, I met my brother John in California for a “Weekend with David Whyte.”  As a...Read More

….what else matters besides being kind to ourselves and kind to others? As we mourn the violent murder of George Floyd and so many other innocent people of color, amidst a pandemic that is hitting black and brown communities hardest, we descend into an economic depression. Rage naturally erupts from these wretched injustices and lack...Read More

Many of us have experienced loss, grief, guilt, overwhelm, distress, and confusion in recent weeks.  No two people are in the same situation and our world has become difficult, unpredictable and extreme.  Some have more downtime; others are working more than they ever have.   Here are two strategies to help us be our higher selves...Read More

The enormity of this global moment hits when we learn that in Jerusalem, the church of the Holy Sepulchre (above) had to close its doors due to a pandemic for the second time ever this week.  The first time it was locked for this reason – using the same key – was in 1349, during...Read More

Our Life is What our Thoughts Make It Marcus Aurelius, 121AD- 180AD   I recently began practicing stoicism—not to become an emotionless person, but to minimize negative emotions.  Its antifragile or toughness-training.  Even though the Stoics wrote their philosophy over 2,000 years ago–their wisdom is so relevant to our modern life.  Who among us does...Read More