Dr. Diana Hill
Learn evidenced-backed, contemplative practices to help you develop your wise effort. If you want to put your efforts into what you care most about, this twice-monthly Wise Effort newsletter is for you. Join the Wise Effort newsletter community!
To tell the truth, Dan Siegel rejected me.
Dear Reader, A few years ago Dan Siegel rejected me. He offered to write the forward to my second book, The Self-Compassion Daily Journal while we were on retreat together in Costa Rica. But a few weeks later, when I returned home I got an email from him telling me he couldn't write it. To tell the truth, I was angry, embarrassed (I had bragged about it a bit), and sad. After the tears dried, I took a second look at his reason why. Dan Siegel is a change maker, thought leader, and innovator...
I moved back in with my parents.
Dear Reader, I moved back in with my parents last week because our lease was up, and our re-build is still not ready. So, I’m writing this from my old room—looking out at the same eucalyptus tree I looked at when I was fourteen, in a room that is no longer mine, now filled with my mother’s paintbrushes and Macy’s floral bedding that only a grandma can love. Looking up, I see the wooden moon and stars I hung in junior high. Looking down, I see my husband’s black socks. Needless to say, I’m...
New cohort of the The Business of Therapy and Coaching starts May 11
Dear Reader, Therapists and coaches...Are you tired of the old, outdated way of doing business? Do you yearn to start a newsletter? Offer a group coaching program? Lead an in-person retreat in a magical place? Write a book? Build a course? Offer more talks? The next cohort of the Wise Effort: The Business of Therapy and Coaching program starts May 11. There is still time to apply to get one of the remaining spots. Here's what a few of the recent alumni said about their experience in the...
Are we going to be ok?
Dear Reader, Yesterday I moved back into my treehouse office, one year after tearing it down. We kept the 100-year-old redwood planks and used it to line the back wall. I’m convinced it holds something of the clients who have sat here. Their stories hold the ups and downs and ups again of life. Divorces, getting fired, having babies, getting cancer--it's not life's cycling that gives me hope. It's the "indomitable human spirit," as this week's podcast guest and author of The Book of Hope,...
My word for 2026 was Trust, until...
Dear Reader, Last week a podcast host asked me what was my word for the year. At first, I thought it would be Trust. I want to trust life more. It sounded good—warm, comforting. I want more of that. Then I pulled my annual Osho Zen Tarot card. The card? Intensity. It took me aback. Wait… that’s different than trust. “Intensity is my problem,” were the first words out of my mouth. I feel intensely, I work intensely, I love intensely, I even make cakes intensely. And I’ve spent a lifetime...
Come rest in the peace of wild things
Dear Reader, I’ve been waking up early, before my alarm clock. Boom, eyes wide open. There’s so much to do. This morning in my hypnogogic fugue I found myself reciting William Berry’s poem The Peace of Wild Things. I must have memorized it in high school, because the lines floated easily into mind: When despair for the world grows in me And I wake in the night at the least sound In fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I do and lie down where the wood drake Rests in his beauty...
Hot tub apocalypse and a sourdough cracker recipe
Dear Reader, With a little extra time off this week, my husband and I have been bonding over annoying errands. Today we trekked to the hot tub store. The water in our spa is an apocalyptic brown and the hot tub guy informed us biofilm has gotten into the pipes. GROSS. While chatting with him we learned that he works at the spa store by day and as a private chef by night. His genius? Biochemistry and fermentation (for better and for worse). So, we left with a 12 step hot tub remediation plan...
Yes...yes...thank you...thank you
Dear Reader, I’m writing to you from the Santa Barbara airport, where my flight to Denver has been delayed. I’m wearing Ugg boots and a down jacket (proud of myself for finally dressing for the weather) and sweating it out, crammed between disgruntled travelers trying to make connecting flights. There’s a cute baby in the seat next to me who doesn’t seem fazed by any of this. She just wants her dad’s glasses from his face. I’m reminded of what Gabby Reece said last week on the Wise Effort...
You’ve got to live the moral of the story...
Dear Reader, I’m writing to you from an airplane this morning. There’s a long line of people to my right, clutching their bags to their chests so they don’t bump me, fall coats stuffed under their arms. I’m wearing flip flops and a tank top, contemplating a poem: Today my overwhelm is an overstuffed overhead bin…holding it all together on the outside. I learned this technique from poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer when I interviewed her: take an object in your view take a feeling or experience...
5 surf spots in 2 days
Dear Reader, For my son’s sweet sixteen, he asked for a surf trip down the coast with his friends. So, I loaded him, three of his best buddies, and four surfboards into my car. We hit five surf spots in two days. If you want to learn how to loosen up, spend twelve hours in a car with four sixteen-year-old boys. What the trip reminded me is how good it feels when we prioritize values over control. Of all the things we get attached to—control, status, being liked, comfort—control is my...
Learn evidenced-backed, contemplative practices to help you develop your wise effort. If you want to put your efforts into what you care most about, this twice-monthly Wise Effort newsletter is for you. Join the Wise Effort newsletter community!