Tag archives: spirituality
Making money and living a conscious life are not mortal enemies. So suggests May McCarthy, who over the last 35 years has founded and grown seven profitable companies, in a variety of industries including fashion retail, telecommunications, healthcare software, and capital equipment, that employs 250 people and bring in more than $100 million in annual […]
The beginning of Bonnie and David Paul‘s The Freedom to Choose Project came more or less out of the blue 15 years ago when the couple were on the faculty in spiritual psychology at the University of Santa Monica. An inmate at a California prison who had been inspired by a story she read in […]
It takes nine months for humans to gestate in the womb from conception to birth. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that the same period has elapsed since the Santa Barbara Consciousness Network events went on hiatus as founder Forrest Leichtberg began to incubate a new format for the gatherings. Complications with logistics combined with a desire […]
Nearly all the spiritual traditional and psychological systems suggest that suffering comes from how we interpret our experiences. Life is always going to have painful moments – but it’s what we make them mean that determines our level of inner happiness on anguish. There are many paths that aim to help humans alleviate the symptoms […]
Authentic Relating (AR) Games – the ongoing gathering to go beyond surface conversations established in Santa Barbara by husband-and-wife Simon D’Arcy and Tamra Rutherford – returns from an extended three-month hiatus (due to the Thomas Fire and a change is schedule) next Friday, February 23. This month’s theme is “And, What’s Underneath That?”, a provocative […]
The second Monday of December, at the height of the smoke and ash filling the air from the Thomas Fire, I donned my N95 mask and headed down to Yoga Soup for “The Big Sing”, the final session of the initial inCourage Community Chorus classes led by Britta Gudmunson and Ben Gould. It was quite […]
Sunburst Sanctuary scheduled its popular annual silent meditation retreat long before the flames and flood afflicted Montecito and environs. And while our chatter-filled minds make it seem like staying quiet for a weekend could be cause for anxiety, perhaps quiet contemplation in the community is the perfect elixir for these challenging circumstances. Whatever the impetus, […]
There are a lot of self-help books out there in the world, but Beth Amine‘s just-published Joyous Every Day Living is a lovely little gem. The 116-page book is a simple yet meaningful work that is organized in a straightforward but powerful manner, and represents the first published writing from Amine, a 40-years-plus Santa Barbara-based […]
Like all of us in the Montecito/greater Santa Barbara area, I have had a lot of personal reactions to the Montecito mudslide disaster coming on the heels of the Thomas Fire, from numbness to grief to fear to hopefulness and even gratitude. The latter came mostly last weekend in the wake of the community coming […]
Richard Groves, the co-founder and executive director of the Sacred Art of Living Center, in Bend, Oregon, has been leading workshops and retreats in the Enneagram for nearly 30 years, including up to three times a year at La Casa de Maria in Montecito. An ordained Catholic priest, Groves conducted research for his doctoral thesis […]
Ragan and Alex Thomson met Dale Halaway more than a decade ago, when Alex signed up for a business coaching seminar and immediately felt a connection. Over the years, the Montecito power couple kept working with Halaway, a veteran transformational life coach, in a variety of public and eventually private seminars and coaching sessions – […]
Noell Grace, Ejé Lynn-Jacobs, and the SpiritSings Band have a Yuletide offer: Come all ye merry souls for a magical evening of Christmas carols, mystical solstice chants, and original spirit songs celebrating peace on Earth and the darkest days returning to light. The long-running SpiritSings turns its attention to the holidays, a special show when […]
In his most recent email missive, Yoga Soup founder/owner Eddie Ellner mused on how his effort 12 years ago to “construct the place that I’d want to go to when I felt I had no place to go” eventually turned into the thriving consciousness-raising hub as he eventually realized that he was “surrounded by a […]
Spiritual practices as well as many self-growth paths can leave one feeling overly vulnerable and perhaps even confused about the nature of connection to others. With “Activating Energetic Protection”, slated for 7 to 9 pm this Friday night at Paradise Found, Dr. Valerie Girard and Dr. Fleur Nelson are teaming up for a two-hour presentation […]
Spiritual practices as well as many self-growth paths can leave one feeling overly vulnerable and perhaps even confused about the nature of connection to others. With “Activating Energetic Protection”, slated for 7 to 9 pm this Friday night at Paradise Found, Dr. Valerie Girard and Dr. Fleur Nelson are teaming up for a two-hour presentation […]
