My friend sent me a card the other day. On the front it says, "All up in the club like I want to go home." It made me laugh. It's me all over. I've never really enjoyed parties. By 10pm I'm eyeing the door, exhausted from all the small-talk and noise and overwhelmed by the music and people. For a long time in my life, I felt like a fucking weirdo for feeling like this. And I also felt like a massive fake and contradiction. I find being around people exhausting, you see. And yet I love being around people—and as a coach—spend a [...]

Around mile 4, I wanted to swim to the shore of the lake and get out. The lake was choppy. Far choppier than anything I'd swum in before, and I started to feel sea (lake?) sick. Every time I raised my head to spot one of the giant orange buoys that bobbed in the lake, guiding the way, all I could see around me was grey swell accompanied by sheets of heavy rain. With each tiring swim stroke, I mentally rehearsed the conversations I'd have with my family and friend, Laura—who I knew were waiting for me just a mile away at the [...]

Harvesting season is coming to an end here in rural Germany. Since our move here, well over a year ago now, I have become keenly aware of each season and the way village life weaves around and through the year's rhythms. Seasons make way for the next, and each one brings with it an age-old tradition; whether it's preparing the farmland for the cold, frosty winters that freeze the fields hard, or picking ripe apples and plums straight from the trees in the summer, the farmers gently move in time with the year. My father-in-law is a farmer. He spends most of the summer out in the fields, [...]

Growing up, I remember regularly being told how much I was loved—mostly by my Dad. It's a Goodchild family thing. We tell each other that we love each other, whether it's spoken or via text or a message on Facebook. Growing up, my partner, Kristin, was rarely, if ever told how much she was loved. It's a German thing, apparently. Germans don't take saying "I love you" lightly. The German noun, "Liebe" (love) is a serious word, never used just as a term of endearment or used platonically, with a family member. Kristin and I have been together for 6 years [...]

"What happens when everything is done on the to-do list? Do we go home?" The eighteen year old, fresh-out-of-college company junior asked his new team. His colleagues, one of them my partner, Kristin—who'd spent years and years working for the company—rolled their eyes, partly incredulous, partly amused, and replied, "There is no end! Once we've finished this project, there'll be another one and another. It never ends, you don't get to go home just because everything is done. This is what work is. Get used to it." The young intern sloped off, embarrassed. And confused. We've become a to-do list culture, [...]

I know that people stay in relationships that are not working anymore, because once upon a time, they said "I promise" or "I do", and they daren't go back on their word. I know that people sit behind desks everyday, underneath harsh fluorescent office strip-lighting, hating every moment of their working day, all because they stick at things and don't give up, even when the going gets tough.   I know that people let other people use their bodies in ways they don't want them to, because they once said they'd give it a go and now don't want to [...]

People often ask me things like, "Why can't I get my shit together to do things I know will be good for me, Liz?" Or, as my friend Emma once questioned, "Why do humans put what they love to do—and actually want to do—as a lower priority to what we don't love to do, like work and cleaning?" I've been thinking about these questions recently. I wrote something last year about how we humans have a tendency to avoid doing things that are good for us because we're conditioned, on a really basic level, to go after pleasure and avoid pain. Things that are good [...]

"Why, are you some special snowflake or something?" I saw the palpable relief wash over my client's face as we laughed about what I'd just said. We all think we're pretty special don't we? And, no, I don't mean 'special' in a "Look at me, I'm so fucking important and amazing!" kind of way, I mean in a "I am different to everyone else this must only happen to me!" kind of way. We humans have this tendency to believe that there's this set of life rules that we must follow, that others don't have to, right? I mean, come on, honest-hands up if you think [...]

Am I the only one who finds making decisions really hard? I get stressed, overwhelmed. And really, really irritable. Mostly with myself. Once I've decided to do something, I'm gung-ho, but getting to that point is hard going. I worry, that the decision I'm making is not the right one, and yet, I'm starting to realise that there's never a right decision. A decision just is. It's our thoughts and behaviour around the decision and potential outcome that creates all the confusion. I read somewhere once—probably in a self-help book—that when we're finding it hard to make a decision, we should lean into our intuition [...]

I went running with my kid the other day. I have a running buggy and he comes with me on shorter runs. He likes to shout instructions at me that I obviously cannot understand because he is only one and a half. It's like having a really bossy mini running coach who talks gobbledegook to me the whole time. It's pretty awesome. On our run the other day, it had been raining all morning and there were slugs and snails all over the path. Now, I am the kind of person who tries to removes flies from my house instead [...]