“Survival is insufficient.”
The other day I told my friend Michelle, while speaking about my businesses, that I am not used to being in survival mode. I am used to creating, expanding, building, adding…
And she mentioned the quote “Survival is insufficient”. I feel this. But who is it by?
I don’t have a dog (yet), but I want one so I can get this dog blanket. But wait, I can get this blanket just for myself…
This made me laugh. I wish I knew who to give credit to.
I have a slight obsession with storage boxes and neatly organized drawers. There is something wildly satisfying about a drawer organizer that is made to perfectly fit your drawers and needs.
My wonderful ex-husband, a kitchen designer, has been in the kitchen business for over 30 years and a constant complaint from homeowners and architects has been the lack of custom drawer organizing options. He took matters into his own hands and solved the problem:
With his new business DrawerSpace.com he custom-builds you your high-quality, wooden drawer inserts, based on your needs, right here in Brooklyn. There are lots of different configurations to choose from. So impressed!
What a great gift for someone you love. Say goodbye to ugly, plastic, non-fitting drawer inserts!
These Pile Sculptures by Claudia Pearson are simply stunning.
My heart needed to hear this beautiful lecture today. I can’t say it enough but Tara Brach is a national treasure. So grateful my friend Maria introduced me to her work when I was going through a hard time 6 years ago. Her meditations and talks are grounding and expansive.
“Joy does not simply happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day.”
– Henri J.M. Nouwen
This made me smile.
“There’s something just as inevitable as death. And that’s life. Think of the power of the universe… turning the Earth, growing trees. That’s the same power within you. If you’ll only have the courage and the will to use it.”
– Charlie Chaplin
On Monday morning, right before I dropped off my son at school, I got a text from my sister saying my dad wasn’t well.
A few hours later I found myself on a plane to Switzerland and arrived at the nursing home just in time to say good-bye. My sister, her husband and I were gifted the experience to witness the sacred moment of my dad’s passing.
All his life, my dad believed in and studied reincarnation and in particular the moment the soul leaves the body. Here he was, living it.
My sister and I have learned so much from him just by overhearing him talk about death. (He had an entire library on this topic and I remember reading books by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross at 16!) Yet, as much as I knew about the process of dying, nothing prepares you for being in the presence of death.
That sacred moment of that last breath, when that deep quiet hits. And you find yourself crying in ways you never have.
It felt as if his soul pulled mine out to give it a squeeze and then let it bounce back into my body.
My dad was a force. A man of many interests and talents. A successful (and ruthless) entrepreneur, yet a soul that got gentler as he got older. I often described him as a ball of love in these past few years.
As he aged he became blind and eventually needed to leave his beloved house to live in a nursing home. Even though in younger years he would moan and complain about a bad cold, in this stage of his life he, with so much of his body giving out, he never complained. New nursing staff, not familiar with his name yet, would refer to him as “the kind one”.
My dad has shown me what it means to dream big, to live a courageous creative life. And in the end, he taught me the lesson that life is one big journey of finding back to your truest self, being and living love. He found it. He lived it. (Maybe not in the early years, but definitely at the end!)
What a blessing to witness his passing.
I miss you, dad.
Ps: Please call your parents, if you still can.
This photo was taken a mere 5 weeks ago, when my kids and I traveled to the Swiss Alps.
ABBA announced a new album. First album in 40 years! Watch the video to hear them talk about how they are putting on the show. This is WILD! More here.
– A guide for better conversations. (PDF)
– How to Remember What You Read
– Check out these toasters. WOW!(Also, who doesn’t want to go visit a Toaster Museum?)
– I am way way past this stage with my kids, obviously, but wow would I have bought this radish chewable toy! Hilarious!
– SurfaceSnaps is such a simple product. I didn’t realize how much I would appreciate the cable tidi-ness they bring.
– Bread lamps are funny.
– Why Kids Need Spirituality, By Lisa Miller
– Plastic Dip!? I want to dip all of the things!
– Yeah, I want to be a person who owns a boot brush.
– Team Tattly is hiring a Graphic Designer. Application deadline is Monday!
– The Founder Library. What a wonderful resource!
– This office chair is a bit silly looking to me but I am sure my kids would be into it.
– My grandma used to crochet me slippers like these. Thanks for the memory lane moment, Bombas socks.
– How Mushroom Time Lapses Are Filmed
– “Human beings are immensely complicated creatures, living simultaneously in a half dozen different worlds. Each individual is unique and, in a number of respects, unlike all the other members of the species. None of our motives is unmixed, none of our actions can be traced back to a single source and, in any group we care to study, behavior patterns that are observably similar may be the result of many constellations of dissimilar causes.” Aldous Huxley on Making Sense of Ourselves and Each Other
– I just learned a new term: Business bigamy in this article: My Colleague Is Secretly Holding Two Jobs. Should I Expose Her?
– In love with this old-school fountain pen.
– This purse is also a backpack. Love.
“Be brave enough to live life creatively. The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You can’t get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you are doing. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover will be yourself.”
– Alan Alda
“Encouragement is the oxygen of the soul.”
– George M. Adams
This avocado vase and this acorn vase by Ilex make me swoon! Wishlisted!
This wall in Zoe Schlacter‘s home made me look. I discovered their textiles at a trade show yesterday.
I saw this bumper sticker on a car from Maine and it made me laugh out loud!.
:Life is your art. An open, aware heart is your camera. A oneness with your world is your film. Your bright eyes, your easy smile is your museum.”
– Ansel Adams
“We are born with only one obligation – to be completely who we are.”
– Mark Nepo
“To listen is to lean in, softly, with a willingness to be changed by what we hear.”
– Mark Nepo
This is incredibly calming to watch.
I am in love with this modern, sculptural bird feeder! (I know, I know, it’s price-y!)
