Source (and more!): https://www.tripadvisor.com/TravelersChoice-Destinations
Fun and interesting tidbits that caught my attention... My reflections and random thoughts on finding balance and joy, as well as life, universe, and everything in between
Monday, June 22, 2026
TripAdvisor Best of the Best: 2026 Travelers' Choice Awards
Monday, June 15, 2026
Dear Anxiety….
Greetings all!
If you check in with yourself right now, do you feel anxious? So many people have constant background anxiety. But what if anxiety is trying to do you a favor?
Here are some CALM thoughts on anxiety:
"It’s easy to think of anxiety as the #1 enemy, but what if, instead, you thought of it like an alert system letting you know something needs your attention?
Acknowledging and reframing your experience of anxiety often helps you slow it
down and regain control.
When anxiety feels like a runaway train, pull the brakes with these three
simple phrases:
💙“Anxiety is trying to keep me safe”
💙“I can listen to the
message of my body”
💙“I’m here now”
Remember: Sometimes, anxiety can be an important (and even helpful) experience.
Reflect: What message might your anxiety
be trying to share with you right now?
Reframe: 'I hate feeling anxious.' -> 'I
can take the lesson from anxiety and let it go'."
Breathe and have a great week!
Monday, June 8, 2026
Time Confetti
Greetings all!
I recently came across the term “Time Confetti” – and I thought how cute and envisioned something pink and sparkly! Wrong!
Karen Kwong, an executive and leadership coach, aptly describes time confetti as “tiny chunks of time here and there, in the form of minutes and seconds, lost to non-productive multi-tasking,” all in pursuit of feeling more productive. My readers know how I feel about multi-tasking: “I was not created a Swiss Army knife to multitask like this!”
Here is some food for thought: data shows that an average desk worker changes desktop applications every six minutes. What meaningful tasks can you really accomplish in six minutes?
The term 'time confetti' was actually coined by author Brigid Shulte to describe using free time to do little bits of seemingly inconsequential tasks.
In her book “Overwhelmed: Work, Love, and Play When No One Has the Time,” Brigid writes, "As work weeks get longer and leisure time shrinks, people are becoming sicker, more distracted, absent, unproductive, and less innovative.”
How true – and sad! - about shrinking leisure time! You might feel you are getting more done, then you use those time pockets to find and do more work, and voila - interruptions now become your new normal.
For example, if you have a free hour, would you relax guilt-free with a cup of tea and a good book or would you feel the need to do something productive and clear some of your to-dos?
Time confetti might manifest in:
·
Inability
to relax during break times
·
Always
feeling switched on
·
Constantly
rushing from one thing to the next
·
Decreased
ability to focus
·
Anxiety
when you’re not “busy”
·
Stronger
tendency towards unproductive multitasking
·
Feeling
like you never have enough time
o This is actually known as 'time poverty' or 'time famine' and was researched by Leslie Perlow in 1999
If you need to feel busy at all times and/or are anxious and dissatisfied when you are not, you might be experiencing time confetti. When you try to do “everything, all at once, all the time,” then you are never in the present here and now, and your brain does not rest.
To fight time confetti, you can be more intentional and honest about your use of time, block time for uninterrupted work, schedule intentional breaks, protect your leisure time, and learn to say NO. Do not mistake movement for achievement.
Rest/leisure is not a luxury, it is a necessity. We should not feel that we need to be productive 24/7.
Now – how about that cup of tea and a book?
Sources:
Monday, June 1, 2026
Poem of the Week: Sea Fever
I must go
down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.
I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.
I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
Read on: https://www.poetrybyheart.org.uk/poems/sea-fever