Category Archives: Tammy Strobel

Something Good

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1. This quote from Pema Chödrön’s new book, Living Beautifully with Uncertainty and Change:

It’s not impermanence per se, or even knowing we’re going to die, that is the cause of our suffering, the Buddha taught. Rather, it’s our resistance to the fundamental uncertainty of our situation. Our discomfort arises from all of our efforts to put ground under our feet, to realize our dream of constant okayness. When we resist change, it’s called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into its dynamic quality, that’s called enlightenment, or awakening to our true nature, to our fundamental goodness. Another word for that is freedom—freedom from struggling against the fundamental ambiguity of being human.

2. Two posts from Lissa Rankin: Stop Striving. You Are Already Enough. and 6 Life Lessons I Learned from Blogging.

3. This heartbreaking video. This was going around on Facebook last week, and I finally watched it. This is the real shit. If you’ve ever loved someone and lost them (especially if it was to cancer), and had to keep living after, you will feel this man’s pain, and at the same time be reminded we are not alone.

4. The impossible choice by Sunni Chapman on Roots of She. With everything that’s been going on with my Dexter, this post was pure medicine for me. Especially this,

Oh Life, you are so kind. Even if you had taken him from me, you are still so kind. Because you gave me the love of this dear sweet being, for as long as he wants to be with me, and for a million other reasons, as well. Thank you Life, for this gift of seeing, and thank you Life, for this greatest gift of LOVE.

Thank you, Sunni.

5. The Burning House: What People Would Take if the House Was on Fire on Brain Pickings. I thought so much about this with the fires here this summer, love seeing what people would take, what is precious to them.

6. The Renegade Craft Fair in London on decor8. I would have spent so much money at this. And p.s., I love Holly’s latest blog design, especially the new header and link buttons.

7. 8 life lessons, gracefully learned – advice for my younger self on The Freedom Experiment.

8. Living Into My Words from Erica Staab. And not just because she quoted me, but because of things like this,

How often do we assume that we are the only ones struggling with something, to wrestle alone with our thoughts, fears and doubts only to hear when we finally gain the courage and bravery to share…“Me too.”

9. Famous Writer’s Small Writing Sheds and Off-The-Grid Huts. I felt physical pain looking at these, a tension and nausea in my body because my desire was so intense. I love these, want one someday.

10. Charles Bukowski, Arthur C. Clarke, Annie Dillard, John Cage, and Others on the Meaning of Life from Brain Pickings. So many great quotes here.

11. My Creative Life: Tammy Strobel, an interview with Susannah Conway. I am reading Tammy’s new book right now, so especially loved hearing her talk about her life as a writer. Susannah also shared a few links in her Something for the Weekend post (where I get at least one thing for this list each week) to people living in tiny spaces (Tammy lives in a tiny house) which are making me, once again, want to purge, downsize, declutter, and simplify.

Susannah also shared a link this week to this gorgeous video, The Most Beautiful Lies sung by Clare Bowditch and a few other lovelies.

And while we are talking about the brilliant Susannah Conway, here’s an interview with her on Sassyology.

12. 22 playful + productive + passion-stoking things to do, this September from Alex Franzen on Unicorns for Socialism.

13. The Only Way to Respond to Life, a sweet post by Leo Babauta on Zen Habits. “This moment is a ridiculously generous miracle.”

14. My dog: the paradox on The Oatmeal. Too funny, slightly naughty, and so true.

15. 5 Important Reasons to Slow Down Today on Pick the Brain.

16. 9 Ways to Get a New Venture Cracking from Jennifer Louden.

17. This poem from Rumi.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
and rightdoing there is a field.
I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.

18. This quote from the Dalai Lama.

Hardship, in forcing us to exercise greater patience and forbearance in daily life, actually makes us stronger and more robust. From the daily experience of hardship comes a greater capacity to accept difficulties without losing our sense of inner calm. Of course, I do not advocate seeking out hardship as a way of life, but merely wish to suggest that, if you relate to it constructively, it can bring greater inner strength and fortitude.

19. Humans of New York.

20. Our dreams don’t belong to us. They belong to the world. from Kelly Rae Roberts.

Something Good

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1. We saved the Lyric! I absolutely love the design for the t-shirts they made for those who contributed. “Let There Be Light”? Perfect.

We humans are social beings. We come into the world as the result of others’ actions. We survive here in dependence on others. Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives in which we do not benefit from others’ activities. For this reason it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others. Nor is it so remarkable that our greatest joy should come when we are motivated by concern for others. But that is not all. We find that not only do altruistic actions bring about happiness, but they also lessen our experience of suffering. Here I am not suggesting that the individual whose actions are motivated by the wish to bring others happiness necessarily meets with less misfortune than the one who does not. Sickness, old age, mishaps of one sort or another are the same for us all. But the sufferings which undermine our internal peace—anxiety, doubt, disappointment—these are definitely less. ~Dalai Lama

To celebrate, I am going to see a movie there this Thursday with some friends. From the trailer and a few reviews I’ve heard from people I trust, it is going to break my heart.

2. Oh, Mr. Brilliant by Patti Digh. I think I mentioned last week that I was super sad that Patti had just found out her husband had cancer. This post tells a little bit more of their story, ending with a way you can help them. This is further proof of how strange life is, beautiful and brutal.

3. A Weekend of Pies on Soule Mama. You don’t even have to read this post, just look at the pictures and be prepared to drool, (and yes, this list just moved directly from a post about cancer to one about pie, life is like that).

4. Aimee Mann is coming to Colorado! Okay, so maybe Eric is the only reader that really cares about that. We love her, (I have ever since her Til Tuesday days), see her every time she comes to Colorado, so I was really excited when she announced tour dates this morning and I was able to get tickets. Her new album is releasing September 18th, but you can preorder it now.

5. How to Turn Every Email Into a Mini Meditation from Jonathan Fields. I really like this idea, might try it.

6. Fear + Happiness, or Eight Ways to Let Go of Fear from Katie Swanberg. This is a goooood list.

7. And in related news, Go Small, Be Happy from Tammy Strobel.

8. A reminder to let go, from Lao Tzu:

By letting go it all gets done.
The world is won by those who let go.
But when you try and try,
the world is beyond winning.

9. From Austin Kleon, Show Your Work! Episode 1: Vampires.

10. 12 Amazingly Achievable Things To Do Today from Marc and Angel Hack Life.

12. From the utterly brilliant Justine Musk, are you a cup of tea…or a shot of tequila? in which she says:

You want to be a focused, highly skilled, freak version of yourself.

You want to dig down deep to find that unique part, that weird and maybe slightly psychotic part, that beautiful raw fucked-up part, that you spent a lifetime learning to hide in the first place.

13. Piecing Together Connie’s Sky from Judy Clement Wall on her blog A Human Thing. Yes, I am slightly biased here: Judy talks about a post I wrote, and I adore her…but that doesn’t change the fact that this is real and true and important.

14. And to close, a picture of Blue, a most adorable puppy that’s up for adoption at Animal House. That face! *sigh* And I am a sucker for a dog named Blue.