Elizabeth Hendrickson

Combine the beauty of Jennifer Garner and the comic timing of Debra Messing and what do you get? The hysterically entertaining and insightful Elizabeth Hendrickson! During SoapNet’s “Rock the Soap Cruise,” we talked about her experiences and life lessons learned from mistakes on All My Children and her current run on The Young and the Restless. Press here to read about all this plus her own take on "shoulds."

Bobbie Eakes

Before meeting Bobbie Eakes, I knew she had talent, I knew she had beauty, I knew she had an amazing singing voice. What I didn't know was how much humor, intelligence, and self-awareness has contributed to her portrayal of Krystal on ABC's All My Children. She is also rather fearless, given she was the first actor on the Rock the Soap cruise to give me an interview!


Please press here as she shares life lessons, reflections on a 20 year career in soaps, and even insights on sex addiction!

Van Hansis

Van Hansis by far one of the most risk taking actors working in daytime soaps today. He has taken on the challenge of lending integrity to a role that is controversial, symbolic, and the center of many hot political debates. Please press here to read my interview with this intelligent and delightful artist about his revolunionary role, participating in social change, and what his character really thought about his step-grandfather's attention!

Feeling Brandon's Buzz

Wow, I just caught "The Buzz" tonight, and it was Good! I had such a wonderful time talking with Brandon about living Should-less, improving your relationships, surviving the loss of your favorite soap, and ME!

Please press here to hear more. Or you can download it on iTunes by going to, "Brandon's Buzz."

Mark H's "Should-less" Musings

Mark H. is a psychologist / methodologist who has jumped aboard the "Should-less" wagon! In this wonderful and thoughtful piece, he discusses his dismay over the loss of Guiding Light, and how he is learning to apply "Should-less" living to the decline of the daytime soap opera genre.

Please check out his post, and then please consider if there is anyway his approach can help you to live your life more peacefully as well.

Responsiblity

"The last of the human freedoms is to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."
- Victor Frankl, Holocaust survivor, and author of "Man's Search For Meaning."

The opposite of blame is responsibility. This is where suffering turns into growth, anger turns into peace, pain turns into acceptance, and where playing victim turns into reacting as a survivor.

So many of us have been conditioned in our families and communities to blame others when we are upset. This message is then reinforced by constantly by our culture, by the media, even by the legal system. But in my experience, this deterred focus is a one-way ticket to being depressed, stressed, and consistently losing friends and partners. It just doesn't have to be this hard.

Taking responsibility means you take back your power. You acknowledge the role you have had in every disaster in your life, and think critically about ways to change. It means you stop repeating the same vicious cycles of pain/hurt in your relationships that you have been perpetuating for years. And it means you take action to protect yourself and others from continuing to be hurt. To put it another way, it is the beginning of the end for suffering.

Don't believe me? Read the quote above. If a man who survived a concentration camp in Germany can take responsibility for his attitude, then so can you. Still don't believe me? Then try reading the work of Byron Katie, Nelson Mandela, or even Tina Turner. All consistently put forward the message that NO ONE or nothing outside yourself can bring you down. They can hurt your body, they can deprive of you of food and water, but NO ONE can break your spirit unless you allow them.

BLAME!

In a world where retirement savings are lost, people get hurt, and 72-year-old soaps get canceled, it's pretty hard to find something reliable to hold on to. But here is one guarantee I promise that will hold true throughout your entire life:

Blaming others for how you feel will only bring you more suffering.

If you're comfortable being unhappy, then this may be of no interest to you whatsoever. But if you are interested in feeling a little better, with more peace, and more daily satisfaction, please continue.

Believe me, I understand how it easy it is to blame others for my emotions. We have all been conditioned in western society to believe that we get upset because of other people or outside things. Try filling in the blanks below:

______________ hurt my feelings
______________ made me upset
______________ really stresses me out!

Now look at your answers and consider this: YOU have been played a significant role for your reactions to all these situations. Perhaps not the circumstances themselves, these may or may not have been in your control. But the feelings and the meanings that you assign to other people's actions or the events around you are completely in your control.

How do you take that back that control? Tune in tomorrow, folks, for a crash course lesson in a word beginning with "R" that will significantly relieve your suffering. Anyone want to guess?

Alabama!

I want to give a huge "shout out" to the first person in the state of Alabama to read this blog! Someone on the Auburn University campus took the time yesterday to learn some tools for living "should-less" and became my first Alabama visit. Thanks for visiting, and hurry on back y'all!

Catching Brandon's Buzz

The good news of the day is that I have been booked as a guest on Brandon's Buzz, an internet talk show that discusses soaps, music, and tools for making it through this crazy world. We're taping on April 13th, but until then you can hear some past shows by pressing here. Or, if you have iTunes, just type in, "Brandon's Buzz".

The bad news of the day is that Guiding Light is still a goner. We'll be talking about the cancellation and how to use "should-less" ideas to cope with this and other losses.

Kathy Brier!

Those of you reading this blog may not have any idea how much Kathy Brier has impacted the ideas in "Absolutely Should-less." Part of my impetus for writing was the frustration with where my career was going in New York, and difficulties finding the kind of work I wanted to do. Nevertheless, I still had those internal voices saying to me, "Why are you writing this, no one is going to care to read this, why bother?"

So I took a break from writing and went to see Kathy Brier sing in Manhattan. This amazing actress from One Life to Live and Broadway's Hairspray took the audience on an amazing journey. Singing sassy rock, soft ballads, wicked humor ("gay bacon?"), this young woman was a shining reminder to me that I had a right to pursue my career and my dreams on my own terms.

I had the privilege of interviewing Ms. Brier on the Rock the Soap cruise last week. Please press here to read how she continues to help millions of viewers every day live their "one life" on their own terms.