Feel Good Guru

Feel Good Book Review by Lara Kleinschroth

So, whose life is what they ordered!? For any of you out there, following the exact path you laid out for yourselves as kids or teens or young adults, well–kudos! For the rest of us–and may I go out on a limb and suggest that would be the majority of us–life continually throws us curve balls, fast balls, knuckle balls. And how often do we take those pitches and hit home runs, how often do we strike out?

Change of course is what makes life fun, interesting, challenging. All the ups and downs, trials and tribulations, highs and lows. How well we navigate these changes and transitions helps determine the quality of our lives. And having some great friends with you along the way just makes it all the sweeter. (more…)

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Review by Feel Good Book Guru, Lara Kleinschroth

“Courage has color - it is the weaving of all these colors into a tapestry that reminds us that we are braver than we know and stronger than we ever imagined.  Courage has sound - it comes as a whisper and sometimes a roar.  Courage is the willingness to aspire, reach, and believe in the promise of tomorrow.” Mary Anne Radmacher

Mary Anne Radmacher is an inspirational writer and artist living in Washington State. She conducts workshops on living a full, creative, balanced life, as well as teaching online writing courses (called ON(e)LINE–one on one, progressive sessions, in which she acts as a guide not an editor or critic). (more…)

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My friend Martha, a fan of Feel Good Guru in Japan, recently tried sending me some traditional hand-crafted miso from a tiny operation in rural Japan run by the Onozaki family, the oldest and most respected family in miso artistry. (see her video below made special for Feel Good Guru!) It’s the highest quality miso in the world, naturally fermented, traditionally crafted and certified organic, but much to our disappointment, it was sent back due to Canadian food import laws. Bummer! Instead, she sent me two books, “Japanese Foods That Heal - using traditional Japanese ingredients to promote health, longevity & well-being” and “The Miso Book - the art of cooking with miso”, both by John and Jan Belleme, America’s leading experts on miso and traditional Japanese food. I’ve added both these books to my list of new favorites. (more…)

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“Magical places are always beautiful and deserve to be contemplated. Waterfalls, mountains and forests are all places where the spirits of Earth tend to play and laugh and speak to us.” Wicca from Paulo Coelho’s “Brida”

review by Feel Good Book Guru Lara Kleinschroth

Many of you have read - or at least heard of - “The Alchemist” by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho. It is a beautiful, allegorical tale of searching for our own personal legends - our treasures. Since first picking it up a few years ago I have read many other of Coelho’s books. All follow the same simple, honest storytelling style, and many explore similar themes - the search for self-knowledge, love and wisdom. (more…)

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How often do you wake up saying that? And how often do you find yourself wondering what your strange dream means?

I had two strange dreams back-to-back the other night, and when I awoke, I couldn’t shake them. That’s why I keep my friend Kelly Sullivan Walden’s book “I Had the Strangest Dream…The Dreamer’s Dictionary for the 21st Century” beside my bed, along with my iTouch for notes. Though I believe that a good portion of my dreams these days with info-overload are simply a discharge of data from the trash can of my subconscious, occasionally I remember one that feels like a cryptic crossword puzzle which, once solved, will help bring clarity to my waking life…   (more…)

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I love this man. He’s a passionate speaker, columnist for the NYTimes, best-selling author of the popular “How to Cook Everything” books, including “How to Cook Everything Vegetarian”, and the recent “Food Matters - a guide to conscious eating”. He’s also an advocate of an “incrementalist” philosophy.

He preaches to Americans that they’re killing themselves and the planet with the way they eat. “Too much meat. Too much junk food. Too big a footprint.” He’s not a vegetarian, but he recommends a “vegan til 6″ diet, which, I think, is brilliant. It’s a message that doesn’t feel restrictive and punishing, rather, a positive challenge that’s easy for the masses to swallow… (more…)

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…If You Ran the World? That’s the question Shelly Rachanow asks in the title of her book. It’s a great question. I’d have Barak Obama as my Press Secretary, Michelle as my Head of Education, David Suzuki as my Minister of the Environment, Bono as my Human in charge of Humanitarianism, Richard Branson as my Consumer Affairs Minister, Nelson Mandela as my Elder Council Advisor, Michael Pollan as my Secretary of Agriculture, Oprah as my Advocate for Women and Children, Paul Watson as my Warrior for Wildlife and Gene Baur as my Head of Animal Welfare… (more…)

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All vegetarians, unless they’ve been vegetarian since birth, have a defining moment in their life where they stopped eating meat.

For myself, it was when I lived in Paris at sixteen as a “jeune fille au pair” and was fed twice a day with horse meat. Three months later, I looked in the mirror and realized I’d embodied the axiom “You are what you eat!”

For hundreds of thousands of people back in the late 80’s and early 90’s, that moment came from reading John Robbins’ “Diet for a New America”. (more…)

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It’s absurd that we need to be reminded of the most basic rules of eating: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. But we’ve moved so far beyond real food with our Standard American Diet (S.A.D.) that our society has encountered a whole new grouping for the ailments that plague us - western diseases. These diseases, like obesity, diabetes, heart disease and stroke, according to Michael Pollan, can be traced back to the moment we began tampering with our food to create refined white flour and sugar products, processed and packaged cereals, meats, breads and snacks. We’ve tricked our senses with so many artificial ingredients and (more…)

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My friends at VegNews get invited to a lot of parties, restaurant openings, book launches and charity benefits. Lucky for me, they can’t keep up. So when founding (and award winning) publisher and editor extraordinaire, Joe Connelly, called and asked if I’d like to attend a book launch for local Venice designer with a conscience, Kelly LaPlante, I pulled out my best recycled outfit, grabbed singer/songwriter girlfriend Kathy Leonardo and hit the happening green scene.

The publication is Kelly’s first, a coffee-table book called “Ecologique: the style of (more…)

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Give this guy some green. He’s written a book that’ll help you go green without sacrificing your couch time.

He also has an eco-friendly furniture and home design center in NYC called Vivavi.

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