The other day, I was walking my dog in Riverside Park when I ran into an old friend, Greg. I almost didn't recognize him, though – he looked about fifty pounds lighter than when I'd seen him last.

"You look great!" I said. "Thanks," he said, beaming. "I finally got into the habit of working out. It only took about two decades." 

When I knew Greg, he'd hated the gym. "What changed?" I said, always interested to hear how people make a big turnaround like that (especially when it has to do with exercise). 

"A few years ago, I decided to try a spin class," he said. "It was terrible. It would have been my only spin class – except sitting on the bike next to me was a beautiful redheaded woman. So I went back the next week. At first, I only went to see her. But then the class itself started to grow on me, and I began to miss it when I didn't go. I've been going three times a week ever since." 

"What happened to the redhead?" I asked. "Did you ever talk to...

Courage. Willpower. A million-dollar coaching course. There's no end to the list of things that will help you reach your goals. But in all the rush to visualize and manifest and achieve, there's one crucial piece that often gets overlooked – and yet without it, you'll get nowhere.

 That thing is hope.

 But what exactly is hope?

Here's how I think of it: hope is what tennis players have when they're on a winning streak. (Can you tell I was watching the US Open this month?) This is true in other sports, too, but especially in a tennis match, you can actually see the players' level of hope. When she's down and feels like she can't win, she's making unforced errors, she's losing her serve – it's obvious. It's in her body language, in her face, in how she carries herself. She's pacing, angry, distracted. You can practically tell she's going to lose.

 Until something changes. Usually it's a change in strategy. She tries something different – a dropshot,...

Years ago, on a sunny afternoon in L.A., my husband Stephen and I were sitting in a rental car in a parking garage on Sunset Boulevard. He had just gotten fired from his job, and he was in a state of complete panic about what we were going to do.

Our daughter, Kaya, was six months old. I’d just gotten certified as a life coach, so I didn't have regular work yet. His was the only income we had coming in; we had no money to our names; and did I mention we had a six-month-old?

“What are we gonna do?” he kept saying. “How are we going to make money?”

The gig he’d been fired from was a “first-look deal,” which, in the film industry, is where they pay you to generate story ideas. A lot of people crumble under such intense pressure to be creative, but Stephen thrived under it. He can see stories and plotlines where other people see chaos. But that day, sitting in the car, all he saw was a dead end.

“It’s going to be okay,” I...

 This part week, I started to get the sneaky sense that fall is just around the corner. I know it’s a month away, but suddenly people are talking about school, final vacation plans, signing up for after-school activities. All of that is happening now, and all I can think is no! I don't want it to be fall. I want summer to keep going forever. 

One reason I love summer is that it makes things feel easy. When the sun is shining and school's out, I just feel like it's easier to relax and let things flow. But as the leaves start to turn, and change is in the air, and the responsibilities of the school year loom ahead, it feels like that easiness is coming to an end. It's time for structure, alarm clocks, and mega to-do lists. I start to get a pit in my stomach, and it's saying, Oof, this is going to be hard.

But you know what? Just because things get busier and more regimented doesn't mean they have to get harder. In fact, "hard" and "easy" are states of mind. We choose...

I have a confession. For all my years of working with mindset, there was a lot of time that I avoided the concept of mindfulness. I thought it was overused, and (dare I say it?) boring. I thought it meant never thinking about the future, never being really excited, never setting goals or planning ahead – and those are some of my favorite things! 

But then I realized something: that judgment was really resistance in disguise. Thankfully, with the help of reading, trusted friends, and a whole lotta practice, I learned what mindfulness really means.

It means stepping into the flow of life. It means opening up to the messages that our bodies, minds, and hearts are sending us – and they are constantly sending us messages that we need to hear. When we're not mindful – that is, when we're distracted by what we're doing later, or fixated on what we don't have, or numb to our emotions, we miss out. It's like watching TV while someone is trying to tell us something...

On my ideal day, I wake up super-early, without an alarm, refreshed and ready to go. Then I have a long, leisurely, mindful transition into the day. Of course, I live in the real world, so that doesn't always happen - and when it doesn't, you can bet my whole day is off kilter.

That's why I've decided to make a list of the three most important things to do every single morning, and share it with you. Try these (they don't take long at all), and see if they don't radically improve your day.

Take time for yourself, even if it's just 5 minutes. It's tempting to dive right into the day, but pause to check in with yourself and find center first. Whether that's having a cup of coffee before everyone else wakes up, getting a workout in, meditating, reading, whatever - make sure part of your morning is just for you.

Ask powerful questions. So many of us wake up already thinking, "I don't have enough time," "I didn't sleep enough," "I'm not doing enough." The best way to combat...

Have you ever set a goal, and gotten really gung-ho excited about it...only to fall away from it a few days or weeks later? (New Year's Resolutions, anybody?)

Well, today I want to invite you to call to mind a goal you were once excited about. What was it? What happened, that you fell away from it? 

I'm gonna guess that your mindset around that goal isn't the most positive one. And that can cause huge problems, because your mindset determines your results. So let's look at three powerful ways you can use your body to create a success mindset.

1. Explore your vision.

When you visualize what you want, a couple things happen. First, you can see more clearly how to get there. It's like starting at the end, and working backwards. Second, you start to get emotionally connected to your goal. Both those things will help you work toward it.
 
Here's my favorite way to explore your vision: go on a Journey Walk.
 
Studies shows that walking unleashes creativity and helps you...

A couple years ago, I offered a Moticise workshop on Money & Career at a special event for entrepreneurs here in New York. In it, we did the Wheel of Life, an activity that gives people a new perspective on what areas in their life need work.

In the Wheel of Life, you color in each area of your life to the extent that you feel it's going well. If you're feeling good about your spirituality, you might color it in all the way; but if you're having trouble with your health, you might leave it blank, or only color it in a little bit.

After the group colored in their Wheel, I asked them to talk about their Money and Career slices. "Why did you color it in the amount that you did?" I asked.

A woman named Taylor spoke first. She'd introduced herself as a realtor who had recently ventured out on her own, and she said, "You know what's funny? My Money and Careers sections are way lower than I thought they would be."

"What do you mean?" I said.

"I thought those areas were going well, but...

"I don't know what to do," Tricia said as she sat down across from me. She gave a heavy sigh. "I just feel so drained, all the time. And yet, everything in my life is fine. My kids are healthy, I'm healthy. My marriage is wonderful. I like my work. I mean, it's not perfect. But there's nothing wrong, and yet…something's wrong."

When I hear something like that, I know it's time for the Wheel of Life.

I showed Tricia a sample Wheel. "There are all the major areas in our lives," I told her, "but unless we're taking care of all of them, not just some, the wheel can't turn properly."

I asked her to fill out her own Wheel of Life, coloring in the areas fully if they were going well, partially if they were okay, and leaving them blank if they weren't. She got busy with her colored pencils. When she was done, she looked it over in surprise.

"What do you see?" I asked.

"Well, like I said, most things are going fine," she said, pointing to the slices that she'd colored in fully....

A few months ago, my friend Steve emailed in response to a blog I wrote (the one where I got chased by coyotes), and we got to talking about how we can trust our intuition – and how to know if what we're hearing is our intuition in the first place?

Steve had studied this extensively in regards to addiction – first, with his own addictions, and then in his graduate work, and now as a counselor. His insights were so profound and applicable to all areas of life that I had to share them with you. Here's his story…

I work with many clients who have lost their ability to trust their intuition. Many use their substance just to feel normal each day. Addictions, including alcoholism, affect the brain by overriding the executive function. That's why people will choose to use a substance against their better judgment, knowing there will be negative consequences. In other words, an addicted person's intuition doesn’t stand a chance. (In the addiction field we call this...