I know some of you will be sad about this, but there won’t be a Something Good list next week. I’m taking a week off to visit my family in Oregon, which means I’m taking a week off from blogging. I hope that even without my list, something good will find its way to you, kind and gentle reader. If not, this particular list is long enough, it might take two weeks to get through it all. 🙂

1. I Was A Single Mom With $6 To My Name. Here’s How I Turned My Life Around.

2. Why I Am No Longer A “Vegetarian.”

3. Artist Turns Old Wooden Doors Into Giant Street Art Murals.

4. 7 Reasons Why Life Is Better Without Booze. The author’s website looks pretty great too: “Soberistas.com, a website which brings together a totally non-judgmental community of like-minded people who’ve either kicked the booze or who are looking for help in doing so.”

5. Dear Human: Take Care of Yourself.

6. Awkward Everyday Lives Of Animals By Simpsons Illustrator Liz Climo.

7. Supreme Court Ruling and Christian Outrage.

8. Questions to ask before giving up, (a PDF). Not sure where this originally came from, but thanks to Jessica for sharing.

9. 13 Signs You’re Wasting Life But You Can’t Admit It.

10. Who’s burning black churches? Arsonists hit at least 3 Southern congregations in the last 7 days.

11. Native Children Are Facing A ‘National Emergency.’ Now Congress Is Pushing To Address It.

12. How Your “Someday” List Reveals Who You Really Are And What You Really Want To Do.

13. 10 Mantras to Inspire Your Daily Work.

14. A Former Pro Snowboarder Has Built An Incredible Off Grid Tiny Home.

15. Many in Nation Tired of Explaining Things to Idiots. 🙂

16. Good stuff from Marc and Angel Hack Life, 7 Little Habits that Stole Your Happiness Yesterday, and 15 Reminders You Need When You Feel Like Giving Up.

17. The rejectionists from Seth Godin.

18. My Cancer Pt. II, Medical Fat Shaming Could Have Killed Me.

19. Salt Soap, a cartoon from Lucy Bellwood.

30. Yoga, Bikinis, Facebook And Fat: How A NC ‘Yogi’ Is Reshaping Body Image Using Social Media.

31. What I Learned at Cement Bluff on Rowdy Kittens.

32. How Knitting Made Me A Better Writer.

33. A bunch of wisdom from Brave Girls Club,

It should be the easiest thing of all, shouldn’t it? But it isn’t easy to be true to yourself. Sometimes it is a very lonely road, and a very bumpy road. There are days when we all want to look around at what everyone else is doing and then just do the same so we can go with that flow and just fit in. At least it wouldn’t feel so lonely. Or would it???

You may have tried to fit in, and tried again, and then still again. You may have even “toned it down” enough for a while that you actually DID fit in, but it made your heart hurt and you just couldn’t betray yourself for very long.

If every funky little daisy in the flower garden spray painted herself red so she could hang out with the roses, the world wouldn’t have any variety at all, and what a sad sad sad life for that sunshiny, spunky free-spirited daisy. She was born to be a daisy, after all.

And guess what? the other flowers want her to be a daisy, too. Daisies are WONDERFUL. Be courageous enough to boldly live your own truth. You are so very very very spectacular. Just BE YOU.

And,

One of the worst mistakes we can ever make is to wait and wait and wait for there to be the “right amount” or the “right people” or the “right person” or the “right circumstances” to start living the life that is calling to us. No matter where we are or what we have, there is always a way to get headed in the right direction…and to just begin.

So, dear friend, begin today. Begin with something big or begin with something small, but begin. Begin with one step. And then just take another and another and another and another. If you are waiting for the perfect time to start, the perfect time is now. If you think the time has passed and it’s too late, it is not. Begin today. We really just have to decide that we are going to make something happen, and somehow we will be able to pull together what we need to do it.

As the old Chinese proverb goes, “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago — the second best time is today.” Do what you can with what you have right now, today. Begin.

And,

If you’ve felt that you have to do more to “earn” help or comfort or blessings….if you’ve struggled through to prove that you can do it on your own and run yourself into the ground before you ask for help…if you are so busy with your head down, plowing through and suffering…that you simply fail to notice things that would ease your pain that are right in front of you…

…then it’s time, sweet friend, to look around and see what is there to make things better. Notice beauty, good books, music, helpful people, generous offers and random acts of grace. When something shows up, open yourself up to it. You don’t have to earn it, you don’t have to do anything to “deserve” it. Simply noticing it, welcoming it, and saying thank you is enough…

You are worthy of comfort, blessings and help.

34. Good stuff from SF Girl by Bay, homestead seattle and one very fine site: de dujes.

35. Questions for Diet Companies from Dances with Fat.

36. Thoughts Become Things from Rachel Cole.

37. Fat Girl Job Clarification. Also from Brittany Gibbons, “Once I learned to like my body, I cared more about what I put into it.”

38. Good stuff on Christina Rosalie’s blog, Like magic, and To the coast, and Summer is here.

39. ‘The Condition of Black Life Is One of Mourning.’

40. Jon Stewart doesn’t give a damn anymore: Why the “Daily Show” host has never been more watchable.

41. After Charleston, how a Buddhist outlook can help.

42. A Professor Crowdsources a Syllabus on the Charleston Shootings.

43. Maya Rudolph Parodies Rachel Dolezal on Late Night with Seth Meyers.

44. A Day in the Life of a Modern Poet from Maya Stein.

45. Dear Sugar, Episode 14: How Do We Forgive Our Fathers?

46. the day after the longest day of the year from Amanda Palmer.

47. Please Stop Being a Good White Person (TM).

48. This is my house from The Bloggess.

49. Dispatch From Charleston: The Cost Of White Comfort.

50. Here’s Kalief Browder’s Heartbreaking Research Paper On Solitary Confinement.

51. After a Stillbirth, a Silent Delivery Room.

52. How Victoria’s Secret Swimsuits Look On Everyday Women.

53. See How The Most Celebrated Female Bodies In Classic Paintings Would Look With A Photoshop Slimdown.

54. Yes, you’re a racist… and a traitor.

55. I choose to be fat.

56. Addictions to Powerlessness and Becoming Swanlike from Rachael Maddox.

57. Good stuff from The Queso,, Confederate Flags and the South, and Summer Reading Recommendations from an Award-Winning Author and Storyteller, Katherine Center.

58. The Black Feminist’s Guide to the Racist Sh*t That Too Many White Feminists Say.

59. ‘Gone with the Wind’ should go the way of the Confederate flag.

60. Wisdom from Tulku Thondup,

Loving-kindness is the essence and nature of the whole world and of every being. To see and experience this is to realize who we are. We can all observe that, if someone is in a quiet, undisturbed place—for example, in nature—he or she will become more peaceful. The more peaceful that person becomes, the more joyful, wise, and helpful they will be to others. That is a clue that our human nature in its normal, undisturbed state is not violent or harmful, but loving.

61. How I Quit My Job and Became a Writer.

62. A black man walks into Silicon Valley and tries to get a job…

63. Chapter 23: Forever And Ever.

64. The 30 Day Journal Project, shared in Jen Louden’s post, How Journaling Can Change Your Life or Strait-Jacket Your Creativity.

65. 10 Things to Look Forward to on the Other Side of Busyness from Be More With Less.

66. trigger warning: we are human on lists and letters.

67. money talks with alison luterman.

68. In Her Room: Susannah Conway.

69. Transforming White Fragility Into Courageous Imperfection.

70. What to Do When Your Heart Doesn’t Know What it Wants.

71. Something as simple as smiling can help curb racial bias, study suggests.

72. Why I’m Walking Away From A Profession I Love: Losing Faith, Burning Out & Moving On.

73. No Need for Words.

74. Wisdom from singer Madjo, “In order to create, you first have to exit the darkness. Seize those first notes and let them run wild. Accept that you won’t master them right away.”

75. You are a grown up. Do what you want.

76. Episode 21 | Interview with Elizabeth Gilbert, shared on Rowdy Kittens Happy Links list.

77. Wisdom from George Bernard Shaw, “People become attached to their burdens sometimes more than the burdens are attached to them.”

78. Opening the Question of Race to the Question of Belonging.

79. In which I share 4 reasons why I am NOT against same-sex marriage, an older post that’s still relevant.

80. Interview Someone You Love About Life, Questions from Brendon Burchard.

81. 10 Examples of Straight Privilege.

82. Explaining White Privilege to a Broke White Person…

83. President Obama Delivers Eulogy at Charleston Shooting Funeral of Clementa Pinckney. You can read the full transcript here.

84. Wisdom from Gavin Newsom,

The unsung heroes are the millions and millions of people across this country that engaged in conversations. And many of those one-on-one conversations made people think twice about their original positions. At the end of the day it was nothing more than the aggregation of those conversations and the courage of people to stand up to even their parents, to say, “No Dad, you’re wrong on this—it’s wrong to deny Uncle Bob the ability to get married; it’s your brother. How dare you subjugate him to second-class status?” It was literally those conversations that changed public opinion, gave politicians more courage, and brought us to where we are today.

85. What Happened To The 9-Year-Old Smoking In Mary Ellen Mark’s Photo?

86. I once led an ex-gay ministry. Here’s why I now support people in gay marriages.

87. An interesting conversation: Here Come the Hippies: Oglala Lakota Tell Rainbow Family to Behave in Sacred Black Hills, and Letter to the Editor: Rainbow Family Member Responds to Readers of Indian Country Today

88. Need A Wall Built? Why Settle For Boring Bricks When You Could Have This!

89. ‘Yoga for Larger Bodies’ Animated Documentary is a Wonderful Story of Healing and Connection.

90. A 30-Second Guide to How the Gay Marriage Ruling Affects You.

91. Ten Days in June.

92. The Toxic Attraction Between an Empath & a Narcissist. Been there, done that.

93. A blessing from Ronna Detrick, “Sometimes hanging on by even a thread to the tenderest and tiniest inkling of your own value, beauty, and worth changes everything. Don’t let go.”

94. Legislated morality, civil rights, and the Christian response to marriage equality.

95. Andres’ Bone Marrow Transplant.

96. Online Is IRL from Terrible Minds.

97. Award-Winning Short Animation About A Lost Soul Meeting Death.

98. Tig, the documentary. I cannot wait to see it!

99. Amy Winehouse Documentary Lets Nobody Off the Hook. Another documentary I can’t wait to see.

100. Creative Portraits Of Artist’s Hands Exploring Different Art Forms.

101. Ease and Routine on Allowing Myself.

102. Miniature Hand Thrown Pottery by Jon Alameda.

103. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s message to Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church.