It happens to the best of us. Our mission is to clean out the storage unit in the garage. We plow through a few bags and boxes, tossing stuff in the large blue recycle bin or putting other stuff in a pile for goodwill. Then it happens – we stumble upon the box. The one stuffed to the point of overflow with old diaries and journals from years past.

“One quick look,” you think. Next thing you know you’re sitting on the dirty concrete with tear-filled eyes – and three hours have passed.

Been there? If you’ve ever kept a journal – written your deepest darkest secrets, recorded the details of your day, purged your insides out onto the page – I’m certain you know what I mean when I say journaling isn’t for sissies.

And choosing the journal to jot our thoughts is serious business. Instead of cutting down new trees, why not recycle and reuse what we already have? Ecojot makes 100% recycled journals, notebooks and sketchbooks that caught my eye – they’re playful, colorful and fun! And the company is green from the ground up. Ecojot uses recycled packaging and their Canadian paper mill runs on biogas, uses recycled water, recycles all its waste and donates usable scraps to local schools. As if that isn’t enough, a portion of all Ecojot sales is donated to an environmental cause.

Check out their website to learn more about ecojot and read their list of green-going suggestions including “buy local” and “only run your dishwasher when it’s full”.

Note: Journals come in various sizes, styles and themes with heavy duty covers and paper made from 100% post-consumer waste that is chlorine- and acid-free. Only non-toxic vegetable based inks and glues are used. Prices range from $6 to $30.

If you have noticed new ways to be happy or are one of the cheeky tricksters out there contributing to nurturing talent and improving normal life, you might be unwittingly participating in the growing field of something called Positive Psychology.

In 1998, Martin Seligman chose this theme for his tenure as the president of the American Psychological Association. Whose inspiration gave us the term? Maslow coined the term in 1954 in his book, Motivation and Personality.

Positive psychology might have gone against the grain, since prior to Seligman, “the previous 50 years had been primarily dedicated to addressing mental illness rather than mental ‘wellness’.”

I have always felt a draw to nurture talent and to improve normal life. I found, while growing up, there wasn’t as much support for that as I would have liked. My own studies in the field took me down the path of looking for the problems, because those were the resources available to me educationally at the time. Can anyone say, OUCH! Perhaps, you, like me, find this newer direction in psychology a big plus.

Three overlapping areas highlighted in the field of Positive Psychology that are being explored are:

1. The Pleasant Life or the “Life of Enjoyment”
2. The study of the Good Life or the “Life of Engagement”
3. Inquiry into the Meaningful Life or “Life of Affiliation”

Like “Mental Wellness”, “Green Wellness” – personal ecology – has a nice ring to it, if you ask me!

To find out more, check out this link and peek around on the web, too. Answer the call to wellness on every level and enjoy an outstanding life.

Image: Victor Bezrukov

Note: this is a post by Kate Carter, one of our pals at the fabulous Divine Caroline.

For years, I’ve felt obligated to say I like yoga. Who doesn’t like it? It’s the cool thing to do. Soul-enriching exercise. Stretchy pants. Hollywood endorsements. Hip and calm. But after enrolling in three different classes and enduring hours that felt like years, I am stopping my lies: I hate yoga.

I hate the way the teachers speak in breathy whispers. I want them to speak up, because when I’m in the downward dog position, I’m distracted by others’ unseemly body parts encroaching on my personal space.

I know I’m supposed to lose myself in yoga class, taking on a blank, yet peaceful state of mind. I try to forget about work-related stress, the grocery list, and that mole on my leg that might look funny enough to schedule a trip to the dermatologist. But then I start obsessing about how and when I’m going to get everything done, and worries about my mole turn into nightmarish daydreams about chemotherapy and dying from skin cancer. Now how is yoga going to help me with that?

Not only do my worries surface in yoga class, they become amplified by the fact that I’m cheating on some stretch that feels terrible and doesn’t seem to burn any calories anyway. My watch becomes my enemy, and the minutes pass as slowly as the teacher whispers.

“Hurry up!” I want to scream. But the teacher, oblivious to my panicked anxiety, closes her eyes and groans, “ooohhhhmmmm.” And that is when I know””for sure””that I am in the wrong place.

I’ve taken yoga classes at independent, artsy centers and at large gyms. I’ve taken prenatal yoga, beginner’s yoga, and intermediate yoga. I’ve bought a mat, comfortable pants, and contemplated purchasing a tape. But despite the scenery changes and the yoga-infused consumerism, I always find myself back at the starting line.

During the first yoga class I ever took, I passed gas during a breathing exercise. The teacher at the “Healing Arts Center” immediately commended my body’s natural reaction, but instead of soaking in the praise, I got a case of the giggles that did not stop for the rest of the hour-long class. The teacher’s praise turned into reproachful glances and then angry stares as it became clear that I was not mature enough to handle yoga or a fart.

I missed the next class because of a genuine scheduling conflict, but when I returned the following week, I felt my classmates’ assuming looks: they thought I’d been too embarrassed to come back. To add to my discomfort, we started on the breathing exercises again””popping our stomachs out and back in with great vigor””and I got the giggles once more, because all I could think about was how funny farts are. The teacher asked if I needed to take some time to gather myself, and my answer was “no.” I knew no amount of gathering could make the situation less humorous.

The biggest mistake I’ve ever made, as far as yoga is concerned, is enrolling in a prenatal yoga class while I was working a demanding job and moving houses. I was pregnant with my first””and only””child, and if I had to do it over again, I would choose instead to go see movies, read novels, and do all those other things you don’t get to do once you have a baby. I want those wasted hours back, darn it!

My classmates loved the end of each session, when the teacher would brew some kind of spicy tea and read “birth stories” that previous students wrote after having their babies. The ethos of the class was such that epidurals (and in some cases, doctors and hospitals) were evils to be avoided at all costs. I sipped the tea and listened to tales about the “ring of fire” and looked at my watch and thought I might never escape. I began to think of that teacher as Ms. Torture, because she seemed to want me to endure the worst pain on the face of the earth with no medicinal help.

Just hours after I decided to come clean about yoga, I received an email from my brother, who lives in Siberia and manages two silver mines. He announced to my family that he was enrolled in a yoga class in the city of Khabarovsk, and his email read: “I’m learning to speak in a soft, peaceful singsong. Next I’m going to start sewing my own clothes and drinking tea from tree bark.”

So my skeptical, sarcastic brother is making fun of his yoga classes, too. But””and this is shocking””he is taking them. In Siberia.

As yoga goes mainstream and spreads to all corners of the world, I’m going to stick to my guns. No more yoga for me. Maybe one day, when I’m old and frail and can’t touch my toes, I’ll wish I had gotten into it. But for now, I’ll stick with running””an activity that really is good for my heart””and soul.

Friendly shout-out time! Divine Caroline: There’s a new place where real voices rule. Where people can write and publish stories about anything that matters to them. It’s called Divine Caroline and it’s full of words and wisdom just the way you like them – dripping with honesty. What do we talk about? Style, home, food, relationships, travel, changemakers and much more. You can submit a story if you want or just see what everyone else has to say. Yes, it’s free! Hope to see you soon at Divine Caroline.

Top Image: Shayan (USA)

My editor said, “Emily, slow down with the spiritual/personal development articles!” But it’s hard not to let my mind go there as I just read Eckhardt Tolle’s A New Earth. Between us, I’m just going to indulge a sentence or two.

As we are evolving our consciousness in many ways and turning toward a more eco-conscious way of life, it shows our ability to reconnect with the feminine. By feminine, I mean a more nurturing and caring side of us.

This leads me to the word empowerment I had been thinking about one day while running errands. I was really looking for a way to take off tile grout without resorting to a harsh commercial brand. While perusing, I happened to hear “Green Tile Wild” – a very empowering song by an up-and-coming artist. This song was the catalyst for my choice of cleaners and getting me on this whole kick about reconnecting with the feminine. I wasn’t about to resort to the old commercial stuff! I wanted something caring toward the environment, yet powerful. And I found it. Seventh Generation Tub and Tile Cleaner in Emerald Cypress & Fir fights soap scum and grime with no fumes. And get the description of the blend of balsam fir, lime and emerald cypress: “Green and zesty with a full-bodied heart. Healing, breathing, reflective, (consciousness), joyful, and empowering.”

Now if that isn’t a spiritual shopping spree and a perfectly synchronized match with the song I was listening to and my thoughts of empowerment, I don’t know what is.

The song comes out on iTunes in December, so bookmark this post and we’ll include an update when it’s available.

Image: doolittle1989

Milk Paint. Before oils came along to create an indelible, toxic mess, paints were made from milk, lime and earth. It’s one of the oldest human traditions known – for example, the 16,000 year old cave paintings at Lascaux in France use this eco-friendly mixture of pigments.

Fancy making your own? Take your pick of methods: dry milk, water and vegetable dye or a quart of skimmed milk, an ounce of lime and some coloring. If you’re feeling brave you can experiment with earths and oxides, but places like The Real Milk Paint Company will happily sell you a range of tailored pigments. Your only problem? Every home-made pot will be a slightly different shade unless you measure precisely.

Radiator lining. Wall-mounted radiators have a design flaw – they radiate heat in all directions, one being directly into the wall. And with the big wide world on the other side of it, there’s no way you’re going to appreciably warm that one up. The result is a huge amount of lost heat energy – up to 70% in some cases.

The answer is to put something in the way. There are various hi-tech solutions, such as this radiator booster, but there’s a quick and cheap way to do it yourself, which is to line the wall with tin foil, the most reflective side facing the radiator. The heat will be bounced back into the room and your heating bill will plummet. I’m sure you can think of an artful, tasteful way to do it.

Sun Jar. Some of us thought fireflies, others thought Tinkerbell…but we all agree that Sun and Moon Jars are mesmerizing creations. And not too complicated to build, either. Have a look at the detailed walkthrough over at Not Martha (but pay attention to their closing comment that in this case, the real thing is far superior in sun-gathering and light-emitting ability).

Household Cleaner. Most of the household cleaners you see on the shelves work on a simple principle: people want results. They cut to the chase by using a truly dreadful cocktail of toxic substances to blast germs into the beyond – and you can smell them even when the lid’s on. That’s not good. Happily, there are now cleaner, greener alternatives such as products by Ecover and The Clean Environment Company.

But there’s a more versatile cleaner waiting to be assembled in your larder right now. All you need is bicarbonate of soda, some lemons, white vinegar (not malt – too pungent) and some standard-grade olive oil. And here’s how to use them to effectively tackle most cleaning jobs under the sun.

Stain removal. What about those really stubborn stains that cling on like a limpet in a rock pool? Grass, blood, motor oil, ink, or a drop of your favourite organic wine. Again, the general response is The End Justifies The Means, i.e. absurdly potent bleaches that do the job at the expense of environmental health. Yet there are plenty of safe, strong alternatives, such as concentrated orange cleaner, table salt or corn starch – all leaving the environment just as you found it. (Compare this with the headache of safely disposing of toxic household substances).

Pillow cases. Pillow cases, as well as being cases for pillows, are strong-seamed bags in a retro style, lacking handles. In other words, they’re unfinished tote bags – chic crusaders against the nuisance of urban tumbleweed. So at the end of their bed-life or sofa-life, upcycle them into the latest in supermarket fashion – and let Instructables lead the way.

Notebooks. Everyone has a favorite type of notebook – for example, reporters gravitate towards the spiral-bound flip style. But the perfect notebook is made at home with care and attention and not a little love. Any unwanted paper can be hand-stitched into a sturdy little journal. Get creative (like the people who use elephant dung to make notebook paper). Horde any good paper, such as the better kind of junk mail. Make a place for your thoughts that’s truly you.

Furniture. There’s a great way to get an entirely new set of furniture for the house, and all it takes is a few choice materials, a set of handy tools, and the prefix “re”. Threadbare sofa? Reupholster it. If it’s scratched? Restore or repaint it. And if you’re feeling particularly brave, you could draw on things with a Sharpie!

Moss. Do-It-Yourself moss? Doesn’t moss tend to do things itself already? Quite true – in fact, moss is virtually unstoppable. You can even break it into a blender, whisk it into a paste with a few other substances, and create a living, growing paint. You can cover entire surfaces, or you can create stunning like the ones seen over at GreenUpgrader. For a primer, try Instructables.

The Sun. Our favourite Earth-dwarfing ball of incandescent gas is the source of a million eco-friendly DIY projects. Not forgetting how human beings are themselves solar powered, there are many ways to use the free energy of sunlight. Work out where you can get the most sunlight, and rig up heat-absorbing materials, mirrors (be safe!) and solar panelling – Treehugger has details on how to do this yourself as cheaply as possible. If you have an old satellite dish in the shed, you’ve got a head start.

Turf Roofs. A few decades back, “there’s something growing on the roof” was a sentence designed to galvanize the idle into a bout of guilty DIY. Now it’s something to be proud of. Grass roofs keep houses cool in the summer and insulate them in the winter – and now, after a century of architects turning their noses up at the concept, it’s enjoying a lush comeback.

But how do you do it? Securing strips of turf on a sloping roof is no mean feat – but while you’re reading up on medieval Scandinavian roof designs, there’s a short-cut. The Green Roof Tiles by Toyota Roof Gardens (via Inhabitat) allow you to cheaply, quickly coat your roof in self-watering rubbed-soled layers of Korean velvet grass!

Strategic Gardening. Your garden isn’t there to just look pretty. As well as gently scrubbing the air around your house, it does the same as a turf roof, insulating and cooling as the situation requires. Think about gardening tactics. Where does the wind come from in the winter? Put trees in the way. Where’s the shade in the summer, and water for the local wildlife? How about a bird feeder and a bee hotel? How about letting it all run a little wilder than you’re used to?

If you’ve recently tackled a novel eco-friendly DIY challenge, tell us about it.

Image: benfo

Have you gone to look for your handbook to life lately only to find that pages are missing and that the maps in the back of the book are no longer current? They keep saying these are times of rapid and accelerating change. Maybe it’s time to tune up your navigation system and rev up your intuition! What’s involved in getting to know your intuition, intimately? If you want to feed your left brain, try tuning in to a few definitions. This one for intuition comes from Wikipedia. 

Intuition (knowledge) – understanding without apparent effort, quick and ready insight seemingly independent of previous experiences or empirical knowledge. 

My favorite example of intuition? Intuition is that amazing quality that allows me to show up at the right time and meet the right people without having to “think about it”, like when I met our editor, Sara. Tuning up the intuition is like tuning up the equipment before a treasure hunt!

In my quest to find out more about my own intuition, I was first guided to explore what intuition is not. One way to describe what it is not is to say that intuition often works its way through filters.  Those filters, says Lisa Hartnett, a therapist in San Rafael, California, can confuse intuition with other qualities like delusion and fantasy. 

Try this exercise for an experience of the differences between what intuition is and what it is not:

If you have a meditation practice, on a day when you are especially centered, spend an extra ten minutes asking to feel, see, taste, touch, hear and receive pictures on the nature of delusion. Make sure you are firmly seated in your meditation as the witness or observer and from there, explore as the qualities of delusion arise.  Be prepared that the energy associated with delusion will not feel as good as when you do this process asking to feel intuition in its pure state. Notice where the feelings of discomfort associated with delusion are in your body, paying close attention to your belly and solar plexus. It is also recommended to journal about your experience. As you bring the meditation to a close, be certain to use a practice that helps you to ground your energy and complete the experiment with delusion.

You can try the same thing to experience what fantasy is and how it is different from intuition. Make sure to also sit and observe what pure intuition is. 

Get to know these distracting filters so you can let your intuitve light shine! And if more and more, you end up at the right place at the right time, enjoy the treasures you find. For a fascinating scientific exploration of the mystery of intuition, check out Malcolm Gladwell’s book Blink.

Image: ana rodriguez

Just as I began to roll up my sleeves to see what my part in the coming four years would be, I decided to take a walk with Deborah Anapol, Ph. D., author of The Seven Natural Laws of Love
(sevenlawsoflove) and relationship coach to discuss the growing concern shared among women about the way women have been relating to each other – and where do we go from here as we build community and grow in virtues of sustainability?

I am a 30-something and Deborah is a 50-something.  In fact, she had changed a great deal in her physical appearance in the year and a half since I had seen her, and is now embodying her gentle presence with a decidedly more Elder flavor. In indigenous cultures the world over and through out time, the Elders have provided a level of support to the culture through years of seeing human nature reveal itself as well as by taking part in Mother Nature’s cycles. They have experienced love’s coming and going and by tuning into what creates harmonious relationships among groups of people who are invariably deeply interdependent on each other, have gained wisdom. Modern life has given us the airplane, car, jogging shoes and fast track to escape many group dynamics if we so choose. In the coming years, our ability to create unity is going to be our greatest natural resource.

Deborah spoke of her own journey to claim herself as an Elder with wisdom to share. The talk from other women in their late forties and beyond is the same. They are speaking of the confusion of nearing 50 and finding themselves considering if they are at the crossroads of youth, needing to enjoy the fruits of single life or graduate into life as an elder.

Creating a healthy and sustainable planet involves knowing what you are here to share and how, not to mention the role women play with each other as they address the increase in longevity, longer and longer cycles of youth and vitality, greater opportunity in careers, sexual freedom in part due to fewer people being in long term marriages and many more women choosing to not have children. How will the West adopt the Elder woman in larger numbers to the social circle so her beauty, vitality and wisdom are viable and not based on false glamours or harsh cosmetic approaches? And how will the Elder woman make what she has available, not just to herself but to serve the sustainable collective?  How will younger women embrace Eldering women in the West? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Image: Powderruns

The environment is in trouble. The economy is even worse. The election has us all on the edge of our seats. If you’re feeling tense, depressed, or just plain old stressed, here are some quick tips to up the optimism. We face challenges, yes, but there’s plenty of good if you look around:

Know that you have the power to make positive changes in your life, and that your life will touch the lives of others.
Expect the best.
Remember what you’re grateful for ““ every day.
Stay present.
Be willing to let go of your assumptions about yourself and the world.
Remember that what happened in the past will not automatically happen in the future.
Be persistent, assertive and confident.
Acknowledge that pain, disappointment and failure are a part of life ““ but not all of life.
Make a list of motivating and inspiring quotes.
When you make a plan, believe in it!
Make sure to read about the good news that’s happening in the world. Try Great News Network. 
Take care of your health and eliminate junk food! (A good rule of thumb: avoid “white” foods.)
Don’t dwell on the past or obsess over the future. It’s hard, but try to focus on the moment.
Get rid of your jangly alarm and wake up to soothing sounds. Who ever invented the screeching alarm clock, anyway?
Be open minded to new situations and ideas. We all have biases that color our judgment and cloud our thinking.
Remember: things change! Everything changes, and it’s helpful to accept this rather than resent it.
Instead of worrying about general problems, get more specific to come up with a solution.
Stop taking things so personally. Try not to internalize what’s going on around you.
Be generous and help others.
Keep a diary ““ not just of the bad times, but the good times, too!

Image: elusive.

Got problems with your family, your boss, or your co-workers? Who doesn’t? Conflict and disagreement are natural parts of life; what really matters is how you choose to deal with them. Tonglen is one incredibly personal tool for dealing for difficult circumstances.

Tonglen meditation has been in practice since at least the 10th century. It’s particularly empowering because it gives you an opportunity to imagine yourself actively changing a situation with the power of your heart. Here’s how it was taught to me.

Close your eyes and breathe; take a moment to get into your space and your body.
Visualize someone or something you have difficulties with (even an aspect of your own self) seated in front of you, facing you.
See the dark clouds of conflict and suffering surrounding the person seated in front of you.
Visualize yourself breathing in those dark clouds and bringing them into your heart.
In your heart, transform the darkness into light and exhale that light onto the difficulty in front of you.
Keep doing this breathing visualization until that which is facing you is surrounded by light.

Tonglen is a great meditation if you are having trouble forgiving someone, or if you know someone who is ill and want to send them energetic healing. The power of this practice is that it takes you out of victim mode by empowering you to choose healing and transform a perceived darkness into light. Let us know how it works for you!

Image: Jakub Hia