Earlier, I talked about how you can use meditation practices “in real time,” while you’re working on a task, to stay focused and motivated.  In this post, I’ll discuss how some forms of movement and breathing from yoga can help you find efficiency and ease in…

We’ve all heard how frightened nearly everyone is of public speaking. Maybe that’s understandable, but it creates the potential for lots of misinformed conventional wisdom spread by people who have to make presentations but haven’t had the opportunity to learn what really works. To help correct some misperceptions about what creates better presenters and presentations…

I admit, I’m a worrier. Always have been – when I was a teenager, I used to lay awake nights worrying about… well, whatever teenagers worry about. In college, I used to worry about classes, girls, money – and eventually about the fact that I was laying up nights worrying instead of sleeping. Today, I…

When Thinking Gets in the Way Lately I’ve written much about the chaotic mind, the propensity we have to over-think and the inability so many of us have to escape the internal noise, get out of our thoughts and find our way back to a little tranquility. Or as Happy Gilmour calls it, our Happy Place…

I was a sporadic meditator at best for years, only to really commit to meditation when, just after turning 39, I discovered a mass in my right breast. From the point of discovery of the mass to getting the necessary tests, waiting for results, waiting for surgery, waiting to see if the newly diagnosed cancer…

Have you ever seen bamboo shoots in a storm? I have. I remember huddling in a hut in Thailand watching a raging typhoon sweep through the mountains. The clump of bamboo outside the window was completely flattened by the raging winds. The wind was so strong that it lifted the roof right off the hut…

Despite what you may think, there are lifehacks to be learned from the television show Seinfeld. Take for example the episode “The Opposite”- George Costanza decides that every decision that he has ever made has been wrong, and that his life is the exact opposite of what it should be. George decides to do…

There was once a time when I had no fear. I was 11 years old and I entered a story telling competition. I was confidently telling the story and captured everyone’s attention until suddenly I heard a voice from just in front of the stage commenting about my nose. It’s totally disastrous from that moment…

With Halloween now two weeks away, it’s time to start thinking about Halloween safety. OK, that’s an understatement: if the local news programs are to be believed it’ time to start panicking. Poisoned Pixie Stix, needles-stuck Snickers, and razor-wielding Raisinets lurk behind every Jack-o-lantern-guarded door. Evil ne’er-do-wells lurk ready to pluck your children…

A few potentially useful thoughts about work and working life. When you’ve reached enlightenment, your boss will still be a jerk. The good news is that it won’t bother you any more. The secret of maintaining a calm mind is letting go of emotions and refusing to waste energy on fretting about whatever you can’t change…

Have you noticed how often people draw back from trying something new because of fear? Fear that they might not make it; fear that the outcome will not be as good as they hope that it will be; fear that change may prove that what they’ve been doing until now isn’t as good as they’ve…

Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but it gets you nowhere. – Glenn Turner We all worry. The same wonderful tools our brain uses to imagine new innovations and solve complex problems, also has a habit of looking for trouble – even when it may not exist. Mid-terms, budget overruns, bug…

Hamburger Management is a shoddy, debased version of real leadership that focuses on just three things: whatever demands least, can be used fastest, and costs least. It thrives wherever organizations seek to meet unrealistic targets with insufficient resources to maximize short-term profits. Indeed, Hamburger Management is short-term by nature, and will habitually sacrifice long-term advantage…

You’re driving along the freeway. The traffic is heavy and the weather is bad; there’s water on the road and occasional patches of ice. You’re already late for an appointment and you’re worrying that your boss is going to find out and get mad at you, so you’re driving way too fast for the conditions…

When people speak about the soul — outside of a purely religious context — they’re usually referring to the qualities of something (or someone) that they see as fundamental to its identity. The word “soul” is shorthand for the innermost, truest or most obviously unique nature of whatever or whoever they are referring to. Used in…