This Week's Focus May you find serenity during this holiday season. Start with being the peace yourself by making time to still your mind, showing people you care, and accepting the things you cannot change. I look forward to continuing our serenity journey in 2019!!

This Week's Simple Tip One of the things that makes me smile at this time of year is the sound of the Salvation Army holiday bell-ringers collecting at many store fronts. Volunteers oversee the red kettles each year to raise funds to do good in the community and help change lives for the better. Conventional thinkers have suggested all along that happiness is found in helping others, whether it be with a job on the front-line, or regularly donating time or money. But mul

This Week's Simple Tip I love music, and almost always have it playing in the background. The type of music varies based on what I am doing while listening. If I am cooking, I have a LOUD concert of classic rock'n'roll, but when I am writing, I play calming music which helps with the flow, and actually makes for a very enjoyable work environment. We recently had our kitchen updated. At one point, there were five contractors working, with diverse cultural backgrounds. I was

This Week's Simple Tip Have you ever noticed how much easier it is to say 'yes' versus 'no'? This seems to play out in many aspects of life. In parenting, on numerous occasions I won "the meanest mother in the world" award because I was saying 'no' to my kids when 'everyone else' was being told 'yes' to something. Even if it was not the best response in the long run, my kids would have been happy, and I would have saved myself lots of time by simply saying 'yes.' In the w