stop::drop::breathe

Posted on June 14, 2015 by Cynthia G.

Two weeks into my extended vacation, I am meditating. Every. Day. No more excuses, no more hitting the snooze button, blithely squeezing available meditation time down to “maybe” and “not quite enough” before dashing off to the office.

Now, I’ve got time. Lots of it. And yet, meditation can still be an illusive tease, dancing just out of reach. I’ve tried all kinds of tricks to get my mind to stop racing, to slow down enough to actually follow my breathe in, out, in, out. Sometimes a guided meditation helps. Sometimes music helps. What mostly helps. . .is just doing it. You follow the breath in, follow the breath out, and before know it, like Alice, you’re down that rabbit hole. Namaste, baby!

be::free

Posted on May 31, 2015 by Cynthia G.

“There are three problems with freedom: Things often don’t turn out precisely the way we hope. Resolution takes too long. And we might fail. And so, when it’s our turn, we take a pass. It’s far more reliable to stay where we are than it is to leap, to jump to a new place different from the one we’re in. But there’s an alternative. The alternative is to assume yes [and] no. To bet on failure [and] not failure. To realize that there’s a third state, the state of no knowing, of not landing, of not yet.

Not everything has to be okay.

Perhaps it might be better for everything to be moving. Moving forward, with generosity. Moving forward, with a willingness to live with the tension. Moving forward, learning as you go. The person who fails the most, wins.”

–Seth Godin, What To Do When It’s Your Turn (and it’s aways your turn)

learn::smarter

Posted on April 10, 2015 by Cynthia G.

Not only is his book The Four Hour Workweek one of my personal favorites, this guy is wicked smart! Happy Movie Friday!

Zen Up, calm down

Posted on March 29, 2015 by Cynthia G.

You know that tight feeling in your gut at the end of the day that begs for release? Or that tension that kicks in right after you wake up, when something big is up and you don’t feel quite ready? Or maybe there are bigger questions looming and you don’t have a handle on how to handle them. As one bright person said to me once, “your best thinking has gotten you this far. Maybe you should try something else.” Yeah, this just might be it. My friend, Becca Pronchick, has published a handbook for meditation called: No Matter the Question, MEDITATION is the Answer. It’s a book for beginners, full of great guided meditations. It’s also a go-to for people who have been meditating a while and need some new tricks to still the mind. Either way, this smart, pretty little book has the potential to calm your heart and mind. In case, you know, it matters.

BUY THE BOOK::CALM YOUR MIND

you’re getting warmer

Posted on January 14, 2015 by Cynthia G.

It isn’t so much that we fear rejection so much as that we fear the fear of rejection. As it turns out, rejection itself is not so bad. In 99.999% of the time it is not a judgment, it is not recrimination. We don’t need some “other” to do that to us, we do that to ourselves. When denied what we want we begin to stew, to internalize, berate ourselves for all of our imagined shortcomings. What if we changed the way we deal with NO? What if, instead of fearing it, we leaned in and actually embraced it? Read more here.

hello::2015

Posted on December 28, 2014 by Cynthia G.

You know what time is it, right? Time for the burning bowl. Time to let go of what needs loosening, what’s used up, what’s outlasted its usefullness. Time to embrace the new, be aspirational, make a date with the Divine Wow. If you need some help getting started, maybe you can begin with this vid. So long 2014, it was an amazing year!

bee my honey

Posted on August 29, 2014 by Cynthia G.

We all love a good story. We sit around a campfire and tell stories. We sit in a large, dark, room full of strangers just to see/hear a good story. As our friend Abraham-Hicks says, “The story. . .the story!” This is a story in dance:

grantwriting 101

Posted on August 20, 2014 by Cynthia G.

fundraising has turned into something of an art in the last decade. Along with the art has come plenty of competition. Why wouldn’t you do all you can to get your grant funded? It’s more than just luck, according to the Fundraising Strategist. Yep.

lessons in fundraising

Posted on August 14, 2014 by Cynthia G.

We like to say that if fundraising was easy, every princess could do it. This is why we rely on our friend The Fundraising-Strategist when it comes to dialing for dollars.

fire and ice

Posted on August 7, 2014 by Cynthia G.

No, really. Climate change is showing up in amazing ways. Hawaii gets slammed with not one but two hurricanes. Permafrost is melting, glaciers are vanishing, craters are appearing across the formerly frozen tundra. If weird science doesn’t frighten you, and evolution is your friend, you will want to read what Scientific American has to say about all this crazy business.

Get ready for an adventure, people!