a daily blog on well-being and how to feel better by Mark Barger Elliott…

We were walking through a park yesterday and heard a couple talking intensely. One person said to the other, “listen, all you have to do is clap for yourself.”  Sometimes we are fortunate to have a person in our corner cheering us on. But other times we can find ourselves alone and need to choose…

We were watching a beautiful swallowtail butterfly land on an orange and pink echinacea flower and marveled at nature’s elegance and wisdom. You’ll find a lovely photograph of the two at on-emotions.com As you might know, when a butterfly lands on a flower, two things happen; it feeds itself by drawing out a flower’s nectar,…

Pep Guardiola is considered one of the greatest soccer coaches of all time. In a recent speech to his players caught on video, Pep emphatically said, “I hate it the most when you don’t want the ball. I hate it. You have permission to make a mistake. You have permission to lose. You have permission…

Do you think of yourself as a bumper or a pinball? Let me explain. I had a recent conversation with a colleague where I observed how some conversations can feel like you’re inside a pinball machine. They’re enjoyable, but you’re bouncing around topics randomly without a real path or purpose. Then yesterday while working through…

We were at a restaurant celebrating a milestone last night and wanted to order dessert. I asked our server what he thought about the Torta al Cioccolato, described as gluten-free and a “homemade cocoa and almond flour cake, with vanilla gelato.” He paused for a micro-second and said “well, it’s a seller.”  I laughed, and…

Do you think our soul has an “interior?” I came across the idea in a book about Orlando Diaz-Azcuy, considered the “dean of interior design” and founder of the San Francisco–based design firm ODADA. The book about Diaz-Azcuy was called Soul: Interiors. The poet Walt Whitman said what satisfies the soul is truth. Thomas Moore said…