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I do my best to keep it updated when I'm on the road.
Hello – thanks for visiting . . . I should be getting more regular about blogging now that the book is at the publisher’s. I am in regroup mode---so much gets puts off when I’m writing a book---plus I have those autumnal instincts about getting down to business. To catch you up with my life since my last post, my daughter Adair and I had the wonderful boon of spending the last week of September at the Greenhouse Resort and Spa in Some of the things I’ve brought home with me are It was also the best thing I could think of to have five days with my daughter. Since she’s been married and busy with her husband, dogs, apartment, acting, and day job (personal trainer), time with her is rare and more precious than ever. We both got so relaxed! One amazing service The Greenhouse offers is what they call a tuck-in: a massage therapist comes by at bedtime to give guests a back or shoulder rub. What a place! Oh, speaking of Adair: a couple of days ago at her gym, a man went into cardiac arrest in the pool. He had no pulse. Adair is certified in CPR and was able to get his breathing back before the paramedics arrived. Our family has this gentleman in our prayers, of course, and Adair is adamant that everybody take a CPR course. It’s a simple Saturday commitment or a couple of evenings. Log onto www.redcross.org to find a class coming up in your area. The other night, William and I saw Barbra Streisand in concert in Earlier that day, I was the guest of Alexandra Stoddard, one of my favorite authors (www.alexandrastoddard.com; Living a Beautiful Life, Creating a Beautiful Home, The Gift of a Letter, and Time Alive are some of her many books), at the annual luncheon of the Riot Relief Fund, an organization of which her husband Peter Brown is president. The Fund helps police and fire widows and families. The luncheon was held at a private club built in the 1860s, and we were entertained by the NYPD Pipe & Drum Corps. It was like going back in time, even though the organization’s work is very much about helping today. Tomorrow morning I’m heading out for Wednesday is William’s and my 9th anniversary. We’ll go to our favorite restaurant, Candle 79, and then to hear Bob Woodward at the 92nd Street Y. These nine years have passed very quickly and so much has happened. Our kids aren’t little anymore and only one, William’s youngest son James, even falls under the rubric “kid.” We’ve lived in I guess that had better end things. I have to pack (and figure out what the rules are this week about hair gel and lip gloss) and get things organized for the trip. I hope your life today is all you want it to be. With warm wishes,
Dear readers and friends – I’ve been rather silent due to the book deadline, but I wanted to reach out today and be in touch, deadline or not. This is a somber day in There’s a lot to share from me to you since I haven’t blogged in awhile. Let’s see, there’s: The way you look tonight…My stepdaughter Siân moved in with us last week. She’s a young makeup artist, trained in My old http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=features. (That will take you to today’s features, but if you scroll down you’ll get to last week’s. The story about me ran Thursday, September 7.) By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea…I spent the last week of August on writer’s retreat at the Serendipity Bed & Breakfast in The name game…On the book front, we’ve been going through a lot of discussion over the title. I am very lucky with this one that everyone at the publishing house is so behind the book, they want have input on the perfect title. The downside of that is that everyone has a different opinion. It was originally Fat, Broke & Lonely: The Stupid Lie that Runs Your Life & 5 Savvy Secrets for Breaking Free. Then my editor came up with one I love: How to Break Up with Fat, Broke & Lonely: When You’re Finally Ready to Split from Overeating, Overspending & Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places. I was sure that would fly, but some people think it sounds like a book on how to break up with a boyfriend/girlfriend, so we’re back to the drawing board. I wrote to my agent today: “We should just call it what it really says: God Doesn’t Want You Fat, Broke & Lonely.” She called back and said, “I really like God Doesn’t Want You Fat, Broke & Lonely.” As she spoke those words, a gorgeous orange butterfly flew past my window. You’ve got to understand: I’m on the far East 50s in All good things must end, they say…and one of the best things in my life is, sadly, coming to a close: my radio shows, A Charmed Life and A Charmed Life II, on Martha Stewart Living Radio, Sirius 112. October 1, Sunday at A few of my favorite things…Well, a few of my favorite books actually. I’ve been introduced to so many fabulous books for the radio show. Some of the ones I’ve loved lately have been Diary of a Modern-Day Goddess by Cynthia Daddona; Microthrills by Wendy Spero; Unleash the Power of Nature Foods by Susan Smith Jones; The Office Sutras by Marcia Menter; and The Flip by David Rippe and Jared Rosen. For now, I’d love to share with you one that I absolutely love: The Red Book: A Deliciously Unorthodox Approach to Igniting Your Divine Spark, by Sera Beak. I met Sera last week and she is an utterly delightful 27-year-old with a Masters in Divinity from Harvard. She has whirled with dervishes, volunteered at Mother Teresa’s Home for the Dying in I wish you all every good thing. If anyone is reading this who has a personal connection to someone who died five years ago today, know that you are in the thoughts of many, many people, and certainly in mine. --
August 14 – Overdue blog Hi, everybody – Between the book, the show, the summer, and the fact that my computer has been on the fritz for two weeks (still in the shop---I’ve co-opted my husband’s to do this), I am, again, behind. So: I’ll write fast. I hope all is well with you. I’m so grateful that you want to visit and keep up with my meager goings-on. Let’s see, fun stuff: well, I had a delightful guest on my radio show this week, a young comedian named Wendy Spero (www.wendyspero.com) who has a brand new book out called Microthrills: Reflections on a Life of Small Highs. If you like David Sedaris, you’ll love Wendy Spero. She tells these great tales of growing up with a single mom who’s a sex therapist, and how she’s recently moved to LA and is learning to drive for the first time. “In NY,” she says, “I could get up and go to the deli and know that there was no possibility that I’d kill anybody. Driving in LA, that’s no longer the case.” Anyway, she’s fun and funny and enchanting; do take a look at her stuff. And last week I had some instruction in funniness myself: I took a I’m three 10-chapter sections down on Fat, Broke & Lonely: The Stupid Lie that Runs Your Life & the 5 Power Principles for Breaking Free. The first principle deals with filling inner emptiness, the second with food and weight issues, the third with money issues. They’re good. I’m pleased with them and hope you and lots of new readers I don’t even know yet will be, too. Now I’m on the “lonely” part. And it’s a bear. I realize that even fat and broke, as painful as those states can be, can have some irony in them, and you can laugh at yourself and deal with the situation. Lonely is just plain depressing. I’m finding this section very hard to write. Part of it is that it’s bringing up memories with a lot of pain in them. But if I don’t go through those memories again, I won’t have anything to write, so I have to either face the feelings or face missing my deadline which I really don’t want to do. Since I’m way behind on the book with the computer troubles and all, I’ve booked myself a room at a vegetarian bed and breakfast on the James, my 16-year-old stepson, is here from Adair is opening in The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe next week, and it will be fun to see her in a large role again. She is so committed and works so hard. I couldn’t have done that at 23. I guess that’s about it from me for now. If you’re in the NY area, I’m speaking Sunday August 20th at Unity of New York, Symphony Space, 95th & Broadway, 11 a.m. The topic is “The Elegant Art of the Spiritual Life.” It would be lovely to see you. And to you, wherever you are on this beautiful planet, may you have a day that is downright charmed. My very best, July 24 – A Blog-ette So many people have expressed an interest in my interview with Immaculee Ilibagiza, author of Left to Tell: Finding God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust, that I wanted to let those of you who don’t have Sirius Satellite in on a cost-effective way to sign or have a 3-day free trial so you can at least listen to the show with Immaculee: If you don't have Sirius, you can go to their website at http://www.sirius.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=Sirius/CachedPage&c=Page&cid=1018209032790 and either buy a subsciption OR get a free 3-day trial membership that will allow you to listen on your computer via the internet. This is thanks to my brilliant assistant Joya Scott who can find things online I couldn’t begin to think of. (William and I went to her play, The Answer Is Horse, yesterday and it was terrific.) -- Best wishes, July 18 – A Midsummer Day’s Blog Hello, all. I’m three days late on my promised 15th/30th schedule, but sometimes I believe these things take form when they’re supposed to. We’re having a lovely summer day after several scorchers. I promised I wouldn’t complain since the winter here pretty much lasts till June, but when it was too humid to breathe, I complained a little. To anyone who didn’t get the mailing about the audio of Fit from Within: it is ready and available from www.simplyaudiobooks.com. It is free for the first 30 days, but at least half of that, maybe more, has passed, so if you’d like a downloadable audiobook of Fit from Within: 101 Simple Secrets to Change Your Body & Your Life at no cost, go the Simply Audiobooks site right now. William and I have been walking to I’m working hard on Fat, Broke and Lonely and think I have some good stuff. Prayers appreciated. As you know, this book was not my idea and I have to trust that it was given to me to write because I really am the person to write it, that it will reach its intended audience, do good in the world, and carry me to my next indicated thing. My deadline was moved up from 12/1 to 9/15 so I’m aiming at a chapter (about 1200 words) a day. When the Muse shows up---today she did---that’s easy. When she doesn’t, it’s a grind. The radio show is the most fun. I love it to pieces. I hope you get Sirius Satellite as soon as you can so you can listen. I think you can now get a subscription and listen on your computer so you don’t have to buy a special radio as was the case before. If you’re interested, go to www.sirius.com and see what it says. I’m techno-challenged, but I did hear this over at the Sirius studios so it should be right.
This is Weddings Week at Martha Stewart Living so my guest for Saturday will be Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway, author of The Wedding Goddess: Turning Wedding Stress Into Wedding Bliss, and afterwards I’ll tape the show that will air Sunday, July 30, probably the most important show I’ve done so far. I’ll have on Imaculee Ilibagiza whom you may have seen on the last PBS special with Wayne Dyer. Imaculee survived the Rwandan genocide, although it took almost her entire family and she herself was starved and hunted for three months. During this time of going through what no being God ever made should have to, she had profound spiritual experiences that led to her knowing that she had to forgive the murderers. She prayed 15 to 20 hours a day while hidden in a tiny bathroom with eight other women and wasting away to 65 pounds. When she prayed, the fear left her. She became convinced that although evil had overtaken these people, their souls were not evil; they had done horrific things and had to be held responsible for their actions but they were still God’s children. Her book is Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwadan Holocaust. Please buy this book and read it and let it lift you up. Christiane Northrup gave a blurb and said, “This book renwed my faith in God and the Universe in a profound and real way that has changed me forever.” I so concur. I want to give it as a gift to everyone I know. We need this kind of faith and love right now, maybe more than ever. The world situation weighs heavy on my mind, of course. Living here in Last weekend we went to a cabaret performance because our neighbor, veteran composer and performer, John Wallowitch was appearing. One of the other artists on the program was Julie Gold, composer of the moving song Bette Midler recorded, “From a Distance.” You know the one: “From a distance, we are instruments, playing in a common band. It’s a song of hope, a song of peace, a song of everyman….” It seems so apropos, so necessary. I wish it could be piped into the halls of Congress and the UN and everywhere else that people make decisions that impact the world. Julie has agreed to be on my show this fall---appropriately on Veteran’s Day, November 11. I am so excited and grateful. And life goes on: working out, climbing rocks, writing at Starbucks every morning, tending to the rest of my multi-faceted business life at home in the afternoons. (It’s weird to call what I do a business. I mean, I make my living at it, but I don’t think of it as a business. It’s more a calling or a commitment or a passion or just what I came here to do.) My daughter Adair opens tonight in “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” at the Inwood Shakespeare Festival (obviously not all Shakespeare, but all classical theatre) in Tonight William and I will go down to the Tomorrow night we’ll have dinner in the theatre district with Jack Moran, my first (deceased) husband’s eldest brother who will be in from I spoke in My very best,
Something to blog about… Happy holiday (and to you who are self-employed: what are you doing at your computer? It’s a holiday.) Of course, I’m at my computer but am feeling enough of the holiday spirit to be taking some blog-time instead of jumping right into my writing for the day. My life has been rich and full. The past few days we’ve had as our houseguest from My second taping was Sherry Boone, my spiritual “action partner” and an amazing soprano who’s appeared on Broadway in Jelly’s Last Jam, Marie Christine, and Ragtime. Our topic: “Star Quality.” Sherry and I had such a lively conversation I kept thinking “TV show, TV show. . .I think we could have a TV show. . .” We’ll see about that. You can hear the radio show if you’d like on Sunday, July 9, Anyway, after Sherry’s taping she and Chris and I went to On Sunday Chris spoke for Unity of New York with the message that we are indeed here only to love. He told the story of his relationship with his dad, a man who is very narrow in his views of life, lifestyle, and religion. For years the two of them did not speak. Then Chris realized that he didn’t have to understand his father, only love him. And when he did that, the love poured out from his dad’s side, too. They still don’t understand each other and his father has never been to Chris’s church (the Center for Spiritual Living in After church, Chris and my husband William and I saw the final performance of Doubt on Broadway. It was a gripping drama, superbly acted by Dame Aileen Atkins and Ron Eldard. I usually only pay Broadway prices for musicals, but the dramas can be so moving. I mentioned in my last blog going to the Wednesday matinee of Awake & Sing! There was a small black dog in the show and during a pregnant pause in the second act, an elderly man in the audience announced for all to hear: “That dog’s a really good actor.” Ah, the theater! Another moving and adventurous day for me was Thursday, June 29. I usually dash off to Starbucks to work on my book first thing, but that morning I read the newspaper before I left and learned that the entire collection of Martha Luther King’s written artifacts---homework from school and seminary, letters, notes for speeches and sermons, telegrams---would be on display at Sotheby’s just until And it was breathtaking. I was fighting tears as soon as I got in the room. I’m always moved by people’s handwritten works. It’s as if they leave a bit of themselves behind with the words. And rather like the psychics who claim they can “read” a person if they’re holding her necklace or his money clip, I felt I was with Dr. King as I perused his voluminous writings. Later, when I did get to my computer, I was enlivened. It was if spending an hour in the presence of greatness had opened the channels for inspiration to flow to me. That evening, I went to the Oxonian Society to hear Ralph Abernathy. The Oxonians are the The final thing I’ll share is about my talk on June 25 at Mama Gena’s School of the Womanly Arts (www.mamagenas.com ) . I’d heard about Mama Gena’s from TV---it’s been featured on Today and all over the place---and knew it was a program to teach woman to accept and enjoy themselves sexually and passionately, to unleash the power of pleasure and the power within. They use my book Fit from Within as one of their texts, and I’d had this date to speak on my calendar for a couple of months. When the day came, however, I was tired, my book deadline had been moved up, and I could have used a Sunday afternoon off. Then I got there. What amazing energy!---150 women believing in themselves and their right to enjoy their bodies and their lives. Mama Gena greeted me and said, “By the way, there are some VIPs in the front row---Dr. Christiane Northrup and her daughters, and Heather Graham.” Wow. Dr. Northrup has endorsed two of my books but we’d never met. And Heather Graham---my goodness! Rollergirl! And I’d loved her in The Guru, a comedy with a message. Well, VIPs or not, out I went to “Here Comes the Sun,” the theme song for my radio show, blaring from mega-speakers. It was thrilling. I spoke about the gist of Fit from Within---if eating is a problem, give it to your Higher Power; be willing to sit through the cravings until they go away; and treat yourself very, very well. Then I shared the “free square” concept from Creating a Charmed Life and that day’s idea from Younger by the Day, “More Fun Tomorrow.” During the q & a, a woman had a question about her husband who’d started writing and how she could help him. As part of my answer, I shared that my husband had also started writing (The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Playing the Harmonica and The New American Expat) and had also written a wonderful screenplay. There’s some serious interest in it and, just as she’s plugging for her husband to get a publisher, I’m praying and envisioning that William’s screenplay becomes a movie. At the book table afterwards, a woman came up to me who works for a major studio. She said they’re looking for family-friendly scripts and for William to send his over, which he has done. Of course there are no guarantees about anything, but I absolutely love seeing how the flow of life energy works. I was there, book deadline and all, met some people I’m so happy to know, shared the ideas I believe in with women who were open and receptive, and may have helped William take one further step toward his dream. Just thinking of how things work in that way makes me smile. In closing, I just want to let you know that there is an article in the August issue of Body & Soul called “Dare to Dream!” I didn’t write it but I was interviewed for it and they use my vision map as the illustration for how to do one. So if you have any interest in learning more about vision-mapping and taking a look at my current one (it has the cutest picture of a pig on it…), get yourself the August Body & Soul. (And my show on Saturday July 8 will be about vision-mapping.) Okay, friends, I’d better get my breakfast and head down to the café to write. I go there to get the stimulation of other people and the blissful isolation of knowing that nobody needs me for anything. That seems to be the perfect balance for writing. Be well and happy and thanks for stopping by. I’ll do another entry in the middle of the month. May your life be charmed, June 20, 2006 Dear friends, readers, and listeners -- There’s an old song that goes, “I’m gonna sit right down and write myself a letter….” That’s what I told myself just now: before I empty the dishwasher, put the fresh produce away, make dinner, and eat it, I’m gonna write myself a letter and send it out to all of you. This won’t have regular newsletter format and I can’t promise one of those until my book is finished. Still, so many new people have signed up for the list, I wanted to at least send out a blog entry and let all of you, longtime subscribers and brand new ones, know that you’re appreciated and thought of. The news from here is that I’m probably busier than a self-care advocate ought to be, but I’m busy with the life I always dreamed of, so it can’t be all bad. And I’m taking a suggestion myself from Creating a Charmed Life and “practicing the vacation principle” tomorrow. I’m taking myself to a Wednesday matinee of Awake and Sing! which won the Tony this year for best revival of a play. It will be playing hooky, however, because my editor has asked if I can have the new book (with a subtitle I’m finally crazy about) in by mid-September instead of December 1. That would guarantee a summer pub date for Fat, Broke & Lonely: The Stupid Life that Runs Your Life and 5 Smart Strategies for Breaking Free. Otherwise, it will come out in January ’08 which is far, far off and winter. I toured with Younger by the Day in January ‘05 and it was pretty rough. In the meantime, the book and the radio show have me in harness. My assistant, Joya Scott, is working out beautifully and I think she’ll be able to start coming ten hours a week instead of eight. I wish I could have her all the time, but not only is that in my budget, she has exciting things of her own to do, notably directing a play she conceived herself (about the notorious Stanley Milgram experiments in the 60s) for an upcoming festival. I am loving the radio show and hope that if you have Sirius Satellite, or know someone who has it, that you’re tuning in. “A Charmed Life” is my live show on Martha Stewart Living Radio, Sirius 112, on Saturday afternoons at 2 p.m. Eastern; it re-airs during the early, early (5 a.m. Eastern!) “life-coaching hour” on the same channel Tuesday mornings. Just this month, I’ve expanded to a second show, “A Charmed Life 2,” which airs on Sunday afternoons at A guest I taped last month (to air September 9 when I’ll be speaking in remember to write down your vision statement then...your benefit statement then read it daily with wonderful music. Things will flow into place. And...BTW....I needed the reminder of this great feminine form of power!—Lori Finlay Hamilton, www.womenwisdomwellness.com. I’ve had lots of wonderful radio guests recently. Yesterday I taped a show (that will air June 29 and July 2) with Dawna Stone who won “The Apprentice: Martha Stewart.” She’s absolutely delightful: motivated, motivational, and a real fitness role model. She was a competitive swimmer, does triathlons, and founded Her Sports and Fitness magazine. This Saturday I’m interviewing Barbara Stanny, the H&R Bloch heiress who ended up with money troubles and has since become a financial guru in her own right; her latest book is Overcoming Underearning. (The full lineup of all the shows is on www.marthastewart.com and www.charmedliferadio.com.) In other personal news, my husband William and I joined a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) this summer and have been getting beautiful fresh produce every Tuesday afternoon, today included (that’s the produce I have to put away). The split-out is in front of a church on the Speaking of juxtapositions, last week William and I went to the Gretchen Wilson “Redneck Revival” (you know I didn’t make that up) concert at Sunday before last, I spoke at Unity of New York and had a wonderful time. You know, sometimes things just work. It was like that. My topic was “The Oldtime Religion.” (I think you can order a CD of that talk by calling the church at My daughter Adair is rehearsing for the Inwood Shakespeare Festival here in the city, and my son-in-law Nick has a role in the in-production movie of The Nanny Diaries. It’s a fairly small part (he plays a mime) but he’ll have a credit which should mean that he and Adair will be attending the premier when the film comes out next year. My stepdaughter
Oh, I have some books to recommend! A couple of fun summer novels are Glamorous Disasters by Eliot Schrefer, and 24-Karat Kids by Dr. Judy Goldstein and Sebastian Stewart. The former is by a young man who was an That is going to have to do it from me for tonight. I will ask Joya on Thursday to start collecting info for a proper newsletter next time. In the meanwhile, please come by the blog either on my site, on Amazon, or at blogger.com. I am promising myself (and you) that I’ll write something for the blog on the 1st and 15th of every month. In the meantime, enjoy summer (it took a long time coming, at least to the Northeast) and treat yourself very, very well. My best,
Happy holiday weekend. I feel that with every blog entry I find myself apologizing for not having done one sooner. It’s hard to get to everything, although I have hired an awesome part-time assistant. I feel very blessed to have found her. Her name is Joya. Someone told me that means “jewel” in Portuguese. I think she is one. A problem I’ve discussed with other authors is that many of us feel that we’re “word-drained.” It’s interesting: we used to write only our books and articles for publication, but now a lot of us, myself included, are also doing blogs and newsletters and presentations, as well as composing emails for hours every day. It seems, then, that when we sit down to really write, our brains are kind of cleared out. My response to this is to do my writing for publication early in the morning when I’m freshest. I can meditate first, and go to the gym, but other than ME care (ME=meditation and exercise), writing has to be the first act of the day. And I am pleased to report that the book in progress, Fat, Broke and Lonely, is, I do believe finally revealing itself to me. It’s been tough, like decoding a puzzle, but it’s coming through. I have six months left to finish the writing and I do believe that will be enough. Some rather glittery things have been going on that I do want to share with you. This past Friday evening I was invited by my friend, the amazing soprano Sherry Boone (www.operaathome.com), to an wonderful evening honoring author, Nobel Laureate, and Pulitzer Prize winner Toni Morrison who is leaving Sherry Boone, my friend and confidante, sang the most moving aria, with lyrics by the multi-talented honoree. I was ready to jump up and start the first standing ovation of the evening, but magically and wonderfully President Clinton and Toni Morrison beat me to it! I was practically in tears. Someone I know and love, and someone that I know works very, very hard both at her craft and at keeping real life afloat as an artist in this city, was honored by a man who led the free world and a woman who’s received a Nobel Prize. I will hold that image and that memory in my heart for a long, long time. It was a totally amazing evening. Afterwards, I went out to hail a cab and the heavens opened with an extremely generous rainstorm. Taxis were hard to come by and I stood there literally watching my vintage blouse shrink its way from having full-length sleeves to three-quarter. When a cab finally showed up, I took off my favorite heels to wade through a puddle to the taxi door. It was so, I don’t know, Breakfast-at-Tiffany’s-like? I smiled till my jaws ached. And that was my second glittery shindig in a week! (Something is happening; I’m just not sure what….) Anyway, the previous Saturday night was the 20th Annual gala for Farm Sanctuary (www.farmsanctuary.org), the first farm animal shelter and refuge in My mother-in-law was a supporter of Kucinich’s candidacy for the Democratic nomination in the last election and we asked if he’d write her a note. He did, and signed it “Best wishes and love…” I’m not sure our country is ready for someone who signs notes to supporters with “love,” but I look forward to the day that we will be. (Rep. Kucinich is going to be a guest on my show with his lovely bride Elizabeth. I don’t do politics on the show so they’re going to talk about how they found true love. The story, which is delightful, is on his website: www.kucinich.us.) The most thrilling and inspiring part of the evening, however, was that it was for the animals. This is a cause so close to my heart. There was something to celebrate, the recent ban in the city of Yesterday’s guests on A Charmed Life (Martha Stewart Living Radio, Sirius 112) were an integrative cardiologist Patrick Fratellone, MD, (www.fratellonemedical.com) and raw food chef and author Rhio (www.rawfoodinfo.com). Her cookless book, Hooked on Raw, may be my very favorite raw food recipe book. And she was kind enough to provide the following recipes to share with you. So I’ll sign off with appreciation for your support of my work and your interest in my goings-on. My very best,
Blueberry Jello 1 pint blueberries 2 bananas 1/2 lemon or lime, juiced 1) Blend all the ingredients in a blender. Pour into custard cups and chill. Makes 4 custard cups. Keeps for 2 days in the refrigerator. Hibiscus Punch Hibiscus is a flower which is dried and much used in FOR 2 QUARTS OF PUNCH: 1 1/2 quarts of filtered water 1/4 cup dried hibiscus flowers 1 pint of mixed fresh fruit juices (try orange, tangerine and/or pineapple juice) 3 tbsp. raw honey or to taste garnish with a few grapes 1) Put the dried hibiscus flowers into 1 1/2 quarts of filtered water, stir and let sit at room temperature overnight or for at least 3 hours. The water will become a beautiful shade of pink. 2) Drain the flowers and discard. Transfer the hibiscus water to a punch bowl, add the other ingredients and blend well. Refrigerate until cold. 3) When ready to serve, float grapes in the punch bowl. Serve with a slice of tangerine on the rim of each glass. If you want a gallon, double the recipe. Keeps for 3 to 4 days in the refrigerator. Almond Milk 1 cup soaked almonds (soak overnight in filtered water) 3 to 3 1/2 cups filtered water 1) Drain the almonds. 2) Put the almonds into a blender with 1 1/2 cups of filtered water and blend well. Add the remainder of the water and blend again. 3) Pour the mixture into a cotton or muslin bag or cloth and squeeze out all the milk. This is simple, plain almond milk. For Sweet Almond Milk 4) Put the plain Almond Milk into a blender and add a few pitted dates and a little ground vanilla bean and blend well. Yield: Almost a quart. Plain Almond Milk keeps for up to 5 days in the refrigerator. The Sweet Almond Milk keeps 1-2 days. After storage, the milk separates - so shake well before using. Note: To grind a vanilla bean, put into a coffee grinder. Note: You could use the same basic recipe to make Hearty Buckwheat Porridge 1/4-1/2 cup hulled raw buckwheat 10-15 almonds 1/4 cup raisins or currants 1 banana 1 small mango (or other fruit like papaya or berries)_ 1/2 cup filtered water additional filtered water for soaking the buckwheat 1) At night, soak 1/4 to 1/2 cup raw buckwheat in one cup of filtered water. 2) In the morning, strain and rinse the buckwheat well. It will release a mucilaginous liquid, but keep rinsing until the water is clear. 3) Heat up 1/2 cup filtered water on the stove only to the point where you can still put your finger in, and then turn off the flame. Pour the hot filtered water into the blender, add in the rest of the ingredients and blend to a cream. Serves 1
Hi, everybody – Thanks for stopping in. I think I’ve found a part-time assistant and I’m thrilled. I’ve been so overwhelmed that the thought of a lot of those details easing up is absolutely delicious. I’ve chosen someone who’s very good with web stuff so I will soon be doing links and other web things I’ve not ventured into before. I had a beautiful Mother’s Day and hope you did, too. Adair came over to watch the last three episodes of Big Love that I’d saved for her on Tivo. Then we went to her place to walk the dogs in I admire her so much. She works hard---she’s on fulltime now at the health club where she works, plus training her personal clients, going to auditions, voice classes, rehearsals and performances, and being a wife, “mom” to two dogs (one an elder, one a puppy), co-homeowner, and volunteer dog-walker for a shelter. She’s also gone back to the Chinese studies she started when she was eight, taking classes and working with a language partner. It’s interesting to look at her today, at twenty-three, and think back on our home-schooling past. I was of the “learning from life” philosophy and followed her lead quite a bit. Her interest in theater put literature and history into the curriculum; our travels broadened her horizon and led to the Chinese studies; math we did because we had to and science she’s become much more interested in now than she was as a kid. The home-schooling experts I read at the time emphasized that education should be a never-ending process, and I see that in my daughter today. (So I’m a boringly proud mom. Please allow me this Mother’s Day indulgence.) I’d like to share with you the link to Body & Soul magazine. If you’ve been to my site or followed my blog, you know I’m a contributing writer there. They’re now featuring all their contributing writers---people like Cheryl Richardson, Jennifer Louden, and me---on their newly designed website, www.bodyandsoulmag.com. Take a look: I think you’ll like what you see. It’s Hi, everybody. Ya know how awful you feel when you totally screw up? Well, I did. I had a very busy day with a breakfast meeting, a writer’s meeting, and my radio show, but I’d scheduled to meet a friend after the show at the I’m doing something fun you may be interested in: recording a downloadable audio of Fit from Within: 101 Simple Secrets to Change Your Body and Your Life. I did the first chunk of reading on Thursday and will finish up two afternoons/evenings this week. When everything is ready, it will be offered through a company called www.simplyaudiobooks.com. For the first thirty days it’s available, it will be free---no kidding. I’ll let you know when it’s out. And my friend and colleague Gail McMeeken, I hope all of you who are mothers will have (or did have) a beautiful Mother’s Day. I’ll spend the day with Adair---church, lunch, dog-walking, Macy’s---and we’ll meet up with Sian, who’ll be in a makeup seminar at I seem to most easily find the time to blog when I’m on the road. This morning I’m traveling by train from There is something about nonattachment going on here. It’s natural, I think, to want good things to last, to get the idea that the elements of our lives are like ducks in a row. In my case, there are the books, the speaking, the column, the radio program, all of which I like to think of as permanent structures building one on the other toward bigger and better things---a great big bestseller maybe, or a television show. But just because I can envision those things and do the work that lays the foundation for them, I don’t know what God has in mind for me. When I can let something go when its time is up (even if the timing seems way premature to me), I’m in the flow of my destiny in a way that I can’t possibly be when I’m swimming against the current. So I’m going to It’s a cloudy day but this is a lovely journey none the less. We’re going through Let’s see, what else can I fill you in on? Well, I’m going down to The Village three times a week for a chiropractic treatment for the neck injuries sustained in that accident back in March. The treatment is called decompression; it’s a kind of traction, not unpleasant and I have high hopes for it. That little accident actually reinjured two discs that were already problematic from a more serious accident years ago. I get frustrated with the limitations they impose---not being able to lift things (boxes of books, for instance), having to sit out a quarter of yoga class, telling massage therapists to stay away from my neck. The program is a 20-treatment package. I’ve had three so far. The whole thirty minutes I’m there I affirm how well it’s working. And I’m looking in earnest for a part-time assistant. The one I tried didn’t work out; she really wanted a full-time job and I’m only offering two afternoons a week. I put an ad on Craigslist and have received some 200 responses. A substantial majority are artists of some sort, many of them with BFAs and MFAs, plays that have been produced, paintings that have been in galleries. As I read the notes and resumes, I wish I could meet all of them because they seem like such fascinating people. I know, of course, that I can’t waste people’s time like that and I can only contact the ones who really seem as if they’d be ideal for the job. I’m looking for someone who has something else going on in his/her life so that working for me eight hours a week to start, maybe working up to twelve or fifteen in the future, would be just fine. I’d like the person to live within reasonable commuting distance: traveling two hours to work for four could get really old really fast. I need someone who’s enough like me that we get along (someone who’s familiar with the self-help/spirituality genre of books would be nice) but whose skills fill in where mine are lacking: technology and organization mostly. I am really praying about this. It would be such a blessing to my life and work to have someone who’ll stay with me for a few years and be part of my mission. Finally, I’m having so much fun with the radio show. This past weekend the authors of Working with You Is Killing Me, Katherine Crowley and Kathi Elster, were on the live show, and we taped a future show with Trish McEvoy of Trish McEvoy Cosmetics and one of her makeup artists, Tracey Aloia. It’s so delightful, the chatter and banter and girl talk. And I learn something from every guest. From Katherine and Kathi, for instance, I learned that you can recognize a potential saboteur in the workplace or elsewhere when the person is sappy-sweet and compliments you nonstop. And from Trish I learned that the foolproof way to apply eyeliner is to look down into a mirror instead of straight ahead. I did it this morning: flawless (even though I hadn’t had enough sleep). Thanks for your interest in this writer’s life. I hope yours is going beautifully today. n Addendum – Now I’m heading back to We went to a Cambodian restaurant. That’s a new cuisine for me. What I had was similar to Thai food---quite delicious. My husband is very conservative when it comes to food and I love going to restaurants with people who enjoy unusual food. Unfortunately, my Blackberry decided to go haywire today so I haven’t been able to receive emails and I’ll have a backlog for tomorrow. I’m going to let that be tomorrow’s problem. Right now, I’m tired and chilled---it was rainy today and unseasonably cold. I intend to go home and eat a good dinner---mulligatawny soup (that word comes from the Tamil for pepper water---exactly the degree of spiciness that is appealing to me right now) and chana saag---chickpeas and spinach. Yum. And early to bed with my cat and a lot of gratitude. En route, Salt I’m writing this on a plane, definitely among my top 5 least favorite places. I’ve just finished a hard week of speaking---lovely in many ways but exhausting, too. First I went to I flew from there to By The retreat was wonderful. Women had come for it from One Now I’m on the plane which is pretty much the opposite of fun. Travel is hard on me (my Ayurvedic body type is Vata; ideally, Vata people shouldn’t travel beyond their state line.) With May 1st only a few hours away, and only one out-of-town gig booked and one pending between now and my December 1 book deadline, I have seven months to be a writer. I look forward to this time. I love writing a book. It’s like being pregnant, when most of your thoughts and expectations are on something growing quietly, ready to burst onto the scene at a later date. When I get home tonight, my computer will already be packed from the trip so it will be ready to take to Starbucks in the morning for my three to four hours of writing. First thing in the mornings, M-E---meditation and exercise, just like I tell everyone in the talks I give---and then my writing time. In the afternoons, everything else happens: coaching, email, mail-mail, phone messages, organizing and scheduling and record-keeping, appointments, errands, life stuff. But The flight from 1. I’m grateful to have experienced Sundance. 2. I’m grateful that I’m almost home. 3. I’m grateful that I have nice new clothes from 4. I’m grateful that I’ll get to see Adair this week. 5. I’m grateful for my radio show. 6. I’m grateful that I live in 7. I’m grateful that my husband loves me so much. 8. I’m grateful for all the beautiful, inspiring women I met on these back-to-back trips. 9. I’m grateful that I’ll get to read next week for the new downloadable audiobook of Fit from Within. 10.I’m grateful that I won’t have to get on an airplane or go to an airport again until the middle of July. Whoopee! Till next time, thanks for stopping by and sharing in my adventures and nonadventures. My very best -- Happy Shakespeare’s birthday! I know that because it was also Dede’s birthday, my honorary grandmother and first spiritual teacher. I’m thinking of her this April 23rd and sending her love beyond this world. She was born 112 years ago today! I am breaking my own rule of not turning on the computer on Sunday, but I’m so swamped and so behind, and I’m leaving town tomorrow for a week, so I’m making an exception. It doesn’t make me happy, but you know what they say about desperate times…. That’s a strong word, of course. Although “desperate” may well apply to the macrocosmic problems facing our country and world, my microcosmic life is pretty perfect, outside the ongoing disc problems exacerbated by the accident last month. Even those have subsided, however, and I should be able to work out again, at least lower body and cardio, when I get back from the week’s speaking trip. That will help me feel as if I’m not as delicate as I’ve had to act these past four weeks. The details of my five jobs are my biggest challenge right now. The five jobs are (1) author (my book is due December 1 and I must go seriously reclusive starting in May to get that done), (2) speaker (after this week in Lincoln, Nebraska, and Sundance, Utah, I have only one out-of-town speaking gig lined up before the book is due---that’s on purpose and necessary), (3) life coach, (4) columnist and magazine writer, and (5) radio host. I’ve learned that although I was hired as a host, I’m actually doing what is traditionally considered a producer’s tasks as well in that I book my own guests. This entails finding them; getting their press kits, books, etc., and studying those; reconfirming with details about where to come, etc.; getting guest names to the building so they can get through security; giving the Martha Stewart Living web editor the schedule a month in advance; sending her a summary of each show after it happens; keeping the radio page on my site updated; and sending thank-you notes to the guests. Oh---also doing the interviews, but that’s the easy part. For all the work, I absolutely love doing the show. Yesterday my live-show guests were Dayle Haddon (www.dayle.com, Five Principles of Ageless Living) and Michele Bernhardt (www.innerworldmedia.com, Colorstrology: What Your Birthday Color Says About You---the book is gorgeous; for a quick look at your birthday color before you get the book, though, just go to her site). After the live show, we taped the April 29 program with Jo Davidson and Alice Marie from the Podcast Let’s Get Metaphysical (www.letsgetmetaphysical.net). A friend of mine, John St. Augustine, a longtime radio guy, wrote to me: “TV is supposed to knock ‘em dead; radio is supposed to knock ‘em living.” I like that. My aim is to inject lots of life and hope and promise into each show. Last week I went to From Today I skipped church so I could get caught up before my trip and also to stay warm and dry and take care of my physical self. I’ve been chilled several time this week---the plane, the conference center in Atlanta, and an unseasonable shiver-cold rainstorm here yesterday---so I want to take care of myself for the big week ahead. My daughter is coming over this afternoon to eat Indian food and watch back episodes of Big Love since she and Nick don’t have HBO. That should be pleasant since it’s still raining and is a good day for staying inside and tending to the basics of life: family, laundry, packing, and tidying up loose ends, with some intrigue and polygamy on TV in the background. I like this day. It’s not flashy, but it will pass less quickly than the flashy ones and it will leave me nourished. Best wishes to you – Hi, friends – Today was my first show on Martha Stewart Living Radio. It was so much fun! It also really felt right, as if I’ve been waiting for this for a long, long time. At first I was nervous and read from my notes, but as I talked with my wonderful guests Jerrold Mundis and Rev. Paul Tenaglia, it seemed very right. The topic was abundance, and we talked about getting out of debt and developing a prosperity consciousness. We got out a lot of good information and that felt good. (If you’re having trouble with money or debt, by the way, Jerrold Mundis offers a free ezine, The Mundis Letter: Solvency/Making Peace with Money; you can subscribe on his site, www.mundismoney.com.) Something else that was really special about the experience was leaving the building in Midtown and walking through Oh, I had some good news this week I want to share with you: two of my books, Younger by the Day and Creating a Charmed Life, are now stocked by Wal-Mart. They’re not in every store, just those whose book departments have self-improvement sections. William is visiting his mom in a suburb of Thanks to everyone who’s asked my recovery from the taxi mishap three weeks ago. I’m better but I am having some neurological symptoms and am scheduled for another Oh, speaking of learning: I learned a word today that I’ve thought should exist: eudaemonic. It means “producing happiness.” I’ve used the created term “happy-making” for this, i.e., “Being with my dog is happy-making.” Now I know it’s eudaemonic. I realize this is a pretty esoteric word so I don’t expect to be tossing it about in conversation; I’m just glad it’s there. To all of you who’ve been celebrating Passover, I trust you’ve enjoyed a lovely week with family and a new understanding of what it means to be free. For those who observe Easter, may it be a joyful day for you, filled with new life and hope and promise. -- I admit it: I’m a lazy blogger. My excuse is the taxi accident. I was more jostled than I’d thought at first. One of the two herniated discs in my neck, which I’ve had for years, seems to have been aggravated so I’m still in the cervical collar and just beginning to do some rehabilitative exercies. Using the laptop is not easy, although yesterday at Starbucks when I was working on the book, the nice people there gave me a doughnut box to set my computer on so I can see the screen without having to look so far down. In the world beyond my injury (it’s embarrassing how self-absorbed a person can get when hurt!), I’m working to line up guests for the radio show which has been lots of fun. They’ve offered me a two-hour show and I think I’m going to take it. I’m trying out a possible part-time assistant Friday afternoon. If she’s a good as she sounds, my life should get a whole lot easier. I’m due to get a newsletter out, so do sign up for that. I’ll have it done by early next week. Thanks for your patience and your prayers. --
March 29
Today is my daughter's 23rd birthday. She is a beautiful, compassionate young woman. I am so proud of her. This is also a New Moon in Aries. My astrologier friends tells me that makes it a perfect time to start new projects. I'm pretty laid up from the taxi accident (see prior post) but I want to give you the radio schedule for the first few weeks. I hope that all of you with Sirius will tune in and those who don't have it will find a friend who does.
March 26 I apologize for the length of time since posting last. A lot has been going on. I see the need for an assistant so clearly, but the logistics haven’t worked themselves out. I once had a very competent virtual assistant but I still found myself dealing with various “desk details” someone off-site couldn’t handle. I also had a part-time assistant who came in a couple of years ago but when she was here, I had no computer, so while she was helpful, I was pretty much out of business six hours a week. People are suggesting interns. We’ll see. I was also in a minor taxi accident and am going half-steam due to whiplash. (I am typing this while lying on the couch with my head on a Tempur-Pedic Pillow. It’s more comfortable than sitting up, but my neck is telling me this needs to be short.) One thing I do want to tell you about is my birthday which was March 21st. I had a lovely day. I went to a spirituality meeting in the a.m. and discovered that another woman there had my same birthday---same year even. She asked if being in the second half of my fifties bothered me and I said, “No, I’ve been going backwards since 50.” And I really have. I feel so much better, so much more alive, than I did six years ago. I went to breakfast with people from the group and then to the gym for the treadmill and a stretch class. (My husband gave me a course of personal training for a birthday gift---it was what I asked for, not a hint---but I started that the previous day. I didn’t want to work that hard on my birthday.) Then I went to Quintessence, a raw foods restaurant in the From there I came back to my neighborhood for a manicure and “European pedicure” (the kind with the extra massage and exfoliation---I’d never done that before) and then to dinner with William (my husband) and Adair (my daughter---Nick, Adair’s husband, was at work) at Pure Food & Wine, a gourmet raw foods restaurant. The food was divine, especially the raw chocolate cake. Then we met Nick in the theater district and saw Avenue Q, an adult This weekend was also interesting in that I was at the Carole Hyatt Leadership Seminar, “Getting to Next.” You can read about what Carole does in Well, friends, I need to lie on this healing pillow another ten minutes (without typing) and I’m back to church to be inducted in as an official member of Unity of New York City. I joined I’ll try to write again sooner rather than later. I also need to get a newsletter out, so if you’re not in the data base to receive the Charmed Life Letter, please sign up on the site. (It will go to your spam filter the first time probably, so look for it the first week of April and tell your email server that it’s safe to receive.) I’ll be letting you know about some of the exciting radio guests I’ve lined up. This is going to be so much fun. All good things to all of you –
March 12 Hello, everyone. It’s a cloudy Sunday evening and I’m looking at the Today after church we saw Altar Boyz, an energetic, uplifting, fun and funny off-Broadway musical; then stopped for groceries at Westerley Natural Foods Store; and came home to await to the season premier of The Sopranos. Everybody needs a guilty pleasure or two. Here’s something to listen to if you’d like to click on the link: http://www.AliceMarie.net/podcast/20060315_Lets_Get_Metaphysical.mp3 It’s a 20-minute (or a little less) podcast I did with two lovely interviewers. I hope you enjoy it. And speaking of audible things, I now have the date for my radio show, and its name and everything! (Can you tell I’m excited?) It will be called “A Charmed Life with Victoria Moran” and will be on Saturdays, And a final audible thing: the audiobooks of Shelter for the Spirit are finally ready. It’s a 2-CD set read by the author (me). You can only get them from me (there was a cassette tape from HarperCollins, it went out of print, and the rights reverted to me. I’ve never “published” anything myself before, so there was a learning curve). If you’d like one, they’re $20 (I’ll cover the shipping). You can drop me an email or call me to leave a private voice mail with your mailing address, credit card number, and expiration date. (Please don’t put your credit card number in an email; we can do that by phone.) I wish you a great week. A beautiful end-of-winter. A least one wish fulfilled. And whatever else your heart is hankering for. --
March 9 No actual entry today, but I did want to let you know about the Sundance Women's Health Retreat coming up late in April. If you'd care to give yourself a most nurturing getaway, this could be it: An Enrichment Weekend for With Spring just around the corner, there’s no better time for a Retreat, to replenish, revitalize, and renew oneself. This all-inclusive Women’s Retreat allows each participant to experience everything that Sundance has to offer. This Retreat makes a great Valentine’s gift, for that special someone in your life; and with Mother’s Day fast approaching, this Women’s Retreat would make an ideal gift. This Enrichment Weekend would also be a fun weekend for you and your friends to experience. Sundance offers an insightful enrichment weekend for women, April 27th-30th, 2006. Join us for a unique event that promises to rejuvenate the mind, body and spirit. Increase insight into women’s wellness with workshops and lectures. Awaken creative energy with classes in our Art Shack that may include pottery, painting, jewelry making or photography. Enjoy the unsurpassed beauty of Mt. Timpanogos in spring with a naturalist guided hike and relax in the Native American inspired spa with the power of healing touch. Dine in the Foundry Grill and Tree Room where seasonal cuisine and intimate ambiance combine to make a truly special culinary experience. The weekend will include a performance by Bluebird Cafe award-winning singer/song writers. Then, wake up to mountain splendor in a Sundance Suite exquisitely appointed with rustically elegant décor. Featured guest, Victoria Moran, author of such books as Lit From Within: A Simple Guide to the Art of Inner Beauty, featured on the Oprah Wynfrey Show; Creating a Charmed Life: Sensible, Spiritual Secrets Every Busy Woman Should Know; and Younger by the Day: 365 Ways to Rejuvenate Your Body and Revitalize Your Spirit. Moran's articles have appeared in Ladies' Home Journal; Woman's Day, Body and Soul, Weight Watchers Magazine, Natural Health and Yoga Journal. She has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, including two appearances on Oprah. She recently took on the Holistic Dictionary column in Martha Stewart's Body and Soul magazine. Moran's work has been noted in such publications as USA Today, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Glamour, Fitness, Allure, Health, Self, Cosmopolitan, Family Circle, Woman's World and O, the Oprah Magazine. For more information on this retreat, please call 800-892-1600 March 8 As circles of women tend to be, this was a truly lovely group. I looked around and felt both humbled and honored that all these women took time from their own lives to spend an evening helping with my new book. The group members were upfront with their reservations about the title (the same reservations I struggled with after my editor challenged me with this hard-hitting phrase) but they came up with some great subtitle ideas and some insightful comments about how Fat, Broke and Lonely can be seen as both shorthand for inner emptiness and as the threat the culture holds over women’s heads if they dare to be imperfect by the standards of society. My challenge as a writer is to do justice to both aspects, to help the reader get out from under the curse of perfection (and somebody else”s standard of perfection no less), and at the same time help her fill the empty places inside that she might otherwise want to fill with too much eating, too much spending, or too much dependence on other people. (Having done that kind of filling myself, I know it hurts.) Oh, people always like to know about the menu. Last night I served Lentil Shepherd’s Pie from The Cookbook for People Who Love Animals by Ingrid Newkirk; Aztec Salad from The Peaceful Palate by Jennifer Raymond (it’s black beans, corn, red and green peppers, and tomato---really good); Pasta Salad made by Adair; raw veggies with two kinds of hummus and my famous (okay, not famous, just often served) tofu dip (a pound of tofu in the food processor with a tablespoon of olive oil, a tablespoon of lemon juice, a teaspoon of rice vinegar, and sea salt, onion powder, lemon pepper, minced garlic, and dried dill [lots of dried dill] to taste); and fruit salad with cashew cream (blend raw cashews till they’re ground and then blend in orange/pineapple juice till you get a nice creamy consistency---totally yummy with no refined sweeteners). This morning I had a radio coaching session with Marice Tobias (www.tobiasEnt.com), an amazing media coach who was in Then I went to lunch with my husband at his favorite neighborhood Italian place (a rare treat since he usually can’t get away in the middle of the day), then to the gym for “Slow Sculpt” and “Posture Stretch” classes, and now I’m working---well, sort of: I’m at the computer anyway but talking with you never feels like work. Several people have written to me that they would be interested in being part of a telephone focus group for Fat, Broke and Lonely so I can get some out-of-New-York input. If you’d like to be part of that, please drop me a quick email at charmedlifelady@aol.com and include your phone number. Thanks.
Hello, visitors – first-timers and regulars. Thanks for stopping by. I have the Intro done for Fat, Broke and Lonely, and today I worked on chapter 1. I don’t know yet if that part is good: I just wrote. I got a later-than-planned start (9:30 instead of 8—friends came over to watch the Oscars so I had an later night than usual) and pretty much wrote through till 2:30. I’ll read it tomorrow and cull the brilliant from the embarrassing. Tomorrow night I’m having a gathering of half a dozen or so women to talk about the premise of the book and get their take on things. I’d also like to do some telephone focus groups with women outside New York City. If you’d be interested in being part of that, drop me an email at charmedlifelady@aol.com. Oh -- an Oscar note. It was fun to see Heart Phoenix next to her nominated son right there in the front row. I knew the family slightly through animal rights several years ago. We once visited them at their home in Florida. My daughter played with the kids, including Joaquin who was then called Leaf. It was a beautiful day with lovely people. Seeing two of them at the Academy Awards was extra-special. (I loved it that he brought his mom. He seems like such a nice guy.) My birthday is coming up March 21 and something I’ll be doing to start the year in the best way I know of is to attend one of the famous "Getting to Next" workshops put on by Carole Hyatt & Associates. Here’s the information if you’d like to be part of the experience as well:
You are invited to attend the “Getting to Next Workshop” with best selling author, international lecturer and renowned career strategist, Carole Hyatt March 24th and 25th 9:00 am – 5:30 pm Author of The New Woman's Selling Game, Shifting Gears, When Smart People Fail, and Lifetime Employability, Carole has designed this two-day interactive seminar to help women get in touch with their natural gifts and skills to develop strategies for uncovering new career paths and professional possibilities. Chart your career transition with other successful women, and discover why the Getting to Next workshop has been described as The “A-ha” Weekend. The program fee of $450 includes meals, workshop materials, access to the website bulletin board, invitations to special events (including the annual alumni reunion in New York), an autographed copy of Lifetime Employability, and access to a professionally diverse network of over 1000 graduates. Arlyn Imberman, a renowned handwriting expert and author of “Signature for Success”. Arlyn will be a workshop participant and a guest speaker. Her presentation is entitled “Reading Between The Lines, (what your handwriting says about you)”! And as an added bonus she will analyze individual handwriting samples! This will certainly prove to be another exciting and memorable part of the “Getting to Next” experience.! Registration is limited. To attend, please RSVP to tljacobs47@aol.com
Please send your business card along with a check made payable to: Carole Hyatt Associates Inc. c/o Tanya Jacobs 372 DeKalb Ave - 1i Brooklyn, NY 11205 The workshop will take place at the Beresford Apartments 7 W 81st Street, NY 10024
For more information, Please visit the program’s website: www.carolehyatt.com.
Or contact Joan Liman at joanliman@aol.com March 3 Hello, readers and friends .... I have been getting questions to answer so let me jump in. Someone wanted a recommendation for a book on meditation. One I like is How to Meditate by Lawrence LeShan. It=s not new but it=s excellent. Someone else asked about my being a vegetarian, how that started and why I do it. The first time I stopped eating meat I was thirteen. I=d never met a vegetarian and didn=t know what I was doing. I remember eating mostly cottage cheese and canned pineapple that summer. I finally got really hungry and when I was offered a steak I ate it. That ended the experiment, but I knew I would go back one day with more knowledge and a firm commitment. That happened when I was eighteen. I was living in Today it’s just a part of my life. I haven’t been perfect for the past thirty-five years: I went back to eating fish for a time, and it’s taken me a very long time to totally commit to being a vegan, not eating eggs or dairy as well as meat and fish. But the more I know animals and how wonderful they are, and the more I know about animals and about how they’re raised today in cruel confinement, the more committed I become. And I don’t just read about these things: I’ve done the research with my body. I’ve been to an egg factory where the chickens are crammed together unable to move or have anything resembling a normal life. I’ve been to a slaughterhouse where I saw a cow, terrified to step onto the moving ramp and go to her death, respond to the slaughterman’s whistling to her, the way he might whistle to his dog, and come to him in good faith to be stunned, skinned, and dispatched from being to beef. I will never forget the smell of that place, or how cold it was, or seeing men standing in blood, forced by circumstances to do a job most of us couldn’t contemplate. I do believe that a meatless diet is healthy and eating as a vegan is a great way to stay slim without giving the whole thing much thought, but that’s not why I do it. It’s about those chickens and that cow and those men. If you’d like to read more, a classic book is Diet for a New America by John Robbins. Cookbooks I like include The Vegetarian Meat and Potatoes Cookbook by Robin Robertson and The Compassionate Cook by Ingrid Newkirk. You can also log onto www.GoVeg.com, a People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals site with all the info you could ask for about the how-come and how-to of a vegetarian/vegan lifestyle. Gotta run--- March 2 Responding to a reader query: February 26th Hello, blog buddies – I apologize for the delay in doing a post. My computer was in the shop three times, first with a bum keyboard, then with a stubborn virus. I think it’s one of those ironies that after lots of procrastination I finally committed to getting started on the new book, had a good writing day early last week, and then the computer started acting out. Hopefully everything is in order now. Today brings the New Moon (good for starting projects, I’m told), tomorrow is a new week, and in a that week a new month. I couldn’t be starting Fat, Broke and Lonely at a better time. I still have not totally warmed to the title, but my editor keeps telling me that “warm” is not the point, it’s supposed to shock and startle and get people to open the book and see all the great things I have to say about filling inner emptiness. My problem is: I’ve been fat. I know the pain of that. I know the unkindness people can show. It’s funny, I’ve also been broke and lonely but those words aren’t as loaded for me as the first one. I know I’ve been given a gift here, the opportunity to get my message out to a larger audience with a book the publisher is totally behind and championing. I just don’t want to deny the pain that that little word “fat” causes so many people. Maybe just writing this here to what I consider my “inner circle” of readers and friends will help. People have written with lots of questions since I’ve been offline so let me get to some of those. Lindy asked about treasure-mapping or vision-mapping which I write about in Lit from Within and firmly believe in. The process is simple. You get a full-sized piece of poster-board at an office supply or art store (some drugstores even have this in their school supply section) and a glue-stick. Then start collecting magazines---your own and other people’s, so you have a nice variety. Give yourself a few evenings to flip through these periodicals and cut out any pictures, words, and phrases that speak to you or that suggest the direction in which you want your life to go. Cut out everything that catches your eye; you want to have more clippings than you’ll eventually use on your map. When you have a nice stack of clips, get out your poster-board and arrange the cut-outs where you want them. It’s advised that the center of your map be devoted to something that represents spirituality to you; the rest of the map will be things you want to come into your life, character traits and states of mind you want to develop, success you want to attain and service you want to do. I think of the map as a portrait of the life you desire. Glue on your words and pictures in whatever arrangement suits you and then hang your map where you will see it every day and no one who would make fun of it or not appreciate it will see it at all. Then look at your map every day. I learned recently from my friend Barbara Biziou, a ritual expert (www.bluelotusproductions.com), that 69 seconds is the amount of time it takes for something like this to stick, so I’ve been scanning my map for 69 seconds every morning, starting in the center with the references to the Divine and my spiritual growth, and going out from there to those parts of the map dealing with my career, relationships, finances, health, service to the world, etc. I like doing a new map every year, but there was one I kept up for nearly four years in three locations. It was a pretty magical map, with pictures of Oprah Winfrey and the Someone else wrote to ask about wheelchair yoga. I’d never looked into that but a Google search yielded quite a bit. Links include www.ensostudio.com/yoga_instructors.html, www. yoga.tips-and-gear.com, and www.yogaheart.com. There’s so much else to share, although I need to stop in a few minutes and get ready for church. I’ll go into other details at another time, but let me at least tell you about two wonderful films I saw. The first was a documentary called Trudell about onetime Native American political activist John Trudell who is now a poet and performer. He and the director were at the theater, Quad Cinema in my beloved The other movie William and I saw was Neil Young: Heart of Gold, the filming of a concert he did at the Ryman Auditorium in Well, friends, it’s a longish bus ride with a transfer to Symphony Space at 96th & Broadway where Unity of New York holds Sunday services, so I need to be sprucing myself up for the occasion. Someone once said to me, “Dress to show respect for the place you are.” I have a lot of respect for this church and its wonderful energy, so I’ll wear my new long black skirt, cut on the bias. It was on sale for a song, but respect doesn’t come with a price-tag. -- Hello, all – I hope you had a romantic Valentine’s Day, either because you’re in a romance or because you know how to live romantically in or out of one. (There’s an applicable chapter in Creating a Charmed Life, “Add a Little Romance.”) I started on the new book yesterday. Starting is the tough part. Now I’m open to some hard work and some days when the words just flow. That’s when being a writer is the sweetest job in the world. Last night William and I went for Italian food on 46th Street between 8th and 9th Avenues, “Restaurant Row,” and then to see Ring of Fire, a Broadway show based on the music of Johnny Cash. It was horrible. We left at intermission. The singers were talented and they hit all the right notes, but there was no passion. It was if they not only didn’t feel this kind of music or understand it, they almost seemed to make fun of it. The show is in previews now and, unless there’s some miracle we missed in the second act, I don’t expect it to last long. We came home and watched one of William’s birthday DVDs: the first five years of The Sopranos. We both love it, even though I don’t usually watch violent shows. Part of my fascination is that I believe that my late father had some ties to the mob in I also remember once when I was about ten scrounging through junk in my dad’s office storeroom. I came up a ratty old violin case. Inside was an exquisite violin, inscribed inside by its maker and dated 1765. When I asked about it, my father told me an amazing tale of being given the instrument by a patient who couldn’t afford to pay my dad, a doctor, for his wife’s lifesaving surgery. On The Sopranos, Meadow’s discovery was even more dramatic: she found “…$50,000 in Krugerrands and an AK-47 when…looking for Easter eggs.” Anyway, I’m enjoying watching these stories and making connections to my own bizarre but colorful childhood. It also makes me eager to go forward with my solo show, My Father’s Other Job. It’s hard when I write for my living to take the time to write something as speculative as a one-person show, but it’s such a great story, and I’ve been blessed with a wonderful far memory and the desire to write and perform this. I need to set aside some time each day---no work, no email, no marketing, no coaching appointments, no tidying up the thousands of loose ends that come with being a self-employed “sole proprietor”---and work on the show. (Act I is finished. Act II looms. I have a coach, Matt Hoverman, and when I schedule a session with him, I’ll get my act together on this.) Oh, William did a very sweet Valentine’s thing: I mentioned at the time of the Grammy awards that I was surprised to see a category for “contemporary folk music” and that John Prine had won for this latest CD. I love music with meaningful lyrics and have always liked John Prine , but I don’t think I’ve owned one of his albums for over fifteen years. I own the new one now, thanks for William who pays attention. I know a lot of guys don’t, and I feel very fortunate. This morning I met my daughter Adair at a Starbucks uptown. She had a personal training client at Speaking of daughters and web sites, my stepdaughter This seems to be my day for thinking about the young women in my life and how they’ve become themselves before my eyes. Pretty heady stuff. Bittersweet, too. I remember getting to know Well, friends, I have to stop and get my computer to the shop. There’s dirt or cat hair or something clogging up the internal mouse and I need to have a working machine for putting in my hours on the book this afternoon. Thanks for reading all this. It’s just my life. If you can use any of it to make your life more fun or interesting or meaningful, I would be honored indeed. --
February 13 Hello from snow-blanketed NYC! We’re climbing through drifts here and it’s really rather wonderful during this winter-that-hasn’t-been-a-winter. The snow started on Saturday when I was update doing a Charm Your Life retreat at Pumpkin Hollow Farm (www.pumpkinhollow.org) and it was beautiful to see the snowfall out in the country. There’s a stream running through the Pumpkin Hollow property and on Sunday morning when we all trooped down to the meditation building---an almost fully glass-walled octagon---the snow and the rushing brook was like a Christmas card. The trip back was less than idyllic (one of the attendees, here from southern A wonderful quotation came from the weekend, which I share with you with the participant’s permission. We were going around the circle sharing something about our spiritual lives. One woman said, “I get my spirituality from all over. I’m kind of like a mutt.” I loved that. Mutts are smart, friendly, resourceful, and healthy. I’m all for having an inner life with those positive characteristics. Today I’m playing catch-up. My daughter has been helping me with some of the clerical overload but she won’t be able to come this week, so I’m returning calls and emails, getting through the mail, making flight reservations (two engagements are back-to-back, creating the complications of a three-way ticket), adding new people to the data base, and getting covers printed for the Shelter for the Spirit audiobook (HarperCollins did a cassette when the book was new; the rights reverted back to me and I’ve had CDs made, but they need inserts). So much of life is just doing tasks, tidying up loose ends. I rather enjoy it actually: it’s real and solid. Tomorrow, Valentine’s Day, William and I are going to see Ring of Fire, a musical based on the songs of Johnny Cash. We’ll go to dinner somewhere fun (I’ve been eyeing a newish vegetarian Thai place in the Oh – I promised one of my dear blog readers a couple of weeks ago that I would answer a question she emailed me in the blog. I seemed to have misplaced the question. If you’re reading this, please ask again (my apologies). ebruary 9 An invitation to pass on your wisdom Hello to old and new friends – and I think there are a lot of new ones since the subscription list for my quarterly online newsletter just jumped exponentially, probably as a result of Amazon Connect. Anyway, I’ve been playing tour guide the past few days. My dear friend Elizabeth Simons is here from On Saturday evening, William (my husband) and Elizabeth and I went to the famous cabaret club, “Don’t Tell Mama,” to see my friend Rose Andrez in cabaret. It’s exciting to see someone I know pursuing her dream and doing an even more smashing performance than the last time I saw her. After Rose’s show we had dinner at the acclaimed vegan restaurant Zen Palate. On Sunday, we went to church at Unity of New York. The minister, Rev. Paul Tenaglia, gave everyone in attendance the challenge of spending the following week without saying anything negative about another person. It’s quite an eye-opening assignment. As long as I’ve been on a spiritual path and trying to do the best I can, I still see how much negative talk I do. It’s usually about total strangers---celebrities maybe or someone who annoys me for some silly reason. I am growing a lot this week. After church, Liz and I met my daughter Adair and her husband Nick for lunch at Tomo, a terrific (and very reasonably priced) Japanese restaurant on the We’ve also seen two movies, Transamerica and Mrs. Henderson Presents. Both were excellent, and after Mrs. Henderson Presents an older gentleman told us that he had gone to the Windmill Theatre, portrayed in the film, during World War II, and that it brought back so many memories he’d cried during the movie. And we had great shopping in She’ll fly back tomorrow and I must immerse myself in the new book. Oh, the contract for my radio show came today. When I know when it will be on, I’ll let you know. May today be memorable for you in every good way. -- Tofu Cheescake Makes one cheesecake. This smooth and velvety “cheesecake,” is delicious topped with fresh fruit and the simple lemon glaze below. Agar flakes, which are made from seaweed, are sued as a thickener. Look for them in natural food stores or Asian markets. 1 nine-inch baked crumb crust 2 tablespoons agar flakes 2/3 C soy milk or rice milk ½ C sugar or other sweetener ½ teaspoon salt 1 lb. firm tofu 4 tablespoons lemon juice 2 teaspoons grated lemon peel 2 teaspoons vanilla Combine the agar and soy milk or rice milk in a saucepan and let stand 5 minutes. Stir in the sugar and salt. Simmer over low heat, stirring frequently, for 5 minutes. Pour into a blender and add the tofu, lemon juice, lemon peel, and vanilla. Blend until very smooth. Spread evenly into a pre-baked crust. Top with the Lemon Glaze which follows, and fresh fruit if desired. Lemon Glaze 1/3 C sugar or other sweetener 1 ½ tablespoons cornstarch or arrowroot powder 1 ½ tablespoons lemon juice ½ teaspoon grated lemon peel 1/3 C water Fresh fruit for topping (strawberries, kiwi, mandarin oranges, etc.) Stir the sugar and cornstarch together in a small saucepan then add the lemon juice, lemon peel and water. Whisk smooth. Heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture is clear and thick. Spread evenly over the cheesecake. Top with fresh fruit. Chill thoroughly before serving. Hello on a bright chilly afternoon in I’ll be leaving in the morning for I have some major news: yesterday I learned that I will be doing a radio show for the Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia network on Sirius Satellite Radio. It will be once a week for an hour. That’s all I know at this point, other than it will have a life-coaching emphasis. I’ll let you know more as I do. (For all you Jennifer Louden fans, she also has a show on this network; hers is called LoudenClear.) This is really a blessing in my life. It’s something I’ve wanted for a long time and now that it’s happening I feel ready. It’s funny: you can want something and want it and want it, and then when it finally happens, it’s just the right time. Anything sooner would have been premature. I’m grateful for this opportunity and excited about planning wonderful, satisfying programming with fascinating guests. In closing today, I’d just like to share something one of my teleclass students said the other night. She is Terry Jordan, one of mentors and bright, shining, favorite women. She told the class that in her house they have a phrase that helps in many ways. It is: “Whatever you can do in the moment.” She and her husband both do Iron Man triathlons (yeah, I’m impressed, too…) so they’re always in training for some event, but with work and raising a son (homeschooling even), there’s not always time to train by the book. To the rescue comes, “Whatever you can do in the moment.” I love that. It’s so freeing, and yet it commits me to doing something---not necessarily something major, just “whatever I can do in the moment.” ‘Thought you might like this, too. -- uary 24th Hi. I’m just back from the Possible Woman Leadership Cruise (www.possiblewoman.com). It was short (Friday afternoon to Monday very-early-morning) but really wonderful. I did a keynote on Creating a Charmed Life and a workshop on Younger by the Day and really connected with the women there. Most of them work in the corporate world and I haven’t worked for a corporation since I proofread credit cards for Phillips Petroleum for nine months after high school to save money to move to London. None of that mattered: we all bonded. My roommate was Barbara Hemphill, author of Taming the Paper Tiger, a book that seriously helped me some years ago to become less of a disorganized mess than is my natural state. Barbara’s web site is www.ProductiveEnvironment.com. She has simple, wonderful solutions like her trademarked F.A.T. system (everything needs to be either Filed, Acted on, or Tossed). Another woman I felt particularly in tune with was Marjorie Barlow, Ph.D., a relationship coach from Corpus Christi. She’s of retirement age but is neither retired nor retiring. You know what it feels like when you meet someone that you think you’ve known before? Someone in whose shadow you’d like to stand for about ten years and just soak it all up? Marj is a person like that for me. And she said the dearest thing about her husband: "We have the luxury of time....Every morning he brings me coffee and the newspaper and fresh flowers." Now, that makes going forward into the future decades of life sound downright heavenly. (She is the founder of Possible Woman and the author of the book, The Possible Woman.) As for cruising in general, both my roommate and I found that we were sleepy much of the time. I guess what they say about ocean air is true: it’s a real sedative. Today back in New York, though, I’m full of energy. Those couple of days of laziness (well, laziness plus two presentations) must have done me good. It’s funny, though: as I sit here typing, I can still feel the ship rocking a little. It’s a nice kinesthetic memory. Otherwise, it’s finally time that I can tell you about the new book since someone wrote to me that the "deal" was in some publishing e-letter. The title came from the publisher. They’d been tossing it around for months but couldn’t think of who should write it. Then my editor called me and said, "You can write this. I don’t know why I didn’t think of you before." I asked for the title. He said: "Fat, Broke and Lonely." Wow. I didn’t know if I should say "Thanks for the vote of confidence," or "Wait a minute, that’s not me." But it has been me, singly and in tandem, at many times in my life. The minute he said it I knew what the book was about: filling inner emptiness. That’s something I know about. So I did a mini-proposal for them and I’m about to start writing. I have asked that I be assured of a kind subtitle that minimizes some of the in-your-face-ness of the title. The combination I like is Fat, Broke and Lonely: And Everything Else You Don’t Have to Be. Another possibility is Fat, Broke and Lonely: Why You Feel So Empty and How to Fill the Void, but I like the former better. In any case, this means I need to get into book-writing mode: hibernation like a grizzly bear. I won’t be answering emails as faithfully as I have been, and although I’ll take new coaching clients who seek me out, I won’t be looking for any. I’ll keep having a life (yoga, the gym, fun, friends, and family) but I’ll need to tighten my days and do more with evenings and weekends. I’ll be holing up in my local Starbucks three or four hours a day to court the Muse. They’re giving me nine months to get the book to them for its first edit—enough time if I keep my nose to the keyboard, but none to spare. That’s about it from me. I hope you’re finishing up the first month of this New Year in a good way and anticipating a bright future. Something I’m doing this year is keeping a log of high points—"peak experiences" as Abraham Maslow called them. Having several listings in the first month is a hopeful sign. Blessings on your day – Victoria January 18th Hi, all. This is odd: I wrote yesterday and told you all about Barbara Biziou's wonderful New Year's retreat. For some reason, it never got posted. I apologize. You can read about Barbara's terrific work at www.joyofritual.com In the meantime, I just wrote a lot of information for a new service Amazon.com is starting called AuthorConnect. I've had some trouble getting the info to post to their site (does this sound like a pattern?) but in the meantime I thought I'd put it here for you. (It may be more about me than you'd ever want to know---feel free to skim or skip). -- Victoria Hello and thanks for stopping by – My interests are the same as the topics I write about: eclectic spirituality, well-being, and having a life that’s magical to live and that also leaves the world a better place. I’m committed to living naturally and healthfully and helping other people do that, too; I would like to do more work to help alleviate the suffering of animals, which is a cause close to my heart; I love New York City and the near-miracle that I made it here in middle-age instead of at twenty-two when most people seem to come; and I have a lot of fun with girly stuff like clothes and cosmetics. (I went to fashion school at 18 and my first job was writing fashion ads for a department store – there’s still some of that in me, as evidenced in my books Younger by the Day and Lit from Within). I also enjoy yoga, feng shui, musical theater, and films – especially indie films and documentaries. I write life-enhancing books. “Self-help” is the genre and one of my passions to make self-help literature, too. In addition, I do keynote speaking around the country and the world (if your organization books speakers, please have a look at the “My Speaking” page on www.victoriamoran.com), and I am a certified life coach, with in-person clients in New York City and telephone clients all over North America. I write the “Holistic Dictionary” column in Martha Stewart’s Body and Soul magazine, and I occasionally write articles for publications such as Yoga Journal and Natural Health. My work has been noted in publications from USA Today and The Christian Science Monitor to Elle, Self, Glamour, Family Circle, Fitness, and O, the Oprah Magazine. I’ve also been a guest on Oprah! twice --- with my books Shelter for the Spirit and Lit from Within. For the first thirty-two years of my life, I struggled with overeating and dieting; I overcame that (from the inside out) and share what I know in my book Fit from Within. There’s a blog on my website if you’d like to keep up with my goings-on, and I also do a quarterly ezine, The Charm-Your-Life Letter, named for my biggest selling book (so far), Creating a Charmed Life. If you’d like to subscribe to the ezine (it’s free), you can sign up at my site. Gosh, I love books and keeping the number down so they fit in a The Game of Life and How to Play It, by Frances Scovill Shinn; Perfect Health, by Deepak Chopra; You Can Heal Your Life, by Louise Hay; Diet for a New Eat to Beat Cancer, by J. Robert Hatherill; The Power of Makeup, by Trish McEvoy; Home Design with Feng Shui, Terah Kathryn Collins; Integral Yoga Hatha, by Swami Satchidananda; Seat of the Soul, by Gary Zukav; The Encyclopedia of Women’s Myths & Secrets, by Barbara G. Walker; God Doesn’t Have Bad Hair Days, by Pam Grout; Ripe, by Janet Champ and Charlotte Moore; Nickel and Dimed, by Barbara Ehrenreich; A Most Surprising Song: Exploring the Mystical Experience, Louann Stahl; The Sacred Writings of the World’s Great Religions, S.E. Frost, Jr., ed.; The Perennial Philosophy, Aldous Huxley; True Prosperity, Yehuda Berg; Earn What You Deserve, Jerrold Mundis; Dorothy Parker: Complete Stories; An Anthology of Famous English and American Poetry (this is a Modern Library book I’ve had since high school – it’s probably out of print, but I love it); The The Elements of Style (no writer would be without this one); Book Biz, by Samuel Epstein; and Publicize Your Book, by Jacqueline Deval; The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Playing the Harmonica, by William Melton (okay, I admit it: he’s my husband) and Randy Weinstein; Four cookbooks: Ten Talents, by Rosalie Hurd; The Cookbook for People Who Love Animals, by Ingrid Newkirk; The American Vegetarian Cookbook from the Fit for Life Kitchen, by Marilyn Diamond; and The Peaceful Palate, by Jennifer Raymond; plus a couple of guilty pleasures like The Nanny Diaries and The Devil Wears Prada. Favorite music: Music is easier to pin down. I love some light classical music---Mozart, Tchaikovsky---but since I’m a word person, music means most to me when it has lyrics. Favorites are: Broadway shows (especially that one song per show that insists that you can do anything---like The Impossible Dream and Everything’s Comin’ Up Roses; Grateful, an exquisite CD from the composer John Bucchino; The Shootout at the I’m Okay/You’re Okay Corral and every other CD from my friend Greg Tamblyn; The inspiring CDs from singer/songwriter/life-uplifter Jana Stanfield; Will the Circle Be Unbroken---a wonderful CD of yummy country songs by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and guest appearances by some of the finest country artists that every picked, strummed, or fiddled; 60’s/70’s classics---the Eagles, the Beach Boys, and especially the Beatles (I was a great fan as a kid, got a press card for a teen ‘zine and got into my first Beatles press conference at 14; when I 17, Paul McCartney bought me a drink: that’s when I knew I had a charmed life). Movies: Documentaries are my favorites – Born into Brothels, MurderBall, Corporation, The Smartest Guys in the Room. This year’s feature film picks for me are Capote and Let’s see: favorite friends of mine who have written books (and just saying this I know I’ll leave a dozen out: if you’re one of them, forgive me---and also remind me and I’ll add you): Nathaniel Altman (the first author I ever knew: he showed me it was possible), Leslie Levine, Barbara Bartocci, Jay Mulvaney, Leah Komaiko, Rev. Tami Coyne, Gail McMeekin, Barbara Biziou, Jacqueline Whitmore, Lynn Robinson, Charles Sommer, Laurel Donnellan, Susan Smith Jones, Rev. Chris Michaels, Wyatt Townley, Louis Colaianni, Donna Henes, Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway, Richard Carlson, Ph.D., Terah Kathyn Collins, Patti Breitman, Rev. Evan Howard, Stephanie Pederson, Leslie Gilbert Elman, Maril Crabtree, Jennifer Louden, Varda One, Deborah Shouse, Pam Grout, Clare Sylvia, Mari Lynn Henry, Kathy Patrick, Nancy Nordenson, Cathryn Michon, Suzy Allegra, Tracy McWilliams, Camille Maurine, Kelly James-Enger, Jerry Mundis, Geralyn Lucas, Neal Bernard, MD, Fr. Paul Keenan, Elizabeth Knight, Suzanne Havala-Hobbs, Sunny Hersh, Sam Horn, Scott Gerson, MD, Nancy Coey, and Cyrus Copeland. Favorite Favorite places to shop: Suzanne Splann Boutique (90th & Madison), Anna (wonderful little boutique in the East Village), Ibiza (fun Village shop with lots of classy and unusual clothes), Edge NYC (on Bleecker between Broadway and Lafayette, a collection of fabric artists, designers, and jewelry craftspeople---up and coming so they’re still affordable and absolutely terrific), Koos Boutique (a one-designer paradise: his clothes are still out of my price range, but I love to dream), Moo Shoes (nonleather shoes, boots, bags, and jackets on the Lower East Side), Pangea (online---vegan goodies and cruelty-free beauty and household goods), (for groceries) Integral Yoga Natural Foods on 13th Street in NYC; and (when I’m back in my hometown of Kansas City, Missouri) the Junior League Thrift Store---I have an aversion to buying new jeans. Favorite makeup: Trish McEvoy (and my favorite fragrance is her Blackberry-Vanilla Musk) Favorite skin care line: Dr. Hauschka Favorite Broadway shows: Phantom of the Opera literally changed me the first time I saw it: I knew I would change my life and come to Favorite vacation destinations where I’ve already been: Favorite vacation destinations I’ve yet to visit: Antarctica (I want to see the penguins), Central African Republic (or wherever else I can see great apes in their natural state), the Galapagos Islands, some countries in the Middle East (my husband used to work for an American company in Saudi Arabia but I’ve never been to that part of the world), and parts of Eastern Europe where my books are translated but where I’ve never been---Poland, Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania. Favorite indulgences: massages, facials, reflexology; reading a pretty magazine; hanging out with Bobby (my cat) and Aspen (our dog who moved in with my daughter when she moved out---I miss her terribly); lunch or tea with a really good friend; retreats, seminars, lectures, classes, learning in general; hot baths; tofu cheesecake. What I’d like to see changed in the world: I’d like for people to tolerate each other’s differences, so we could talk about things like religion instead of fight over them. I would like for everybody to have enough: I heard someone say that abundance is great, but that it seemed wrong to him that some people have several homes while others don’t have a place to sleep tonight; that resonated with me. I would love it if people recognized nonhuman animals as not just things but vital beings, with the same senses and emotions as our own; my hunch is that if we could feel for these creatures that are so innocent and lacking in guile, we’d have more compassion for other people, too. It would be a happy day for me if individuals and nations decided to join together and clean up the planet. It would help our health and ensure our future. Finally, it would be so wonderful if we finally beat our swords into plowshares. What on earth are we doing in an age when we can communicate in an instant and fly everywhere and create technology that seemed like science fiction not so long ago, and we still go to war? War? That’s such an archaic, atavistic way of dealing with things. I guess we can start by being peaceful within ourselves and with those close to us and hope it spreads. Best thing I’ve ever done: Raise my magnificent daughter, Adair. She’s a young actress and as her “day job” is a personal trainer (see www.fitnessbyadair.com). She’s married to actor Nicholas Moran (yes, folks, he took her last name). JANUARY 2006 (Note -- This is my newsletter, not a standard blog entry. If you'd like to subscribe to the Charm Your Life Letter, click on the newsletter signup icon on the home page.) Hi everyone- I hope 2006 is feeling like a luscious year already. So many people have told me that they have a very optimistic feeing about this year and I’m one of them. I’ll be doing these newsletters quarterly instead of bimonthly since I now have a blog. That’s a fun way to keep in touch. Just come to my site www.victoriamoran.com and click on the icon that says “ If there’s something you’d like to see there, or in the next newsletter, just drop me an email at charmedlifelady@aol.com. Wishing you your best year ever -- I. A Thought on Love Sai Baba is a spiritual teacher in “Love exists for love’s sake and nothing else. It is spontaneous and spreads delight. Everything is permeated by love. Love can conquer anything. Selfless, pure, unalloyed love leads man to God. Selfish and constricted love binds man to the world. Unable to comprehend the pure and sacred nature of love, man today is a prey to endless worries because of his attachment to worldly objects. Man’s primary duty is to understand the truth about the Love principle. Once he understands the nature of love, he will not go astray.” II. Where I’ll Be: JANUARY 29, Sunday FEBRUARY 10, Friday MARCH 4, Saturday -- BAYSIDE, QUEENS, NY -- YOUNGER BY THE DAY workshop, as part of the Queensborough Community College 'Special Speakers Series for Women's History Month.' Spend a Saturday morning immersed in the uplifting ideas and practical tips of a Younger by the Day lifestyle. Learn how to guard against invisibility, nurture your dreams into being at any point in your life, live with all the vitality of youth with a simple acronym: M.E.N. (Move, Eat Beautiful Food, Nurture Yourself), and go home acquainted with Victoria's 'Ten Instant Youtheners.' Saturday, March 4, 9 to noon. Course # ENX-176. $55 plus $10 registration fee. Register by phone at 718-631-6343. My mother wrote this for me shortly after my first husband died. My mom herself passed away last year. I think she’d like my sharing this with you. She always said I got the writing gene from her. Just for Today by Gladys Marshall Just for today, I will not look back On the way things were for me. I’ll keep my thoughts firmly focused, On happiness yet to be. Just for today, I’ll see the need To accept things I cannot change, That each day’s a new beginning, A lessening of the pain. Just for today, I’ll maintain my calm, Letting only good thoughts cling. I’ll keep looking into the future, And the wonders it can bring. Just for today, I’ll close the door On the sadness I had to feel, Forgetting each “What might have been” To embrace this day and heal. IV. An Ingredient to Watch Out For I’d never heard about possible health problems associated with the ubiquitous cosmetic preservatives called parabens until my friend Barbara Barrington, a British homeopath, alerted me a few years ago. Now the potential troubles are coming out in the popular press. Here’s the lowdown: Parabens—with prefixes methyl, ethyl, propyl and butyl—can mimic estrogen in the body as they accumulate in our fatty tissue. Although solid evidence for a link between these and any known health risk is scanty, concentrations of these preservatives have been found in tumors of the breast (as initially reported in a 2004 article in The Journal of Applied Toxicology). Another small study at Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine in Even many “natural” cosmetics contain parabens and I have a far from paraben-free dressing table. Still, I appreciate it when a product I like—everything in the Dr. Hauschka line, for instance—is preserved with vitamin E or some other alternative. V. Two Books I’m Loving Right Now Part of my Christmas vacation was spent reading two fabulous books I highly recommend. The first was God Doesn’t Have Bad Hair Days by Pam Grout. I LOVE THIS BOOK! She has great chapters like “The Dude Abides” and “The Cheese Does NOT Stand Alone Principle.”
Here’s a clip: “There’s a space heater, or rather an energy force, that’s right inside us and we haven’t bothered to turn it on. Instead, we lie here freezing, unhappy and believing there’s nothing we can do about our sad, desperate lives…We think of life as a random crapshoot and believe we don’t have a lot of control over what happens…What I’d like to suggest is that God—or what I’m calling spiritual energy—is 100% reliable. It works every time like a math principle or The other book I’m raving about is Ripe: The Truth About Growing Older and the Beauty of Getting On With Your Life Despite Our Youth-Obsessed Society. I learned about Ripe when both it and my book Younger by the Day were reviewed in W4W Voices, the Women for Women magazine (the journal of the nonprofit Women for Women Foundation that’s connected with Menopause the Musical -- www.mtmw4w.org). Anyway, Ripe—by Janet Champ and Charlotte Moore—is stellar. It’s visually stunning with yummy photographs and great design, and the message is honest and empowering. Here’s a delicious little snip: “So say good-bye to the girl you were and the things she didn’t get. Say good-bye to the babies you didn’t have. The loves that didn’t materialize. The hopes you carried around so gently but just couldn’t quite, somehow, bring to life. Mourn the people you’ve lost; they have no substitute. Mourn the smothered chances, the stillborn dreams; they have a habit of haunting unless you let them go. And then turn the page. And get on with the rest of your life.” (I added the bold because that’s really the message of this beautiful book.) VI. A Lovely Little Gift for Yourself or a Friend Rita Woodward’s Charming “Inspiration Keeper!” Ehat is it? – VIII. Some Quotations that Cheer Me A few years ago, someone sent me pages of quotations she called “Power Words.” They came with headings like “Belief” and “Acceptance and Gratitude.” I get so much sent to me that I’m embarrassed to say that I’ve kept the quotations but lost the name of the sender. If it’s you, let me know and I’ll acknowledge you in the next newsletter. In the meantime, thanks, whoever you are, and here’s a little inspiration for a New Year: “Flops are part of life’s menu, and I’ve never been a girl to miss out on any of the courses.” – Rosalind Russell (start of my ever so favorite oldtime movie Auntie Mame) “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when adults are afraid of the light.” – Plato “I don’t think of myself as a poor, deprived ghetto girl who made good. I think of myself as somebody who from an early age knew I was responsible for myself, and I had to make good.” – Oprah Winfrey “When we die and go to heaven, our Maker is not going to say: ‘Why didn’t you discover the cure for such and such?’ The only thing we’re going to be asked at that precious moment is, ‘Why didn’t you become you?’” – Elie Weisel “Your real security is yourself. You know you can do it, and they can’t ever take that away from you.” – Mae West “As long as you’re going to think anyway, think big.” – Donald Trump “There does, in fact, appear to be a plan.” – Albert Einstein
January 9, 2006 Hi, everybody -- I apologize for the hiatus. After a brilliant Christmastime recovery from the flu and a week's normality, I got food poisoning and was puny for a few more days. Hopefully I've paid my dues to illness for both '05 and '06. The only thing to be said for getting sick is how remarkable it feels to be well again. The other morning I was riding down Park Avenue in a cab, looking at the buildings I'd seen in movies all my life, and the trees in the middle of the wide street with their holidays lights twinkling, and I thought, "Wow, all this...." It was as if I'd never seen any of it before. Oh, here's some news: because of the food poisoning I couldn't start my 4-week teleclass on Younger by the Day last Wednesday, so it will be starting this week instead: Wednesday, January 11, at 8 p.m. Eastern/7Central/6 Mountain/5 Pacific. It will go for an hour-and-a-half each night and run four weeks, through February 1. This is a class by phone -- and it will be recorded so if you miss a class you can catch it during the week. (The fee is $89 and enrollment is through Jennifer Louden who's hosting the class for me; you can also read more about it there: www.comfortqueen.com/younger.html.) I had a little party for Epiphany. There were half a dozen women here and we made vision maps (sometimes called "treasure maps") out of magazine clippings and posterboard. It was so much fun and now I have a fresh treasure map for 2006. If you want to do one, the only "rule" is to put something spiritual in the middle as a reminder that there may be something in store that's even better than what you think you want. The only wonderful thing I did lately was yesterday: my husband and I went to see Chita Rivera in A Dancer's Life on Broadway. It was magnificent. Chita will be 73 on January 23rd and in 1986 she was hit by a car, her left leg was shattered, and she has sixteen surgical screws in it. The doctors said she would never dance again, but in 1993 she won her second Tony and she danced yesterday like a young woman. It was stunning, inspiring, thrilling. I'm giving a talk tomorrow for a women's luncheon here in Manhattan, so I'd better get to sleep. Thanks for stopping by. -- Victoria Chistmas Day 2005 Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, and if you're reading this on the 26th, Happy Boxing Day, too. I had a storybook Christmas. I was prepared for the first Christmas in twenty-three years without my daughter since she's married now and I knew she and Nick were going to Vermont. They were thoughtful enough to plan to divide the holiday between the two sets of parents and be with us for Christmas evening and dinner. However, the NYC transit strike last week meant that they weren't able to rent a car so they didn't take their trip. Instead, they ordered the "Pet Chauffeur" service and came over here on Christmas Eve evening with the two dogs. They stayed 24 hours. I know I owe the Vermont in-laws the whole holiday next year, but this one was such a gift for me. We had the best time. I'm a Christmas person and raised Adair that way. We have bunches of traditions. Last night we put up the tree (I've always wanted to wait till the 24th but never have before. Since I was so sick with the flu---I finally stopped being perfect and took antibiotics; they really did make all the difference---we put off getting our tree. William walked up to 57th and First to buy it from the French Canadian guy who comes every year and camps out there for a month with his trees. We opted for a smallish one that we could put up on a table since Oliver, Adair's puppy, is feisty. We decorated last night, ordered Thai food (I said we had traditions, not that they're necessarily traditional), and watched Christmas with the Kranks and National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. This morning I skipped church since I'm not 100% well but we did stockings, Adair made vegan biscuits and gravy for Christmas breakfast (I'll put in the recipe if anybody wants it), and then gifts. William was very generous and thoughtful and Adair is an elf at heart. I feel very amply gifted. We stayed in all day just being grateful. We had dinner (lasagne, it was my mom's specialty) and after Nick and Adair left I watched Billy Graham on Larry King. It was very inspiring. I admire Graham so much: he believes what he believes and doesn't put other people down. He has matured into great love and tolerance which is really wonderful to see. He said that his mission is to let people know that God loves them. I thought that was the coolest mission. Even though I hold some theological and social views that are different from his, I would love to be able to state so clearly and succinctly what my purpose on earth is. Before I go to sleep tonight I want to say to anyone who's reading this, thank you for stopping by. Thank you for being a part of my life,even if our paths never cross any closer than this. May you feel the magic of this time of year, even if you may be feeling less than magical at this moment. And may the year that's coming giving you great wonders and blessings and amazing surprises. Love, Victoria December 16 Hi. I have the flu, the first time in four years. It's not real bad, just hanging on. I don't even have a Christmas tree yet which for a dyed-in-the-wool Christmas person like me is a first. Because of the threat of a transit strike, I've had my daughter's two dogs since last night (and Adair and her husband part of the time). I see so many human traits in the dogs: sibling rivalry and "Your bone must be better than my bone." It would probably be better if I weren't sick and could take them out more. I've been thinking today about the curious fine line between going for what you want and accepting life on life's terms---allowing for God's will. Someone today told me a Sufi quotation that I loved: "You westerners define 'miracle' as any time God does what you want." If you have any thoughts on this, drop me an email: charmedlifelady@aol.com. Best wishes.... December 13 -- Gosh, I'm shocked I haven't written anything in over a week. I think about the blog every day so it feels as if I write more. I'm still learning the ropes. I'm also trying to figure out how to differentiate the blog from my Charm-Your-Life newsletter (which you can sign up for on this site if you'd like. You can also read past Charm-Your-Life letters further down on the blog.) Anyway, the past few days in this writer's life: today I feel under the weather, a kind of low-grade flu I think, so I canceled a meeting with my literary agent and will skip my Kabbalah class tonight. It's sort of yummy to stay in sometimes, especially when it's very cold out as it is right now. It's cozy to have my desk kind of strewn with stuff and sharing it with Bobby, my cat, who is drawn to printers in some inexplicable way. It's almost 7 p.m. and William should be finishing work soon so we can have dinner and a lazy evening. He's a lawyer, self-employed. His office is in our bedroom; my office is in our living room. It's delightful (and will make us among the lucky ones if there is a transit strike in New York City on Friday). Oh, I made a decision: for a couple of years I've been fighting with myself to get up at 6 a.m. It seemed that if I did that, instead of arising at my body's normal time, 7, I could get so much more in, be so efficient. I have struggled to reset my clock. I've made pacts to call people at 6 and have them call me. A couple of mornings ago it hit me: this is nuts. When I get up at 7, I'm happy and content and rested. Why fix what isn't broken? It's been so freeing. Who says I have to go to the gym at dawn or that good writing can only happen before noon? It's nice to ease up on yourself. Tomorrow I should hear some thing from Harper San Francisco about my next book. Once I know for sure that I'm writing it, my life will change. I'll go from extrovert mode (lots of speaking, marketing, media stuff) into writer mode when I'll spend 3 to 4 hours a day in my neighborhood Starbucks just writing. It sounds heavenly. Sunday I went Christmas shopping with Adair (my daughter) and we had so much fun. We went to Macy's and saw Santa, which was such a hoot. I think that being the Santa for Macy's in New York City must be the ultimate in the Santa profession and this one was perfect. We just had a short time since Adair was between shows of A Christmas Carol, which she and her husband Nick are both in. It's a wonderful production; you can read more about it at www.personalspacetheatrics.org. This past weekend I saw Memoirs of a Geisha which was okay and Brokeback Mountain which was wonderful. William insists that I see The Chronicles of Narnia, and I will, although I'm not much of a fantasy person. I like documentaries and photographs and reading nonfiction. (Of course, if you'd heard me cracking up last night watching Elf on DVD, you wouldn't have thought of me as a documentary person. I love Elf, I think because I sense that I came here from a wonderful place with very different rules and getting used to life on earth has taken some doing. In that way, I relate to Buddy, the human-raised-by-elves at the North Pole. And in the movie he comes to New York---"through the Sugarplum Forest, across the sea of whirly-twirly gumdrops, and into the Lincoln Tunnel." I love it.) That's about it from me. If there's anything you want to read about here, drop me an email at charmedlifelady@aol.com. Best wishes, Victoria December 5 – past my bedtime Several people have written to me about the blog so it seems that you are finding it, which is exciting and kind of amazing. To paraphrase Bogie in It’s late so I’m probably a little punchy but I do want to keep up with this thing. I just need to figure out where to fit it in. There are so many details to the work I do that I often feel like a juggler, but not a very good one. My professional life has four lanes like a highway: books, speaking, coaching, and magazine work. On top of those is the administrative work that takes up more time than I wish it did---email, web site, marketing and promotion of the books, speaking and coaching, keeping press materials copied and ready to send, following up on journalist’s queries, getting bios and handouts and itineraries to speaking clients, ordering books for speaking engagements and checking to see if they’re there (schlepping them on the plane if they’re not), and the details of running a business, keeping the books and so forth. I also go to the post office almost every day, which in I’m not complaining: I absolutely love my life. More hours in the day, however, would help a lot. I’ll fill you in on the past few days. This afternoon I went to Adair’s place (that’s my daughter; she’s twenty-two and newly married) to see her Christmas decorations. It was so sweet to see how she’s decked the walls in their little apartment near I decorated a bit as well, inspired by hosting four other authors yesterday for an event we called “Books, Blessings, and Advice.” It was wonderful. About 80 people passed through, including Amy Cunningham who writes a wonderful column for BeliefNet.com: www.ChatteringMind.com. The blessing rituals done by Barbara Biziou, Donna Henes, and Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway were exquisite. In Donna’s, she started by putting a little scented oil on someone’s forehead and gave her a verbal blessing; then it was passed all around the circle, each person offering a blessing to the next. I didn’t know how it would go---I mean, some of the people I invited were neighbors and acquaintances who probably aren’t used to such things---but it was exquisite. Everyone took part and seemed delighted by it. After having turned my living room into a reasonable equivalent of five bookstalls yesterday, this morning I got things back in order and put my books back onto the shelves, but not everything went back the way it was. William (my husband) and I realized that the way we’d moved the coach was the way it should be, so now we have a cozy conversation circle with the sofa, reclining chair (it massages; it’s great), and rocker that we didn’t have before. It’s less TV-oriented and more people-oriented. And I decided to devote one bookshelf to books by people I know. That’s really special. I look at it and feel hugged by friends and colleagues. What else? Oh, Saturday I went to a dialects workshop with Louis Colaianni. He’s a gifted teacher of theatre, speech, and diction, and the author of The Joy of Phonetics and Accents. (He says that every sensual person should own three books: The Joy of Sex, The Joy of Cooking, and The Joy of Phonetics….). I took the class because in my speaking---which is sort of a cross between a motivational presentation and a one-person show---I do some accents and voices and I’d like to improve and expand on those. The other participants in the class were all actors, so it was a little intimidating. I’d asked the instructor beforehand if I could participate since the class was listed as “advanced.” He said, “That means it’s for people with advanced thinking.” What a good answer! Anyway, it stretched my brain because he was teaching us the International Phonetic Alphabet and I am symbols-challenged: I could never learn to read music, even in first grade when just about everything sticks. But I really want to take more of these classes, so I’m motivated to learn. And it has to be great cognitive exercise, laying new neuro-pathways for completely new information. Tomorrow will be busy with three coaching clients and a visit to Philip Kingsley for a hair treatment, a gift from my beautiful, elegant, and ever attentive literary agent and friend. I have thin, fine hair, and she promises me that the amazing Mr. Kingsley and staff will be able to make the best of what God gave me. I’ll let you know how it goes. Good day or good night, wherever you are. -- -------------------------------------- |
