The Brilliant Balance Blog

This morning I was driving to hot yoga in the rain at 5 AM when I passed an old man jogging on the side of the road. He wore a gray sweatshirt and black sweatpants and between the rain and the darkness, I almost didn’t see him at all.  But I caught the glint of his silvery […]

My husband and I have been trying to finalize plans for a long weekend away for more than three months now.  It feels like we have literally been on every travel site that exists, investigated flights on every airline, read hotel reviews from every brand, checked weather forecasts in every time zone, and compared more rental cars than any […]

“Wafting across the dimly lit kitchen drifts the heady scent of vanilla mingling with sugar and toasted coconut. Flour is dusted along the counter and even on my nose as I sit cross-legged, pencil poised above my notebook….” So began my college entrance essay 24 years ago. That opening line is etched in my memory as vividly as the address […]

I had a fabulous conversation this morning with a woman I coach that got me thinking about the power that Either/Or thinking holds over many of us. Without even realizing it, we box ourselves into pairs of alternatives that feel mutually exclusive and then we bounce between them trying to decide which one is the better option. Either I […]

Remember when you were a little girl and you’d play make believe with your friends? Someone would say, “I’ll be the big sister and you can be the little brother.”  Or “I’ll be the person who works the cash register and you can be the person who comes into the store to shop.” Or “I’ll be a […]

As someone who loves her work, sometimes it’s all too easy to drift into a zone of imbalance without feeling the effects right away. It’s one thing when you hate what you’re doing and resent your need to burn the midnight oil, but when you love what you do, well, then work sometimes feels like play […]

My two youngest children are in rehearsals for an upcoming school production of Winnie The Pooh (Kids). I’d all but forgotten the deep wisdom to be gleaned from the pages of A.A. Milne’s Tales of Winnie the Pooh, but the lessons have come flooding back to me as I listen to my littles sing their hearts out. Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, Eeyore […]

‘Tis the season for all things cozy and warm. I know just the words “Pumpkin Spice Latte” evoke an emotional (okay, Pavlovian) response from more than one of you. I’m more of a “Tall-Blonde-Half-Caf-Room-For-Cream” kind of girl myself, but apparently there’s not a specific season for that. Whatever, Starbucks. We’re snuggling up to Fall these days and I for […]