Lame Animal Totem: The Blobfish

The Blobfish is a creature made of gelatinous tissue that allows it to float around the deep ocean floor, compensating for near-total lack of muscle by being totally nondiscriminating in its eating habits. Sound like you? Quelle coincidence! You and I have the same totem animal this month!

Blobfish energy is flaccid, weak-willed, and…I don’t know, whatever. When Blobfish floops and plurbles up through the plumbing of your subconscious and into the toilet bowl of your conscious attention, it’s time to relinquish all resolve, put on your bathrobe, and eat every last bit of pudding in the fridge.  If you can’t find [...]

Conjuring Good Magic: Setting Powerful Goals

Photo by Sheeshoo

“Life would be so great,” said Ilsa, a fledgling entrepreneur, “if I could just start a business to pay all my bills.” Another client, Sue, wanted to have a baby. “Being a mom would make me happier than anything in the world,” she told me. Like any codependent life coach, I wanted everything for Ilsa and Sue that they wanted for themselves. I longed for a magic wand that would let me bippity-boppity-boo their dreams into reality, fairy godmother–style. Instead, I did the next best thing: I worked with them as they made to-do lists and financial [...]

The Rainstorm After the Calm

Photo credit: Kym McLeod

Drought is a strange stressor, a parade of beautiful days that slowly become terrifying. The current drought in California is the worst in history. While the rest of the country shovels snow and preps for floods, we Californians dab on the sunscreen and freak out a little more each day.

I have reached the New Age-y point where I really do see how I’m creating many aspects of my reality: my friendships, my business, my sinus headaches. But so far, this drought has me stumped. I tried controlling it with my mind. It gave me a sunny sneer [...]

Top Dog: How to Deal with a Know-it-All

Recently, due to several misguided decisions, I found myself having a sleepover with five friendly but ambitious dogs. The entire night was one long dominance display. No sooner had I settled each pooch onto a separate cushion than the biggest one got up, grabbed a chew toy, and stood over the others, proclaiming (in dog language): “I am Bjorn! And I am Pack Leader! For this toy is mine! And I own this toy! And the toy is my property!” and so on.

It reminded me so much of Harvard, I got a little misty.

We humans use many “toys” to [...]

Compass v. Culture

As the seventh of eight children, I was raised with little pressure. For instance, no one at home cared much about my test scores, or even whether I took tests. This was wonderfully freeing but disorienting, so as an adolescent I absorbed the culture of driven materialism that still dominates American society.  Of course, this created the suffering that arises when we live life from the outside in, rather than the inside out. That blessed &%#$ suffering helped me let go of societal expectations and feel around for my “inner compass.” Ever since, in any argument between Compass v. Culture, I’ve [...]

Lame Animal Totem: Tardigrade

The Tardigrade is a truly wondrous creature: an eight-legged microscopic beastie also known as the “moss piglet” that can go without food or water for more than ten years, live in the vacuum of space, stew in boiling water, and keep waddling onward, good as new.  Tardigrade energy is the totem of people who just will not freaking STOP, the spirit animal of all who believe everyone needs to hear about their gruesome dental history, their endless arguments with ex-spouses, the exploits of their moss-piglet children.  Which reminds me: Tardigrade is also the totem of Things That Aren’t As Cute As [...]

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