Let’s misbehave today

Please enjoy this excerpt of
Braving It: The gentle art of living boldly
…coming this month!

It’s always amazing to hear about people who brave their lives naturally, effortlessly. I can’t help but wonder what combination of biology and experiences enables them to be true to themselves, regardless of who they’re with or the situation they’re in. To have the courage of their own truth, to listen and live by their inner voice, often in spite of some of the loudest and most insistent voices shouting around them — this amazes me.

If you don’t know the name Isadora Duncan, it’s worth Googling her. Read More

Famous no’s in history

Beautiful someone, “no” can change the world.
In fact, sometimes it’s the only thing that does.

 

Rosa Parks

On December 1, 1955, 42-year-old Rosa Parks stepped onto a bus in Montgomery, Alabama on the way home from a long day of work. She paid her fare and took a seat. Contrary to many accounts of exactly what happened that day, when a white passenger demanded that she give up her seat because the whites-only section was full, she refused not because she was tired from a long day of work (though she was), but because she was tired of being treated this way. “The only tired I was,” she wrote in her autobiography many years later, “was tired of giving in.”

Her quiet but firm refusal to give up her seat and her subsequent arrest for this simple act of civil disobedience sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott. In appealing the arrest, Rosa Parks spoke truth to power and openly challenged the legality of segregation. The boycott lasted 381 days and in the end, this Read More

Permission to be ourselves

Please enjoy this excerpt of
Braving It: The gentle art of living boldly
…coming in June!

 

At the time the idea for Braving It was taking shape in my mind, fueled (as all Blossie’s books are in one way or another J) by my own heartfelt experiences and those of the people I love, an amazing book crossed my path: The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. Written by Bronnie Ware as a series of reflections on her time providing palliative care in people’s final days, this amazing book traces the many ways in which Bronnie herself was transformed by the gift of getting to know these people at this time in their lives.

Especially striking is the number one regret Bronnie heard people share: “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.” Sitting with that for a moment is nothing less than earth-shattering. Read More

The “naked no”

Ever feel like the demands on your time are just endless?

Please enjoy this important excerpt from The Gift of No!

 

Compare what I call a “naked no,” a no without an explanation (a simple “I’m not available” or “I can’t make it” for example) with the too much information (TMI) version of the same statement: “I won’t be able to go because I have a fitting for the dress I’m wearing to my brother’s wedding.”

Beautiful someone, in the first case, no means no. Not much to talk about because the naked no doesn’t leave the door open for discussion or give someone information they can use to take down our boundary.

In the TMI version, we’ve practically invited the person to say, “The fitting’s on Thursday? That’s three days away! You have plenty of time to move the appointment and help me instead!” or “Those appointments are easy to change. All you have to do is call them. They’re very flexible!” or “A fitting? That’s why you can’t make it? Seriously?”

Read More

Love the ride: it gives the gift of lessons we can’t get any other way

An excerpt for you from Dream Come True…enjoy!

 

The road to success is full of potholes and detours.

Beautiful someone, there’s a reason this became a cliché — it’s because it’s true!

It’s a bumpy road no matter where we’re headed. We know that, I mean it makes sense. But it’s easier to know than it is to handle. Who actually wants to accept tough times and frustrating days as givens in life?

The problem is, no matter how hard we try to avoid them, mistakes and bad days find us anyway. We say the wrong thing. Get distracted online and waste massive amounts of time. Fall asleep when we should be studying. Make the wrong decision, sometimes even when we’re trying our hardest. Things happen, too — the flat tire, the email that didn’t go through, the critical appointment we miss. Read More