Here is the latest mini-meditation; I hope it brings you some moments of peace.

The days are getting shorter, and soon these pelicans will begin their winter migration. Watching them fly in graceful formation at sunset is a reminder of the beauty and rhythm of nature. I hope you find this scene as calming and restorative as I do.

On another n…

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Day 12 for your review.

This panel is based on concepts from Dialectical Behavior Therapy, developed by psychologist Marsha Linehan. The idea behind emotional mind, rational mind, and wise mind is to help clients balance two opposites and arrive at a healthy middle ground.

But this way of thinking need not be limited to therapy. It can—and should—be taught proactively to everyone, especially by the time students reach high school. That way, they can begin to understand their feelings and how their minds work.

In keeping with the idea of making things fun, I was inspired to use ice cream to illustrate this point. After all, who wouldn’t want to eat endless amounts of ice cream? If only we could!

However, that’s not good for our health—and thankfully, our Rational Mind steps in and slams the brakes before we spiral head-on into a giant tub of frozen delight.

Moderation. The Middle Path. Wise Mind… It might sound a bit boring, but as a long-term strategy, it's a great way to enjoy treats—mindfully and in moderation.

Oh, and I couldn’t resist referencing that delightful German phrase: Innerer Schweinehund—translated into English as “the inner pig-dog.” We all have one, somewhere deep inside—whether it’s about ice cream, emotional extremes, retail therapy, or something else entirely. And the Wise Mind is what helps keep it at bay.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Day 11 for your review.

This panel was inspired by the words of the late Stanford psychology professor Philip Zimbardo, who used this phrase to highlight the powerful influence that environments have on human behavior.

When we create healthy environments, they can positively shape people’s actions. Environments include not only physical spaces, but also social and cultural elements such as norms—whether in families, schools, workplaces, or society at large.

Television, radio, and other forms of mass media and social media also play a significant role in shaping our socio-cultural norms. This is where Entertainment-Education comes in.

By infusing entertainment with positive messages and modeling healthy behaviors, we can support the public in adopting healthier habits—including reducing violence.

Advertising is one example of how environments are already being modified to influence behavior: people are constantly being persuaded to buy all kinds of things. So why not use the same tools to influence the adoption of positive behaviors, and encourage more compassionate and kind actions?

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Day 10 for your review.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Day 9 for your review.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Day 8 for your review.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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You might recognize some of the items below from the Your Daily Brush series.

If you are new here, I invite you to look among the earlier posts and see what speaks to you.

Perhaps a music related way to brush your mind? Or maybe a mini-mediation?

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Day 6 for your review.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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If you can get out into nature, that would be ideal. Even a few minutes of walking outdoors can boost your emotional health. If you cannot go outside, consider taking a few moments to look at the sky, trees, or other plants near you.

It’s that simple, and it is always within your reach.

Rx: Here is a photo taken at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco that I would like to share with you as a micro-meditation. I invite you to look at the photo and notice the colors and lines. Immerse yourself in the image for a few seconds. Take some deep breaths with long exhalations and give yourself a brief mental hygiene break.

If you feel inspired to share your photography with us in the newsletter, please let me know. I would be delighted to share it with our community of readers.

To your health!

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Day 5 for your review.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Today’s installment seeks to describe the universality of brushing one’s teeth…within the confines of 5 inch by 7 page. Hope it makes you smile.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Here is day 3

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Here is day 2.

To your health!

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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The time has come to share something that has been hidden from public view for a while: a prototype of a mental toothbrush and mental hygiene toolkit.

It just happens to be in the form of cartoons, and it’s on its way to becoming a book.

In the coming days, I’ll be sharing this prototype with you in serialized format. It has already been reviewed by mental health professionals, including a psychologist with expertise in mental health publishing.

That person said to me, “The world needs this…” But, because it didn’t align with their publishing goals at the time, it did not come into being then.

I’ve now decided to share it with all of you here as the next step, as we work toward finalizing it and bringing it into the usual channels for book publishing.

What you’ll see is an advanced draft, and this is your chance to offer any thoughts or feedback, if you feel inspired.

So here we go with the first two pages. I hope you find it both educational and entertaining.

To your health!

P.S. Please keep in mind this is a draft. The final version will be illustrated by a professional cartoonist.

If you are inspired to share your feedback, please do so via the button below. This is a draft and the final version will be done by a professional cartoonist I collaborate with.

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Hope you are all doing well and will enjoy the latest mini-meditation.

I had a delightful chat with these ping pong players who gave me permission to film and share with you.

As you watch this and re-watch, I invite you to look at different aspects of the video as focal points for your mini-meditation:

• You can follow the ball.

• You can look at…

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Dear Friends,

Hope that you are all doing well.

My content sabbatical will come to an end in a few days at which time I will resume with more of Your Daily Brush.

In the meantime, I wanted to reach out and share with you some updates and a look behind the scenes.

I have been working pretty much seven days a week to keep things moving forward at Brush Your Mind and the World Love Forum. On top of that, I injured my shoulder while riding a bus and that has added more challenges…including affecting my ability to type for long hours.*

But the good news is that things are moving forward and I’m delighted to share these updates with you:

1. I have been working on fundraising to launch a violence prevention campaign and as you can imagine that is quite demanding.
   
   This work involves producing written materials, filming videos and then doing the outreach work…By the way, if you happen to know anyone who might be interested in supporting violence prevention work through the advancement of love and emotion regulation, I would be delighted if you might consider connecting us.
   

2. Over the past months, I have been working to deepen my technical expertise in the area of prevention of emotionally toxic workplaces. It has been an exciting course of study and am looking forward to sharing more about that soon. According to the American Psychological Association, about 20% of Americans report experiencing emotionally toxic workplaces and this is also a global health concern highlighted by the International Labor Organization and the World Health Organization.
   
   My goal is to add this form of emotional abuse and physical violence to our prevention portfolio; more specifically, our focus is that by advancing compassion in the workplace, we can prevent or at least reduce, the incidence of emotional toxicity.

3. In addition to toxic workplaces, other topics I am currently researching include: social networks and transmission of positive behaviors across groups; spirituality and the scientific evidence for prayer, and embodied approaches to resolving trauma. All of this is to inform our newsletter content and to pave the way for further innovations in mental health promotion.

4. I continue to work on submitting TEDx applications, as this is one of the channels for disseminating key messages widely. In 2023 I was selected to speak at a TEDx event but they lost their financial sponsor…and another place that had accepted my application for 2020 cancelled due to the Covid 19 pandemic.
   
   Again, as with fundraising, one never knows where things will land…and part of the formula for success is to just keep going forward and not giving up.

5. I am engaged with volunteers behind the scences, who share their expertise on topics such as project management and public communications, as we prepare for scaling projects.

6. Last but not least, I have an exciting line up of further content, which I am hoping to film and share with you soon. It was suggested to me by a couple of communication experts that I try out videos as change of pace, instead of writing essays. So stay tuned…

Rx: Hopefully my content sabbatical has given you a chance to try out creative ways to explore brushing your minds on your own. As a brief refresher, I would like to share with you five key ideas that you can implement daily:

1. Practice deep breathing - especially the long exhalation along the lines of what I had written about earlier. Even just a couple of minutes a day will add up and make a big difference in helping you stay centered and calm. And the more often you do something, the more it gets laid down as “tracks” in your brain - hence the saying: Neurons that fire together wire together.

2. Tap into the power of music to energize you when you are feeling slow or to help calm you when you are feeling tense or revved up.

3. Practice gratitude because research demonstrates its mental health promoting benefits. Along with helping you feel positive about things, the practice of gratitude has been found to help prevent depression.

4. Move: even if no gym, just walk, dance and do some kitchen counter pushups. The reason for this is that movement and exercise have been shown to benefit our emotional health. In some situations, exercise has been found to be as efficacious as antidepressant medication in helping deal with mood. For extra motivation to move, consider combining it with music as mentioned above.

5. Nature: Look at the sky and look at trees and birds around you. Notice the sights and sounds of nature and let them recharge your batteries. As with gratitude and movement, research informs us that nature, even if it is via videos, promotes our emotional health.

If you are not sure where or how to begin, just pick something and have a go at it. And if you are feeling tired, worn out, run down etc. consider lying down and working on your deep breathing. That is easy to do and still carries lots of benefits.

See you again in a few days!

Take care of yourself and I am sending you many good wishes,

SD
*In case you are wondering how exactly can one injure themselves while riding a bus? It happened when I was standing, holding a pole in preparation to get off at an upcoming stop. The driver slammed the brakes as he reached the crest of a hill instead of a gentle stop. The force of the slam made me lunge westward while my hand, arm and shoulder stayed back east, dutifully clutching the pole - and there you have it. :-)

PS. Here’s a music video that you might find relaxing as background music or for meditation. To your health!

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It is a quiet yet powerful portrait of a woman whose mission is to aid these birds. Not all survive, but many do and to watch their healing journey is a very moving experience.

It is a good reminder that hope can be found even in the face of despair. We just have to look for signs of it.

Rx: I invite you to set aside the time to watch the documentary with your full attention. This way you can also turn watching this into a sort of mini-retreat to recharge your psyche and soul. Watch it with no distractions and invite a friend or loved on to join you if like. If you wish, after watching it, you can talk with the other person about what the documentary meant for you.

How did it make you feel? What emotions came up? Did you feel resonant joy when you saw the rehabilitaed birds fly away? How do you feel about the woman who cares for the birds? These are some questions to get your conversation started. Feel free to use these as a starting point and come up with more of your own.

To your health!

Please Note: After 75 consecutive posts, I will be taking a brief pause from Your Daily Brush because in addition to this, I have been working intensely behind the scenes to get read to launch the forthcoming campaign: Make Hope Contagious. Stay tuned for more information about that in the coming days!

In the meantime, thank you to those readers who shared with me their positive feedback! It means a lot to me. And special thanks to those who are paid subscribers and founding members. Your membership helps cover some of the basic operating costs to keep this going until I find a major sponsor.

Allow your eyes to wander around the image and notice the details such as the lines, textures and variation in colors, especially at the mountain tops.

Rx: Enter fully into the moment as you take in the image…all the while breathing slowly and evenly. That’s it!

Linger a moment and enjoy the image and soon you can reconnect with your inner calm.

To your health!

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It is easy to let these things intrude into our sense of calm and affect our feelings of wellbeing.

Here is one way to draw healthy boundaries: by shifting focus to doing something tangible and, in so doing, controlling what we can.

For one of my former professors, it was washing dishes. They said it was the most tangible thing in their day of endless tasks… The dishes had a finite beginning and end and it certainly was a lot faster than writing a paper for publication, or even grading student papers.

For me, along with doing dishes, it is vacuuming the floor. There is something soothing about cleaning and watching the dust bunnies disappear. (For non-U.S. readers, please rest assured, no animals are harmed! "Dust bunny" is a slang term for clumps of dust that form when regular cleaning gets delayed.)

As I often say to people in my meditation classes, you don't have to go to a monastery to experience the peace and calm of meditation. Just chop vegetables. Or just wash dishes. Or maybe fold some laundry.

Regardless of the simple task, the main thing is that you embrace it with a sense of peace and calm. Don't rush to get it over with so you can move on to another task.

Immerse yourself fully into the present moment. And allow your body to shift gears, especially if you are in nonstop hyperdrive mode, like so many people who juggle work and family responsibilities.

Use this time to breathe easily and expansively. Notice the colors and textures of the laundry you are folding. Notice the water and soap suds as you wash dishes. Enjoy the thrill of suctioning balls of dust or sweeping them into a dustpan! Notice the colors and textures of the vegetables you are chopping.

What else can you think of in your daily life that you can do for five or ten minutes, or maybe even longer, to help you connect with a sense of accomplishment and a sense of calm?

Rx: The next time you feel a sense of overwhelm about world events, turn inward for a few minutes and seek to create order in some small corner of your life. This is one way you can plant and water the seeds of peace; and this is mental hygiene.

To your health!

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What is working for you? What might be frustrating?

Please feel free to reach out to me if you have questions or if you would like to share how you are brushing your mind.

If you are experiencing dips or slips, remember, progress is not always steady. Sometimes we dip or slip despite our best efforts. That is just the nature of life.

If you do experience any setbacks, offer yourself compassion and talk to yourself as you would to your best friend. And try to problem solve to see how you can take a step-by-step approach to creating a mental hygiene routine that feels good for you.

To your health!

P.S. I’m inspired to share this photo below of of San Francisco in the fog because though it is June, it is quite chilly with lots of fog and wind!