“Peace is not a relationship of nations. It is a condition of mind brought about by a serenity of soul. Peace is not merely the absence of war. It is also a state of mind. Lasting peace can come only to peaceful people.” —Jawaharlal Nehru The journey from insanity to serenity is often long and [...]

It doesn’t seem to make sense, but when we desperately want relief from stress and anxiety, the thing to do is dive straight into our emotional pain. It’s so counterintuitive – we’re trying to get rid of pain, why would we jump right into it? Because: Avoiding pain means we get to keep it – [...]

This week Insanely Serene joined Facebook. I felt an urge to engage on a more regular basis with serenity seekers, and I’m just not writing enough blog posts (so sorry, my dear readers)! It was such a good idea. It’s like the creativity dam broke and serenity started flowing! The page invites commentary, video, images, [...]

I’ve shared with you before that my lifelong goal has been peace of mind – an escape from worry, relief from constant anxiety. In my years pursuing peace, I’ve discovered this: each of us must carve a path for ourselves. No matter how appealing someone else’s methods or process, we must still make them our [...]

Peace of mind is a constant goal…but there always seems to be something that gets in the way. I call it a bugaboo. That niggling thing – a thought, a feeling, a behavior – that just keeps getting diverting us from peace. It could be a big thing – say, an addiction, or something less [...]

Anyone get this message growing up: “Think of yourself first!”? What, nobody? In fact, most of us learned the very opposite – “How selfish to put yourself before others! Put others’ needs first.” Isn’t putting others before ourselves a selfless act? It seems to make sense, but here’s the problem: When we give before we [...]

mis·take –noun 1. an error in action, calculation, opinion, or judgment caused by poor reasoning, carelessness, insufficient knowledge, etc. There is no such thing as a mistake. If someone had told me that years ago, I would not have believed it. Then, I thought nearly everything I did and said was just wrong. I made [...]

When a storm of life passes through, whipping up turbulence around us, we feel no control over our destiny. Things are happening to us, and it seems the best response is to be defensive. Reacting to the storm out of fear, we may lash out to push through it or turn inward to protect ourselves. [...]

Have you ever seen the bizarre commercial that advertises “Head On”? It’s unclear what the product is or does, but it’s insistent upon one thing – you must: Apply directly to the forehead! Presumably, it relieves pain of some sort. And you just need to repeat the treatment. I realized this concept – vague as [...]

Every now and again, I have a real breakthrough on my path to more peace of mind. As you know, peace of mind has been my life’s goal even when I didn’t know it, when all I had was constant anxiety. Now that I know I’m after peace, and even have a few tools to [...]