Finding peace in your lives and relationships, especially if you feel stressed with financial, health, or relationship challenges, can sometimes seem almost impossible. And yet finding that peace is essential. There is a story of a king who offered a prize to the artist who could paint the best picture of peace...

Each of us longs to express who we are, what we think and how we feel. But how often do we? From my perch I see more being repressed than expressed. Considering that repression can lead to depression, illness and even violence, what is stopping us from being true to ourselves and...

Ever felt like you were falling through space? Everything that held you and tethered you has disappeared and evaporated. What is a free-falling, spiritually-inclined person to do? Pull off the galactic highway and take a little snooze or hitch a ride on a screaming meteor? There might be another way...

The time has come to write a new story for our lives and to let go of those handed down to us by our families and our cultures. These are not our stories; they do not belong to us. We must hand them back with love and write our own. We are being urged to become aware and informed and, by doing so...

In honoring our feelings, we can more swiftly and comfortably navigate through difficult times, and come out wiser in the process. If we face our difficulties with grace, gratitude, if we can combine occasional expressions of pain and sadness with our usual routine of...

Sometimes we may feel as if we haven't discovered our purpose. However, each moment brings with it a new purpose, right now in the moment. Zen sword master Taisen Deshimaru reminded his students, “Be happy here and now or you never will be.” And writer Margaret Bonanno points out, “It’s only possible to live happily ever after on a..."

by Eldon Taylor. Uncovering our biases is an important step in discovering ourselves. Evaluating the words we choose, what they mean, what they imply, and how we use them is an exercise in self-awareness. Whether we repeat a “blonde” joke, a sexist expectation, a racist definition...

by Deborah King. Often, our most important beliefs are unconscious. Over 90 percent of those that we currently hold we took on as kids from our parents or caregivers, school, and culture. These views run the greater part of our lives and determine if we’re going to be...

I was speaking to a friend who is the head of a customer service department. She tells everyone in the company, whether they work in the warehouse, in accounting, or wherever, that everyone in the company is in customer service. As I reflected on her words later, I realized that her sentence "we're all in customer service" had much more further reaching...

by Alan Cohen. I recently made a pilgrimage to the ancient Mayan temples at Chichen Itza and Tulum in Mexico. At one pyramid our tour guide informed us that the Mayans regularly offered human sacrifices to appease their gods. While we would regard such offerings as primitive and even abhorrent, the mindset of sacrifice is still...

What would you be doing differently if you did not have to prove yourself to anyone?  Your enemies are not your dysfunctional parents, childhood sexual abuser, or punitive parochial school teacher; your enemies are the thoughts they instilled in you that you still believe...

Whenever you live something consciously it never becomes a loaded thing on you. If you go to the market to purchase something and you move consciously, walk consciously, purchase the thing consciously, with full remembrance, mindfully come back home, this will never be a part of your memory. If you want to remember it, you can remember it, but it will not be constantly forcing your attention towards it...

Over the years, I have read many wonderful books on the subjects of spirituality, philosophy, and personal growth. These books usually paint a beautiful and inspiring picture of reality.  But often, after the inspiration of the book had faded, I found myself asking, "Wouldn't it be wonderful if reality were like that?"

When you open your life to the rest of our world, it can be daunting. It is easy to become hypersensitive to the violence and suffering around us. Maybe you cannot tolerate the extreme violence of many movies and TV shows, or even the news reports on the radio. Emotions may run high on all accounts.

by Alan Cohen. My eight-year-old neighbor Mark keeps me on my toes. Mark asks lots of questions, which I am sometimes tempted to dismiss as childish. But when I think about them, I usually discover a profound lesson. The other day Mark asked me for a ride to the local grocery store...

Most people have some physical symptom that signals them that they are starting to run down their batteries. A sore throat, headache, or hemorrhoid flare-up is the universe's way of alerting you that you are getting stressed.

Our difficulty lies in the fact that in asserting our right to partake in the man's world we have come to identify with the very patriarchal attitudes that devalue our mothers and grandmothers. We are ashamed of our yearnings for connection, our tears, our mothers. We try to live like men: valuing separateness and achievement.

by Alan Cohen. You can find yourself in ideal conditions and be miserable, and you can be in the most adverse conditions and soar. Environment and physical factors may influence us, but attitude makes or breaks us. You may not be able to...

A Course in Miracles asks us to keep our priorities in order. Spirit first, matter second. People before stuff. Love before fear. Leo Buscaglia noted, We were born to love people and use things, but we learn to love things and use people.

Now is the time for women's equality in Congress and at all other government and corporate decision-making levels. With men, we get rhetoric, more problems and no answers -- but lots of excuses. I am convinced that we need women's realistic, common-sense approach to the needs of modern America.

In just one year, guns are used to kill more than thirty thousand Americans, and thousands more are injured. The fear of gun violence alone affects the quality of life of every American, even those who have never experienced it firsthand. What we forget is that living in fear does not have to be an inevitable part of life in America.

A testimonial of an encounter with a policeman who assisted in showing her the way back to the path of enlightenment and recovery: "One morning last spring I was driving down US1 at 5:30 in the morning. Well, I wasn't just driving, I was speeding. I was going at least 15 miles over the 45mph limit, and my mind was not on the road..."

In my community, there is one man whose life speaks louder than his words. He is known as Sam, and he lives on the streets. His life provides us with a sense of charity so that we can live guilt-free in our lavishly furnished homes. We don't want to learn how one could adapt to living on the street.