For those who asked, and everyone else, here are 5 of my recommended reads for 2013 so far. I put links to Amazon for your convenience.

1. Search Inside Yourself by Chade Meng Tan. 

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A saboteur is a person who practices or commits sabotage. The original French word also invokes the meaning of the verb "to botch." I'm not writing about people who sabotage, but rather the things we allow to sabotage our own effectiveness at work and happiness in general. These saboteurs soak up our time and energy, leaving us far too drained to even remember our dreams. Yet we occasionally get this glimpse that life could be different, that I could be the sparkly woman again, or have a fun party, or paint. That fun and creative part of ourselves does speak to us. It throws stones against the windows of our consciousness, trying to get our attention. Failing that, this inner creator gets bolder (pun intended!), throwing large rocks. For a stubborn person like I am, it took the huge boulder of a request for a divorce (from incredible me of all people!) to get my attention. That was in 2005. Read more »

We're on the topic of Repositioning Yourself Profitably because it's getting to be that goal-setting time of the year and readers are always asking me for more exercises or how to do this or that better at work. Doing this exercise circumvents your critical thinking (which is important) to work with your more creative side (which the critical thinker often squashes). The reality is we're constantly repositioning ourselves and being repositioned by other people. 

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Yesterday was the last day of the Charleston International Music School Summer Festival. Ruben and I are ecstatic and exhausted from everything involved in putting together this intense 2-week experience, for the second time. Next year we have more people involved so we will accept cello and viola students as well. It's deeply rewarding to watch these young musicians from different places, nationalities, ethnic backgrounds, grow and connect with each other. I get butterflies from seeing how they have the courage to play with passion, to seek excellence in their playing and to support each other. And here's an insider tip for you. The dress rehearsals are more fun to watch than the performances. I almost stop breathing when I'm in a dress rehearsal because it's so exciting to watch the musicians perform and get last-minute teaching from Ruben. Over time, you tend see similar results over and over, kind of like the same things we go through repeatedly. Read more »

What I mean by complaining is pointing out the negative aspect or interpretation of a person, a product, or a situation, in order to get it out of your system. I'm not saying I never complain like that, I am saying complaining never solves anything. That isn't to say you should never give feedback, only to take care in how you do so. It's one thing to let the waiter know your fish was served cold, it's another thing to get angry and pitch a fit about it. Or worse, complain to other people how awful it was, but never letting the people who can actually solve the problem, know about it.

This is a tricky issue, of course, because biting your tongue, if that's the only thing you do, will put holes in your tongue, but not solve anything either. It's not only that you refrain from complaining, the deeper solution is to interpret what you see from a more powerful perspective. Read more »

Actually, I'd prefer not to have faith, thank you. I'd much rather control all the variables and the outcomes. Maybe you, too, would like to be Ultimate Ruler of the World. Faith is great in theory, but uncomfortable in practice. That's why most of us chose to live without faith, because obviously it doesn't always work out. And that's a good thing.

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 If you think about it, our education system pretty much runs as this enormous processing factory. It produces, however imperfectly, millions of somewhat educated high school graduates each year; young people who jumped through all the right hoops to get that high school diploma. Our system encourages them to show up at the job, listen to and follow instructions, and learn the material according to the institution's rules, AKA academic norms. It's a fairly successful system that produces an average workforce. Whether this system is preparing young people for a truly global knowledge-based economy is an interesting topic. The thing is, our education system teaches everyone this: follow our rules and everything will be fine. Read more »

Here's a Passion Fruit Writing exercise for you to play with. So much of inviting more prosperity in your life has more to do with letting go of things, than it is adding more things to do. I mean that' the problem so many of us face -- TOO much to do in too little time! It's hard to see sometimes what it is you can STOP doing. Living in a perpetual state of overwhelm is a symptom, not the cause of your frustration. This exercise is about letting go. While there can be a certain comfort to living in crisis mode, ultimately you burn out to a crisp. Here's a simple exercise for your journal:

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President John F. Kennedy is to have said, "The only reason to give a speech is to change the world."

Easy for him to say. Still, if you have a group of people gathered to listen to you, you have an incredible opportunity to change the world in some small way, to share your expertise, to encourage or inspire those who are listening. So what do you wear when changing the world? Read more »

Nope, that's not a photo of me, although I understand how you might think so. ;-) Actually what I did was POLL dancing, meaning I worked 14 hours at the polls this past Tuesday. That's not exactly a newsworthy event for most people, but it was for me. After years of research into the power of political rhetoric (on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez,) I usually stay far away from anything that hints of politics. But a coaching session last June changed things for me. That's what good coaches do. Read more »