Let's get right to it and let's be blunt, shall we? This past Sunday kind of sucked. Of course, even in the middle of something sucking, I’m thinking: This will make a great blog post as soon as I get through it! Sure enough, I got through it (with tear-streaked mascara tracks running down my face for much of it) and it seemed like there was some gold in there for you, which makes it all worthwhile.

What I wanted to share with you are 3 important things to know about thoughts.

1-Thoughts are magnetic

When you have an uplifting thought, other thoughts of the same frequency want to join in the fun, which is very nice.

On the flipside, when you have a thought that’s pessimistic, negative, sarcastic, resentful, angry and so on, you’ll notice many of its cronies seem to flood your brain. 

Case in point. On Sunday, I was cleaning our fantastic new home while my family did other things. A little pity party started brewing with a thought like: Why am I the only...

This past Sunday (July 25), my beloved husband, Paul, and I celebrated our 23rd anniversary. (We had to do some math to figure out how long!)

We decided to go to Kelowna, BC (a lovely lake town about 7 hours away from us) in honour of our special day.

A few things happened on our trip that help to illustrate why I think our marriage has been so successful to date.

1- Forest fires and optimism

Calgary (where we live) has been smokey on and off for the last few weeks due to many fires in the provinces adjacent to us on both sides. We knew we would be heading into potentially even more smoke, but we were optimistic regardless. Perhaps you’re familiar with the feeling of just wanting to get away and see some new sights? 

On our drive, we ended up driving right by some fires in the mountains. Like literally trees burning just above us. However, the highway was still open, so we assumed we were safe.

Despite the very proximous fires (I...

Some people in my family love change (me and my daughter, Zoe) and some people don’t love it quite as much (my husband, Paul, and my son, Oakley).

That means that some of us are really loving our new place and some of us are taking a little longer to adapt. 

It was really Zoe who wanted to move in the first place because, for the last 3 years, she and Oakley have shared a room. They got the master bedroom in our old place and we put almost floor to ceiling bookcases in the middle to divide up the space.

However, Oakley talks a lot in his sleep (Zoe kept a journal of the funniest things he said) and he sings in the morning, just as he’s waking up, so Zoe really felt the need for some more privacy and quiet in her own space.

We found a 3 bedroom condo, so she’s thrilled and is happily decorating her room with 4 walls. She even has an ensuite bathroom, so she’s living the life.

I was happy to move again because I like moving, change and novelty....

I’m sitting here in our lovely, spacious, luxurious, bright, modern new home, reflecting on what an absolute gong show it was to move in here. Let me tell you why and then I’ll share some learnings and some photos of our new place, along with this month’s Self-Care Masterclass topic.

Last Tuesday, we started our exodus from our amazing little lifestyle condo. We had scheduled three days for our move to our new place. The way we like to move is sans boxes, meaning that we have a bunch of rubbermaid containers that we fill up, drive over and empty to go back and do more of the same.

Most of Tuesday was spent making trips back and forth using our car, along with a borrowed vehicle from my mother-in-law. It worked quite well, apart from the heat wave and a 3 hour delay in being let into our new place. My husband, Paul, managed to teach a number of hours of summer school along with packing, driving and unpacking, and the kids and I worked around his schedule.

On...

Well, we’ve moved and it was quite the experience. I’ll share more about that adventure next week. In the meantime, I wanted to tell you all about another exciting area of my life. 

If you’ve been with me for a while, you may know that my daughter, Zoe, is on a Netflix show called Black Summer. If you’re brand new around here, I’ll give you a little background (and a refresher for the rest of you).

That's Zoe on the left.

Zoe has been acting professionally since she was about 5. She was the voice of Pillow Featherbed in the animated series called Lalaloopsy (before she could even read!). She also did a number of commercials for TV and radio, along with some small parts in some movies.

My husband and I never dreamed of having kids in acting (our son, Oakley acts as well) but that’s what happened. They expressed their interest and we’ve done everything we can to support them.

When Zoe was 14, she landed a role on the zombie apocalypse...

Guess what...I’m moving today! Into our bright, spacious, modern, luxurious new home! (That’s been my mantra and intention since January.)

Rather than provide you with a narrative this week, I’m going to lead by example and give myself the gift of acknowledging that I need and want to focus on moving, because as you know, moving requires a lot of energy.

I’ll be back in your inbox next week with something exciting and/or profound and/or comical to share. 

Have a most exceptional day.

With mobile love and progressing courage,

Christina

Creator of Courageous Self-Care

Lover of moving

Currently living in happy chaos

I used to be scared of you. Well, not you specifically, but I was scared of the vague collection of all the you’s who read my blog and emails. 

I also used to be scared of people who visited my website and the people I met who asked me, “So, what do you do?”

Why would I be so scared of you?

I was fearful of being judged, rejected and misunderstood.

Here’s what I did for years. I would create an amazing program or coaching package. I would do all the hours and hours of behind the scenes work, crafting the language, making the visuals, putting all the pieces in place. And then I wouldn’t tell a soul.

That got frustrating for my big heart that just wanted to share and teach, so I upped my game. I thought if I really went all out and invested in something big, I would have to tell people because I would be motivated to make a return on my investment. I put a down payment on a retreat that I decided I was going to run in Costa Rica. I planned out...

Well, hello there! Thanks for stopping by. I don’t know if you know about the monthly Self-Care Masterclasses and their origins, so I decided today is the day. It’s compiled into a catchy top 5 list, because who doesn’t love a countdown?

The Brief Preamble

Towards the end of 2020, I had the inspiration to do monthly Self-Care Masterclasses. Although it was an uncomfortable stretch, I decided that 2021 would include these masterclasses. Why?

I’ve spent so many years learning from masters around the world and I absolutely love taking what I’ve learned, putting my own twist on it and then sharing it. Plus, being a former teacher, it feels great to use that gift. 

Each month, I tune into what will best serve our community and then I design a masterclass around it. One of my gifts is taking big spiritual ideas and turning them into practical, strategic action steps you can easily incorporate into your life. 

So far, the people who have...

A couple of Sundays ago, {{first_name}}, my family and I were making our plans for the day. We usually do our cleaning on Sundays and we were talking about some other things to do as well. My husband, Paul, said, “So what do you want to do today?” 

Many ideas flashed through my mind, but what came out of my mouth was, “I don’t want to do anything. I want to do nothing.” That was followed by a surprise visit of a cascade of tears that I didn’t even know were in there. 

Being the amazing guy he is, Paul said, “Well, why don’t you just do nothing? What does that mean?”

With trepidation, I shared what I would have rather kept secret because it felt embarrassing. In the spirit of authenticity, though, I said, “I just want to watch movies all day long.” I had never done that and it felt so… irresponsible. It also had a glimmer of deliciousness, though. Could I really give myself permission to lie in bed and...

Have you ever thought, “Well, I guess I just need to work harder to get what I want?”

Probably. The generation before us was all about hard work. And it served them pretty well (apart from the self-care bit).

So, what if you’re exhausted, on the verge of burnout? Do you really think working harder is the solution?

It’s not. It’s not even about working smarter. It’s about getting the same or even better results with more ease and flow. Doesn’t that sound better?

Wouldn’t you love to get better results by doing less?

Here’s a little story to illustrate my point.

In March I did some work for an organization and sent them an invoice, as requested. They said they would submit the invoice for payment immediately.

A week went by and… no payment. Another week, same thing. I started feeling annoyed. And then it escalated to angry, so I increased my efforts to collect the money. I sent some inquiry emails and was assured...