Tag Archives: Rita’s Notebook

Something Good

branches051. Butternut Squash and White Bean Soup Recipe. I need to try this one. It looks yummy.

2. Talking About Feelings from Adam Kurtz. “For me, talking about feelings just means I’m being honest or open. It means I trust you. I can talk about my fear of death without actually feeling like I’m going to die. But I understand for some, that’s not normal. Being that open is weird. Feelings are private.”

3. It all matters from Alexandra Franzen. “Your words, your actions, your art projects, your efforts, every small, tender, beautiful thing that you put forth into the world matters so much. So much more than you may realize. Every single day, as you go about your work, you have no idea whose life you could be impacting for the better — often, in ways you can’t even imagine.” Go read the rest, please. ❤

4. Word Maven & Story Whisperer: Meet Alexandra Franzen, an interview. “Once or twice a month on Annapurna Living, we spotlight a creative entrepreneur who chooses to do business with integrity and soul. Today, please enjoy our conversation with author, columnist and communication expert, Alexandra Franzen.”

5. New music: Rhodes, and Wet and Laura Mvula.

6. Yoga Nidra Meditation is the Best Kept Secret to Deep Relaxation. This article gives a great overview of the practice and a few examples.

7. 25 Daily Rituals Of History’s Most Successful…And What You Can Learn From Them. A really interesting, helpful list.

8. Want to Create Things That Matter? Be Lazy. Because this, “If you’re driven to produce things that matter, then you need to put deep work at the center of your professional life. To do so will probably require that you become lazier in the Feynman and Stephenson sense of the term: that is, you must treat with sluggish wariness efforts that keep you away from depth, regardless of how many small benefits they promise,” (original share on Susannah Conway’s Something for the Weekend list).

9. 16 Self-Care Experts Share their Tips on How You Can be Kinder To Yourself. What an amazing resource, (original share on Susannah Conway’s Something for the Weekend list).

10. 100 Day Self Connection Experiment, “In this video series, Kyle is going to spend two hours a day with a new self connecting intention. Every day, for 100 days, he is going to make a video about what he is discovering,” (original share on Susannah Conway’s Something for the Weekend list).

11. Good stuff from Austin Kleon’s newsletter, a collection of essays by creative people about their breakthrough moment, and Why I Taught Myself to Procrastinate, an essay by Adam Grant.

12. Where to work: A manifesto, a really great set of expectations. My favorite is you should work where “your health is crucial.”

13. The Oldest Living Things in the World, a really cool photography project from Rachel Sussman. “Since 2004 I’ve been researching, working with biologists, and traveling the world to photograph continuously living organisms 2,000 years old and older.”

14. 36 Pictures To See Which Muscle You’re Stretching. Ever since I did yoga teacher training, this sort of thing fascinates me.

15. No food is healthy. Not even kale.

16. Triskele Paper Globes, a really fun project.

17. Letter of Recommendation: Sick Days, about the importance of doing nothing.

18. How to Rewrite Your Past, Present, and Future, about the importance of journaling.

19. 8 Lessons from 8 Years of Marriage.

20. Watch Mary Lambert’s Video For “Ribcage.” And when you are done with that, watch this one, Mary Lambert – Lay Your Head Down.

21. Resilience from Seth Godin.

22. The 100 best Instagram accounts of 2016.

23. Top 10 procrastination tactics to get you back on track, some good tips from Karen Walrond, because sometimes procrastinating, when done right, actually leads you back to your work.

24. Just what we needed dept: A $25 standing desk. Confession: I still use the cardboard box method.

25. Guy Turns 700 Year Old Abandoned Cave Dwelling Into Vacation Home. I want to go to there…

26. 8 Reasons Why I Don’t Want to Hear About Your Diet.

27. Magical Night Photography Of Tokyo’s Streets by Masashi Wakui. Confession: I have a thing about Japan, the aesthetic, both the ancient and the modern. I want to go to there…

28. Dieting, withdrawal and how meditation pointed out a dangerous addiction from Amanda Bray. Amen.

29. Need an awesome supine sequence to complete your practice? This person is crazy flexible, but this is a great sequence.

30. Andrea Tsurumi: You’ll Never Have “Enough Time.” “New York-based illustrator Andrea Tsurumi doesn’t take the easy way out. Early in her career, she gained experience at a literary agency and a major publisher; these roles carved out a clear cut path in publishing. But instead of growing complacent over the years as an in-house illustrator, Tsurumi opted to strike out on her own as a full-time freelancer.” A really great interview.

31. What would happen if we let people be broken sometimes? from Renegade Mothering.

32. 9 tips for being a better cook, some really great tips from Tree Hugger. One of my favorites is “learn to toast.” This is one of those things where you don’t believe the extra effort will be worth it, but trust me…so worth it.

33. Watch DeRay Mckesson help Stephen Colbert understand white privilege. “What you can do is extend that privilege so you can dismantle it,” Mckesson tells Colbert. “You can create opportunity for people.”

34. Diet Foods Are Tanking. So The Diet Industry Is Now Selling ‘Health.’ This is a frightening, dangerous shift I’ve been watching happen with great interest and concern.

35. Getting Rid Of “Bikini Body” Is A (Baby!) Step. We Have A Long Way To Go.

36. Wednesday Words 1.20.16: A creative recipe. Love the quote and the picture, love the project idea.

37. Wisdom from Mara Glatzel,

You are allowed to rest.
You are allowed to ache with need.
You are allowed to want more even if your life is pretty good right now, simply because it thrills you to imagine it.
You don’t have to have an excuse for wanting, wholly and holy.
You are not needy. You are a human with needs.

38. The Buddha in Obama’s pocket. I miss him already.

39. All the things that softly kill me from Danielle LaPorte.

40. A Simple Life is Not the End Goal, a great reminder on Be More With Less that “We don’t remove the clutter, reduce the stress, and boycott the busyness to have a simple life. We do it to have a life.”

41. Truthbomb #976 from Danielle LaPorte, “Let the pain, the joy, the desire soften you.”

42. What are you doing for others? : 100 great ideas from Positively Present. Seriously, this is my idea of fun.

43. No Toilets for the Homeless by Stacey McKenna. “Living without shelter often means forgoing ‘perks’ like indoor plumbing. Here’s how nearly 600,000 Americans get by.”

44. Wisdom from Andre Dubus, “It is not hard to live through a day if you can live through a moment. What creates despair is the imagination, which pretends there is a future and insists on predicting millions of moments, thousands of days, and so drains you that you cannot live the moment at hand.”

45. How to Roast Garlic. Yum.

46. 15+ Awesome Possums And Opossums. I always thought possums were kind of gross. After looking at these pictures, I’m reconsidering my position.

47. WATCH: Giant Panda Revels In D.C.’s Giant Snowstorm. This was everywhere the past few days, so you may have seen it already, but if you didn’t, I wanted to make sure you didn’t miss it.

48. My Name Is Megan, and I’m an Alcoholic. An important read. I sent it to someone I love, someone who needs to hear over and over until they get it that “At some point, your only two options are quitting, or dying.”

Something Good

Peach bread, etc.

Peach bread, etc.

1. Brave Girl University. This is going to be seriously awesome, y’all. I’m talking epic.

2. Unfurl – Chapter One. Meghan Genge is sharing audio recordings of her new book, one chapter per week. I long for the comfort of curling up and being read to, so this is such a gift.

3. Hard Conversations: An Introduction to Racism, Unconscious Racism, and Silent Racism. This started yesterday, but you can still sign up. Patti is putting this together and offering it for FREE, but if you think it is important, even if you can’t take part any other way, you can help fund this good work.

4. Master working for yourself without crushing your soul by Paul Jarvis.

5. Good stuff from Seth Godin: What is your art? and Yes!, please and thank you.

6. Good stuff from Zen Habits: Worried About What You’re Not Doing and A Brief Guide to Quitting a Bad Habit.

7. Defining What Works by Rachel Cole.

8. Good stuff from Chookooloonks this was a good week list: the importance of plating.

9. July, in the kitchen from SouleMama. This post makes me hungry.

10. 13 Things I Learned in 13 Years of Teaching My Taos Writing Retreat from Jen Louden.

11. Wisdom from Brave Girls Club, “The people who really matter in your life don’t care what you wear, what you drive or where you live…..they love that beautiful heart of yours.”

12. The Good Questionnaire on A Design So Vast.

13. When you’re done fighting for it. The upside of finally giving up from Danielle LaPorte.

14. Fear Is Fucking Us All Up from Terrible Minds.

15. Good stuff on Rita’s Notebook: Are you already doing the thing you’re meant to do? and Antidote to the August blues.

16. Wisdom from Jessica Patterson:

A spiritual practice ought to be something that can sustain you until your last breath. THAT is why I make time, every damn day, to sit humbly at the feet of trees (or the sea or mountains or the desert, wherever I am) under whatever sky we are given, and just be held. Stilled. I get a lot of “must be nice to have free time” messages from people who miss the subtle but vital distinction: ALL my time is free–mine, and mine to inhabit. That I choose to bow daily at the feet of something beautiful does not mean my schedule is easy or open. I could lament and bitch and do my best to keep up with the Jonesing neuroses of our world and post about that. But I try to carry that practice and beauty into the busyness of my days and remember that I am, in fact, free. My opinions, tastes, abilities, worries, desires, obligations, and interests may shift with time and circumstance. But I think I am always going to want to be held by something bigger than me. And so I practice that daily. No matter what. And you know what? I have not regretted that practice. Not once.

17. Boy Who Couldn’t Afford Books Asks Mailman For Junk Mail To Read; Mailman Responds Spectacularly.

18. Support Isabel in Interfaith Education and Service. Isabel blogs at Lists and Letters, and just started writing an advice column, Dear Bare Heart.

19. 30+ Resources to Help White Americans Learn About Race and Racism.

20. Of Lions and Men: Mourning Samuel DuBose and Cecil the Lion.

21. Day #18: 7/28/2015: WYSIWYG Ten Lessons from Project Awake 365.

22. Find out how I respond to “Are you a saver or a spender?” in this post on Mabel Magazine’s blog.

23. Burg Story from Amy McCracken. The best and worst story e v e r.

24. Jane Goodall Speaks Out About Slain Lion.

25. 6 Reasons People Claim Waving the Confederate Flag Isn’t Racist – Squashed.

26. How White People Sound When They “Disagree” With PoC About Racism.

27. 13 Graphs That Will Speak To You If You Suffer From Anxiety.

28. Wisdom from Erica Cook, “I’m not interesting in competing with anyone, I hope we all make it.”

29. Tig Notaro Boyish Girl Interrupted – Tease (HBO). Can’t wait to see this.

30. Social Media and Ambient Intimacy from Jason Silva.

31. Wisdom from Christina Rosalie on Instagram,

Love is why we are here, of course.
this life, begging us
to notice it’s wildness,
its unpredictable, yet
certain briefness and wonder.

32. The obesity era.

32. May You Know the Fearlessness of an Open Heart by Sharon Salzberg.