Tiny Bites of Wagaliciousness

Is there someone in your life who loves to argue? Ugh…that’s deep in the no-fun zone. And have you noticed that this argumentative person just digs in their heels, or as a dear friend says, “puts on their donkey feet” the more you try to get them to see a different point of view? That’s something fairly common in argumentative people – they hold their beliefs so strongly that when presented with e...

Do you know someone who has a chronic medical condition, and it seems like that’s all they can talk about? And maybe this person is a dear friend and part of a long-standing group of friends, and when you’re all together, this one person goes on and on about their ailment? Pretty soon, everyone is annoyed and tired of offering suggestions, and exhausted by the medical play-by-play. The human thing...

When was the last time someone said to you, “the world is in a downward spiral” or words to that effect? It is so easy to believe that the world is going to Hades in a handbasket – mainstream media scours the world constantly for bad news, gets video of it, sets it to minor-key music to subtly alert your brain to danger, and broadcasts it incessantly, or at least until another disaster happens. Wh...

Do you hear the phrase “all your power is now” and wonder what, exactly, it means? This Tiny Bite is for you. You literally can’t do anything at any other time than now. Sure, you can reminisce about the past. You can think of things you could have done differently or better, and yet you can’t change a single thing about what happened in the moments, days, and years before right now.   Think...

Are you the kind of person who saves things for special occasions? You were gifted a beautiful, expensive watch and it lives in the jewelry cabinet? You have your grandma’s china and only use it at the holidays? You have the car of your dreams and rent a car to go on road trips? Why do you do that? And I ask this, knowing that for years I did exactly the same thing. When you have something you lov...

Have you ever gotten out of bed and just wanted to crawl back in? Yeah, those days don’t feel very good. There are days where you feel like you could take on the whole world and sweet-talk them into getting along, and other days where you feel defeated before you even get your teeth brushed. Give yourself grace. Give yourself permission to not be Superwoman or Superman or SuperNonBinary. You’ll st...

Have you ever stopped to think about how much you’ve changed throughout your life? Probably not, because we feel the continuity of our own being, not the changes we go through. You don’t have the same opinions about anything that you had when you were 8. You don’t have the same feelings about life that you did when you were 22. Your political views have probably changed, your taste in music and fo...

You are a loving, caring person. You fiercely protect those in your inner circle – family, close friends – and you’re there when they need you. Maybe you even relish the challenge of being the knight in shining armor for others. You see an underdog and your heart swells as you think of ways you can help them make their life better. There is nothing wrong with that. Those are admirable qualities th...

Today let’s talk about possessions. No, I’m not going to extoll the virtues of a minimalist life because that would be hypocritical. I have collections of arctic art. Collections of seashells. Collections of rocks and paperweights and books and mid-century pottery. I own things that graced my grandma’s kitchen, my mother’s kitchen, and now my kitchen. My house is anything but minimalist, and yet i...

What do you aspire to in your life? Chances are you’ve hit a bunch of goals as you’ve lived your life, and you still have things you want to do, and dreams you yearn to have come true. What do you do on a daily basis to enable your own goals? Think about it – if you had a project for work, you’d have a timeline, a deadline, and a plan to achieve both. Do you have those for your life aspirations? M...

Do you have a family member, friend, or coworker who argues with your feelings? Think about that for a minute – they argue with your feelings. How rude is that? When you open up and tell them how you feel and they say something like, “well, I said that in the heat of the moment and you know I didn’t mean it, so why are you so mad?” that is called invalidation. They’re telling you that they don’t b...

Are you having a rough day? Maybe it’s the kind of day that started out with a toothpaste drip on the last clean shirt in your closet. Maybe every light between home and work was red. Maybe it was pouring rain, you had to park in the uncovered part of the lot, and your umbrella is in the closet at home. Maybe your computer wouldn’t boot up, your desk chair lost a wheel, and someone swiped your cof...

A friend said to me recently that for all her adult life, she’s been the buffer between people she loves and the things or people that upset them. That statement made Mom spring immediately to mind – she was often the buffer, too. She kept her children from being too rowdy when her husband had a migraine or was tired and cranky at the end of his workday. She kept her two sons from picking at each...

Have you ever been told you’re soft-hearted, and the person saying it meant it as an insult? A lot of people believe that in order to succeed you must learn to be hard-hearted, maybe even a little bit ruthless. Those people are welcome to their opinion, and I believe they are wrong. Just as you can be angry without being mean and underhanded, just as you can be sad without wallowing in self-pity,...

Someone you work with being passive aggressive? You know the drill…long silences, exaggerated eye rolls, and letting sarcasm drip from innocent-sounding words. Those are all clues that your co-worker wants you to know how they feel…they just don’t want to have to tell you. Most of the time, passive aggressive people don’t know how to calmly talk about their feelings because they’ve spent a lifetim...

Today I want you to take inventory. At some point today, give yourself 30 minutes for this exercise. Give yourself permission to focus strictly on you – close your door, or go outside and away from people, or surround yourself with strangers who won’t interrupt you. Put yourself in the environment that sparks creative thinking, then focus on taking inventory of your strengths and what you’d like t...

Do you wake up in the middle of the night, feeling like you’re in a panic? For a long time I woke up at 3:15 as if I’d just had a bad dream. Adrenaline was pumping and it would be two hours before I could even think of sleeping again. Sound familiar? Your sleep schedule could be the victim of your brain, just like mine was, and when your sleep is continually disrupted, so is your life and your hea...

Is life a bowling ball and you feel like the pin? The ball just keeps knocking you down, time after time, and you’re standing there, taking it? That’s not a good way to feel, is it? After being knocked down so many times, it can feel futile to even stand back up again. It’s in those moments that you teach yourself who you are. You’ve overcome a lot to get to where you are right now, right? Yo...

Is there something you’re longing to do? I love to draw and paint and am not terribly good at either. Every now and then, something surprises me and turns out better than I thought it would. Most people have something they’d love to do and feel they’re not terribly good at. What’s yours? Do you pick it up and try it now and then, and how does it feel when you do it well? How does it feel when you...

Especially in a presidential election year, it’s very apparent that a lot of people hold hard-and-fast opinions about certain things. Life informs our beliefs – once we’ve seen something or heard something often enough, we come to believe that it’s true, whether it’s factually true or not. That’s the way the brain is designed to work, and it’s how humans can learn as quickly as we do. It’s also ho...

Take a moment and think about the people you know – who do you think feels inner peace much of the time? Creating an inner, peaceful world for yourself is what this podcast is all about – remembering to take the tiny steps to observe your feelings and adjust your own attitude so you control your inner world instead of letting circumstances and other people control it. Today, observe your feelings....

Do you know someone who is difficult to get along with? Maybe they are defensive when you offer an opinion different than theirs, or maybe they constantly correct your behavior? This kind of person is easy to deal with when they’re in your life by choice, because you can choose to cut them loose. When it’s someone you work with, it’s a lot harder, though. It’s tough to feel wagalicious when you’re...

Is there someone who acts like they don’t like you when you’re around? I’ll never forget going on a girlfriend trip to New York. There were seven of us on the trip, and one of the women made a point of shunning the company of another. She sat as far away as possible at tables, took a different cab, and was caught a few times making catty remarks about the object of her disapproval. Have you ever b...

Do you ever make a mistake? Sure…we all do. Part of our shared life experience is that we’re not perfect. Sometimes the screw-ups are little and sometimes they’re not so little, and they all have one thing in common: they’re a major part of how we learn. One of my dogs is a therapy dog who works one-on-one with children, helping them hone their reading skills. One little boy brought in two books –...

Do you know someone who like to talk about their problems…a lot? They love to tell the story of what happened, painting themselves in the best light while bemoaning the petty behavior of others? After they’ve told you about the newest unfair chapter in their life, do you hear them down the hall, telling the same story to others? Here’s what you need to know about people like that: they’re not seek...