Hey there, fellow adventurers of the mind and body! Today, let’s do a deep dive into the enigmatic art of surrendering to the flow - a concept that has been a game-changer in my life and one I’m STILL practicing daily and learning from daily too! It may revolutionize yours too. Buckle up because we're about to embark on a journey of uncertainty, exploration, and unparalleled growth.

Have you ever tried to walk or swim against the current of a creek, river, or even waves in the ocean? It requires some effort, and after a while, it feels really HARD! Water is the most fluid of all the elements. It can change into many forms very quickly. It goes with a flow of allowing itself to be guided where it will go. It is constantly moving forward, endlessly moving into nooks, crannies of rocks, and caves, slowly and surely breaking down rocks into sand and carving into the landscape. We can learn a lot from water and from nature as a whole!

Nature teaches us valuable lessons about letting go of control and embracing a more allowing mindset.

Here are a few ways in which nature can help you learn to stop controlling and start allowing:

I hope you’re either a fan or familiar with Star Wars as you read this. If not, you might want to skip this post!

Star Wars Day is on May 4th, one of my favorite pop culture-influenced days.

I’ve been watching the original trilogy with my youngest son, and still, it’s exciting to watch and, for the times, pretty freakin’ cool!! The special effects aren’t the best, but they were cutting-edge in the 1970s and ‘80s.

So many good lessons in those movies that I use in my life so much and that I’ve had to learn to tune into as I’ve gotten older.

As a recovering control freak who likes things like guarantees that everything will work out with whatever chance I might take, who has avoided looking at her dark side, knowing that every one of us has a dark side.

On March 30, here in the Twin Cities and much of Minnesota, Mother Nature decided to play the cruelest of April Fool's pranks on us and send us a blizzard that dumped almost a foot of incredibly wet, heavy snow in some parts of the state!

Here in Saint Paul, we were blessed with 9 inches.

Having just returned from a vacation where the temperatures weren't tropical per se, but they were warmer than it had been here all Winter, it was hard to laugh at the joke.

Happy first day of meteorological Spring!

Here we are in the "shoulder season" of Spring.  

It's March 1st today, and according to the meteorological calendar, today is the first day of Spring. Here in Minnesota, you'd never know it, though, because all I see outside is snow, slush, and ice! This morning I woke up to snow and ice falling from the sky!

Ah, yes, shoulder season. The in-between time between Winter and Spring.  

It's cliche, I know, with February being the month Valentine's Day falls on, and it is such a Hallmark holiday and all!

Let's focus on heart energy, though. Specifically, opening up that heart energy and what that feels like.  

Happy New Year! Don’t you LOVE the feeling of a fresh start? A clean slate. Feeling the excitement of what could be… this is how so many of us start out the new year.

It’s hard to maintain that same excitement after the initial lift-off. Whatever you want to do there need to be incentives in place to help you stay on the positive momentum you started with!

Here are three tips for making the resolutions stick:

I love the Winter Solstice even more than the Summer Solstice. There is something special about the time of year, and the letting go of the old and ushering in the new simultaneously. Here are some beautiful things about this season of darkness that you might consider…

This simple but profound practice can change your life. As we come toward the end of the year, it's a beautiful time to reflect on the past year and see what is there that you feel grateful for. I have a gratitude practice I do EVERY DAY. Let me share what that looks like with you — it can inspire you to make the practice your own.

On a summer family vacation to the upper peninsula of Michigan several years ago, I went trail running on a gorgeous system of cross-country ski trails, everything was going great until I turned around a corner and was overcome with the feeling, “let’s get out of here fast.”

I don’t know why that happened. There was nobody else around, and I couldn’t hear any sounds that sounded like someone hiding behind some trees or bushes, but I just knew that I wanted to hightail it out of there as quickly as possible…

The nights have had a chill in the air that I haven't felt since last May. I have dug out sweatshirts to put on at sunset and reached for my down quilt in the middle of the night.

I want to share some gorgeous Fall hikes with you here in Minnesota. These are my best-of-the-best, organized by geographic area.

When the Covid 19 pandemic started in 2020 and the world shut down, many people looked for new places and ways to get out and explore.  

Many people tried camping and outdoor trips, and many tried wilderness experiences for the first time.

This was great AND not so great, at the same time.

Expect the unexpected and be able to handle it with ease. Here are some lessons from my recent experience.

This past week was a bummer. My son’s 8th birthday was on June 25, when he and the rest of our family tested positive for Covid. What a way to ring in another year, to have your birthday party canceled, your cake stashed in a freezer for later, and a piece-meal attempt at a kind of celebration where nobody was feeling up to doing much…

I surprised myself this year on Memorial Day. I took part in The Murph Challenge. I trained for about six weeks, did a few trial runs, and then did the event on Memorial Day and surprised myself! I finished below my goal time by 20 minutes!

When you challenge yourself beyond your known abilities, it can be scary and intimidating but also REWARDING!! At the finish, the accomplishment you feel can't compare to anything!

Start with something like registering for a 5k or another type of fitness challenge that you think you could do and is a bit of a stretch. Once you register, you've committed yourself, and then it is time to commit to the training and preparing phase.  

Here are some incremental steps you can take to start your challenge…

Items for enjoyable outdoor experiences for every budget!

If you love to play outside as I do, then you have items you like bringing with you for creature comforts while exploring in the wild. The following items are some of my go-to's for making my outdoor adventures next-level.

Create your urban day campsite with these essentials…

How to minimize the slog and embrace the process!

If you're anything like me, the winter months are perfect for long baths, extra sleep, skipping essential workouts, and eating way more than I need to, often in the form of heavier foods and carb-laden delights! Here it comes, the annual re-fit.  

I call it "the re-fit" because it's me re-engaging with fitness and getting fit again.

If you're in a re-fit too and need some encouragement, here are some things that I've done before and am doing this year to make the process much more enjoyable and not discouraging, or worse, not fun!

How to motivate yourself to get out and play during the damp part of Spring

Spring has finally sprung here in Minnesota!

While other areas of the country are already in full bloom, people have been wearing t-shirts and shorts for a while now; here in Minnesota, we still have our Winter gear out and are likely shoveling newly fallen snow every so often!

How can you stay motivated to get out and play in the cold, damp, and messy environment, whether you have a lot of mud or water that can be a barrier to having a delightful time?

It was the summer of 1998. I was an intern at Pacific Crest Outward Bound School in Bend, Oregon. I was on a 2-week course in the 3 Sisters Wilderness in Central Oregon, assisting the two instructors and teaching some naturalist classes to the students on the course. The final part of the course was to summit a mountain called Broken Top. Broken Top is a crumbling volcano that looks as if it could topple right over when you look at it.

Remember when you were a kid, and any car trips just seemed to take FOREVER? You’d constantly be asking your exasperated parent or caregiver, “are we there yet?” They would answer “no,” and then you’d ask again five minutes later.

As an adult, have you ever been waiting for something to happen, and you find yourself feeling impatient that it seems to be taking too long or wondering when it will be here?

Not having the proper clothing can turn a trip into a miserable experience where you want to bag it and head home. Here are some essential tips about packing for an outdoor trip, no matter what season or the forecast may predict.