Her garden has fallen to ruin. Irene is old now, maybe ninety. Her memory has fled, leaving her eyes like lights in an empty room. I always try to say “hello” to her when I see her. She is guileless, full of wonder, a child in awe of the universe.
    Her garden used to be the most beautiful around. She took such pleasure in tending its flowers and plants. She and my wife would share knowledge of bulbs and buds.
    There is no such knowledge in Irene now. Her eyes are watching other worlds. When she answers at all, it is in response to questions only she can hear.
    I listen to her closely. What remains alive in the dim chambers of her memory?

I have always believed we must either consider life and everything associated with it a miracle, or consider nothing a miracle, and I’ve used this philosophy in my life and in my medical practice. What I mean is that we really cannot explain the origin of life and its evolution. In a sense everything came from nothing. But because I believe life evolved from intelligent, loving, conscious energy, the “nothing” is something, even if it is indescribable. Creation itself is a miracle, whether we know how it happened or not.

Another miracle is that we and all living things were created to survive.

I admit it. I’m a bit of a reality TV junkie. My latest obsession? Why Not? with Shania Twain on the Oprah Winfrey Network. It is fascinating to watch this Grammy Award–winning singer struggle with her Inner Mean Girl’s Big Fat Lies, especially when she has so much evidence of what a badass she is. Just goes to show how our external circumstances can have very little to do with our internal dialogue. I love witnessing Shania win her voice back. I find myself rooting for her at every turn, hoping that she will wake up her Inner Superstar so she can shine bright once again.

I can see how she is beating herself up with Big Fat Lies like “I’m a fraud,” “I’m a failure,” and “I’m not enough.” If I were her coach, boy, would we have a blast busting through all the lies and locking in on the truth of her magnificence. So I thought I’d give you a peek at one of the Lies featured in my book, Big Fat Lies Women Tell Themselves: Ditch Your Inner Critic and Wake Up Your Inner Superstar, that I see Shania telling herself and believing.

When I first heard the title of the book Ethical Intelligence, my first thought was, “Yes, it’s smart to be ethical. That sums it up very neatly.” And then I read the subtitle: Five Principles for Untangling Your Toughest Problems at Work and Beyond, and I immediately wanted to publish this book and help spread its words far and wide.

The author of the book is Bruce Weinstein, PhD, a professional ethicist and the business ethics columnist for Businessweek.com. And for a book about ethics, it is surprisingly practical, filled with lots of difficult everyday problems and suggestions on how to face them.