Your Jewish Fairy Godmother writes Motivational and Inspirational essays These essays average 750 words. Below the recently published sample is a list of topics and excerpts/abstracts. Please email with your needs and preferences for special focus issues.

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ANGER: "WHEN YOU COME OUT SWINGING" It's rare to have a really good fight with someone we don't care about. We can get cranky with a salesclerk or the phone company, but the real force of our anger is usually reserved for loved ones, for the people whom we spend our days taking care of, the ones we count on to watch our backs, the ones whose betrayal or insensitivity hurts the most. AWARENESS: "LIVING WITH INTENTION" We tend to think of intention as having the self-control to mold our actions to some goal. The truth is that sometimes focused will is simply not enough. Too often we forget to knock on the doors of our stronger powers and say: Hey, wake up. I need some help. BOUNDARIES: "DRAWING THE LINE" We're always so busy doing instead of being. A lot of what we do is for others. It's always an interesting problem, trying to figure out where to draw the line. As you learn to take better care of yourself, you will also take better care of those around you. And everyone will benefit. BEREAVEMENT: "NEVER SAY GOOD-BYE" What can we do when the time comes to say good-bye? We can say it with all the love that we feel, that we have ever felt, with all the strength we can muster through the tears. When someone is dying it is time to remember who this soul is to your own. And when the ending happens, you never have to say good-bye. Because you can continue to remember. COMMITMENT: "WHEN WE SAY 'I DO' 'I do' is powerful stuff. Perhaps the reason it's often so hard to say is exactly because of the implicit level of respect and belief that it conveys. But that's also what makes saying it so empowering. 'I do' is moment of affirmation. 'I do' is a deep breath, a strong second wind, pure air, water, and psychic fuel. It is a statement of conviction in your own strength, in your ability to be a co-creator of your reality. CREATIVITY: "LEONARDO YOU" Commit to setting aside some regular portion of time in your life to be creative. Each day, each week, each month if that's all you think you've got. And in that time allow yourself to experience your world with greater awareness and openness. Don't worry about what you'll do, or make, or how it will turn out. Start by giving yourself the gift of empty time and open senses. EVOLUTION: "YO-YO LESSONS" We've all got "stuff." Maybe it is karmic, coming from one lifetime to the next, or maybe it's the simple "what goes around comes around" lessons of the earthy plane. But whatever your stuff, be it love, or money, or food, or something uniquely your own, you and the rest of us are trying in our very human ways of dealing with our stuff, to feel lighter, freer, more content, in body and soul. EXHAUSTION: "END OF THE LINE" The ironic secret is that if you rest more, if you'll get more done. You recharge your batteries, both physical and mental. You get perspective, some energy, and some second wind. You'll come back to your life both replenished and more enthusiastic. You'll perform better after you've had a psychic tune-up, even if it's a quickie. GLOBAL AWARENESS: "FELLOW TRAVELERS" In these times when our personal choices must succumb to the needs of greater interdependence it is important to remember that the true journey happens not only in space and time but in our hearts. This journey is from a consciousness of me first and only to one of us together. It is a transition from a place of defensiveness to one of sharing, from ego to compassion, from self to whole. GOALS: "NOW AND WHEN" Now opens us to hard questions. It makes us look in the mirror. The present holds us accountable. It doesn't take no for an answer. It offers us something to do, a next step to take, but it also relentlessly and vividly shows us our now in all its perceived inadequacy. We see our great white underbellies, instead of the svelte empowered beings we truly are, we truly will become, when we get to when. HAPPINESS: "HOW'S BY YOU?" Being happy is more than a state of being. It is one of mind. The first lesson we confront, and the one that life will continue to offer us, is to choose to be happy. We may not be able to control the circumstances in which we spend all our time, but we can choose how we respond to them. INSENSITIVITY: "OUCH" Almost all of us hurt people sometimes. We err by sins of omission, sins of commission, putting our verbal foot where it shouldn't go, and often that's down our throats. We get flustered, apologetic, self-righteous, concerned, withdrawn, or any number of other very human responses, most of which have as their underlying futile hope moving the clock back a couple nanoseconds to delete the last thing we said. INTUITION: "LEARNING TO LISTEN" Too often we walk around thinking we know less than we do. Don't be afraid to amplify your inner voice. Strive to live with greater awareness and intention. Brighten your psychic mirror. Learn to dance with your own spirit. INSIGHT: "INSPIRE ME" If you are ready to see something new, if you are tired of your self-same song of grief or who done me wrong, then you can look your insight full in the eye, let yourself laugh with rueful self-knowing, with the realization that the character at the heart of the skit that's left you reeling looks a lot like your own self. LESSONS: "SEEKING THE DEEPER LESSON" On days when nothing is going right we grab for someone to blame, some place to lash out with our frustration. But if we step back a little from the broken glass, locked door, or spilled milk, what we find instead is an opportunity to learn to cope that offers a burst of cleansing anger, a chance to thump our egos but then to relinquish control to some higher good, some universal nexus that factors in our small wants and needs with the greater balance of life. LOVE LIFE: "LOVES ME, LOVES ME NOT" Old or young, partnered or single, first-timers or adventurers, there's an ironic blues that we sing about our love lives. They're never satisfying. No matter how much love we have coming at us, it rarely seems to be enough. How did we get to be such gluttons, and why do we suffer with it so? MOODS: "MEAN OLD GRUMP" It's hard to laugh when you are grumpy. You might grimace a little, to show you are a good sport beneath your veneer of sullen withdrawal. But more likely you act cantankerous or grouchy when someone talks to you or a decision needs to be made and you have to help. Your voice tightens and your sentences are unusually short, unless you are retelling the story of whatever pushed you over the edge, and then it is a familiar and comforting litany. PATIENCE: "MOMENT BY MOMENT" Patience is something we tend to learn the hard way. In the short run there's lots of foot tapping and steering-wheel clenching. Keep reminding yourself that life, in all its delicate and tangled complexity, is meant to be savored moment by moment. You are here not only for the past or for the future, but for now. PROJECTION: "SHADOW PLAY" What if you challenged yourself to a level of honesty and self-acceptance that lets you admit your flaws, that lets you witness these imperfections that tarnish, but are rarely fatal. What if you learned to see them as a part of you instead of something that only others are afflicted with. What if you see them as a starting point for progress instead of a brick wall that youÕre destined to slam into. QUALITY: "MORE OR LESS" What if we measured by experience, by awareness, by the quality of attention that we give our lives. How would we feel if we paid more attention to the how instead of to the what? How can we teach ourselves that less does not mean deprivation or failure? How can we trade in getting lots or often for being fully present? RELATIONSHIPS: "HEREÕ' LOOKING AT YOU" Partnership is a cauldron. It is the kettle of your needs and desires brewed up with a hefty dose of karmic necessity. Whatever you're next ready to learn, to cope with, to clear off your plate, that's what a relationship will show you best, and most often. Keep reminding yourself that the reason this person is in your life is to remind you of your own work and that your job is to pay attention. REPETITION: "ONE MORE TIME" It's not that we're resistant to learning. It's just that some lessons take repeating. And repeating, and repeating. Need to seep into our psyches like water carving through a rock. We often dream about waking up having blasted through (being thin, solvent, partnered, or all three at once), but the reality is that most of us triumph through persistent changes repeated often, rather than through great leaps, no matter how attractive they may seem in our dreams. RISK-TAKING: "SO, WHERE'S THE EDGE?" We're all looking for that scent of danger, the utter vitality than comes from feeling completely alive. We crave, secretly or not, that intensity and zeal that comes when we are fully focused. And we tend to be most focused when we take risks. SELF-CRITICISM: "LIGHTEN UP" Self-judgement is our worst enemy. It saps our strength, clouds our judgement, and leaves us feeling vulnerable. Instead of affirming our assets, self criticism diminishes us. And we've spent a lifetime learning how to dish it out. Spent decades accumulating memories of disappointments, legacies of when we have missed success, whether it is by a whisper or a mile. SELF-ESTEEM: "MIRROR, MIRROR, ON THE WALL" Too often we use self-esteem as an imperfect reflection of what we think, or more likely fear, that others see in us. Instead, create the space you want to inhabit, and fill it with vitality and grace. That's all the self-esteem one soul can hold. SELF-IMPROVEMENT: "MERRY GO ROUND" We're all victims of our own ambivalence. We want change and expect progress. We see ourselves in a seemingly more evolved place, whether that's richer and grander, or simpler and more divested. But regardless of how we conceptualize this alternative future, we assume thereÕs lots we are responsible for improving to get us where we want to go. SILENCE: "SILENT DAYS, SILENT NIGHTS" The greatest damage when we don't talk about the hard parts of our lives is that we risk shutting down inside. We need to spend so much emotional energy hiding, building walls, compartmentalizing, even to ourselves, that we bury the truth of our feelings under a landslide of avoidance and denial. It is a heavy burden for the heart. And it wears us down. SPIRITUALITY: "WINDING YOUR SPIRITUAL CLOCK We need to keep affirming our individual and collective ability to find the seed of consciousness that helps connect us with the divine. Remind yourself regularly of the integrity of your values. Make time to let them refresh you, to nurture you, to challenge you, and to inspire you. SUCCESS: "SUCCESS STORY" Often we measure too big. We choose an X that lives on the horizon, impossibly, and safely distant. We can always have a challenge, and a hope, and lots of reasons for not reaching our goal. But what if you set mini-goals, smaller XÕs, setpoints that you can see, touch, and reach. A short story instead of the great American novel, a hike instead of a mountain trek. A sense of your own strength that you can make happen soon. That you can achieve and practice enjoying. SURPRISES: "SURPRISE YOURSELF!" Grab a paintbrush, pick a color, and splash a swath of vitality onto the palette of your life. Lay down a new melody and listen for the answering harmony. Leave space in your schedule for the unexpected, and don't flinch when it finds you. TRUST: "IN WHAT WE TRUST" Trust is what helps you cross this psychic desert. Trust is what helps regenerate your innocence, what gives you the strength to try again, even when you feel the pain. It's what keeps Charlie Brown kicking at the football and what makes us root for him every time, even when we fear we know what's coming. Trust is hope drawn from the well of faith.

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