It may sound odd and feel uncomfortable at first, but contemplating one’s mortality can be helpful for living more fully each day. — There’s a Buddhist contemplation that I do on my birthday. At a certain point you contemplate a simple phrase: “Death is my friend, the truest of friends, a true friend that never abandons me.” Pretty morbid, right? Here I am, getting ready to see family and friends, and I’m being…

“Find something you love to do and you’ll never to have to work a day in your life.” — Harvey MacKay When I was seven years old, my First Grade teacher asked everyone to draw what they wanted to be when they grew up. I remember walking around my classroom…

A few years back I wrote an entire book about heartbreak entitled LOVE HURTS. Part of that experience was meeting with strangers and holding space for them as they shared their heartbreak story. During my heartbreak appointments I learned a good many ways that one’s heart can be shattered. However…

There are two types of forgiveness that often accompany heartbreak. The first is the desire to forgive someone who has wronged you in some way. The other is the yearning to forgive yourself, which is actually the foundation of forgiveness overall in my experience. I am, by nature, not an…

There’s a traditional analogy in Buddhism: a man is walking in the forest when, out of nowhere, he is shot with an arrow. Now, instead of pulling it out and tending to his own healing process, he begins to spin out, thinking “Who shot me? Why am I always the…

A big part of what I do for a living is teach people how to create a home meditation practice. Meditation, for some, can feel like an isolating endeavor — sitting in your home, wondering if you’re doing it right, with a TV full of episodes of your favorite show…

It’s that time of year again, where we contemplate major changes in our life. As the calendar refreshes to a new year, we too yearn to hit refresh on ourselves, setting resolutions that we will finally (finally!) implement from now on. It might be physical (such as exercising more or…

One night, while out at a bar, my friend Corrie offered a confession: “I tried meditating,” she began, “but it didn’t work for me.” Over the 14 years I’ve been teaching meditation I have heard people say this sort of thing before, so I had a few follow-up questions about…

What is love? Baby don’t hurt me Don’t hurt me No more — Hadaway In 1993 a song swept the nation, entitled “What is Love?” I have listed most of the lyrics above. It was a simple song, but one that was catchy. It also identified a crucial connection: love…