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This is your life.

This is the mantra that keeps me grounded in the present. It arrives unprompted from my mind—This is your life—and causes me to take note of what I’m doing, because the thing I’m doing at that very moment is my life, made up of the thousand…

A friend asked the question from the front row at my book launch event, right as we were wrapping up the program and closing Q&A. Her words hung in the air like a challenge. What would come after publishing a book—an accomplishment many dream of but few ever reach?

I…

The book launch week of The Long Run Home came and went like a shooting star burning bright across a midnight sky—brilliant, stunning, and singular. As I reflect on it all, I realize: I will never publish my first book again.

I find it incredible that it took me ei…

Dare to Begin—this is the message that’s been echoing in my mind. It’s the call to action from my upcoming memoir, releasing in less than eight weeks! When I think about my greatest wins—and when I think about people reading my book—that’s the message I want…

“You can do it, AJ. You can do it, AJ. You can do it, AJ,” I heard my son whimpering quietly behind me on the tag-along bike attachment. He was scared of biking, and this was our first attempt on the tag-along after years of trying to get him on his own bike with tr…

By-when? — It’s the question that lingers at the edges of my mind. If I’m to do a task, by-when is the rudder that steers my sails.

Wind is needed, certainly. But I can’t control the wind—I can only harness it when it comes, and wait patiently when it does…

We love setting big goals. It’s easy to dream big: imagine the perfect outcome, visualize success, and aim for the moon — “because even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars,” right?

But what happens when those dreams stall? When your motivation fades, and…

I’d never look at a daffodil bursting through the earth in the spring and criticize it for not blooming sooner. Knowingly, I am above the snow and grasp that the flower won’t survive in any season other than the one intended for it to bloom. It’s effortless for me…

Every rep counts — this is the thought that drifts into my mind as I think about the challenges of the day, sitting in a chairlift beside Primrose, my oldest child. Up we go, ascending the ski hill on a crisp but sunny winter day. At the bottom of the slope–too far…

I was desperate – locked in place and frustrated. No book hacks, self-help podcasts, or personal commitments could shake me free from the years-long rut that clung to my life like a hoe dragging through tough soil.

There were things I couldn’t do anymore – not e…

Before I packed my bags to leave for California, a last minute trip for a chance opportunity to run into someone interested in my book, there was work to do. In the week leading up to my departure I found that it took all of me to believe in the choice that I had made,…

For years I wrestled with my desires (increasing revenue for my nonprofit, publishing my book, and speaking on stage), and what I could produce (none of those things). I had BIG desires, but low results. Ugh.

I just had to work harder, obviously – wake up earlier, …