This is a post responding to Alis' thought-provoking post from last week, in which she challenged people who are "asleep" in their own lives, living mechanically, like Neo from the Matrix before taking the red pill. She said people who live consciously, breaking away from the nice warm beds of mundane lives, those are awake. That ...
Updates, inspiration and spring winds
Hello dears, I hope you're not intimidated by the large snow flakes drifting outside. As a matter of fact, last week I've been spying on the early morning sky, driving to work. Unfortunately as I get both my hands on the wheel, I wasn't able to shoot the beautiful rosy clouds (very Vanilla Sky-like), something like ...
Do less. Be more.
I love October, it's one of the months when everything around pops with colour, I feel nostalgic and more attentive to the changes around, in the air, as it shifts from warmth to breezy to cool, in search for winter. October is also one of the busiest months of the year, full of long meetings, last ...
Capture summer time
During summertime I often tend to think about life and death. Sounds a bit ridiculous, right? How can you think about death when everything outside is full of life, there's light 16 hours per day and everyone seems to be at the peak of their happiness? Well, sometimes, in the peak of happiness lies a grain ...
Taking the time to read
In a different life, my dream job is to be a librarian. I spent many autumn and winter afternoons in the Bucharest British Council library, near a roof window facing trees and grey skies. While working 3 months in Chicago, one of my favorite places was the Library - the large one with 7 floors, in the ...
10 Things I’d like to do Every Day
1. Sleep in late and get up at around 9-9:30. I'm aware that's a luxury. Sometimes my inner clock kicks in on weekends and so I wake up at 7:30. But then, if I can, I stay in bed, watch movies and read. 2. Eat a very healthy meal. Don't you get annoyed at yourself when several days pass ...
How to quiet your brain
Does this look familiar to you? You wake up. You stumble to the batroom, brush your teeth, get dressed, gulp down some coffee, head to work, answer emails, answer phone calls, answer questions, sit down in meetings while thinking about the shopping list for the evening, drive home, clean up, cook, eat, wash, go to bed. ...
Spring rebalancing – update Week 1
I wrote last week about starting a re-balancing endeavour for myself. I was a mess, physically and mentally, and realized I needed to do something about it. So in last week's post you'll find that I set to make some changes in 4 areas: - Physical - eating healthy, going to bed earlier and exercising - Mental ...
4 steps to regaining balance
I don't know about you, but this early spring has been extremely hectic for me. I've moved to a new house two months ago, and much of my thinking and dreaming revolved around French style furniture and budget lists that were overspent. On top of that, I've recently traversed the best and most consuming period ...
The search for vintage and the search for self
Searching through kitchenware ideas (I'm planning on decorating a new home) I found that plenty of the nicest (and yes, most expensive) stuff is ...well, old-looking. Grandma's kitchen stove - or not really. The vintage trend is all over us. We reinvent the Fifties, watch Mad Men, listen to retro music, buy analog-looking (of course more ...
The importance of daydreaming
Did you know that children of 10 -12 years old started to suffer from stress? Really now, do you imagine a 10 year old saying that he's got bad time management and he needs to check his agenda before seeing his friends? Unfortunately, that's the truth today. Stress comes (also) from little time with ourselves Young children spend their ...
Best Time Management tools – Part 2
As I'm now officially on vacation, I can continue the series of the Best Time Management tools tried and experienced, and recommended further. The part 1 post you can find here. Here are the next few tools/tips that can improve your personal organizing/peace of mind, if used properly and frequently enough. 9. Daily/weekly priorities list An example of a ...
Harmony is…?
Today is Midsummer, also known as the Summer Solstice - the longest day of the year. Since we're living - most of us - in big cities, we're missing out on the usual country traditions of the day, but I believe legend goes that it was somehow connected to gathering the grains, as they started ...
Slowing Down – How To
This is part 3 of a series of 3 blog posts on how slowing down can actually improve effectiveness and productivity. This focuses on practical aspects. The first one's called "Are you living your life too fast?" and the second is "Benefits of SLOW living". How to slow down? I'm a fairly fast person. Multitasking is my ...
Benefits of SLOW living
This is part 2 of a series of 3 blog posts on Slow Living. You'll find Part One here. I believe that being fast becomes more of a curse than a blessing. We're impatient. We lose focus. We forget what is important. Productivity has increased exponentially in the past century. However, working time has also increased. Paradoxically, isn't ...
