 The holiday season is kicking off for many of us, and it has me thinking about how to move through all the upcoming activity with more joy and gratitude. Thanksgiving invites us to slow down, connect, and appreciate the good in our lives—but it can also bring stress, expectations, and challenging interactions. Is there a way to enjoy the best of the holiday while leaving tension and disconnection at the door? I don’t know about you, but when I get together with my beloved family, I can easily slip into a younger version of myself. Old patterns emerge, old grievances flare, and before long, my inner judge starts spinning negative stories that aren’t helpful—yet I still find myself believing them. A recent Positive Intelligence (PQ) blog post captured this perfectly: “Analyzing, worrying, and spinning in a mental circle primarily activates the Survival Brain. The harder you think, the deeper you dig the hole of stress and anxiety. Your Saboteurs love to keep you stuck in this spiral.” What’s becoming increasingly clear to me is that the Survival Brain can’t think its way out of an emotional hijack—it only digs us in deeper. The fastest way out is to engage the part of the brain that’s resourceful, flexible, and present: what PQ calls the Sage. The good news is that a few simple tools can help us return to groundedness, presence, and genuine gratitude—no matter what the holidays bring. As that same blog explains, “The way out is through a completely different approach: physical awareness.” The most foundational practice is the PQ Rep: a brief moment of nonjudgmental attention on a physical sensation—like the feeling the breeze on your face or the weight of your feet on the floor. This 10-second exercise does two powerful things:
Will a single 10-second practice save you every time a relative says something crazy-making? Probably not, but just like doing bicep curls builds stronger muscles, doing these short PQ Reps over time strengthens your ability to access the more resourceful part of yourself when you need it most. If you're interested in the science behind all of this, you can find it here. So this Thanksgiving, let’s engage with each other with more ease, presence, and joy so we can truly appreciate one another. If you want to find out more, sign up for my newsletter to hear about upcoming workshops where we’ll explore these ideas more deeply! Happy Thanksgiving!  I am a child of the '80s, and I have a vivid memory from about 3rd grade that I associate with the idea of celebration. It was Back-to-School night, and my PE teacher, Coach Judy, had all the students on the gym floor showcasing our PE skills. I was in a line with three other kids, and we were dribbling basketballs to the beat of Kool & The Gang's "Celebrate." I remember standing there, awkwardly bouncing that basketball, hoping to impress my parents with my skills. Every time I hear the song "Celebrate," I think of that performance, and it brings a smile to my face. I can still visualize the gym at Chesterfield Day School in St. Louis, Missouri, so clearly. It had colorful, life-size silhouettes of children painted on the walls, depicting kids walking, jumping, and running in a hive of joyful activity. One wall had a yellow silhouette of a jumping girl with a swinging ponytail. She was about my size, and I loved to imagine that it was me painted there. When we were children, we didn’t have to be told to celebrate; children often just have a joyful, celebratory attitude. But as I coach, I often have to encourage my clients to celebrate their wins--and they often resist. For the past year, I have been joyfully and deeply involved in the Positive Intelligence program created by Shirzad Chamine. In the Positive Intelligence (PQ) framework, one of the most powerful tools for building mental fitness is learning to celebrate tiny wins. It might sound simple—even insignificant—but this small practice has a big impact. Our brains are wired to focus on threats and problems; that’s how we’ve survived. But to thrive, we need to retrain our minds to notice what’s going right. Celebrating small victories like cleaning out the sock drawer, going through your mail, or making that mammogram appointment creates positive neural pathways. These tiny moments of success are like reps at the mental gym. When we acknowledge and savor even the smallest progress, we reinforce our capacity to grow and change. We are often so hard on ourselves, focusing on what we are not doing. Today, let’s take a few minutes to celebrate all that we ARE doing and bring some spontaneous joy and celebration into our day. If you like this post, then you may like Your Wild and Precious Life. See you soon.  |
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