Mindtools & inspirations
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Mind Tools & Inspirations are experiences to help you operate your human system, drawn from yoga, science, and game design
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Made for busy, smart, curious people trying to survive and thrive in challenging times.
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I offer short and super-short experiences (try this), audio narration if you can take time to be guided, and explanations (why do this?).
Subscribe below to receive these free weekly experiences via email.
Welcome to the Mindtools Library
The experiences are grouped into 3 categories.
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UPLIFTING AND NOURISHING
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CALMING AND SUPPORTIVE
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DISCOVERY AND EXPLORATION
Uplifting and Nourishing
Beautiful - June 23, 2025
Yes, simple can be powerful. In this 3-minute practice you connect with something beautiful.
Where you place your attention throughout the day influences your human system—your body, emotions, thoughts, and behavior.
Focusing your attention on a beautiful thing can influence how you feel, how you think, and how you behave.
Inner Light - August 11, 2025
In this 3-minute experience you connect with your inner light.
Inner light is a metaphor for your essence, your life force, your spirit.
Your inner light is separate from the goings on of the outside world.
Connecting with and nourishing your inner light helps you be more you. Connecting with and nourishing your inner light helps you keep external events in perspective.
Summer Fun - August 18, 2025
In this 3-minute experience you take time to remember fun memories of summer when you were young.
We go back to childhood because you and your life were so different then. And the memories are deep, probably not activated in a long time.
In remembering your body and mind take on some of the qualities of that experience.
Perhaps you were able to remember a sense of fun. Perhaps for a little while you embodied feelings of childhood fun.
You return to daily life with a slightly different perspective.
A Day Off - August 4, 2025
Even if today is Monday you can reconnect with the feeling of a day off by doing this 3-minute experience.
Time off feels special—because of what you don’t have to do and because of what you might do.
Imagining is not just in your mind. Your body changes to resemble how it reacts when it experiences what you are imagining.
Opening from Inside Out, September 8, 2025
In this 3-minute practice subtle movements and breath help open up space inside of you.
Sitting for hours causes your body to get stuck. When you get up moving feels stiff instead of fluid.
Opening from the inside out, like you did in this practice, is one way to begin to get unstuck. You can do these movements periodically while sitting at your desk, in a meeting or on a bus.
Your mind and body are connected. When your body opens from the inside out, your whole human system is likely to feel more spacious.
Wonderful Blue Sky, September 29, 2025
Spending time in nature changes how your human system operates (and how you feel).
In this 3-minute practice you connect with your sense of a wonderful blue sky.
If you repeat this practice on different days, your experience will be different. (It’s so interesting!) And you will deepen your connection with the feeling of a wonderful blue sky.
Core Value - June 16, 2025
In this 3-minute practice you invite one of your core values to come to mind. Connecting with a core value can remind you how it feels when you are aligned with what matters to you.
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There can also be a delicious feeling of rightness when you feel aligned with a core value, such as by doing this short practice.
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Doing this can remind you of who you are or who you want to be.
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Doing this might help you bring more of that value into your life.
Calming and Supportive
Handle with Care - July 28 2025
Listening to and acting on what you need is a big deal.
It can be something as small as making time to do this short practice even though you’re really busy.
Acting on what you need usually involves doing something a little bit differently—making a conscious choice rather than just operating on autopilot.
Noticing and appreciating what you just did by doing this 3-minute practice amplifies the benefits.
Brain Cooling, September 22, 2025
In this 3-minute practice you use breath and attention to cool your human system. Lowering the temperature, gently slowing the activities of your mind, can help you see more clearly.
This practice teaches a cooling breath technique that you can do for a few minutes on your own, whenever it might be helpful.
It takes a lot of attention to alternate long slow exhales with natural rest breaths. And that’s a good thing. It gives your mind something to do.
Long slow exhales through the mouth are associated with cooling, clearing, and releasing.
Solid Ground-- May 5, 2025
A good way to feel like you are on solid ground is to embody the feeling. This 3-minute experience helps you to do that.
“Being on solid ground” is a metaphor grounded in a physical experience that can imply coming from a stable foundation, having a secure base, being well-supported, or coming from strength and confidence
Safe as a Giant Clam - June 30, 2025
Most of the day a giant clam’s shell is open, allowing it to feed on tiny plankton in the water. When clams sense a threat, they close their shell to be safe and protected.
Imagine having your inner clam always with you. Imagine being able to close your shell to feel safe and protected.
Doing this practice over time can help you access that part of you that is always safe, regardless of what is happening in the world around you.
Discovery and Exploration
Going Deeper - October 20 2025
In this 3-minute practice you bring your attention inward, to parts of yourself that are less affected by external events.
This practice can provide a reset, helping you briefly detach from external concerns. You re-enter with a refreshed perspective.
This practice might also pique your interest in going deeper.
Chocolate Test - June 2, 2025
I deliciously anticipate my daily square(s) of dark chocolate. But as soon as I put one in my mouth my mind moves on to whatever is next unless I remind myself to stay with the feeling and taste of melting chocolate.
My “chocolate test” reveals how present I am.
This 3-minute practice can help you be more present to everyday experiences.
Perhaps you will discover your own chocolate test.
Irritation is Information - July 14, 2025
You feel irritated when your Anterior Insula Cortex (your AIC) detects that something may not be going the way you want it to go. Your AIC creates vivid feelings in your body to get your attention and motivate you to act.
In this 3-minute experience you practice observing and releasing irritation.
Checking the Weather - April 21, 2025
Like raindrops on a window how you feel colors and shapes what you see.
Becoming aware of how you feel gives you information. In this 3-minute experience you bring your awareness to how you feel—to your internal “weather”.
Noticing how you feel lets you recognize and consider the messages your body is sending.
Curious- August 25, 2025
Feeling curious can motivate you to understand or to try or to learn something.
In this 3-minute practice you connect with experiences of curiosity in your life.
The surprise of what shows up is one of the things I love about Mind Tools. You wait and allow a time you felt curious to show up.
Childhood Cupcake - July 7, 2025
My baker friend gave me what he referred to as a CHILDHOOD CUPCAKE. It had lots of sprinkles. He said “when you eat it you will feel like you are four years old again.”
Connecting with pleasant memories from childhood in this 3-minute experience can remind your body and mind of being that age.
Brain Pulse - June 9, 2025
In this 3-minute practice you check in with what your mind is up to. Taking your “brain pulse” by counting your thoughts is a way observe your thoughts without getting lost in them.
You can use this brain pulse practice to get to know more about the ways your mind works—such as on different days, at different times, in different moods, in different situations.
