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Articles by Jennifer Louden

Browse published articles attributed to Jennifer Louden, with full-archive search.

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By Jennifer LoudenSep 4, 20061 topic

Being A Change Agent: An Inner Approach with Outer Impact

Change agents. We see them everywhere: theyâre the ones heading the annual food drive; lobbying the school board to get soda machines out of the lunch room; hosting family reunions; making the holiday office party more fun; and actually attending city council meetings. They identify opportunities for change and act on them-- instead of just talking about it or waiting for someone else to take the lead. We admire them for their energy and courage, and we may feel a bit uncom

Primary topic: Adult and Senior Development

Adult and Senior Development

4,496 views

By Jennifer LoudenAug 13, 20061 topic

Self-Kindness, Truth, and Writing

Once when I went to a new (to me) yoga class I had a teacher say, "When we go into a pose, we can listen to our ego, which says, 'Push, push, go lower, go deeper,' or we can practice non-violence (in Sanskrit ahimsa) and truth (sattva)." nnNon-violence toward ourselves = self-kindness. I won't bully myself to do better. I will love myself into doing what is best for me. nnTruth = I won't indulge lies in my private conversations. I won't stick my head in the sand and pretend I

Primary topic: Writing Tools

1,899 views

By Jennifer LoudenFeb 4, 20111 topic

Creativity

Did you know the critical part of your self is never going away? In fact, to want to kill the critic off is just playing into the Critic's game because it is wanting to kill off a part of yourself. It reinforces the idea that something is wrong with you that needs to be fixed-- "Once I get this critic handled, THEN I'll be able to create."nnHere is what works much, much better: accept the critic but always, always remember you--the adult, is in charge. Accept that the critic

Primary topic: Creativity

1,827 views

By Jennifer LoudenMay 19, 20061 topic

Do What You Love and Continue to Grow Every Day

Can I tell you, frankly, how sick I am of the story that because we do what we love, we should always be jubilant, light hearted, blissed out, can't-wait-to-get-out-of-bed every-bloody-morning happy and content? Have you ever fell into this belief?nnWhat a disservice this myth does to women like you and me and the two glistening creative souls quoted below--Carla Blazek and Kirsten Oppe. nnHere is my claim: you can do what you love, for a living or a part-time living or simpl

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,368 views

By Jennifer LoudenJul 8, 20041 topic

The Self-Care Minder on Transitions

"I don't know what I want (in my career / creative passion / relationships/ all of the above)."nn"I know what I want to create next but I AM scared and I don't know how to do it so maybe this means I shouldn't do it."nn"I sense rumbling change brewing but I don't know what to do with this rumbling so I keep doing the same thing."nn"I've been in this not knowing fog for years... How do I know if I'm kidding myself? What if I never birth what's next?"nnMyself, I've been in a "c

Primary topic: Positive Thinking

Positive Thinking

1,366 views

By Jennifer LoudenJul 8, 20041 topic

Doing What You Love?

Can I tell you, frankly, how sick I am of the story that because we do what we love, we should always be jubilant, light hearted, blissed out, can't-wait-to-get-out-of-bed every-bloody-morning happy and content? Have you ever fell into this belief? What a disservice this myth does to women like you and me and the two glistening creative souls quoted below--Carla Blazek and Kirsten Oppe. Here is my claim: you can do what you love, for a living or a part-time living or simply b

Primary topic: Happiness

1,329 views

By Jennifer LoudenMay 12, 20061 topic

Being With What Is

I've been observing the tremendous power our interpretations of events have to influence our bodies, our moods, and our ability to be present and notice what is. nnAn example: My knee started hurting a few years ago. Having had my share of knee injuries and two surgeries, I quickly assumed (or interpreted) the pain to mean something was seriously wrong with my knee. I told myself my days of being a yoga queen were over and I might as well forget the book I've been cooking on

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,291 views

By Jennifer LoudenNov 21, 20031 topic

How to Remember

You already know everything you need to know to be the person you want to be in the world. Really. I believe that about you. I believe that about me, too. I also believe we keep forgetting to what we know, keep forgetting live from our deepest values, and that we all need help remembering.nnIn this time of holiday grace, in this time of strife in the world, in this time of desperate need for peace and clarity, I offer you a "cheat sheet" of thoughts and practices for remember

Primary topic: Spiritual Growth

Spiritual Growth

1,286 views

By Jennifer LoudenSep 26, 20061 topic

The Power of Story in the Face of Mortality

I.nThere is a story my father has told my entire life. It is 1964. I am two and he is forty-three. We live on Park Lane in Bloomington, Indiana and every morning when my mother releases me from my crib, I bump down the stairs in my night diaper and I crawl across the kitchen tile and down two more stairs to the half-bath off the family room, where my father is preparing to shave. Dad reaches down and places me on the closed toilet seat, where, according to legend, I raptly wa

Primary topic: Death and Dying

Death and Dying

1,265 views

By Jennifer LoudenMay 5, 20061 topic

Creativity Vacation

I was reflecting on how I spend a week each year in Taos, New Mexico at the Mable Dodge Luhan House co-leading a retreat with author and performer Suzanne Falter-Barns (www.howmuchjoy.com). Another Taos Writerâs Spa is coming up at the end of July this summer. We create a circle for women where we are safe, fed, supported, heard, and given gentle, individual direction, and then do we soar! I think back to a week in which my heart grew two sizes bigger because of my gratitud

Primary topic: Creativity

1,251 views

By Jennifer LoudenAug 18, 20061 topic

Habit Experiments

A few years ago I spent 8 days just off Vancouver Island, British Columbia with my family; paddling kayaks, watching orcas, seeing bear eat crab, and sniffing drifting wood smoke. nnMy sister and brother-in-law came along on our adventure and they both said, at different times, "We would never think to do something like this." We watched these harried city dwellers find the burnishing pleasure of the outdoors; that moment when your shoulders drop and you settle back into your

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,240 views

By Jennifer LoudenJul 14, 20061 topic

Ordinary is the New Extraordinary

Part 1 n"We have become burdened with the idea that everything must be special, or exceptional, or the very best for our children...Indeed, we do our children a disservice by trying to make life extraordinary instead of ordinary. 'Inherited potential will be realized when the environmental provision is adequate. Adequate, not exceptional. In order to flourish, children don't need the best of everything. Instead they simply need what is good enough. Consider that 'good enough'

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,226 views

By Jennifer LoudenJul 20, 20061 topic

Befriending Your Creativity

Do you secretly hold an âascetic self-flagellant, it-must-be-hard-to-be-good, thatâs for other peopleâ attitude about your creativity? nn(Don't waste your time telling me you aren't creative--life is the ultimate creative act and you are alive, or else you wouldn't be reading this). nnSelf-care and creativity are best friends--one cannot exist without the other. Yet we don't often think about befriending, romancing, inveigling our creativity. Instead we: nn* Compare our

Primary topic: Creativity

1,190 views

By Jennifer LoudenJun 16, 20061 topic

Worry Now, Cry Later

I remember when my daughter finished 3rd grade a few years ago. nI cried.nnA couple days later, she pulled out two boxes of old photos, searching for ones she could paste in her journal. I came home from yoga and stood in the kitchen, eating a rice cake with almond butter, looking at photos with her. Lilly at three and four, playing in our old house in Santa Barbara. With friends. With family members who have since passed on.nI cried.nnI went to church not long after that. It

Primary topic: Child Development

Child Development

1,183 views

By Jennifer LoudenMay 30, 20061 topic

Living in Transition

Do any of these thoughts sound familiar?nn"I don't know what I want (in my career / creative passion / relationships/ all of the above)."nn"I know what I want to create next but I AM scared and I don't know how to do it so maybe this means I shouldn't do it."nn"I sense rumbling change brewing but I don't know what to do with this rumbling so I keep doing the same thing."nn"I've been in this not knowing fog for years... How do I know if I'm kidding myself? What if I never birt

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,180 views

By Jennifer LoudenOct 9, 20061 topic

The Holidays Are Coming: Do You Know Where Your Soul Is?

"Loving earth, work, one another, psyche - all these require unhurried time. Frenzied questing after the icons of modern life (speed, power, instant, more, bigger, unboundedness) devours time and injures the capacity to love. The shy soul is driven inevitably into hiding where she yearns for a time when men {and women} had time to love. The failure to find time for soul is the essential tragedy of our time." nn-Russell Lockhart, from When Men Had Time to Love nnnIt's almost h

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,169 views

By Jennifer LoudenApr 7, 20061 topic

Life: Lessons Ad Infinitum

I spent last week making art in two different workshops. It was a very humbling week. I encountered that first hard bump of learning something new, that first jolt of, "Oh no, I can't do what I want to do, I can't make what I see in my head or feel in my heart." When I learn something new, I experience a brief grace period (beginner's mind?) when what I make or do is satisfying. Then the bump, the frustration, the ouch comes -- it's not working anymore! Oh no!nnI'm proud to s

Primary topic: Creativity

1,167 views

By Jennifer LoudenJun 2, 20061 topic

"I'll Show You!" And Other Limiting Motivations

I discovered that the fuel for many of my accomplishments in my life was "I'll show you." As a child, somewhere around 6th grade, I assessed that I wasn't smart enough to accomplish what I wanted in my life so I began to rely on sheer will to get things done. All I needed was one person to challenge me, to doubt me, and I was off. When I conceived of my first book and a friend said, "You'll never get that published. You know how many self-help books there are already?" I had

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,151 views

By Jennifer LoudenApr 21, 20061 topic

For Freelancing to Equal Freedom, Choices are Required

The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that 8.5 million people identify themselves as consultants or freelance workers -- and other sources have that number as high as 30 million, and growing. One aspect of freelance work that many people underestimate is the amazing number of things that can surface preventing you from working productively. Another is your own fears, bad habits, and neuroses staring you boldly in the face with fewer people to project blame upon (like your fo

Primary topic: Business Opportunities

Business Opportunities

1,140 views

By Jennifer LoudenJun 23, 20061 topic

The Veiled Gift of Envy

I once spent a year obsessed with another writer's success. Envy whispered in my ear, "You should have what she has and right now." I was aghast at my obsession, especially given that I didn't particularly like her book, and yet envy wouldn't go away. It was (almost) comical how each time a fresh wave of envy broke over me, there she would be, her name in an email, her book dropping out of a bookshelf at my feet, an invitation to be on a panel with her in my PO Box. Instead o

Primary topic: Positive Thinking

Positive Thinking

1,128 views

By Jennifer LoudenApr 17, 20061 topic

A Twist on Goal Setting: Bare Minimums

Recently I asked my Self-Care e-newsletter readers to share what helps them "turn toward their truth." I've also called this 'minimum self-care requirements' in other issues. As a result, this is what I wrote today to be included in my upcoming book:nnBetween survival and a fully humming creative life lies the middle ground of minimum requirements for centering self-care -- a fancy way of saying what you absolutely must have to stay in touch with your center.nnThese minimums

Primary topic: Goal Setting

1,096 views

By Jennifer LoudenAug 25, 20061 topic

Accept, Serve, & Flow

I sat down to write about the self-nurturing essential of receiving -- love, energy, compliments, ideas, gifts, the Divine â and I didn't want to write. nnI kept putting it off, doing anything but writing... and then it hit me when I was out walking... I haven't been receiving so how I can I write about it! I've been cutting myself off from the flow, I've fallen into that old pattern of shining out without taking in.nnMy buddy, coach and co-facilitator of Surfing the Edge o

Primary topic: Women's Issues

1,047 views

By Jennifer LoudenMar 29, 20061 topic

Creative, Connected Self Care

Most self care materials are related to how you manage your own needs when taking care of others, especially when other people are ill or incapacitated. Since there are so many resources out there already related to that angle, this article fleshes out the idea of self care in a couple of directions. The first relates to how we creatively care for ourselves when we are feeling full, luscious, and charged with energy. I love it when I wake up and for no apparent reason I feel

Primary topic: Happiness

1,022 views

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