People often tell me they feel overwhelmed when they think about setting a big goal (or doing an outrageous act).

“All I can see is how hard it is.”

“I’m so stressed out by all the things I have to do.”

“I’m exhausted just thinking about it.”

I know, I know. Big goals are scary, and they take a lot of work. (Someone on Pinterest once said, “If your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough.”) But sometimes that overwhelm can be paralyzing. Every day, it stops someone from achieving a goal that they are capable of.

So how do you move through it?

When I feel that way, I remember my client Anna.

She called me one Sunday night sounding desperate. She was in the process of leaving a career in film to pursue one in hotel business, and she had her first job interview the next day. So, understandably, she felt overwhelmed.

“Why am I even trying?” she worried....

This summer, I played the role of the women’s rights activist Gloria Steinem, when she interviewed Hugh Hefner in the 1970s. While I was studying her for the role, I came across something she said that changed the way I think about my own life and work.

She was promoting her book Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, and Someone asked her about the title. Initially, she joked “It’s too long, don’t you think?”

“Not necessarily,” he said. “I’m just curious what it’s about.”

“Well,” she said, “A movement is really just people moving. In order to create a movement, you have to have people consistently moving toward what you want to achieve.”

She explained that whenever she gave a speech, she worried that the energy would stop when she stepped down from the podium. Her feeling was, “Okay, maybe I inspired people, maybe I’ve informed them about something they didn’t know....

As soon as I booked the plane ticket, it started.

If you’re going to New Zealand, said my brain, you’ve got to do something exciting. They’re the inventors of crazy adventurous things. They even invented bungee jumping.

Bungee jumping. Oh, boy.

I’d heard you could do it off the Auckland Bridge, which sounded cool, but I wasn’t sold. I was scared.

All during the thousand-hour plane ride, my brain went back and forth. Do it, don’t do it. It’s exciting, it’s scary. You have to, I don’t know if I’m ready.

I got to the hotel at 6:30a.m. As soon as I checked in, the first thing out of my mouth was, “Do you think I can bungee jump off the Auckland Bridge this week?”

“I don’t know,” said the concierge. “People do, but maybe not in winter. I’ll call as soon as they’re open.”

I thanked him and went up to my room. An hour later, he called up. “They go...

Last week in Rio, the gold medal in the 10,000 meter track event went to Mo Farah, a British super-runner. (He holds about a million world records). But during this one Olympic race, you might’ve thought he’d lost the gold – because he wiped out in the final loop.

But what did he do? He got up and kept running. He wasted no time being upset, or worrying, or beating himself up. He just popped up and ran straight to the finish line. And he won.

It’s so simple, but what an important lesson we can take from that. Falling isn’t the end of the race. It’s not even a guarantee that you won’t win. You can take a major wipeout, and still win an Olympic medal.

Yet how often do we mistake failure for something permanent? We “fall,” or fail, or reach a setback – and we interpret it as final. But it’s not.

Falling is difficult, especially when the stakes are high. When we fall, gremlins like to jump right in with their...

Recently, my family and I went to Coney Island, and, as they often do, my kids taught me a powerful lesson.

My son Ty is almost eight, and he wanted to go on all the wild and crazy rides. Anything he was tall enough for, he’d go on. When we got to the haunted house, no one else wanted to go, but that didn’t stop him. So there I was, watching as he rode on the little cart, all by himself, into the Spook-a-Rama. His hands gripped the handle bar, and as he disappeared from sight, I caught a glimpse of his big blue eyes, wide with fear. I didn’t relax until he came out the other end.

When he did, his face was transformed. Actually, his whole body was. His fists were in the air, and he jumped out of the car and ran over, yelling, “I did it! I got through! Whenever I got scared, I just closed my eyes and faced my fear. That’s how! Just close your eyes!”

It was so cute, and at first, it didn’t strike me as anything profound. But on the way home, I...

We are super excited to announce that Moticise received the Fit Bottomed Girls’ Fittie Award for best workout DVD!

Mindset Reset is now officially an award-winning workout. What an honor! Thank you, Fit Bottomed Girls!      Get it here!!

It’s been an exhilarating 2016! I’ve been leading Mindset Reset workouts at a very prestigious financial institution for the second time, Seamless/Grubhub, the Grace Institute, and a handful of others around NYC. This summer, I’m booked to appear on morning TV in New Zealand (!), and last but not least…we’ve launched the latest Moticise speaking series – Holistic Nutrition for Maximum Potential, which looks at how your diet affects your mind, body, life, and everything else. Food, fitness, fun – all my favorite things! More info coming soon.

It’s so important to celebrate the highs in life. Celebrate all your...

Spring is a time of renewal, cleansing, letting go of the old to invite in the new. This week, I want to share the incredible story of how my friend Kim learned to let go of her pain and embrace a new life, while flying high above the Hudson River…

It was Monday, March 2013. I was sprawled out on my couch in Brooklyn, putting the finishing touches on my grad school application and waiting for my boyfriend to get out of work and planning what to make for dinner. When he got home, without explanation or apology, he broke up with me. Just like that.

I was devastated. We’d been together six years, talking about getting married – yet he gave me no warning, no compassion. In a second, my life came crashing down.

I fell apart. I lost ten pounds in a week, surviving on coffee and liquor, moving through my days in a painful, unreal fog. Everything hurt. I just couldn’t absorb the truth: that relationship, which had been my bedrock, my identity, was over.

...

Last week, I got to go on The Daily Burn, a fitness show based here in New York, as their guest celebrity. I did the morning workout with them, and we did a really cool exercise about “reaching new heights” on a trampoline. You can still catch the interview, and if you’re looking for a fun, challenging workout to do every day, you can stream the workouts free for a month – check it out!

During the workout – it was about a half hour of cardio and strength-training – Greg, the instructor, said something that really struck me.

“If you’re thinking ‘I can’t do this’ – remember, that ‘I can’t’ is just an interpretation of a feeling. It’s not a reality,” he said. “Breathe into it, stay calm. Keep going.”

How profound! And it’s true in several ways – not just about exercise, but about life. Self-talk is a hot topic these days, and it’s continually...

The other day I went to this fundraiser for a friend of mine, where we played poker with the Poker Divas. This was the first lesson – you have to play to win. If you just play not to lose,  you will almost definitely lose.

I thought, what an applicable lesson to life. It made me think of a time I was at a conference, where they asked you to put a number on a ping pong ball at registration. And then throughout the conference, sporadically, they’d come out with this big box full of ping pong balls, like a lottery, and they’d call a number and give out some pretty significant prizes.

One time when they were calling out numbers, I was out in the hallway, and a guy who worked at the conference asked me, ”How come you’re not in there? They’re giving away prizes.”

I said, “I know, but I never put my number on a ping pong ball, so, I’m not going to win.”

And he said, “Hm, that’s interesting. I wonder where else...