Remabulous

32 for 32: #13 down... I have been to Big Sur!

So... we are on high alert to get the rest of the 32 for 32 goals done before August 30th...

I went to Big Sur the weekend of July 23-26. Here's the report directly from there as well as a tour of my room at Deetjen's.

32 for 32 Vegas Edition

Hello all!

I am writing this post from my almost frighteningly large suite at the Venetian in Las Vegas. Through a crazy series of events I find myself here for a David Neagle seminar. When you get one or two signs you are supposed to attend something, it's still possible to say no and get on with your usual life. However, I just had far too many signals that this was an essential experience for me.

I can't entirely say why that is, but in the 31 for 31 list, I said that I would say yes to more adventures and so I have built that habit from last year.

It is an amazing thing to look over all that has happened since last October. I was just into my new apartment then, just getting used to the east side and getting to know new friends there. And now these friends are some of my favorite people. I have met so many wonderful people in the last year: mentors, clients, friends an colleagues.

I feel so lucky!

So now I get to lie on a gold couch and watch an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer- I never watched it when it was on TV, but now I am hooked. Hooked enough to bring the season 3 DVDs with me on a business trip that I borrowed from my friend Amy.

Hi Amy! Your Buffy disks are on a trip. I think they are happy to be here.

As am I. I am not entirely sure what I am in for this week, but it feels exciting. I'll keep you all posted.

ps- I made an amazing version of Madeleine cookies that is wheat and sugar free. I am really excited about it! I'll post it as soon as I am home this upcoming weekend as I don't have the original recipe I modified with me on this trip.

It will be my Halloween present to you all.

Greetings from Barcelona!

Hopefully, as you read this post, this is the view I will be enjoying. Thanks to my friend Rachel Cellinese for sharing her pictures from her trip to Barcelona last November so I could get a sneak preview of my trip...

I left to travel on the 11th and will be heading on to Seville midweek this week and staying there until the 22nd, when I head back to LA.

I have picked out a few fun things for you all to read and look at while I am away and I very much look forward to sharing images and footage and conversations from my travels when I get back. The flip most definitely came with me and my family, and I am so excited to see what that adds to traveling fun.

If you have tips and places you love in Barcelona, please share them... I hope to have good e-mail access while away.

If you were signed up for the newsletter, today you got my tips on how to plan for travel even in this economy. Don't want to miss another issue? Sign up today!

Face in the clouds over Kenyon College.

As I promised, here is my little video of the sky over my college. The weather was beautiful and the benefit of visiting Ohio in the summer is that it is green green green with vivid blue skies. Here's a little taste of what I saw while I was there with my friend Abby, while we reminisce about cloud gazing and the Pooh Sticks club, founded the year I started college, based on Winnie the Pooh's favorite game.

This week's tip: Seek Beauty.

This past weekend in Stinson Beach was a great reminder: that I love having a meditation practice, that I love unstructured time, that I love cooking with friends, and that I love to look at a beautiful view. 

 

One person had brought  bio-feedback monitor for us to play with and we each got to watch the beeping light of our heartbeat as we learned to relax and turn the red light indicating stress to blue and then green, indicating relaxation. I wonder how much of the ease of arriving at green had to do with the view of the ocean through the floor-to-ceiling glass wall of the living room. 

 

Beauty keeps us sane, but the wonderful thing about it is that it is so subjective. I was delighted, when driving home, with the shapes of the power lines and their towers. I could barely stop myself from pulling over and sketching them. They looked like robots or statues. Normally, I would blow right past this sort of mundane element of a long highway drive, but as i am on a check-in call on Mondays where we talk about the art we are working on, I was looking with different eyes. 

 

This weeks tip is simply this: what if you were to imagine that you had on a pair of goggles that allowed you to see everything as beautiful? 

 

Would that change your day? Your approach? Your life?

 

Give the world around you a chance to be beautiful today. It will show up for you. (ps- the image above was taken on the 5, not in Stinson...)

This post is taken from my weekly feature on my newsletter. If you'd like to get more info like it in your inbox, please visit www.remabulouscoaching.com and sign up!

 

aah! internet has been tricky to get the past few days.

having a fantabulous time wandering around san francisco, staying with friends, my cousin, and seeing others. have wanted to share about the most delicious thing i have ever eaten- blogher ladies must check out the helmand on van ness- as well as all the amazing insight and wisdom i have been picking from people's brains. haven't had long bouts of connectivity to upload pics or to write, so i shall satiate myself off the blackberry this morning and hopefully get time to post more thoroughly tonight. for now i will just say i am grateful to have such an amazing group of friends in this beautiful city. makes me miss living here, but it seems everyone misses san franisco in some way who has been here. i'm off to see my teacher, ashanna solaris, this morning for a two hour mega session. am very excited. i'll hope for more time and a strong signal tonight. xoxo

adventure of the week: imperial spa, san francisco

who knew that for $90 you could transform your childhood? at imperial spa in japantown, relive the experience of your childhood bath. three friends and i enjoyed a soak and steam as well as fomentation before they headed off to give up the top few layers of their skin. wow.

the reviews are all true, according to their report: ladies in black lace bikinis scrubbing you to an inch of your life, cucumber salad on your face, hot milk and baby oil everywhere. you will not be the same after this experience.

getaway: japantown, san francisco, for the budget traveler

looking to get far away, but working with a limited budget? when stepping away from the traditional 9 to 5, it's important to look for bang for your buck if you allow yourself vacations at all. this weekend, i was able to play tourist in my old city and to feel like i was transported to an entirely different country-
this image looks like tokyo, but it's california. all this and no international airfare. here's how to plan a japanese getaway of your own...

image: pbo31 via flickr.

big sur and sf delights

i'm off to a wedding this weekend with a much-needed stop in big sur on the way. a change of scene to clear the head is always a help. will be staying at one of the few places i have never tried in big sur: the big sur river inn, so look for a full report. have a wonderful friday, and if you're in l.a., know that i am jealous if you get thunderstorms. i miss them much from when i had them as a kid during the summer on the east coast. happy memorial day! hope you're enjoying a break from work and up to something fun.

adventure!

i have been off on adventures lately. the current one being a trip to stinson beach for the weekend to celebrate a friend's birthday. another being trying to type this post on michael's computer, which has a differently responsive keyboard than mine...

have been enjoying a smorgasboard of magazines laying about on the coffee table while coloring a large rainforest themed poster- a tradition for this weekend- and came across an article in this month's bust magazine about a woman, michelle dobrovolny, who biked from manitoba to texas in 58 days. she faced a lot of questions about whether or not she was afraid to travel alone and camp, to the extent that one stranger asked her to e-mail regularly to be sure she was ok. this made me think about the idea of being lost or away from the expected, a theme that has been prominent with me recently.