Blog
Your Story Matters: leading and living your creative best
Welcome—so glad you’re here. Do you, like me, want to work more creatively, lead lightly, be productive, and design the life you want to live? Are you curious about how storytelling can help you can engage others and shape meaning? If so, I hope you enjoy these posts and I look forward to hearing from you!
How to find Magic in the Ordinary
Last weekend, our furnace quit. That meant no heat and no hot water. We warmed the house by turning on our stove's gas burners. My husband chivalrously carted buckets of hot water from the kitchen to the bathroom so that I could take a bath (sacred evening ritual)...
Three crazy super-easy ways to add thanks to your life
Many of us in the United States are preparing for the November marathon known as Thanksgiving. While not as intensive as Christmas, it still involves (assuming you’ve invited people over): inviting guests, scanning recipes, cleaning the house, buying and...
Finding fiery hope
"Hope locates itself in the premises that we don’t know what will happen and that in the spaciousness of uncertainty is room to act." Rebecca Solnit How do we join our hope and rage together? Isn't it time to join Greta Thunberg and rage about the insufficient...
Where in the cycle are you?
To everything (turn, turn, turn) There is a season (turn, turn, turn) And a time to every purpose, under heaven Pete Seeger (and Ecclesiastes) When I first arrived at our island home almost fourteen years ago, I started to garden like a madwoman. This was...
When life goes to the dogs
Sometimes the things we do that are crazy might be the most sane.
Put the hallow back in Halloween (plus five freaky facts)
Halloween is coming, that once a year fest of spooks, villains, princesses, and pumpkins–a merchandiser's dream. If we could ignore the overdose of commercialism, though, we might find, within the history of its Celtic predecessor, rituals that would help us move...
What if, sometimes, there is no reason?
Does everything happen for a reason?Even if you believe this to be so, would you say it to someone who's grappling for her life?I suggest not.Like most of us, I'd like to believe that my life is under control, I want to believe that if I do my best, life will work...
If fear knocks: 8 ways to survive an anxious day
Today I'm waiting for the outcome of a friend's surgery, and whether that's fear or anxiety, it's pretty hard to take because there's nothing I can do to influence the situation. Fear and anxiety have set in. Technically, they are different although I consider them...
Finding your true “yes” and your true “no”
One thing I have noticed in recent years is that my "no's" and my "yes's" have gotten stronger and clearer. Being able to listen to one's self and sense (and offer) a true "yes" and a true "no" may be one of the superpowers we can claim with age, even if gracefully...
Got Rhythm?
We all have rhythm. It's built into us through our heartbeats and the circadian (24 hour) rhythms that influence when we feel hungry, energetic, or sleepy. As our biology influences our rhythms, so, too, does the way we work. Our distant ancestors followed rhythms...
Heal the burn
It's so difficult to watch the pictures of the Amazon burning, knowing that there's so little that can be done, at least in the short run, even as some countries offer millions in aid. One way I stay sane is by sending healing thoughts to nature, just as, on so many...
3 Reasons not to think about death (and why you might reconsider)
What if thinking about death could bring you more life, more beauty, and more connection to the people you love? Most of us want to avoid the topic. That's not news. Ernest Becker wrote about it years ago in his classic, The Denial of Death. I experienced how...
My husband is under house arrest
My husband is not guilty of crimes against the state. The state may be guilty of crimes against him. The news about what is happening or not happening in Washington, D.C. is robbing him of his optimism and faith in the future. I watch him going down as he reads about...
Is it time to create your “Joy List?”
This week, I'm balancing writing an article about coping with life's little losses by remembering all the joys that I'm finding. I'm creating a "Joy List," a go-to, no-thinking-required list of top pleasures, delight-full projects, music that moves, things that make...
Play your way into presence
How does one learn to be more present–in that state of being in the moment, open, receptive, and curious? And how do I move beyond my overstretched I've-got-to-have-life-figured-out brain, and, occasionally, (good luck), stop trying to control the world? I'd like to...
Peeking into the lives of others
I'm fascinated by how others live, not just by the face they show the world. Living in Paris, I'd spend hours people-watching at outdoor cafés. A café creme was the excuse I needed to be able to sit and watch the world pass by. Living in Seattle, I enjoyed...
Freedom’s not just another word
"Freedom's just another word for nothing else to lose." Kris Kristofferson Last week I lost a piece of my heart: our foster dog Jackson. After many bouts of sobbing, I found myself in a peaceful stupor, when the word freedom came to me as if Jackson had sent it....
When the tail stops wagging
Today, as this post is being published, our dog, the irrepressible Jackson, is being put down. Perhaps dementia was triggering his increased aggression–we don't know. Our trainer assures us that this is the right way to go; our old dog will be fine and it's better to...
The power of deep hope
Last year a good friend went through a true dark night of the soul brought on by medical circumstances. The prednisone she was given for an acutely painful condition weakened her bones, leading to a serious fracture of her lumbar spine. Even in rehab, the excruciating...
When you’re feeling climate despair, give nature a face
I'm feeling pretty despairing about climate change these days. The idea that people in high places dispute the science behind what's happening to our environment seems unconscionable. Barbaric. But then a lot of things seem that way to me these days.I recently...
Your blog is an ongoing tonic for the soul, and a reminder of what’s possible.
Stephen SilhaWow! You keep writing the most pertinent, passionate, and clear articles I have the pleasure to read. Bravo!
Doug LipmanAs always, Sally, I am dazzled and inspired by the elegance, eloquence and relevance of your writing…
BIll Veltrop
Meet Sally
She’s an inspiring communicator, an original thinker, she weaves big ideas and practical examples together to help her clients take their next big step forward. She teaches leadership presence by modeling it.
She is visionary and practical, vulnerable and solid, accessible and real. A perpetual learner herself, she’s not afraid to take risks to develop the talents of her clients.
Engaging Presence
