• New Year, Your Way

    It’s a new year and everyone is making huge plans. There’s a new start, clean slate and another chance to get it right. What pressure! Social pressure encourages us to make big plans, live your biggest life, change the world, lean in, make it count. It can seem like everyone is planning amazing goals, but what if that’s not possible for you? I believe that we need kindness more than admonishment and pressure. (Click to Tweet!) Lasting, healing change happens organically to the schedule of your body, not when an artificially constructed calendar turns over. I’m refusing to pressure myself just because of a calendar invented hundreds of years ago…

  • Dark Times, Towards the Light: A Healing Journey Update

    I was discharged from hospital on Thursday, and am so happy to be home. I am okay. I had “not-a-stroke,” but we aren’t entirely sure what it is. I was admitted on Wednesday afternoon, because my right side suddenly went numb and felt like it had collapsed. I had weakness, loss of sensation and numbness in my right side from head to foot. I still have these symptoms, but they’re better than they were. I’ve had All Of The Tests from heart trace to CT scan, everything is clear so that’s good news. The doctors think perhaps it’s related to my pre-existing conditions. I’m home and safe and in the best position to…

  • Guest Post: A Contemplation of Beauty

    Remember the beauty of your body: The curve in your neck Crows feet around the eyes Stretch marks from childbirth Worn hands Your belly with its round enjoyment Beyond the untouched beauty of the newborn, our bodies show we have lived: we are alive. Remember the beauty of your heart: Sacrifices for the ones we love Compassion for strangers Empathy that our stories evoke Peace when we truly feel heard Anger that insists on better Even fear that reminds us what is important, even as it stops us in our tracks. Our hearts’ beauty brings meaning, connects us. Remember the beauty of the things we cannot know: The moments of…

  • Dear Grace Q & A: 7 Steps To Your Business Comeback After Chronic Illness

    How do you move forward when you’ve had to take a break from business because of illness? I’m so happy to answer this! Let’s break it down, shall we? 1. Listen to what’s underlying. Ask yourself questions to really dig into how you’re feeling and what your greatest fears are. Are you worried people have forgotten you? Think you are unreliable, unprofessional? Do you feel guilty about needing a break in the first place? Where is your fear coming from? Whose voice is it? When you pinpoint your underlying worries, it’s far easier to acknowledge them and then, take the actions necessary to alleviate them. 2. “Turn your setback into…

  • Non-Hippy Happy: Building the Happiness Habit

    Firstly, full disclosure, I am pretty hippy. Not in a tie-dyed, groovy maaaan, recreational drugs, ‘drop in any time it’s an open house’ way. Not at all. I can’t stand tie-dye. I certainly don’t speak like that. I’m as square about drugs as its possible to be without actually being law enforcement personnel and if you try and come to my house without an invitation I won’t answer the door. I like block colours, received pronunciation, virgin drinks, appointments, and actually being dressed when you arrive. But in terms of happiness, wellness and emotional health – I’m a meditating, affirmation reciting, mantra chanting, mandala wearing, yoga class attending, flower-crown loving and therapy advocating hippy. But I was…