John Wooden, the legendary basketball coach for UCLA would begin each of his training camps instilling this (and other messages) into the minds of his young players. He must have been doing something right as the UCLA Bruins of the 1960s and 70 won 10 NCAA basketball championships and an amazing 7 in a row! We are generally familiar with the idea of moving quickly. We see an emergency or an issue that needs resolving and we want to take...

While our hearts go out to the victims of Harvey, we’ve heard story after story about the people who reached out to help those in need. Alison Regan and her family, who found themselves on dry ground in a Houston suburb, know they needed to help and took out their inflatable kayak and found 15 elderly couples who were surrounded by water in their homes. One of the people has a severe heart condition and they wound up steering the...

Our little pup, Cody is just over two years old, is a barrel of fun. Training him however…not so much. One of my biggest issues with him is his barking at the TV. When he sees anything with more than two legs, he goes into his high stress reaction, jumping and barking at the perpetrator, whoever that might be. I’ve read articles about stopping this behavior, tried Cesar Milan strategies, and even discussed with my dog consultants (vet, groomer, trainer...

One of the questions I often hear about my resilience work is whether I really believe that “having a positive attitude is all it takes to overcome life’s difficulties?” Uh, no…I don’t… However having the right attitude is an important factor in how we recover and grow from adversity. Even more specifically, the power of our mindset is a key element in everything from happiness to longevity. A research study recently conducted at Stanford indicated that people who think they...

Inoculating yourself against stress is less painful than getting a shot in the arm and works just as effectively. Vaccinations are intended to challenge the body by injecting a small amount of the disease your are trying to avoid into your body and having the body respond to it by building antibodies to those viruses. Stress inoculation works by putting yourself into small and meaningful stressful situations so that you become more comfortable and ready to deal with the stress...