Choose Your Life Monday is an invitation to name what pattern you will lovingly notice this week and to do so in community. Of course, you can do it any day you want- you don’t have to start on Monday. Join in when and whenever suits you.

Last week I wrote about being a Christmas kitchen idiot and how burning the walnuts triggered a big story of “I can’t do anything right, why am I such a loser?”  I’m happy I was so scathingly honest because:

It helped you to be more lovingly expansive with yourself or as Julie said “PS - Scathingly honestItidbits ROCK!”

and

Because I received this email from Rebecca which made me laugh so loud I spit my tea across the room.

I was reading your latest about burning the nuts and feeling inadequate… and all I can think is: you have done so much for so many, you have changed their lives…and you are upset about burnt nuts? [this is where I blushed at my own scathing honesty]

Heck, I am planning to toast walnuts completely smoking black in your honor! I’ll call it the annual “Jen Louden Holiday Kitchen Fire.”  [this is where the tea spitting occurred]

You were meant to do something else in this life. And it seems to me you are doing that which you are meant to. I’m sorry the nuts tweeked your sense of self, but in the grand scheme…? [this is where I took a big swallow of tea and felt both sheepish and blessed]

I say this because of how much you have helped me with your book, The Life Organizer - it has given me a new way to see myself, new language to think thoughts in. It is a source of inspiration, strength, comfort…and joy. [this is where I did a little dance around the room and sang one of my off tune nonsense  happy songs in joy for my book helping] [this is also where I said, yes outloud, ‘Damn, that is a good book.]

On your tombstone, it will not say, “She couldn’t toast walnuts.” It will say something to the effect, “Beloved Jennifer was loved far and wide by many whom she never met…but they are her friends and love her as if she were family.”  [this is where I got tears in my eyes and wondered at the power of words to connect us all]

Sincerely, One Grateful Reader

I hesitated to share this email because I thought it might seem a little self-congratulatory as in  “Does Jen think her poop doesn’t stink?” or somebody might think, “Well, isn’t it good for her that she has her purpose all figured out, that only makes me feel worse because I don’t” (none of you are petty enough to have these thoughts so I’ll have them for you)  but I decided to because…

I felt so busted and in such a good way

To my ears, Rebecca is saying, to me and you,

Hey, stop focusng in what you don’t do well and start paying attention to what you can’t help but do, your natural genuis.  What the  heck do you care about X when you can do Y and Z and plenty of A, F, and L?”

To my ears, Rebecca is the voice of God saying,

I only want you to be you. If you spent more time being you, you sure would have more fun. Either way, I love you.”

So, I propose, in Rebecca’s honor, that we each perform our own verison of the Jen Louden Holiday Kitchen Fire.

• What are you ready to acknowledge is not your thing, not your gift, not your bailiwick, not your talent, not your forte, not your genius, at least in this life time?
• What are you ready to stop trying or maybe you stopped trying a long time ago but you still wish you could?
• What would, if you let go of it, let you have more brain space and greater heart energy for your natural can’t-help-but-do-it genuis?
• What will be in your kitchen fire?

My “I will not be this in this life time” list is:

I will not be cook - and I will have lots of kitchen fires

I will not be a good speller - and this blog will have lots of typos

I will not do much of anything neatly - and I will continue to make art and wrap presents

I will not be a linear thinker - and I will still get my point across

I will not have a clean car, a tidy garden, or stain free clothes- and my sister will

I will not love parties where I don’t know people - and I won’t go if I don’t want to

I will not be calm, cool and quiet - and it will get worse as I get more deaf!

Wow, this feels so good, you’ve got to try it. I could go on and on, and I don’t want to write too much because I want to be sure I’m really ready to not want these things anymore, that I’m really ready to say, “Not this time around.”

So this week, I am proposing that you lovingly explore the idea of making an “I will never” list.

Forget putting down things you are already over - who cares about those?

Instead, list the things that you keep wishing you could do or ways you could be even though you know it’s not you.

Write down what you still itch about, even though you know, if Rebecca wrote you an email, she’d say,

Oh come on. Look over here. Here is your genius, here is where you want to focus. Stop with that stuff, leave it alone and get  on with ______!!!”

I can’t wait to read yours!

Join me! Name what you will put in your kitchen fire in the comment section. I can’t wait to read what you will burn. Burn baby burn, it’s the not no more inferno.

Choose Your Life Monday is an invitation to name what pattern you will lovingly notice this week and to do so in community. Of course, you can do it any day you want- you don’t have to start on Monday. Join in when and whenever suits you.

The holiday family bonanza is winding down. Tonight is our last family dinner for eleven. And may I say, we have all done a great job of meeting and greeting and being patient. And I have done a very fine job of not getting into caught in my story that nobody loves me? Yeah!

In case you missed last week, my intention last week was:

will lovingly notice when I’m feeling like a victim or abandoned. I will simply notice my thoughts and what my body is doing and if I chose, I might speak to myself kindly, I might look for a need of mine I could better meet, I might go outside and watch the wind in the trees

or I might just notice.

That was a good one. By setting it, and by talking to Bob about it, I avoided my whole poor pitiful me story.

What I did not avoid, however, was my “I’m a big incompetent boob” story — it premiered on Christmas day but not to raving reviews.

You see, I’m about as genetically far removed from the Martha Stewart’s and Julia Child’s of the world as Pol Pot was from Mother Teresa.

I can’t cook, can’t bake, can’t wrap presents in clever yet environmentally correct ways. I’m not much better at creating meaningful holiday rituals nor creating wonderful ice-breakers to foster deep connection between suddenly united yet complete strangers aka newly blended family (although I do that really well when I teach retreats).

So on Christmas Day

when I attempted to help Bob with dinner by making Laura’s Brussels sprout recipe and he wanted to pan toast the walnuts but I wanted to toast them in the toaster oven but then I forget about them and they burnt, I watched myself melt into the “I can’t do anything right, why am I such a loser?” story.

Oh, it didn’t last long and nobody in the family was around so they didn’t have to politely look away while I picked at my inadequacies but still, it was not fun. It felt so old and yucky and yet so very real.

It’s me at my victim best as in “If I can’t be perfect, why be at all?”

I share this scathingly honest tidbit so

a) if you experienced a moment of self-loathing or cooking incompetency over the holidays, you will feel less alone

and

b)if you can wrap presents in clever yet environmentally correct ways, you can (privately) entertain a moment of high fiving yourself

and

c) because even though we can set wise intentions and be aware and take naps and read Mary Oliver’s new poetry book and not over-do it, we can still get side-swiped, especially when we are tired or around our families or under stress. Especially then.

So a big hug to my stupid boob story and then on to this week…

I’ll be creating the final touches for my luscious big Virtual Retreat (January 16-19th) and I am so damn proud of it and of my Comfort Cafe and Life Spa (when you sign up for the retreat, you get the option of a free month’s membership site but only until December 31st) so get on it now.

I’ve noticed that as proud and excited as I am, I’m also stressing. Wondering if I can do it all, do it right, get the word out enough, etc.

So this week (cue angels and a Greek chorus and drums and why not a harp… and bongos, I love bongos)

I will lovingly notice when I am telling myself I can’t. I will simply notice the “I can’ts” and what thoughts go with “I can’t”, what reactions I feel in my body, what choices I feel I can and can’t make.

I might also ask “Is it true I can’t do ____?” or I might just notice.

‘Cause one thing I’m loving loving loving about Choose Your Life Mondays it is showing me through experience that changing my patterns doesn’t always have to always be hard work. That the ease of simply being aware can sustain me without me having to do anything.

What are you noticing?

Join me! Name your pattern in the comment section. You can name the same pattern from last week, if you played last week. Or you may want to tweak yours a tad. Or comment on the process.  Love reading your intentions!

The last few days have been hectic ones in my house as we prepared for our first blending of Bob’s family and mine — from brunch through dinner. I’m utterly heart blasted by the love and care everyone gave to each other — from my daughter Lilly making a slide show with pictures of everybody in our “old” and “new” family to the tune of Jack Johnson’s “Everything’s Better When We’re Together” to the divine food Bob, my mom, and others made to the genuine connections.

Even all the dogs played nice.

It was the true spirit of Christmas: being our kindest, most patient selves. Tending the light in the midst of the dark. Accepting what is here now and being grateful for the miracle of love. Tender, imperfect, sweet and glorious.

And I’m exhausted. So I’m declaring today “Mini-Retreat Day” and asking you if a few hours — or even minutes — relaxing and recharging is appealing to you?

Note I did not ask if you thought it was possible to take some time alone. First connect with your desire.

• Do you desire some time alone this weekend to rest?
• Do you desire a walk alone in the woods and then some time by the fire or in the sun writing or drawing in response to, “When in the last week did I feel most alive? When did I feel least alive? What am I most grateful for? What am I ready to forgive myself for? What am I ready to celebrate myself for?”
• Do you desire a few hours to art journal or read and scribble poetry or call a friend you’ve lost touch with (I chatted with my friend Jodie, we haven’t spoken much in the last two years, today and it was wonderful.)
• Is your yoga mat calling to you? Or a novel? Or knitting? Or?

Let that desire draw you to it, let it part the waters of “But I should” or “I have to” and “But if I don’t…”

Come home to yourself this weekend, even if only for a few minutes.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
P.S. This is your last chance to get on the preferred buyer’s list and save 50% on the The Comfort During Uncertain Times Virtual Retreat: Finding Calm, Confidence and Contentment no Matter What. I’ve created a world class line up of teachers and lots of extra goodies so that you can actually make a real retreat for yourself, in the midst of your daily life, January 16th- 19th. Info here.

Choose Your Life Monday is an invitation to name what pattern you will lovingly notice this week and to do so in community. Of course, you can do it any day you want- you don’t have to start on Monday. Join in when and whenever suits you.

It’s been snowing for hours and hours.

Our neighborhood is playfully transformed, wild shapes (my patio table is covered with what looks like a giant coconut cake) and no borders (where is the curb?) and dogs chasing each other everywhere. Neighbors visiting in the street, kids sledding, and a series of igloo forts complete the holiday sweetness.

My sister flies in tomorrow.  Bob’s mom and dad drive up on Christmas Eve. His sister, her husband, and his mom arrive on Christmas Day. It’s our first holiday blending our families and we are both preparing with care to avoid stepping on our emotional toes when if we get a bit stressed.  I won’t divulge Bob’s holiday blindness but mine is to either try too hard as if it were up to me to make help everybody have fun or my other pattern is to fall into a “nobody loves me” story.

Argh, those are ugly.  But hey, you got to see it to notice it to shift it.

Choose Your Life Mondays is about choosing one pattern to lovingly notice, not two, so I choose… ini mini mini mo… the winner is… “nobody loves me”

This week I will lovingly notice when I’m feeling like a victim or abandoned. I will simply notice my thoughts and what my body is doing and if I chose, I might speak to myself kindly, I might look for a need of mine I could better meet, I might go outside and watch the wind in the trees

or I might just notice.

Feels good to me.

What do you want to notice that might ease or buoy or lighten your holiday week?

Oh Let’s Us Not Forget the Recap of Last Week’s Noticing

Last week I declared I would lovingly notice when I was feeling overwhelmed and I remind myself there is another way and that overwhelm is fear in another form and fear can teach me lots but it does not get to run my life or dictate my choices.

Oh yeah, this was good one!

Noticing my pattern of overwhelm and its oh so cozy relationship to fear was highly instructive. It never fails to astonish me when I peel away another layer of my own shit… it always feels both embarrassingly obvious and wonderfully freeing.

All by simply stopping to remind myself that I don’t have to believe what fear has to say as in I don’t have to believe:

• that I can’t write anymore or
• that my writing about fear and uncertainty don’t make sense or
• that I’ll never be able to get all my work done to launch The Virtual Retreat and the Comfort Cafe and Life Spa the way someone who was smarter or younger or more evolved would
• that I haven’t cleaned the windows or painted the dining room chairs or finished shopping and thus I am a bad mom (that one really makes me chuckle)

Just noticing, along with a little mindful questioning from The Life Organizer, and listening to my own Mood Changers (I usually hate the sound of my own voice) helped me have the most aware and pretty creative week.

I bow in awe to the power of attention.

Want to join me? Name your pattern in the comment section. You can name the same pattern from last week, if you played last week. Or you may want to tweak yours a tad.

For the last few weeks, I’ve been sending out resurrected bits from the Daily Dollop, which I published um, daily, a few years back. These are little dollops (doh) of grounding kindness, mindful questions from The Life Organizer and reminders to rrrreeelax.

(You do subscribe to the newsletter, right? It’s different than the blog - doh)

Anyhoo, one of the Dollops pinged a few pithy reflections and fascinating questions back to me and prompted gears to turn within my snow bound little brain.

The Dollop in question

How Can I Trust Myself Enough to Choose the Path of Self-Kindness?

Self-nurturing is a caramelized topping over a trust brulee. You’ve got to have the trust or you are just left with burnt sugar. Mistrust of past decisions and mistakes can make it easy to believe that burnt sugar is good enough for you. But it isn’t.

Today’s Intention: Exploring the link between self-trust and self-kindness, even if just for a moment.

And Now for The Fascinating Question

Christine wrote:

This one is very thought provoking and complex, Jen. It is so germane to the issues I am struggling with today. I would really appreciate a little elaboration on it - especially the sentence about mistrust of past decisions and whether burnt sugar is good enough. Thanks so much! I adore you, too!”

Adoration right back at you, Christine. Thanks for the berry, berry good question. Here’s what I think I meant (I say think because there is certainly no right answer):

If we nurture ourselves, without being connected to self-kindness, we end up not nurturing ourselves.

Huh?

Without self-kindness, we lack a connection to ourselves and we often end up settling for less than what would truly, really, honest-to-goodness fill us up, soften us, warm us, inspire us. We may settle for what I call shadow comforts or my friend Molly Gordon calls phantom comforts - which just means something that masquerades as self-nurturing, makes us feel less us, less centered, instead of more.

Either way, we end up feeling brittle and frustrated and restless, even cheated.

Why does this happen?

It happens because we aren’t trusting what we really want. We aren’t trusting our instincts, our desires, “the soft animal of our bodies” and that lack of trust is breed and fed by self-judgment, by beating ourselves up for being human (i.e.  highly imperfect and prone to mis-steps and strange detours that, at the time, seemed oh so brilliant).

When we beat ourselves up, we reinforce the idea we’re not to be trusted and we don’t deserve to listen to what we really want.

We move away from our own wisdom, our own desires, from true self-nurturing and toward burnt sugar.

Beating ourselves up leads us away from learning and thus away from trusting our desires and away from the ability to see and choose our own paths

But when we can connect with a bit of self-kindness, a wink or two of self-mercy

We begin to touch into self-trust. We can feel safe enough to take a few moments to discern what we really want, moment-by-moment.

We begin to let life lead us instead of us trying to force life to do what we want.

We develop a level of trust in our instincts and desires, that, while far from perfectly reliable, is deeply affirming and renewing. Truly richly comforting.

Then the whole idea that burnt sugar is good enough for you

- the idea that pleasure is having the cake (or buying the purse or calling the man who broke your heart again or indulging in another three hours of on-line Scrabble) begins to fall away and you experience, with your body and your heart, what truly comforts you, what helps you to be a creator of your own life.

Or as Jill Badonsky says in her utterly delightful new book, The Awe-Manac,

make compassion a hobby. The non-linear practice of moving forward two tiny steps and side ways one stumble is okay. In the long run, this will get you further than the other schemes that 85 percent of give up on because we didn’t do it perfectly or because it was too much too soon”

I await your comments, which are always, incredibly insightful.

Choose Your Life Monday is an invitation to name what pattern you will lovingly notice this week and to do so in community. Of course, you can do it any day you want- you don’t have to start on Monday. Join in when and whenever suits you.

Want to join me? What do you want to notice this week? Name your pattern in the comment section. I love reading all your comments so very much.

Awareness is spreading its light throughout our little community as we practice noticing one pattern a week. Simple and powerful and, in a comforting healthy way, fun.

Sometimes, during the week, I come back here to read what you each have declared and it strengthens my resolve with my own intention. Thank you for that.

Last Week

I declared I would lovingly notice that when fear and overwhelm come to visit, I can choose to put my attention on the feelings rather than the self-talk that accompanies the feelings.  I can name what I am feeling and notice it, without trying to change it and without getting caught up in the story that goes along with it.

Susan Piver taught me this and it helped ease my free floating fear and dread quite a bit this week. Susan has agreed to be one of the guests for the Comfort Queen’s 2009 Virtual Retreat: Finding Calm, Confidence and Contentment in Uncertain Times  (you may have noticed I’ve change the title three times; fear likes to tell me that is unacceptable and people will think I’m a flake. I changed the title anyway).

I’m going to ask Susan to talk about this skill in her session.

This Week

I’ve noticed that my fear and worry increase when I set unrealistic and unspecific goals for myself. The obvious solution would be to create a neat and tidy plan for each day, right?

Nope.

When I do that, I get into my whole tight-jawed, self-improvement, pushing hurry-up be better and better mode. I forget The Life Organizer intuitive way of navigating my life. I forget to ask juicy questions like, “What would I love to do in the next half hour?” a question I learned from Michael Neill, another of our retreat experts. I forget to connect to something larger than my mind, like the facts (“How many hours do I have to work today and how long does X usually take me to do?”) or to ask for help from my breath, nature, or friends.

I know there’s a better way but I get lost and then don’t know how to find my way back. So…

This week I will lovingly notice when I’m feeling overwhelmed and I will remind myself there is another way and that overwhelm is fear in another form and fear can teach me lots but it does not get to run my life or dictate my choices.

I will remind myself that overwhelm is not the truth, that there is another way, that there is always time to stop and breath.

Ah yes, that feels good.

How was the week for you? Last week Hiro Boga’s intention was…

 1

Start a diet.

2

Try to be everything to everybody at all times.

3

Glue glitter on everything. Keep getting little pieces in your eye, especially while driving in holiday traffic.

4

Visit a mall. Then a big box store. Then go back to the mall for something you forgot. Be sure and grab something to eat in the food court and eat really fast while sitting under florescent lighting listening to Christmas carols.  Don’t drink any water all day while you shop.

5

Handcraft hundreds of intricate holiday cards that involve more glitter and long handwritten notes. Send to everyone you have ever met. Go to the post office during the busiest time and stand in line for hours to buy cute holiday stamps.

6

Compete with your neighbors to see who can put up the most elaborate holiday decorations. Make multiple trips to the hardware store for replacement bulbs.

7

Eat massive amounts of holidays confections. Be sure and eat the most sugary ones with coffee before breakfast several days in a row and then (because you started a diet), don’t eat anything until dinner.  Be amazed at your mood swings and memory loss.

8

Fret frequently about what you are going to give _______ and _______ . When you decide, spend more than you can afford.

9

Stay up late many nights doing any or all of the above.

10

Say yes to every party, recital, play, Nutcracker, caroling, gift exchange, latke-frying, sleigh-slooshing invite. Or pout because you didn’t get any.

11

Keep trying to run your business /do your work, write your book, exercise, keep your relationships healthy, be politically active, find the true meaning of the holidays, and oh yeah, stay on that diet.

Wait… I have to extract my tongue from my cheek…

I really only have one thing to say about the holidays: This year, choose what you want to do – not what any article says nor what you did last year nor what your grandmother did in 1889 and certainly not what you think you should do.  Find your beautiful and imperfect way.

I know, you probably already do but I thought I’d state the obvious. I’m good at that.

(Oh and if I gave you an anxiety attack with this list, you might want to check out the Mood Changers and Comfort Wishes or one of my calming and comforting books, still on sale.)

Choose Your Life Monday is an invitation to name what pattern you will lovingly notice this week and to do so in community. Of course, you can do it any day you want- you don’t have to start on Monday. Join in when and whenever suits you.

So I screwed up a tad.  I put a link to the first Choose Your Life Mondays post in my newsletter that went out yesterday not this one…

The good news? There are a ton of wise and articulate and amazingly aware women in our community and they posted very inspiring thoughts on what they will lovingly be aware this week here.

But not here.  So now there will be two very juicy lists of what we are each being aware of this week - there and here!

So go read their comments because you will be richly wildly inspired and then you can post there or if you are in a hurry and don’t want to read everyone’s comments or you just want to post here because it’s tidy then great and if you have already posted, please bonk me on the head now for trying to explain all this in such a tedious manner (I drank champagne last night and ate cake at my birthday party with the girls and I’m a tad sugar coated today).

Okay, back to Choose My Life Monday

Last week I will lovingly noticed when I was exuberant and I enjoyed that about myself and if I had the thought, “I should do something with this energy, like use it or share it or make it last,” I just took a breath.

Here’s what I learned: when I start to feel exuberant and on fire with life, I can get snagged into thinking I need to do something with the feeling.  This week when that started to happen, I felt my feet on the ground and I brought my awareness to the environment around me and I told myself, “Hey baby, just feel good or big or excited, be here with this energy, this feeling. Nowhere to go, nothing to make, nothing to make happen.”

Oh that felt so good!  So simple and so good.  I love awareness!

This Week

I’m re-inviting my experts for the Comfort Summit today — which has morphed into Comfort During Uncertain Times Virtual Retreat: Finding Calm, Confidence and Contentment no Matter What , an even juicer idea!

…and as I work this week on this BIG EXCITING SCARY project, I will be aware of when fear and overwhelm come to visit. And when they do, I might choose to do what Susan Piver teaches in her wonderful book How Not To Be Afraid of Your Own Life and put my attention on the feelings rather than the self-talk that accompanies the feelings.  I can name what I am feeling and notice it, without trying to change it and without getting caught up in the story that goes along with it.

Meditation in action!

I won’t try to change what I’m feeling, I’ll simply notice the feeling, and let the story go.

Want to join me? What do you want to notice this week? Name your pattern in the comment section. I love reading all your comments so very much.

I got sick on Thanksgiving. Icky sick. And then felt yucky all weekend and until, really, Friday.

Bob, the beloved boyfriend, pointed out, lovingly, as he is wont to do, that I don’t like to admit I’m sick. He is, yet again, right.

I don’t like to admit I’m sick because it doesn’t fit my picture of myself — I’m strong! I’m healthy! Plus, it just feels hard to believe.

Silly perhaps but I’m don’t think I’m that odd in my reaction (I’m not saying I’m not odd, just not that odd in this case). Even if you are fine with being sick, perhaps you don’t allow yourself time to be sick; you have to keep going.

Whatever the reason, the result is the same — we don’t get to the rest and nurturing our bodies, and often our hearts and souls, need.

We get the poopy part of being sick but not the sort-of good part,

the chance to pause, be still, curl up, and then reemerge, thankful for our health, with a renewed perspective and gratitude. And if there are lessons to be learned from being ill —   say I’ve fallen into my pattern of making things harder than they need to be and perhaps, just perhaps, I’ve gotten sick because I’ve been pushing myself too hard — I don’t get a chance to see that pattern and release a little more of it unless I let myself pause.

Okay, enough said, on to a few tempting self-care tidbits

1

Remind yourself it is totally okay if you don’t take care of yourself. No one is going to make you. You are in charge of your life and your time and your choices. If you don’t want to, you don’t have to. (You might want to stamp your foot while repeating this little reminder.)

2

If there was one thing you could do right now to feel better, what would it be? (You do not have to do it but it might be nice to know what it is and you might see it probably isn’t such a big hairy thing to do something that would make you feel a tiny bit loved.)

3

Perhaps you truly can’t stop to be sick: the show must go on, the surgery must be performed, the speech given, the drowning child rescued (okay, I’m being dramatic but still, you must do what you must do today - we’ve all been there.)  Try relaxing into the fact that you feel the way you do and you can’t do anything about it. Instead of pushing away what you’re feeling in your body or being resentful that you have to do X when you feel Y, just be with where you are. If thoughts of “Oh poor pitiful me” come along or “It’s always this way, I can never take time off,” let those thoughts be there without getting caught up in them or, if you do, come back to the space of noticing you feel like shit and there is nothing you can do. Keep noticing how your body feels and that right now, you can’t do anything about it.

4

Ask yourself, “What would the Dalai Lama do?” I know, he would have somebody to take care of him but if he didn’t, he would probably think something like, “I am going to stop and put my feet up and drink some tea because I possess Buddha-nature (essential goodness, everybody does and yes, that means you) and thus the sane way to treat myself is with gentleness and regard for my self.”

5

Ask yourself, “If I had the most nurturing and loving person in the universe taking care of me right now, what would she / he do for me?” Then imagine how good it would feel to be taken care of right now, in exactly the way you would want to: the words that would soothe you into pausing , the cool hand on your forehead, the kind of drink that would make you feel a little better, the way the fresh flowers by your bed would look, the crisp, turned down sheets…

6

Is there one thing that you just imagined you could give yourself right now? One thing? Just one tiny thing?

7

If you were going to take care of yourself, you could make a pot of Traditional Medicinal Gypsy Cold Care or Throat Coat tea, steeping the bag for 10 minutes to get the full benefits. Or you could steep a cinnamon stick in hot water, add honey if you’d like — and sip at it, adding more hot water as needed.  Cinnamon has anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant, analgesic, and anti-bacterial properties.  Honey is also great to soothe the throat and stop bacterial activity.

8

Call or email or text or instant message or Twitter someone who loves you and tell them how sickly and terrible (or slightly rotten and green around the gills) you feel.  Throw yourself a pity party (on Twitter, you only get 140 characters so you have to whine succinctly). Then ask for one suggestion to ease into taking care of yourself.

9

Press firmly (just short of wincing) where your nostrils meet your cheeks. You can press firmly, release, and then press again. Take some deep breaths.  Great for sinus congestion and when you feel a sore throat coming on.  Also doing this tiny thing for yourself might encourage you to go drink some tea or rest. Or not. That’s okay, too!

10

Read this sweet tidbit by healer Hiro Boga about how she resisted being ill and then her wonderful dialogue with Mr. Flu.

What do you do to take care of yourself when you are sick?  Especially when you can’t or don’t want to be? I’d love to hear and so would the other cool people who hang out here.

I got to talk with my good friend Mr. Michael Neill this morning on his radio show about fear and how you can find comfort and calm no matter what.  You can listen in - and if you did already listened and want to know more about the upcoming Comfort Summit we talked about, join this list and you’ll be among the first to learn all about it.

What I loved about our conversation was getting to talk about fear openly. I feel like I’ve come out of the closet about fear and like someone who just stopped smoking or discovered they love fruitcake, I want to tell everybody I can what I’m learning about fear.

Here are a few highlights from our conversation:

• Shame and fear are linked; we can feel ashamed for feeling afraid because we should only be happy and grateful, especially if we have done a lot of inner work or have a roof over our heads. It can be very hard to admit we are afraid.
• We can feel we are doing something wrong if we feel fear or anxiety. If we just ate better, meditated more, trusted in the Universe more, had invested more wisely, we wouldn’t feel this way
• While we are each afraid of different things (money, illness, aging parents, getting our creative businesses off the ground, finding love), we all need the same thing: a way to access, to source, calm and comfort, that is not dependent on what is happening in our lives. We each get to that source comfort in different ways but we all have the capacity to experience comfort no matter what.
• While it imperative to let yourself realize and feel you are afraid without pushing it away, it’s equally vital to  remember that you are the queen / king of your life; You are the one who gets to choose. Fear does not have to impress you nor does it automatically get to run your life.
• Letting yourself be afraid without running a big story about how bad you are for being afraid or how you will always feel this way or if just this was different, you wouldn’t be afraid, prolongs the ick.

I’m working away on the Comfort Summit and the new membership site… today had the idea to turn the Summit into more of a four day retreat… more comforting and safe feeling, me thinks.

Back at it!  Love love love!