Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/tinybuddha/~3/SFMHR7O4SKA/

“Three things you cannot recover in life: the word after it’s said, the moment after it’s missed, and the time after it’s gone.” ~Unknown

Do you meditate?

I do. I come from a Buddhist family, and meditation is like an heirloom to me.

I didn’t start meditating until I was an adult. But when I did, I meditated diligently. From forming a meditation habit to getting the latest meditation app, I’ve done it all.

And one day I got a little worried.

I didn’t feel much difference. I didn’t feel calm and peaceful like I was supposed to feel.

In fact, I didn’t feel anything.

Nothing has changed. I was still the irritable, depressed person that I was. Meditation felt like a waste of time.

Later, I was shocked to discover how many mistakes I was making.

I want you to avoid these mistakes so that you can meditate efficiently without wasting your time as well.

1. You don’t embrace distractions.

I used to hate distraction. I’d use earplugs, lock my door, and yell at everybody to shut up before I meditated.

By all means, minimize distraction. But realize no matter what you do, something’s going to bother you. If you’re like me, you become more irritated each time you get distracted or interrupted. This …

Source: http://www.sonima.com/food/vegan-falafel-bowl/

Take traditional falafel to the next level with sweet potato goodness, to add kick and flavor to the Middle Eastern dish. Our sweet potato vegan falafel buddha bowl combines starchy veggies, with legumes, and delicious veggies for a healthy, well-balanced meal, filled with lots of healthy fats. The bowl can take as little as 10 minutes to prepare, and cooks in 35 minutes—a simple and fast way to bring delicious nutrition into your daily routine. ShareTweetPlusPin

Recipe and photo by Isabelle Steichen and Jenné Claiborne, founders of Buddhalicious, an online vegan meal planning service. Sign up for a free weekend challenge here!

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Source: http://zenhabits.net/cling/

By Leo Babauta

Stress is a killer. It contributes to health problems, unhappiness, depression, relationship problems, and more.

We’re always going to have some stress in our lives, but how can we manage it?

By finding the cause, and working with that cause.

In my mindfulness experiments, I’ve found that the root cause of stress is clinging to things. We cling to the hope that things will go as we expected or planned, and then get stressed trying to make that happen, or frustrated when it doesn’t.

Clinging to things causes our stress and frustrations.

So how can we stop clinging?

By realizing that there’s nothing to cling to.

The things we want to cling to, as if they’re real, solid, permanent fixtures, aren’t there. If anything, they’re fluid, changing, impermanent, or just imagined.

Nothing to cling to.

Imagine you’re swimming in water, struggling to hold on to a solid structure you think is near you. Trying to grab hold of it is stressing you out.

Now imagine that there’s no structure there. Just water. You can continue to try to grab onto something … or you can accept that there’s only water, and relax. Float.

The kicker: we’re just a drop of water too, in the middle of an ocean.

Here’s your challenge for today:

Ask yourself what you’re stressed about today. 
Ask yourself what you’re cling…

Source: http://www.theminimalists.com/p024/

By Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus · Follow: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram

In this episode of The Minimalists Podcast, Joshua & Ryan hand the microphone to Jessica Lynn Williams and Melissa Cain, of The Mind Palace Podcast, for a special guest episode.

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Mentioned in This Episode

Pre-order: Minimalism Film
Recommendation: The Mind Palace Podcast
Review: Boston Globe
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Review: Washington Post
Single: All That Remains
Soundtrack: Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon, and Google Play.
Theaters: Minimalism Film

This episode was produced by Shawn Harding. Our theme music was written and performed by Peter Doran. Our podcasts are completely free, so if you found value in this episode, and you’d like to help us produce more, please consider donating a dollar to The Minimalists. Your donations help keep this podcast 100% advertisement-free (because advertisements suck).

If you’d like to comment on the podcast, you can leave a review on iTunes. Not only do we read every review, but your positive, creative reviews also help our simple-living message reach more ears.

If you have a question for The Minimalists you’d like us …

Source: http://www.foodpolitics.com/2016/05/why-trade-issues-matter-the-still-to-be-ratified-trans-pacific-partnership-tpp/

Every now and then I like to try to catch up with the arcane topic of trade agreements (see last week’s post).  Today, I’ll deal with the other one still in play, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).  The U.S. Trade Representative’s Office states the administration’s position on the TPP.  Ballotpedia.org has a helpful summary of where we are on it.

For this one, should you be at all interested, the full text of the TPP is available online.  Like all trade agreements in which the U.S. participates, the TPP is about reducing and eliminating tariffs.  In principle, this is supposed to foster competition and create business opportunities and, as the Trade Representative’s Office says, “leveling the playing field for American workers & American businesses.”

The TPP was signed by the U.S. and the 11 other participating countries in February.  But for us to participate in it, Congress has to ratify the agreement.  It has not yet done so, not least because the TPP is caught up in election-year politics.

Contributing to slow approval is the weak endorsement of the International Trade Commission, which was required to report on the agreement’s economic effects.  Its conclusion: TPP would improve the economy by 2032 (the target year, apparently)—but by less than 1%.  The report gives examples of the increased percentage over baseline in 2032:

Annual real income: $57.3 billion (0.23 %)
Real GDP: $42.7 billion (0…

Source: http://www.foodpolitics.com/2016/06/fda-what-is-happening-with-front-if-package-labels/

The FDA issued its final rules for the Nutrition Facts panels, but now I want to know: What ever happened to its front-of-package (FOP) initiatives?

The New York Times editorial on the new food label raised this very question.

But the labels, which most food companies will have to use by July 2018, still have serious limitations. They require busy shoppers to absorb a lot of facts, not all of which are equally important, and then do the math themselves while standing in the grocery aisle. And the labels are on the back of the package, where only the most motivated shoppers will look.

The editorial refers to the FDA’s front-of-package initiatives early in the Obama administration.  These involved two reports from the Institute of Medicine.  The first, released in 2010, examined about 20 existing front-of-package schemes cluttering up the labels of processed foods and evaluated their strengths and weaknesses.  It recommended that FOP labels deal only with calories, saturated fat, trans fat, and sodium.  My question at the time: why not sugars?  The committee’s answer: calories took care of it.

But the IOM’s second report in 2011 included sugars and recommended a point system for evaluating the amounts of it and those nutrients in processed foods.  Packages would get zero stars if their saturated and trans fat, sodium, or sugars exceeded certain cut points.

<img class="aligncenter" style="color: #000000;font-family: 'Times New …

Source: http://refineryfitnesspdx.com/five-small-changes-for-big-health-changes/

Friends and family are always asking me for recommendations about how to improve their health.  While I want to be helpful by providing that life changing, magic answer, what I try to remind people is that it is often the little things they do on a daily basis that make the most difference.  For most people, just making some small changes can pay big dividends for their health.  Here is a list of five changes I would recommend to almost everyone to help optimize their health.

Eliminate or minimize processed food.  I know most people are VERY busy and have a million different balls up in the air and prepackage food can be easier and quicker to get on the table, however, with very few exceptions, fresh, whole, unprocessed food is a much better choice.  When you eat food in its whole form, you are consuming it the way nature intended, with the vitamins and minerals in the proper ratios and you know exactly what you are getting.  This unprocessed food is also “packaged” with healthy fat and fiber.  There is no guesswork about what is in an apple but often when I read the ingredient list on processed food, I have no idea what some of the ingredients are.  You would never pick up a mystery substance off the grou…

Source: http://clubindustry.com/news-central/sportsart-eco-powr-generates-green-energy-radisson-red

This press release was provided by SportsArt. The Club Industry editorial staff was not involved in the creation of this content. 

​SportsArt ECO-POWR™ continues to encourage facilities to embrace the benefits of sustainability, recently extending to the hospitality space.

read more

…

Source: http://clubindustry.com/news-central/motionsoft-launches-mosoclub

This press release was provided by Motionsoft. The Club Industry editorial staff was not involved in the creation of this content. 

Rockville, MD – Motionsoft, the leader in software and payment solutions for consumer-based businesses, including gyms, fitness clubs, corporate fitness facilities and, hospital and universities today announced the launch of MoSoClub, a club management software solution for small and mid-sized clubs.

read more

…

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/tinybuddha/~3/86Tw-wF89zE/

“To experience peace does not mean that your life is always blissful. It means that you are capable of tapping into a blissful state of mind amidst the normal chaos of a hectic life.” ~Jill Bolte Taylor

I was fifteen when I first noticed I was depressed. That was also when I became seriously interested in happiness.

How can I get my hands on it? Where does it come from? Why does it seem so natural to some people?

I wrestled with those questions for quite a while.

Fast forward to ten years later and things look a lot different for me. Happiness is now a default instead of a rare state. What a relief.

A few key lessons have made a world of difference. I’d like to share the most important one today.

Two Kinds of Happiness

One kind comes with positive experiences. It’s conditional. It comes when good things happen and it leaves when bad things happen.

The other kind doesn’t depend on the occurrence of any particular event. It is sustainable and unconditional. It exists underneath both desirable and undesirable experience. It is the canvas on which other emotions are painted.

It’s also the kind with which most of us are unfamiliar. Why is that?

My theory is that most self-help, personal development, and psychology resources focus on the first…