Echoes Of Earlier Times
August 12, 2024
I have travelled a lot throughout my career. When my daughters were younger and still living at home, I’d occasionally take them with me on the road.
I like to think it was a treat for all of us.
Sometimes they would attend an event with me. Sometimes they’d visit with nearby family or friends while I worked. And when they were older, while I was involved in a program, sometimes they’d enjoy time on their own in a new location.
I was reminded of those shared trips last week when my youngest daughter, Lindsay, asked ME to tag along with HER on an overnight business trip to Moose Jaw. (more…)
PAUSE – 18.06 – How Is Your Situational Awareness?
June 6, 2018

Reflection: We’ve just returned from a month of travel in Europe where our adventures included visits to Barcelona, Rome, and Venice. These cities are densely populated to begin with, and they each host tens of thousands of tourists a day.
The streets are packed with bodies in motion – both locals going about their daily business and tourists trying to see the sights. Many people were thoughtful and considerate – others not so much!
One of the things we noted repeatedly was a significant lack of what my husband calls ‘Situational Awareness’ – a mindfulness around the impact that our behaviours have on others. Here’s how that played out. (more…)
PAUSE GEM #53 – Pause Every Ninety & Art Cda 150.10
August 30, 2017
Editor’s Note: As they have for the last couple of years, your summer Pause messages will feature the ‘Best of Pause. These GEMS are readers’ favorite messages from earlier years. Whether you are a long time subscriber, or new to our list, I hope you enjoy them all. After Labor Day, your Pause messages will once again feature all new info and resources.
P.S. – Also, be sure to scan right to the end of this message. You’ll want to be sure to catch the details on my Canada 150 Summer Art Project and the unique Provinces of Canada paintings on offer each week. This week – Saskatchewan.
REFLECTION & ACTION: You’re working away – head down – afterburners aflame. You’ve been making great progress and, blessedly, the interruptions have been few. Still, after an hour and a half or so, you start feeling restless. Your attention begins to wander. And, you find yourself becoming a touch irritable and impatient.
Why are you having trouble with focus when the stars are aligned for work? It could be your internal body rhythms clamoring for your attention.
The human body isn’t built for nonstop high performance. We do a better job of maintaining energy over the long haul when periods of focused concentration are offset by time out for renewal.
There are parallels in other life situations. For example, a race car driver’s success depends on fast, high speed performance on the track. But an equally important part of that racer’s success is knowing when to pull off the track and into the pit for adjustments and repairs. Ignore, postpone or cancel the pit stops, and the race is lost.
Top performers in all kinds of fields tend to work in approximately 90 minute cycles – sprints if you will. They shift back and forth between periods of intense effort offset by periods of purposeful renewal.
A key word here is purposeful. The impact of automatically grabbing a caffeine or sugar hit, or giving yourself a ‘rev it up’ pep talk to drive your energy back up the ergometer, will be short lived. Many of these ‘short term quick fix’ energizers fizzle fast and end up harmful in the long term.
Plan for variety and be more intentional in choosing your renewing pauses. (more…)
PAUSE GEM #51 – Keeping It Simple & Art 150.8
August 16, 2017
Editor’s Note: As they have for the last couple of years, your summer Pause messages will feature the ‘Best of Pause. These GEMS are readers’ favorite messages from earlier years. Whether you are a long time subscriber, or new to our list, I hope you enjoy them all. After Labor Day, your Pause messages will once again feature all new info and resources.
P.S. – Also, be sure to scan right to the end of this message. You’ll want to be sure to catch the details on my Canada 150 Summer Art Project and the unique Provinces of Canada paintings on offer each week. This week – New Brunswick.
REFLECTION AND ACTION: Broker world peace. Jump-start the economy. Cure cancer. Eliminate poverty. Save the planet.
The range of global concerns seems endless. Even our more modest individual goals and ambitions can end up supersized to the max.
As inspiring and enervating as big hairy audacious goals can be, they also carry significant weight. And, shouldering the weight of the world can feel overwhelming, crippling and exhausting.
That’s why a recent commentary by my Halifax friend and colleague, Peter Davison, struck me so positively.
Peter wrote: “Go forth, do good, return home, stay blessed. Repeat as necessary.”
It’s an approach to daily life and a plan of action that’s blazingly simple and eminently doable.
In the midst of demands on your time and draws on your energy, keep Peter’s prescription in the forefront of your mind. (more…)
PAUSE GEM #46 – Burnout And Meltdowns & Art 150.3
July 12, 2017
Editor’s Note: As they have for the last couple of years, your summer Pause messages will feature the ‘Best of Pause. These GEMS are readers’ favorite messages from earlier years. Whether you are a long time subscriber, or new to our list, I hope you enjoy them all. After Labor Day, your Pause messages will once again feature all new info and resources.
P.S. – Also, be sure to scan right to the end of this message. You’ll want to be sure to catch the details on my Canada 150 Summer Art Project and the unique Provinces of Canada paintings on offer each week. This week – Newfoundland Labrador.
REFLECTION & ACTION: I’ve been thinking a lot about burnout in recent days. Not because I’m feeling burned out myself, although I have been there more than once in the past. But rather because I’ve been digging back through results of the Overload and Overwhelm survey that I conducted a few years ago.
Over and over again, people mention the downward spiral triggered by too many expectations and too few resources. They describe the hopeless feelings associated with not being able to see a light at the end of the tunnel. And, to cap it off, much of what they are doing feels pointless.
Still I’m hopeful. While meltdowns may be common, they’re not necessarily inevitable.
One of the things I have noted over the years, is that burnout is not always related to the number of hours worked. Meltdowns and burnout are just as often connected to feelings of hopelessness and pointlessness. It’s like we’ve lost track of any meaning that might once have been associated with the activities that fill our days. And so while we invest more and more energy we experience fewer and fewer returns on that investment.
And therein lies one of the main challenges: staying connected to the reasons why we’re doing these things in the first place. (more…)
PAUSE – 15.22 – What If? Life Lessons From The Road
August 19, 2015

Reflection: After a vacation, I like to take a bit of time to reflect on the experience.
There’s an element of savoring involved – remembering people and places, incidents and moments.
And, for me, any kind of noticing usually triggers lessons as well.
As I thought about this summer’s travel experiences, it occurred to me that there are some lessons that might be applied to everyday life.
I’m sharing them here in the hope they might be helpful for you, too.
Action: When I’m traveling, it seems so much easier to dress for the day. Choices are limited to what fits in one suitcase. What if we simplified those decisions everyday by streamlining our wardrobes at home?
The touring days that are most satisfying are those where we narrow the focus to one or two places or experiences rather than trying to jam too much into a short period of time. What if we narrowed our everyday focus to a couple of high priority items and stopped trying to do it all at once?
Some of the most ease-filled moments on vacation occur when we give ourselves time and space to put up our feet and take a break. Whether it’s catching a nap, dipping into a book, or jotting a few notes in the travel journal, there’s something to be said for retreating and regrouping. What if we made a regular habit of stepping away from the press of everyday activity to refresh our energy and reflect on our experience? (more…)
PAUSE – 15.20 – A Little Distance Makes A Big Difference
July 22, 2015
Reflection: What do you see when you look around? Burdens and responsibilities or delights and opportunities? And how much of a difference might it make if you could put a little distance between yourself and those everyday demands?
Vacations and time out matter. Not only for the richness of adventure and creation of new memories, but also for the perspective that comes with distance. Re-entry, after a time away, brings with it the opportunity to appreciate everyday life anew.
In our recent weeks of adventuring, we discovered that the Hermitage in St Petersburg holds some amazing artistic treasures. The fields of lavender and sunflowers in Provence are every bit as compelling in person as they are in pictures. The sounds of Paris are like nowhere else in the world – with the wha-wha of police sirens overlaying the bells of Notre Dame.
And now that we’re back, we’re finding that our time away changes our experience of being here. (more…)
PAUSE – 15.03 – Are You Bringing Your True Self to The Table?
February 18, 2015
Reflection: On our recent cruise vacation, Dave and I shared dinner each evening with the same three couples.
All came from different parts of the world, all were congenial and good humored, and all had interesting backstories to their lives.
Over the course of the trip, we looked forward to the nightly connection – swapping tales about our day’s excursions and life in general.
As our adventure drew to a close, I wondered how best to let them know how much we appreciated their company. In the end, I sketched a postcard for each couple. Each sketch was different and each one represented a unique aspect of that couple’s interests.
I signed them, added a personal note to the back of each card, and presented them at our last dinner together. The postcards were a colossal hit.
I was actually surprised at how deeply they were appreciated. To me, the ideas for the cards came easily, and I enjoyed making them. It felt like no big deal. I found myself curious about what prompted the strength of their reactions.
It occurred to me that one of the reasons could be that creating and sharing the cards was a direct expression of a few of my strengths: appreciation, creativity, and thoughtfulness. There seems to be an authenticity, an ease, and a deep connection that arises when we’re acting from the core of who we are.
Action: So what’s to be gleaned from this experience at sea? (more…)
PAUSE – 14.39 – What Are You Waiting For?
December 17, 2014
Reflection: As we lift off the runway on the flight home from Toronto to Saskatoon, something seems wrong. On our ascent, we level out too quickly, even drop a bit in elevation, and the sounds are off.
Within five minutes of take-off, the pilot announces a malfunction with the nose gear on the plane. It appears to be locked in the down position and refuses to retract. (Better that than the other way around!) He intends to return to Toronto after calculating how much fuel we need to burn off before it’s safe to land.
A half hour later we learn we will be working off another 45 minutes of fuel. In total, we spend an hour and a half zigging, zagging, and circling the skies over southern Ontario.
It’s an interesting experience to find yourself in a situation totally out of your control where your next 90 minutes may or may not be your last. What would you do in that place with that time?
I thought about it, and rejected the idea of reading the newspaper, watching a movie, or going over my notes from my conference. Those activities all seemed a bit pointless – distractions at best. I thought briefly about writing a note to those I love. But that seemed a tad melodramatic.
And so, I simply thought about my recent connections with those who are dear to me. I’d spoken with my husband by phone each of the days I’d been away. I’d visited with my folks the day before I’d headed east. I’d spent the previous weekend with daughter number one and her family in Calgary. I’d traded phone calls and messages making a plan to meet for lunch with daughter number two.
I’d connected with all five of my sisters as we worked through plans for Christmas dinner. I’d shared laughs and great conversations with my friends and business colleagues at the conference. I’d recently spent an afternoon with a group of women friends who meet two or three times a year. I’d posted encouraging comments on the Facebook posts of several dear friends. I’d spoken with the neighbors making a plan for a get together first thing in the new year.
Sure, there were plenty of loose ends and things undone that also flashed through my mind. I could easily have created a long list of tasks awaiting attention – programs to plan, gifts to buy, books to sell, and art to make. But, somehow that all seemed secondary and nowhere near as important as whether or not I was current with the key people in my world. Had the most important words been said and deepest feelings shared? (more…)
Your Sixth Pauseworks Postcard Pick Of The Week
August 6, 2014
Here it is! The sixth of nine chances in the 2014 ‘Summer Sketchbook Special’ to own a piece of original art at a sizzling price of just $49 (plus applicable taxes and $10 for shipping).
Quai Aux Fleurs – Paris is number six in the series of Pauseworks Postcards.
Each 4” x 6” postcard features the Pauseworks Studio 2014 postmark in an upper corner.
Each will be surface mounted on a coordinating 6” x 8” mat board ready for framing or display as is.
To claim your PW Postcard, just send me an email with the words ‘I’ll Take It’ in the subject line.
The first reader to call dibs on each week’s mini masterpiece takes it. Enjoy … and may the early bird snag the sketch.
BTW – if another early bird beats you to the draw, and you’d like to order a print or prefer something in a larger size, here’s the link to make that happen: Quai Aux Fleurs – Paris.
Note: Only the original bears the PW Studio stamp.
You can always check out this and other images on my Fine Art PauseWorks Studio Gallery Website.