This is a picture of my son.

He took of himself with his phone.

He’s currently obsessed with soccer.

It’s hard for many of my friends to understand how much time and energy we put into this sport.

We adjusted our year-long trip to come home so our son could play with his team.

And, trust me, it is not because we have delusions that our son will play professionally or get a full-ride scholarship to Stanford.

We are committed because our son loves it.

He gets butterflies on the way to practice.

He can’t sleep the night before a game.

He cries when he misses a save.

As his parents, we know that loving something this much matters.  There will be few things in life that ignite your passion, and when you find it, you must do it.

Yes. At the expense of other things.

So we fly from around the country so he doesn’t miss a game.

We take him to practice twice a week, goalie practice once a week, and the field during the day so he can practice.

We treat him like he’s training for the World Cup.

Not because soccer will be his career or is a very important sport.

But because he loves it.

In our family, what we love to do is what matters.

It matters more than school, more than a trip across the country, and more than being realistic.

I can think of no better lesson to teach my son.

I can think of no better lesson to learn.

I think laughing might be the most important thing.

I am fascinated by people who never seem to laugh.

I laugh at everything.  I love laughing.

I am always looking for an excuse to laugh.  I want to find you funny.

My kids are always laughing.   They laugh at us mostly. But I love hearing them laugh.

Babies laughing are the best.

My favorite is to spot someone trying not to laugh-which of course makes them laugh harder.

I wonder how many times I laugh per day.  It’s a lot.

My friend Jodi and I are always laughing really loud wherever we go.  It makes other people laugh. I think laughing is contagious.

I’ve been told more than once to keep it down because my laugh is so loud.  I never do.

I’ve been told laughing is unprofessional.  I totally disagree.

I think the world would be more awesome if we laughed more than we worried.

Everything has a funny side. I am always looking for it.

Don’t be so serious. It prevents laughing.

Find what’s funny.

And there’s always something funny.

Sorry, but you can’t know what is best for someone else.

You may think you have answers for how they should live their life. But you don’t.

Thinking you do is nothing short of arrogant.

You may think they should stop drinking or overeating or watching so much TV.  You may want them to be kinder or more ambitious or better at cleaning the house.  But you want that because you think you know better.

You don’t.

You have enough work to do in your own life. Don’t you?  What do you want to be better at doing?  Focus on that.

Your judgment of others is hurting you. It’s making you angry. It’s making you crazy because you can’t control them.

You tell yourself it is out of love.  But judgment isn’t loving.  Trying to control isn’t loving.

You don’t have their answers.

You have your answers.

Get to work on those.

I will be happy when I meet the love of my life.

I will be happy when I am thin.

I will be happy when I have more money.

Problem is…

We often get thinness or money or love, and the unhappiness is still there.

And then we’re really screwed.

Because now we are unhappy and hopeless.

So we gain weight and spend money and sabotage our relationships-so we have an explanation for our negative emotion.

If we believe our happiness comes from “out there”, we have to give our power away to whatever is out there.

And then we have to control it manically, so we don’t lose it.

Really, though, the only explanation for unhappiness is our mind.

That’s why you can find happy people living in poverty and miserable rich people.

It doesn’t matter what you have, weigh or who you have to love.

What matters is what you think.

Period.

There is no way around it.

Taking responsibility for happiness is where all your power is.

Happiness is a choice. You either choose it or you don’t. No explanation required.

I was reading Penelope Trunk’s blog the other day and one of the lines grabbed ahold of me, “Let your life surprise you.”

I wonder how you do that?

You let go some.

You have faith.

You admit you don’t know everything.

You stop trying to control how it will all turn out.

I believe in creating and managing and happening to my life.

Letting my life surprise me seems a bit passive.

And yet, the idea of it hasn’t left me.

My whole life doesn’t have to be a surprise.  I can create most of it.

But I can also be surprised.

I can look for the unexpected beauty, love, and people that I couldn’t possibly have planned.

I can leave room for it.

I can hold some space for it.

I can let it surprise me.

I am offering six coaching sessions in March to anyone who wants to clean up some thinking. Join me.  Details on home page of www.brookecastillo.com.

Seriously?  Have some self respect.

This is what I say to my children when I walk into their room at the end of the weekend.

Their room looks like they’ve had a 48 hour rave when left with no weekday expectations.

I talk to them about cleanliness.  I explain that being able to see the floor has its merits.

I show them how pleasant it can be to have a bathroom that doesn’t smell like death.

Come on boys.

But… but …but… so and so doesn’t have to clean his room, you should see it.

And what about so and so’s car?  They don’t have to clean it out every time they get home.

Why are you always all over us to keep everything clean?

Because you deserve it from yourself.

Living in a clean, non cluttered environment is healthy.

Putting some effort into your own well-being is significant.

Because getting into a car that doesn’t smell like old soccer socks and warm Gatorade is my birthright.

How you treat yourself is a sign of how much you respect yourself.

You will teach people how to treat you throughout your life.

They will learn by how you treat you.

If you want to be treated like garbage, then you are on your way.

But if you want people to treat you like the kings you are, show them how.

A couple of years ago, someone I love decided they no longer wanted me in their life.

I was devastated.

I was mad.

I was confused.

But mostly, I was sad.

I knew better than to hate or argue or try to change her mind, but I couldn’t shake the sadness.

I tried to coach myself out of it, and usually I am very good at coaching myself, but sadness stayed.

That’s when I realized I wanted to be sad.

I wanted to cry. Truly.

My heart was broken and I wanted to let it be broken for a minute without trying to fix it.

It was supposed to be broken.

And so I was sad.  I walked around with sadness like it was my heavy purse.

I owned it.  I carried it willingly.

Morning. Noon. And night.

Day after day.

And then one day I noticed…I didn’t want to be sad anymore.

I was tired of being sad.

I missed my friend. Every time I saw something that would have made us both laugh, I felt her absence.

But I was done being sad.

And because I had respected sadness and given it its due, it respected me and let go when I asked.

I remember when it happened…the radio was on and gave me a new thought…

“Now, you’re somebody I used to know.”

And I felt happy.

Happy to have known her.

I want to quit all the time.

I think of quitting on myself often.

But I don’t.

It’s easier to quit on a relationship than to do the work to make it strong and unconditional.

It’s easy to quit on your own business when work gets hard and no one acknowledges you or pays you for what you do.

It’s so tempting to quit on goals and dreams and ideas.  They require courage, hard work, and faith.

Quitting on yourself requires nothing special.

But not quitting is better, way better.  Sometimes what’s harder is better.

Not quitting is a skill.  You have to practice it.  You have to not quit.  Often.

I practice it when I workout.

When I create new products.

When I design a new class.

When I dread a difficult conversation.

When I feel a feeling instead of reacting to it.

Quitting might give you temporary relief.

Quitting might give you the indulgence of releasing a challenge.

But it denies you the honor of completion.  Of kicking fear and doubt in the head.

Of overcoming the garbage that stands in the way of you getting what you truly want.

The satisfaction of knowing when it got hard, you didn’t quit.

Love is amazing when it’s easy.

The other person is doing what you like, when you like it, so the loving comes easily.

And it feels great.

But then they do something you don’t like. Really don’t like.

That’s when loving is hard.

It’s hard because you don’t want to love them when they don’t do what you want them to do.

You want to punish them.  Or hide from them. Or ignore them.

But why?  Because none of these things feel good.  It sucks to ignore, hide, punish.

It feels unjustified to answer unwanted behavior with love.

But, do you know what?

It feels good.  Love always feels good.

Even when it’s unjustified.  Love rocks.

And it doesn’t mean you condone, agree, or want what they did.

It just means you love them.

And nothing they do will ever change that.

I have created work when I didn’t have support and I have created work when I did.

Having support is better.  Way better.

I have had friends, colleagues, and mentors who have encouraged me when I doubted, and it was the difference between completion and procrastination.

When I was starting The Life Coach School, I second-guessed myself constantly.  A friend listened, and then said, “But, Brooke, you know you will help so many people.”

That statement is what I kept thinking through every subsequent doubt.

When I was learning how to lose weight without struggle, I kept thinking I would be overweight forever.  One of my mentors told me, “Success usually comes after multiple attempts, your previous failures are most likely an indication that success is near.”  She was right.

Having someone with perpective on your life, who doesn’t believe your doubts or worries, makes creating work in the world so much easier.

Someone to tell you the critics are wrong.

Someone to remind you what you do well and applaud each of your completions.

Someone who doesn’t require you to be perfect, but does require you to put your work into the world.

Someone who has your back, even when you make mistakes or fall on your face.

I tell you this, not so you will go out and try to find someone to believe in you.

I tell you this so you may be that person for someone you believe in.