Years ago someone gave me a piece of advice that has never once let me down. They said, “always look for the gift in every situation.” I didn’t fully understand it at the time. I do now, because I’ve had a lot of practice. Peru is my spiritual home. It has been for 30 years, […]
Full moon blessings, friend. I tossed and turned pretty much every night last week. This week, properly restless. Mind circling, the same worries over and over, the kind of thinking I know better than to indulge. I have spent twenty five years teaching people how to calm their nervous system, and there I was at […]
There is a word in the Andean tradition that has no clean translation into English. Allyu. It means family, but it is bigger than blood. It means community, but it is bigger than proximity. An allyu is the living web of relationship that holds a person up, human and non human alike. The mountains are […]
One of my closest spiritual soul sisters finally came up to Yorkshire for a visit. I gathered my whole family around for dinner so everyone could meet each other properly, because they’ve all been hearing about one another for twenty years. Twenty years of stories, finally sitting at the same table. Santosh came up specifically […]
When I was a teenager, someone told me I had the form and the talent to go professional with horses. I had the blue ribbons to prove it. And I wanted a horse more than almost anything. But I also wanted ballet. And the theatre. And to travel the world. And I knew, even then, […]
There’s a particular kind of suffering that comes not from loss, or failure, but from not knowing where you are. You look around and the old version of your life doesn’t fit anymore. The old you, the one who knew what she wanted, who had a clear sense of direction, who could explain herself at […]
After nearly two weeks of travelling, I’m on my way home. Restored in my soul, happy in my connections and full, in every sense of the word. I saw new cities, had spectacular cultural experiences, and unlike my usual healthy eating discipline, I fully committed to the gelato and pasta plan in Italy and the […]
Travelling is wonderful because it constantly brings home to me what is actually important. On the challenging side there is the hassle factor, the organisation, packing (ugh!) things not going to plan, delays, tech not working, traffic and confusion, and the moments when a foreign language feels like a wall rather than a door. On […]
Chip Conley, the founder of MEA, the Modern Elder Academy, recently shared something from a Jerry Seinfeld interview that I haven’t been able to put down. The idea that the blessing in life is when you find the torture you’re comfortable with. He traced the word torture back to the Latin torquere, to twist. Not […]
Shame doesn’t always scream; often, it hides in our procrastination, our people-pleasing, or in the way we treat our bodies. It is a silent, heavy shape-shifter that stays in our cells until we find the courage to look it in the eye. Of all the emotions we carry, shame is the most isolating. And for […]
