Spring is a time of renewal, cleansing, letting go of the old to invite in the new. This week, I want to share the incredible story of how my friend Kim learned to let go of her pain and embrace a new life, while flying high above the Hudson River…

It was Monday, March 2013. I was sprawled out on my couch in Brooklyn, putting the finishing touches on my grad school application and waiting for my boyfriend to get out of work and planning what to make for dinner. When he got home, without explanation or apology, he broke up with me. Just like that.

I was devastated. We’d been together six years, talking about getting married – yet he gave me no warning, no compassion. In a second, my life came crashing down.

I fell apart. I lost ten pounds in a week, surviving on coffee and liquor, moving through my days in a painful, unreal fog. Everything hurt. I just couldn’t absorb the truth: that relationship, which had been my bedrock, my identity, was over.

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Last week, I got to go on The Daily Burn, a fitness show based here in New York, as their guest celebrity. I did the morning workout with them, and we did a really cool exercise about “reaching new heights” on a trampoline. You can still catch the interview, and if you’re looking for a fun, challenging workout to do every day, you can stream the workouts free for a month – check it out!

During the workout – it was about a half hour of cardio and strength-training – Greg, the instructor, said something that really struck me.

“If you’re thinking ‘I can’t do this’ – remember, that ‘I can’t’ is just an interpretation of a feeling. It’s not a reality,” he said. “Breathe into it, stay calm. Keep going.”

How profound! And it’s true in several ways – not just about exercise, but about life. Self-talk is a hot topic these days, and it’s continually...

It was high tide, and the waves were enormous, crashing against the shore. My family and I were spending a weekend at Cape May, and every day the beach had been glorious—sun, waves, sandcastles, the works. This one day, though, the waves were the biggest I’d seen—and it brought two totally different reactions from my two kids.

Ty, who’s seven, saw it as a big adventure. The waves were bigger than he was, but he couldn’t stop giggling as he jumped into each one. He watched the bigger kids doing it, and he followed right along, for hours, loving every minute.

Kaya, though, was terrified. My husband Stephen and I tried to shift her focus—“Look how many people are out there having fun! How can we jump each wave? What else can we do? You’re fine, you’re perfectly safe!” But she simply could not see past the fear.

It was such a clear example of a simple but powerful truth: you feel what you focus on.

Which means that you have the...

If you know me, you probably know I’m passionate about visualization. I’ve used it for almost every important goal in my life – and, as long as I’ve done it right, it’s always worked.

Which means that I’ve had times it didn’t work—and that I’ve found one crucial aspect that makes all the difference.

Back when I was on soaps, I had an audition for a role in the reprise of Bonanza: The Next Generation. The character sounded perfect for me—except that she was an expert equestrian. I barely qualified as an amateur.

Still, I went to the audition. My plan was to fudge through the part on horseback by riding English style, not Western. Just a few minutes after I mounted the horse, though, it started pouring. The director called me back before I even made it once across the field. It was over so quickly, I was sure I wouldn’t get the part.

But maybe because it was over so quickly, they didn’t have...

Sometimes people say to me, “Sonia, I get the whole motivational exercise thing. But I think you’re asking too much, to imagine the life of my dreams. It’s just not possible. I don’t know what I want.”

I understand that. If you’ve done the Journey Walk Guided Visualization, or the first section of Mindset Reset, maybe you’ve felt that way yourself. It can be overwhelming to allow to yourself to imagine the life of your dreams.

That’s the key, though – allowing yourself. Just for a few minutes, let your mind wander, explore, run free, chase a rainbow, dream. See where it takes you. Just for a few minutes, shut out those voices that say “That’s too much,” “that’s too big,” “you can’t have that,” “you’ll never do that.” Silence them—stop clinging to them!—and allow something else to come in. There are no wrong...

During one of the Moti-adventures, I led a group of women kayaking to the Statue of Liberty. The workshop was about riding the currents of your life, and breaking our goals down into milestones.

As we got started, we could see the Statue of Liberty, and it looked so far away. Our kayaks felt so tiny—it was a little ominous; even I as the leader was like, oh my gosh, how are we going to make this happen?

The first thing the instructor told us was, don’t look at the Statue of Liberty. You know it’s there, you’ve seen it; you know that’s the goal; now let’s break it down. Our first destination is going to be that little red brick house on the other side of the river. Keep the tip of your boat focused on that house. And just paddle until you get there.

So that’s how we overcame that fear that arises when you’re starting something new. It can be scary, to look at your goal, your end point, maybe your whole dream vision. You might think, but...