Linda Holman

   “Real rest feels like every cell is thanking you for taking care of you . It’s calm, not full of checklists and chores. It’s simple: not multitasking; not fixing broken things.”  — Jennifer Williamson I love Christmas, but I get stressed out when I have too many social things to do around it. For me the best part of Christmas is the time when the tree is up - the smell of pine, and my husband and I cuddled up on the couch watching sweet Christmas movies. Time off work, time to relax on the deck with friends and family, the quietness of the week between Christmas and New Years. Time to rest and recharge. What I don't like is feeling pressured to buy gifts, cook for lots of people, or run around too much on the day itself. I don't like the drive to finish all the work, visit all the people, and do all the traditional things. I'm also not a fan of how much of the pressure to have the perfect time is applied almost exclusively to one person in the family - usually a woman....

  "Never believe that body is permanent. Body is like a water bubble. Mind is like a mad monkey." - Sathya Sai Baba   When I first heard the phrase "monkey mind" I immediately understood what it meant! I was a few years in to my meditation journey, and mostly this had consisted of making huge resolutions to meditate for impossible amounts of time, followed by disappointment that I was never able to "empty my mind" or stop thinking.  But learning that the nature of our minds is to be like a monkey - jumping from thought to thought as a monkey jumps from branch to branch - this was very freeing! That's just my mind being the best mind it can be. It's been running the show for a long time now and absolutely expects that any idea or notion that it flings at me will be given my full attention. I leaned that I didn't need to try and stop the thoughts, I just had to stop being carr...

    "Go within every day and find the inner strength, so that the world cannot blow your candle out."      –Katherine Dunham    Meditation seems super interesting to you, but yoga.. not so much. Is it possible to get benefits from meditation without having to do yoga? Yoga and meditation are often practiced together; in fact there’s a school of thought that the main point of yoga is to get the body ready to sit for long periods in meditation. The word “yoga” is often translated as “union”, and the uniting of the mind and the body is a common way of thinking about it, so in that regard they can work well together. But there’s absolutely no requirement to do yoga along with a meditation practice - and especially when you are new and working on building a habit you want to have as few barriers to practice as you can . I think it’s easy to get caught up in how we think something should look, or focus on having all the perfect conditions before starting so...

  “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.”  –  Arthur Ashe Sometimes people get pretty excited about the benefits of something they've recently tried and get quite evangelical about it. I've definitely been guilty of this over the years, even though I find it annoying when people do it to me. It can have the opposite effect and put me off trying new things just because someone tells me I "should" try it!  Another barrier to trying something like meditation is wanting to have all the conditions right to begin - that's basically impossible, so it's best to just start as soon as you can, even if things won't be perfect. You don't need any special clothes or particular types of cushions - you can meditate in a chair, sitting on a train, or even walking !  There are many, many different types of meditation, and most groups want you to meditate in a particular way as their experience tells them that's the "best" way to do it....

  “Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.” - James Clear Consistent underachievement can help us reduce perfectionism, which holds us back from starting things and makes us very hard on ourselves. If there’s something you want to do, then starting small is great, and starting small today is amazing. Consistent underachievement can help us get out of our own way and begin doing the things we’ve always wanted to do, without all the huge self-imposed expectations. Years ago, when I first read the phrase “consistently underachieve,” I hated it. The thought of specifically setting out to do a crappy job felt like it went against every fibre of my being — I was utterly in the grasp of perfectionism back then. But it was a seed, planted in my overwhelmed and under-rested brain, and it grew and grew until I had to take notice of it. The idea is that rather than making a massive life change, which you’ll struggle to maintain (for example, doing an hour of...