Do you consider yourself someone who knows how to receive answers to your prayers? And to take it a step further, do you want to teach your children how to build confidence in their ability to pray? Then this post is for you. . .

I’ve been teaching my  19 year old son who is on a mission and experienced a lot of illness. My daughter who is away at college in a very competitive music Arts program. And my youngest son who is figuring out how to plan his future, he’s a junior in high school and he has a difficult health diagnosis. 

And I’m serious here. I want my kids to know how to pray in a way that accesses the powers of heaven. I believe the powers of heaven are real, and that we’ve been given everything we need to access those powers, if we have the faith to do so. 

I also believe that God is bound to answer a prayer of faith, that God operates through spiritual laws that are scientific principles that govern the...

Our family recently visited Iceland for our 30 year wedding anniversary and it felt like a dream come true. I could not have wished for a more dreamy vacation. Many of you wanted to know more of the details, so I am happy to share them with you, but there are a few things you should know:

• I have older kids (16, 19, 22) who are athletic and adventurous and love all things geeky science, (my daughter wanted to be a paleontologist/geologist/ninja/cowgirl when she was little) so that is how we plan our activities, based on their interests. I know this isn't for everyone.
• We are not big spenders. We are conscious of the cost of things like flights / hotels / restaurants / shopping, but on vacations we do splurge on good food and comfortable bedrooms / bathrooms for everyone. This isn't the cheapest way to do Iceland. . . but somewhere in the middle.
• Everything in Iceland is dependent on the time of year and the temperature. We went in the summer (August) which only gets up to 55 degrees...

 The Quest for Motivation - story of Ghengis Khan

I want to start with a quick story: Do you remember learning about Ghengis Khan in school? Yeah, me neither. I actually learned about him when I taught my kids in our homeschool, and I was intrigued by him. 

I would consider him a human with high motivation. In Mongolia, they have a word that describes creative passion. The word is Temul, and it comes from the root of the name, Temujin - who is also known as Ghenghis Khan. Temujin and Ghengis Khan are the same person. The word Temul has a poetic translation in Mongolian culture, they describe it as “the look in the eye of a horse that is racing where it wants to go, no matter what the rider wants.”

I love that description. I’ve seen that look in a horse’s eye before. It’s a little scary, honestly. Because there is NOTHING that is going to deter that horse from its path. Sometimes a fear will spook the horse into...

Hello my beautiful friends. I wanted to share some of the principles I teach my clients -  and teach you how to achieve peace with your body where you’re at today, and moving forward through the different stages women’s bodies go through.

Health and wellness goals are a beautiful thing. 

But as women's bodies change over the years, it can affect a woman's self-esteem. I want to set you up for SUCCESS as you approach your health, wellness, and weight loss goals if you’re pursuing them, so I’m going to walk you through a few steps on how to do that, especially after having children and perhaps not loving how your body looks this summer.

Step One: The first step, and this isn’t easy for many of you, I know, is to acknowledge all the things you are proud of yourself for in maintaining a healthy body and doing your best.

There’s a huge lack of this among those of us who have a tendency to be a little hard on...

I recently flew out to Boston to be with my daughter for spring break, and we had an amazing time, I took my youngest son with me, and my daughter in college - she showed us all of her favorite little spots with yummy food and book stores and Japanese clothing shops, so fun. 

On the plane ride home, I sat by a gentleman who asked me what I do for a living when I got my laptop out and started writing - I told him I’m a life coach and I help women love being a mom. 

It just popped out of my mouth. 

I don’t think I’ve ever introduced my work like that before. 

And he asked me, I could tell he was going to be a talker, dang it, but he asked me how I did that? And I said - moms come to me for coaching with problems they’re facing, especially the teens these days, - and I help them solve those problems. 

 I told him how I always tie a coaching session into a true principle about human behavior, and...

Hello my friends. How are you doing? Are you doing fine? Doin’ okay? I’ve noticed we all tend to say those very vague and generic things when we aren’t really doing fine or okay - and I understand why we answer that way - but today, if someone were to ask me how I’m feeling, I would say ‘bittersweet - oh what a treat.’ and then I would grin and my eyes might get a little watery, they might well up a little bit with tears, or they might not, because I really am swimming in the bittersweet emotion lately.

We just dropped my son off for his two year mission - he’ll be serving in a foreign country if all goes smoothly - and this is kind of a big deal, right? 

Just before we said our final goodbye, he reached down and gave me a huge hug, he gives the best hugs, and he’s a full twelve inches taller than I am, with long and strong arms, he said, “I love you mom, you are the best mom, thank you for getting me here and...

Let's talk about change, I’m giving you some insights and some tips on how to deal with it with more grace, and how to get better at dealing with change when you really don’t want to, but you have to anyway.

This topic was sparked from a recent article I read about women who approach mid-life, all three of the women interviewed still have teenage or young adult children in the home, but they see the changes coming, and all they’ve known is being a mom, they’ve given their all to that endeavor, raising children and then they’re finding themselves feeling lost, and starting to feel kind of irrelevant as their children are gone all day and they have time on their hands, wondering what to do with themselves.

I think we have to be intentional about what we decide to believe about our roles as women, and our place in society. 

I personally believe it’s never been more of an exciting time to be a woman in society. I see a lot of...

I’m looking forward to teaching you about a valid  theory in the psychology world I think every parent needs to know. I learned about Attachment Theory in my marriage and family studies degree, my first thought was: wow, we all mess up our children. Dang. But I’ve since built upon that initial response  and want to share the insights from it, and how it can help you in your relationships to understand why you are the way you are, and why other people are the way they are.

Based on our childhoods, how we were nurtured, and based on our temperaments, we developed what I call trust templates, which is just in simple terms, your default programming with your ability to trust. Sometimes, our trust templates need some attention and updating. 

I think of it a little bit like remodeling a home, which I personally love to do. I love to update and paint, knock down walls, open things up, just tweak things so it feels more functional and...

Hello my friends.

I just got back from Atlanta to visit my amazing bosom friend and kindred spirit from high school. We’ve been friends for a long time now, and as we were reconnecting last week, it hit me how there are certain qualities in friendships that are foundational for a friendship like ours.

I wanted to share what I was thinking about last week spending time with her. It’s worth sharing.

If you haven’t done so yet, will you take the time and leave me a review? This really helps podcasters out, helps us spread the goodness. If you have time, I would so appreciate it.

I know a lot of you listening like to share these episodes with your friends, share this one with a good friend and maybe invite her to join you on the kindred spirit journey.

I’m going to give you seven tips on friendship, how to cultivate them, and also keep your daughters in mind with their girlfriends as we discuss them.

And I love...

Hello my friends. I had a series of podcasts and topics I’ve drafted for release this month, but it hasn’t felt right, and mainly because well, does the world seem like it’s burning right now to you?

I don’t like the feeling of focusing on the negative, and that is not what today’s episode is about – but I see a need to address what to do when you are feeling helpless and how to handle the passion and the caring and the concern you carry in your heart when you see things unfold in the world that hurts your heart.

So that’s what I’m offering to you today. I’ve heard from so many of my clients tell me that these tips and these ideas are helping them move forward with more of a leadership energy, versus feeling helpless.

For those of us who are working on ourselves and interested in improving ourselves and the world, as we’re trying to manage our heads and our hearts – I want to offer to you...