A Mindful Life

The past three days have provided much relief, and rather a lot of enjoyment. Friday was productive in terms of resolving the tension that cropped up at work. My students were rambunctious yet endearing as only fourth and fifth-graders can be. Friday evening my husband and I treated ourselves to a meal at Juicy Burger [...]

As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them. –John Fitzgerald Kennedy

The following quote was taped on my wall for many years. It helped me in my transition to a new life in Austin (where I moved without even a job waiting for me) and through graduate school, internship, and the credentialing exam. I was rummaging through old folders and found it. Perhaps it is time [...]

Yes, indeedy. I felt a pang just reading it! Oh, Austin, how I pine for thy culture and easy-going, friendly folks! I miss y’all.

I came across a humorous “You Know You’re From Silicon Valley When…” by following a link from Bryn. And since I’m not really from here, I’m going to go off and find ones for Texas and New York. However, if you don’t live here and want to know about the experience, do read below. It [...]

I saw a grief counselor today at The Centre for Living With Dying. What prompted me to call, finally, is that yesterday I expressed myself inappropriately at work, which made me realize I need a safe place to process all the pain and anger I’m sitting on as I go through life’s daily routines. The [...]

Traditionally, the best and brightest specialists were promoted to positions of leadership, on the strength of the rationale that their creative success would permeate the team they headed. The legacy of this strategy, however, is knowledge organisations that are often financially and intellectually weakened by these brilliant specialists who were actually incompetent, autocratic leaders. Even [...]

I’m a mental health professional, but I am also human. Therefore I experience the slings and arrows of life, which sometimes land solidly under a chink in my armor, and as I cannot be objective about myself, I suffer as others do. Recently I wrote to my friend, Marta: IÂ’m treading water of my own [...]

Every girl should have a mother, I think, not the sort of predatory monster sketched out and whined about in pop-psych books designed to cop a chunk of the bestseller trade, but an ordinary mother like mine, flawed but serviceable, who will hang your kindergarten plaque in her kitchen and teach you to sew an [...]

All I know is that people never penetrate the veiled consciousness that earns me the label “dreamy” (though it isn’t dreaminess unless life itself is, after all, a dream). Places do. I can establish a direct relationship with the slant of sun across a rug, the smell of blueberry bushes or mud flats, the scratch [...]