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During a recent approachability workshop with a group of human resources managers, one of my audience members shared a touching mantra that she recites with her employees.  I want you to tell me all of your quirks and faults and secrets, just so I can say that I love you anyway.  Can you imagine how profoundly freeing it must feel to be seen in that moment?  It’s no wonder…

Buddha said that attachment was the root of all suffering.  But that doesn’t mean it has a monopoly on any one form of suffering. We get rope burns from clinging to anything that’s inherently impermanent, good or bad.  And so, attachment isn’t limited to the sinful pleasures, glittering temptations, fleshy indulgences and wicked delights of the world.  It could also mean thinking that the bad times are going to last forever. Over…

Rollins wrote that faith wasn’t about religion, rather, it was about engaging in an ongoing transformative dialogue instead of seeking some static final understanding.  What a relief. Especially in a world that places a premium on certainty. Where people we try to be experts because they’re scared and grasping for order don’t want to feel foolish or look stupid and lose control.  It’s just a defensive edifice against the…

During prolonged periods of sadness, part of me wants to just suck it up and bide my time and wait for the pain to disappear so I can begin living my life again.  But another part of me knows that’s another just carrot on a stick.  Because the moment will certainty be gone as quickly as it came.  Once I get there, there disappears, a new problem presents itself…

Members of the polyamorous community have a beautiful term called compersion, which is the empathetic state of happiness and joy experienced when another individual experiences happiness and joy. Essentially, it’s the opposite of jealousy. According the founders of the movement, compersion is the antidote to the insecurity, fear and anticipated loss of a partner over their affection for another lover.  It sanctions the idea of our partner deriving pleasure separate…

Gandhi was right when he wrote that joy lies in the fight, in the attempt, in the suffering involved, not in the victory itself.  Proving, that it’s one thing to locate joy in spite of our suffering, but the harder question is, can we locate joy inside of our suffering? Can we get to a place where we’re so grateful and engaged and in love with our own process…

Saunas are helpful for relieving stress, relaxing muscles, circulating blood, flushing toxins, cleansing the skin, boosting the immune system, moisturizing our hair, and if we’re lucky, finding a date for the weekend.  But make no mistake. Going to the sauna is not a workout. Our brain may think it is because we’re at the gym and getting sweaty and feeling invigorated at the end.  But if we’re not moving our body…

As the world record holder of wearing nametags, I’ve conducted a significant amount of field research around the experience of labeling.  And what I’ve discovered is that it’s a doubled edged sword. Depending on the context, labeling can either be helpful or harmful.  Affect labeling, for example, is the process of attaching words to feelings. It helps us manage our emotions, empowers us to classify and understand what’s going…

Toffler predicted that the acceleration of technology would leave people suffering from shattering stress and disorientation aka, future shock.  A central tenant of his philosophy was the concept of information overload, a term he popularized to define the moment when the amount of input to a system exceeded its processing capacity and resulted in a reduction of decision quality.  Understatement of the millennium.  Fast forward to the digital generation,…

In the show business world, you don’t make money until you make somebody else money.  That’s why no organization wants to be the first person to trust you. Because if you’re not a proven well, if you don’t have a history of producing oil, and if you don’t have a reputation of getting people laid or paid, you have no leverage.  I remember hearing a veteran talent manager, reflecting on his…