Last week I read John Green’s new novel, The Fault in our Stars. This is not a review. After I had read the first twenty-one pages, I told my husband this was going to be the best book I’d read all year. A little while later I went to the bookstore and bought the hard [...]
Archive for the ‘Life’ Category
The Pursuit of Excellence, or How Becoming Awesome Takes More Than 30 Days
Posted in Arts, Life, Personal Development, Writing, tagged Amy Sundberg, arete, commitment, excellence, focus, mastery, practice, priorities on February 2, 2012 | 13 Comments »
I have devoted my life to the pursuit of excellence. The Greeks called this areté, striving for excellence, living up to the best of one’s potential, and facing challenges with courage and persistence. I wanted to be the best student. I wanted to become a skilled singer. I wanted to travel around the world. I [...]
Bad Luck, Good Luck
Posted in Life, Personal Development, tagged Amy Sundberg, bad luck, free spirit, good luck, luck, optimism, positivity on January 24, 2012 | 10 Comments »
I am a very unlucky person: I had a difficult childhood. I suffer from chronic health problems. My mom died when I was nineteen. I don’t fit in easily with many groups. I attract people to me who take advantage of my over-niceness/over-empathy. Sometimes people have treated me very poorly. There have been many times [...]
The People Who Are No Longer Here
Posted in Life, tagged Amy Sundberg, missing on January 12, 2012 | 7 Comments »
Sometimes I miss the people who are no longer here. Some of them are dead. Some of them (most of them) I didn’t know all that well. I miss the ones who died young in a special way, because I’ll never find out who they might have been. I had a high school classmate who [...]
Life is a Work in Progress
Posted in Grief, Life, Personal Development, tagged Amy Sundberg, fear of change, optimism, pain, perfectionism, personal development, positivity, priorities, what if, writing on January 10, 2012 | 7 Comments »
I don’t really like pain, and I don’t like to feel uncomfortable. Sometimes I daydream about my ideal life, when I have fixed all my problems, have everything I want, and am exactly where I want to be in my career.I will never achieve that ideal life. And thank goodness, because if I did I’d [...]
Symbol of the Year…not to mention Award Season
Posted in Life, Science fiction and fantasy, tagged Scythe, symbol, awards, Campbell Award, Hugo Award, Nebula Award on January 5, 2012 | 9 Comments »
Yesterday, I received my symbol of the year in the mail. Yes, it is the Scythe from Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 7. Full geek points to you if you recognized it. For those of you not familiar with the show, the Scythe is a mystical weapon forged for the Slayer (into every generation [...]
Blog Retrospective 2011
Posted in Life, tagged Amy Sundberg, Backbone Project, blog, blogging, favorites, personal development on December 29, 2011 | 1 Comment »
It’s been a good year here at the Practical Free Spirit. I’ve garnered much enjoyment from writing for this blog, and as I gain more experience, the essays often come easier. I’m becoming clearer about what I care about writing about, and I’ve had some great conversations with many of you. In terms of traffic, [...]
New Year Wishes
Posted in Life, Personal Development, Writing, tagged Backbone Project, health, people pleaser, perfectionism, priorities, travel, writing on December 27, 2011 | 2 Comments »
At this time of year, I always feel like I’m straddling the flow of time. Half of myself is looking backwards and evaluating what has gone on before, while the other half is looking forward to what the next year may hold for me. I don’t make New Year’s resolutions per say because I prefer [...]
2011 Life Lesson: You Are Worth It
Posted in Life, Personal Development, tagged Amy Sundberg, Backbone Project, mistakes, people pleaser, perfectionism, personal development, personality, self esteem, self respect on December 22, 2011 | 10 Comments »
Some of my astute readers might have noticed that I initiated a massive life re-haul and personality shift this year. I have written a fair amount about being a people pleaser, developing a backbone, and being a perfectionist because these were things that were on my mind. I decided, somewhere in the haze of extreme [...]
Pages
-
Top Posts
Archives
Categories
Tags
Twitter Updates
- Just wrote a blog post that I'm very excited about! Hope people are willing to chime in with their opinions tomorrow. 18 hours ago
- .@raecarson All hail our household appliance overlords! 20 hours ago
- RT @damiengwalter Writers : do you consider yourselves artists? Why? --am interested in your answers to this question! 1 day ago
- What does it mean to be an artist? http://t.co/ltf1D4Jz #practicalfreespirit 1 day ago
- So far this has been a really fantastic reading year. Really enjoying it. 2 days ago
