by admin | May 7, 2015
Tuesday, May 12th at 10:00 PST – Dr. John Duffy is a highly sought-after clinical psychologist, certified life coach, parenting expert, and proud parent. He has been working with teens, tweens, and their families for more than fifteen years, providing the critical intervention and support needed to help hundreds of families find their footing.
His new book, The Available Parent, helps mothers and fathers to shift the dynamic of the relationship with their teenager. Healthy conversations replace angry outbursts or petulant silence. Techniques in The Available Parent foster a new kind of relationship based on a foundation of radical optimism instead of fear-based control.
He is proud to be a regular parenting and relationship expert on the new Steve Harvey show and The Morning Blend on NBC. His radio credits include NPR, WKRP, the nationally syndicated Mr. Dad, Bobblehead Dad, and many more. He also contributes to a number of print and online media. These include The Huffington Post, Good HouseKeeping, Redbook, Cosmopolitan, Teen Vogue, AOL, PsychCentral, SheKnows, EHow, and Yahoo, to name a few. Video, audio, and article excerpts can be found on this website. He blogs on availability and communicates regularly through his fan page on Facebook and Twitter. Dr. Duffy also speaks nationally on parenting and other relationships.
Listen to “Available Parenting with Dr. John Duffy 5/12/15” on Spreaker.
by admin | May 6, 2015
My dad is an avid hiker, a true outdoorsman, and a rugged athlete. I am not. I am creative. “Artistic,” you might say. But definitely not an athlete, and there is nothing rugged about me, not even my attitude. So, as a kid, I learned to get my bum out of bed early and trek through the woods with him or else I’d have a long Sunday at home, all alone. While the idea of coloring seemed much more fun, I was not a good sales girl, so off we’d go to the mountains.
Thankfully, over the years we have both developed a love for the theater, especially circus arts, musicals, and plays. He is retired now and has the good sense to indulge in such pleasant modes of entertainment on a regular basis. He also has Debra, his Love who accompanies him, but from time to time she can’t make it. And these are the magical evenings when dad takes me on a date.
Typically, the call comes out of the blue. This was the case recently as I was in the middle of a busy day contacting radio guests and publicists. I answered the phone and heard my dad’s voice, “Oh, Debby-Do, How are you?” (Such nicknames made me cringe as a kid, and now I beam!) He continued, “I’ve got two tickets for a great show. Would you like to….?” I didn’t let him finish. “Yes! I’m free! I’m not doing anything.”
I was elated. A date with dad! And he is no Scrooge when it comes to a fancy dessert to top off the night.
Of course, the best part is that I get him all to myself–I get to feel special–but finally we have a way to meet up without a full day of blazing sun, hoofing over boulders, and keeping an eye out for Bigfoot. Instead, I get to dress up, gawk at the artists, share a fudge sundae with my dad, and eat the cherry on top.
by admin | May 1, 2015
(originally posted on Dr. Maisel’s blog)
There may be new creative projects that you want to begin or new ways of marketing and promoting yourself that you know would be smart to attempt but something seems to be holding you back. Here are four tips that will lead very naturally to an increase in your confidence.
One. Know what you currently do
Because our lives rush along, providing us with no chance to catch up with ourselves, we often don’t really know what we’ve been attempting or accomplishing. When was the last time you had a conversation with yourself about what sort of art you’re making or what sort of marketing efforts you’re attempting? It’s harder to know what new things to try if you don’t know what current things you’re doing. Settle in and spend some real time discerning your current situation.
Two. Detach from the idea that there is just “one way” to do things
In part because it reduces our experience of anxiety, we often decide to do things one way—paint one sort of painting, market in one particular way—and then refuse to think about or else discount the desirability of other art or other marketing efforts that we might make. Maybe we think that only the gallery scene is for us and that marketing our art online is beneath our dignity. Try to let go of the idea that there is just one way to do things and find the courage to investigate other ways of making art and marketing art, even those that at first glance look completely uncongenial. You might discover that one of these other ways actually ignites some passion in you and instantly increases your confidence level.
Three. Investigate your dislikes
If you dislike realistic painting, why do you dislike it? If you dislike abstract painting, why do you dislike it? If you dislike talking to gallery owners, why do you dislike those interactions? If you dislike studio visits, why do you dislike them? We often make snap judgments about our likes and dislikes and subsequently never investigate those likes and dislikes again, responding instead with a knee-jerk reaction. Take a good, hard look at those things you claim to dislike and see if they really are so unlikeable. Turning some of those dislikes to likes may prove the exact equivalent of rekindling your desire and increasing your confidence.
Four. Investigate your fears
We often hide from ourselves the fact that something is making us scared or anxious. Maybe we have real fears that our drawing skills aren’t up to snuff. So we keep dodging that painful information and paint abstractly not because we genuinely want to paint abstractly but because we know that our realistic paintings wouldn’t measure up. It is very brave work but very valuable work to look your fears and anxieties in the eye. Only then will you understand your true situation. That understanding is bound to open the door to courageous new efforts—and new confidence!
by admin | May 1, 2015
Tuesday, May 5th at 10 a.m. PST Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino’s best-selling book PERCOLATE – Let Your Best Self Filter Through teaches readers how to implement positive changes and work through the trouble spots in their life.
Percolate inspires us to wake up to what’s possible. When we feel possibility, that’s when our hearts and minds tend to simmer with fresh ideas – the ones that help us to achieve goals and enhance our well-being.As The CEO and Founder of
Best Ever You, Elizabeth has created a place and network for people to discover their authentic selves and create a plan and practice for acknowledging what matters.
Elizabeth’s goal is to help connect people to themselves, those around them, and the world as a whole. Elizabeth works with individuals, groups and businesses to help people discover positive, lasting & transformative change.
She does this by focusing on energy, health, behavior, gratitude, values and belief systems, goals, tolerance, and peace.
Listen to “Percolating with Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino” on Spreaker.
by admin | Apr 22, 2015
“All right is almost always where we eventually land, even if we fuck up entirely along the way.”–Cheryl Strayed
I decided to headline today’s blog post with those words of wisdom, not because it’s exactly the topic I’ll be discussing, but because those two intentions match mine.
My topic today is Gabrielle Bernstein’s e-Course “God is my publicist.” Hay House gifted me with this three-week lecture partly, because they’re really cool folks, but mostly because they figured it would help promote my books. I was lucky enough to meet Gabby last year in London and she was recklessly generous enough to write the forward to E-Cubed.
Unlike some publicity campaigns that require big budgets, weekly strategy sessions and countless pleas to the media powers-that-be, Gabby’s course suggests appointing God to handle the details.
That doesn’t mean sitting around polishing your nails and refusing to pick up the phone when say, Oprah calls. It means making a rigorous practice of connecting with the big guy and asking that your message reach the folks who need it. As she points out, the possibilities to connect and make an impact are endless.
Endless possibilities, as far as I’m concerned, is a synonym for God, even though many of us hooked that word up long ago with the exact opposite.
God, to use the synonym I refer to in my book, is the FP (or the Field of Infinite Potentiality). I devoted my life to the FP many years ago. I appointed it the CEO of my career and, so far, it hasn’t let me down. It’s enabled me to write 17 books and create a life without “a real job” for more than 20 years. It’s enabled me to make a living on my wit and my craft.
I believe the only thing keeping anyone apart from the FP is their own walls and judgments.
Judgment, I was relieved to find out, is not my function. Surrender to the FP is really my only job. The less I try to do on my own, the better my life becomes.
Gabby’s other potent publicity strategy is sending love to potential customers….in my case, readers.
She reminds us that all of us have a mission and, no matter what we think it might be, it always involves love. Expansion. Beauty. Joy. So, dear readers, whoever you might be, I send you heartfelt appreciation and, yes, love which is the only thing that’s real.
by admin | Apr 22, 2015
April 28th, 2015 – Janet Lynn Roseman, PhD, is an assistant professor in medical education at Nova Southeastern University College of Osteopathic Medicine in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and director of the Physician Fellowship Program in Integrative Medicine. She specializes in spirituality and medicine, and created the Sidney Project in Spirituality and Medicine and Compassionate Care™, a unique model in medical education that reminds physician residents of the sacredness of their profession and the importance of creating caring environments for both patients and physicians. She was the David Larsen Fellow in Spirituality and Medicine at the Kluge Center for Scholars at the Library of Congress.She leads workshops for people with cancer and offers the “Cultivating Courage with Joan of Arc” training program for healthcare professionals who work with oncology patients. She lectures on the intersection of compassion and medicine, and is dedicated to changing the medical culture from what it is to what it can be. Dr. Roseman is also a Reiki master, dance therapist, and intuitive healer. Her column on healing with Joan of Arc appears in Sedona Journal of Emergence.
Listen to “If Joan of Arc Had Cancer with Dr. Janet Roseman 4/28/15” on Spreaker.
by admin | Apr 17, 2015
Instead of a regular blog post, we’ve included writing prompts pilfered from Midge Raymond’s blog. Do something different and try these out. If you like them, good news! She posts a new one every week.
When was the last time you did something artistic other than writing? Whether it was baking a cake or painting a portrait, write about your last artistic endeavor.
2. Write for one minute about each of the following: lemon, chalk, waterfall, fork, silver.
3. Describe the most unusual part of you. Start with the physical and then move on to the psychological/emotional.
4. Describe your worst roommate. This could be a sibling, a roommate from school, a bunkmate from camp, your spouse.
Look out the window of the room you spend the most time in. Describe what you see. Next, write about a view you miss.
5. The other day my husband said to me, “Your extra memory should be here next week.”
It took me a long moment to realize he was talking about the additional memory he’d ordered for my computer, which had been very slow; apparently you can just buy more memory if you run low. (For your computer, that is.)
But I did, for a moment, love the idea of having extra memory, or more space for memories, in my brain rather than just on my computer.
Write about a time you wish you could remember, or remember more vividly.
by admin | Apr 17, 2015
April 21st, 2015 – Midge Raymond’s short-story collection, Forgetting English, received the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction. Her stories have appeared in TriQuarterly, American Literary Review, Indiana Review, North American Review, Bellevue Literary Review, the Los Angeles Times magazine, and many other publications. Her work has received several Pushcart Prize nominations and received an Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Fellowship.
Midge taught communication writing at Boston University for six years, and she has taught creative writing at Boston’s Grub Street Writers and Seattle’s Richard Hugo House. While living in Southern California, she held writing workshops and seminars at San Diego Writers, Ink, where she also served as vice president of the board of directors.
In addition to being a published fiction writer and journalist, she has worked as an editor and copywriter with such publishing houses as Penguin, St. Martin’s Press, Bantam Dell, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Midge lives in the Pacific Northwest, where she is co-founder of the boutique publisher Ashland Creek Press.
Listen to “Everyday Writing and Book Marketing with Midge Raymond 4/21/15” on Spreaker.
by admin | Apr 12, 2015
A dream is a goal with a date on it and action steps for achieving it.
It’s April. If you’re like the majority of people, your New Year’s goals are long since forgotten.
If there were one goal that you’d resurrect for the Spring, which would you choose?
Many goals are lost in the sea of other priorities simply because they require too much effort to attain. In order for a goal to become attainable, the lifestyle and habits around it must be evaluated.
Your life is cookbook
A great motivation speaker, Omar Rivas, taught me the following:
Your daily activities are the ingredients in each recipe. And all of your habits combined create your personal cookbook.
Your daily activities –>your habits –> your outcomes –> your life
Your recipes (habits) make up the cookbook of your life. Are the ingredients (your daily actions) nourishing?
Are your recipes and ingredients worthy of passing on to your family members, so they can keep your recipes forever? Would they pass on health, vitality, love, happiness and success?
It’s important to evaluate the recipes of your life regularly. As you evaluate them, you then have the ability to tweak them.
Borrowing from Omar Rivas again,
Take personal inventory of your time, how you spend it, and how much of it you spend.
Jot down every single activity of yours: Sleeping, eating, cooking, shopping, cleaning, personal hygiene, socializing, commuting, reading, writing, watching TV . . . even having sex (okay, that’s often spontaneous).
Just as you would with your finances – take stock of how you are spending, and you adjust according to your financial goals and your budget.
Make it easy: I use a digital calendar to track all of my activity: email, social media, commuting, reading, writing, goofing off, exercising, etc. I forecast my schedule as far into the future as I can. I forecast every week in advance. Then, I adjust my calendar throughout my day/week so that I can honestly keep track of my time. For example, I may have “write blog post” in my calendar, but I actually decided to clean my office instead – a procrastination move. So I hold myself accountable by changing what happened in my calendar.
Evaluate the patterns you see.
Expect to discover behaviors that are inhibiting your progress. This is the point of the exercise.
No need to judge yourself for not being perfect.
Do you complain there is no time to cook or exercise, but find you’re spending 2 hours watching TV each day? That’s helpful for you to recognize, especially if your goal is to improve your health or fitness (which I think it is if you’re reading my blog). =-)
With self-compassion, call it like you see it.
After evaluating patterns, ask if your behavior is moving you closer to your goal. Decide which behavior to work on first.
Most of us need support and accountability in improving our behavior. For example, I work out with a trainer because it ensures I’ll actually workout. Without him, I just putz around.
Big goals, like quitting smoking or losing 100 pounds, need to be broken down into smaller, simpler steps. For help with making SMARTER goals, see my post here.
Your attitude and subconscious beliefs
Sometimes, we don’t really believe that we can achieve what we say we want. Or, we say we want something, but we aren’t willing to make the sacrifices it takes to achieve it.
To better understand how your subconscious may be limiting you, check in with these two interviews about how the subconscious mind works.
Releasing Subconscious Barriers, a podcast with Tina Huang, PhD in neuroscience
Stop Spinning Your Wheels: How to Get What You Want, a podcast with Bea Soyla (professional hypnotherapist)
Here are resources from my library to support you in your journey:
- The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg. (I have it on audio and in hard-copy. Great book!)
- Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives by Gretchen Rubin (from the author of the Happiness Project)
As Mr. Rivas famously says, A dream is a goal with a date on it. It’s only a wish if you haven’t set a date and broken down your action steps to achieve it.
Don’t let the learning stop here. Take action in one small way today. In the comments below, tell me what will be your next action step.
by admin | Apr 12, 2015
April 14, 2015 – Frances Arnold is a registered dietitian, cookbook author, and yoga teacher, who believes optimum health leads to optimum living – people with well-nourished cells give their best to the world, share their talents, and experience better moods, sharper memories, and a more agile brain. In her words, “Being well-nourished sets the stage for you to live up to your full potential.”
Arnold’s own health journey lasted 16 long, painful, and expensive years. Like so many out there, problems with weight, sore joints, poor digestion, anemia, malnutrition, acne, crippling menstruation, chronic pain, fatigue, brain fog, mouth sores (just to name a few) cropped up at different stages. But, rather than throw pills at the symptoms, Arnold went deep; she found health with food. As a result of her struggles, Frances relates strongly to the overwhelm associated with changing habits and works to support clients with the emotional side of their own health journey.
Specializing in weight transformation, food allergies/sensitivities, stress, migraines, and repairing damaged digestion, Arnold leads clients to reach what seems, at first, unachievable goals. Clients experience:
- Weight loss that stops at a healthy, comfortable size.
- Alleviation from battles with depression.
- Formerly compromised immune systems become robust.
- Beautiful complexions.
- Healthy digestion.
- Freedom from migraine headaches.
- Sharpened mental activity.
- And (this is the best one) an ability to once again enjoy certain “problem” foods.
Frances is a strong believer that anyone can learn to “love the foods that love them back.” She is co-founder of Dieticians for Professional Integrity (DFPI) and belongs to organization such as the Center for Mindful Eating, Dietitians for Integrative and Functional Medicine, LEAP Dietitians, Weight Management Dietetic Practice Group, and The Yoga Alliance. Receive a free copy of her cookbook through her website.
Listen to “Nutrition and Self Love with Frances Arnold 4/14/15” on Spreaker.
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