Getting home, going home, finding your way back home against great odds are all themes that have appeared and continue to appear in literature, songs, and popular culture, from The Odyssey to The Wizard of Oz and beyond. We continue to tell stories about home because the idea of home is one that resonates deeply with humans.

Judgment On a hike up my local ski mountain the other day, I was so struck by the beauty of grasses and wildflowers nodding and bowing in the summer breeze that I stopped to admire them, something I rarely do on my way up the mountain. It’s not at all rare for me to stop and admire some tiny detail of nature, I just don’t typically do it on my way up this particular mountain. I use it as a workout, so my routine is to “motate” up that mountain with no rests, and no turning around to admire the view. I save that for the top. It wasn’t context

I Know Myself Really Well “I know myself really well” is a statement I often hear from clients. It’s also something I told myself for most of my life. But exactly what are we saying when we make that statement? More often than not, what we really mean is, “I know what I’m comfortable with. I know what I like and don’t like.” Knowing what you like is great, but whatever is on that list; preferences, tastes, accomplishments, experiences, whatever is on that list doesn’t even remotely describe or capture who you are. I’d come to see that when I or anyone else makes that statement, we’re essentially saying, “I know what

The Future You You’re about to get in your car and drive somewhere you’ve never been. You’ve got everything you need for your adventure and are ready to go. As you put the car in drive and start, where is your attention?  If you’re serious about getting wherever the adventure may lead, you’ll probably look through the windshield, at what’s ahead of you. Looking in your rear-view mirror wouldn’t make a lot of sense and wouldn’t get you anywhere, except in trouble. At least the past feels known. As obvious as that seems in the context of driving a car, it’s crazy how strong the urge to look behind us can

Is Well-being Created, or Revealed? I was reading an article about a choral group in Los Angeles. The director of the group was talking about how difficult, at the start of the pandemic, it had been for the singers in his group not to be able to get together and sing. As he talked about how much it meant to the singers to be singing together, he made the statement, “Well-being is created by singing.” I know exactly what he means. There’s very little I’m aware of that will let me experience well-being the way singing can, but I have a slightly different take from the choral director. Singing doesn’t

The Future that Never Arrives I’ve found myself thinking about perfectionism and the powerful spell it can cast over those of us who engage in it. A phrase came into my head that sums up the cost of perfectionism to the person held in its spell. Perfectionism is never about the present moment. It’s always about a future that never arrives. Think about that for a second. In that sense, when I’m being a perfectionist  what I’m really doing is deferring the life I say I want.  Doesn’t that sound like crazy behavior? It’s like telling someone you want to have a closer relationship with to “go away closer.” Could a

Getting Over it, or Getting Past it? A client of mine is in the middle of what could be called a crisis. On multiple levels, the world they thought they lived in has come apart. Their job, marriage, and sense of being at home in themself and the world have all exploded. They’re in crisis mode. “I have to get over it so I can move forward” was how they put it. That made me wonder, so I asked them, “do you think it might be easier to get past it than it would be to get over it? I wasn’t even sure what I meant when I said that,

How many times have you looked within yourself to find happiness, without any of the external factors we assume contain happiness?

Curiosity and Happiness I’ve come to a new appreciation of the value of curiosity, and I’m really just talking about being curious with all aspects of life. What I’ve seen is that when I’m curious, life has a newness and freshness to it that goes missing when I’m not in a curious state of mind.  By itself, curiosity doesn’t create happiness, but curiosity sets me up to be willing to see happiness where I may have been unable to see it. I can make a blanket statement about that. It doesn’t matter what I’m being curious about. If I’m curious, things look fresh, and I’m able to see them with