Many years ago, toward the beginning of my personal development/spiritual journey, I heard a speaker that impacted me enough to buy his teachings on a relatively newfangled device called a thumbdrive. 

That thumbdrive somehow found its way onto my Apple Music and the other day, one of the teachings popped up amidst my eclectic playlist. 

(My kids always say it’s an adventure to put my music on shuffle - you never know what you’re going to get… could be a meditation, a chapter from the Secret, U2, a Celtic ballad, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, a recording from my podcast - the possibilities are really endless.)

Anyways, back to the teaching. I really loved what the speaker had to say and although I would love to credit him, he only shows up on my phone as Greg M - so thank you almost anonymous Greg for the following juicy tidbits.

When it comes to knowing and living your purpose, there are two things to be on the lookout for.

Clue to Your Purpose #1

Notice...

Hello and Happy mid-November,

This is not a Black Friday message

Instead, I would love to share with you a lovely moment that happened a few days ago with my 18-year-old daughter, Zoe, who just got her driver’s license.

She was driving along with me in the passenger seat and after she changed lanes, she said, “That was an excellent lane change!”

To which I replied, “If you do say so yourself!”

Zoe said, “Well, I figure if I criticize myself for making mistakes out loud when I’m driving, then I should also compliment myself out loud to even it out.”

My heart was so happy in that moment. It’s always a great day when you see (or hear) evidence that what you’ve been saying to your kids for years is sinking in. 

Persistence pays off - whether it’s with yourself or someone else in your life. And so I ask you (and myself) where can we be persistent this week? Where can we lean in and keep going because we know...

It was my 47th birthday this Sunday, November 12th. I don’t know about you, but I find it quite challenging to keep track of my age, especially since my beloved is a year older than me. I’m rarely sure if I’m his age or mine but it seems to work out to my benefit because I’m always pleasantly surprised to be younger than I thought. 

I have two gifts to give you in honour of the celebration this week. 

Gift #1 is an idea I love and Gift #2 is a birthday flash sale (take a peek a little further down for the details).

Gift #1: The Idea

At a recent talk by Dewitt Jones, a celebrated National Geographic photographer now in his 80s but with the pep of a 47-year-old, he shared an idea that I wrote down because it was so powerful and on point.

He said that we don’t need to try to fix things about ourselves. If we have the focus of fixing anything like health issues, relationship issues, emotional issues, etc, we’re giving more energy to the...

It’s been a couple of weeks since we returned from the Happiest Place on Earth and I had one more thing I wanted to share with you about our trip. Last time, I told you about how Heavenly Helpers made our trip magical. 

This week, I would love to share with you how we took what could have been some annoying/frustrating moments and turned them around. 

On our first full day there, our group had 8 people - me and my two teens, my mom, my sister and brother-in-law, along with my niece and nephew. Our ages ranged from 7-74. On our very first ride, the Indiana Jones adventure, we waited in line for a decent amount of time. When it was our turn we clambered into the 4-rowed vehicle, taking up the first 3 rows. 

Off we went, into the dark unknown. At the dramatic entrance, the snake-festooned grand doors parted slowly. The excitement grew and then… the ride stopped with the doors partway open. The music ceased, the lights flickered and then we were plunged into...

We just got back from an incredibly fun week at Disneyland. I’ve never screamed so much in my life (in the best way possible). See below for a visual of the screaming. 

Front left: Me Front right: my mom Back left: my brother-in-law Back right: my sister. As you can see, this ride was very speedy.

Part of what made our trip so amazing is that I hired heavenly helpers for many different aspects of the adventure. 

If you’re unfamiliar with heavenly helpers, here’s the synopsis. In the book Hiring the Heavens, I learned that there are celestial beings who are ready and waiting to help you with anything you can dream up - all you have to do is ask.

Once you’ve determined what you could use support with, you hire the appropriate heavenly helper to do the task. I’ll give you some examples of how to do that in a moment. 

What I love about the hiring aspect is that it’s very different from just asking. When you hire someone, you expect...

Earlier this year in July, I wrote about slowly crawling down the highway in Canada Day traffic and how it was a gift.

I’m thrilled to share that the gifts from that day just keep on giving. During our turtle-paced journey, my daughter, Zoe, and I were listening to music and we discovered that the singer of a song that we loved (Dermot Kennedy) had more than just one good song. 

Initally, we had heard his song Rome on So You Think You Can Dance and the piece that was choreographed to that tune is one of my all time favourites from that show. Click here to watch if you want to experience one of the most gorgeois dances every created. 

Anyway, we wondered if Dermot had any other good songs and then discovered that most of his songs made us cry in a good way as our hearts melted. More than once, I clutched my chest and swoon-sighed as his poetic lyrics graced my ears. 

Once fully aboard the Dermot Kennedy train, we decided to see if he had any upcoming tours....

The Preface: Halloween is not my favourite experience.

I love the original intention of Dia de los Muertes and All Hallow’s Eve. Honouring those who have passed is definitely cause for a sacred celebration and I would love to go to Mexico someday to take part in the occasion. 

The commercialized version that we have today though, leaves something to be desired, at least for me.

Dressing up in costumes? Totally fun. What’s not to love?

Buying, handing out and consuming insane amounts of sugar/candy? Personally, I don’t touch the stuff and yes, we’re those people who hand out mandarin oranges if anyone comes to our door because I just can’t condone all that candy.

We’re also those parents who got our kids to do the Halloween Candy Buy Back at our dentist. They could choose ten things to keep from their trick or treating spoils (which was still very painful for me and my no candy policy) and the rest got traded in for cash with which they could...

This summer had a lot of highlights. Because of this thing called “being human”, it also had some challenges, one of which was helping to move my dad into a full-time care facility. Over the last many years, his mental faculties have been declining and it got to the point where it was too much for my mom to manage. She made the very difficult and courageous decision to seek help. 

The dementia experience is not the most fun thing I’ve ever encountered, but there have been several perspectives that have helped me see it more as a blessing than a problem. I thought it might be helpful if I shared those ideas with you. 

Perspective #1 Embrace What Is

One of the most valuable outlooks I’ve ever learned is to embrace what is. There’s no use fighting with reality, plus it takes a lot of extra effort to do so. 

A great deal of suffering comes from being attached to how we think things should have turned out. Of course I wish my dad would have a...

In Grade 9, I decided that it was unacceptable to hate anyone or anything. (I was an unusual 13-year-old.)

Flash forward a few decades to this past weekend. I changed my mind. Here’s what happened. 

Let’s put some pieces together. 

Piece #1

In our little oasis of a backyard, there was a gorgeous tree that provided ample shade and privacy. It was the neighbours’ tree that hung over into our yard and I loved it.

Piece #2

We live in a quadruplex and one of the owners - the guy next to us - is a very angry and unhappy man. For the most part, we don’t have much to do with him. We were blessed that he was gone for many months until a couple of weeks ago. I knew he was back because I could hear him swearing loudly in his backyard, which is my most common experience of him.

He kind of manages the condo stuff, including hiring the snow shovelling people and the like.

Paul mentioned to him last week that it might be good to get some tree people in to cut off...

Before the Rockies, one last friendly reminder that the 3/4 Year Review is coming up this Saturday - last chance to take a sacred pause, celebrate this year so far and get grounded and clear on how you intend for the last quarter to go. Details are below in the Christina Recommends section.

This summer, Paul, Oakley and I ventured into the wilds of Yoho National Park to one of our favourite campgrounds - Takakkaw Falls. We love this place for many reasons.

First off, it’s the perfect blend of backcountry and car camping. The campground is about a 1km walk from the parking lot and there are wheelbarrows to transport one’s belongings which means that it takes some effort to get there but not much. The campground itself is pretty remote - pit toilets and such but there is a solar-powered water filtering system and cook shelter with a wood-burning stove which makes it quite luxurious, as far as backcountry camping goes. 

The bottom part of the campground is near a rocky...