 Dear Friends,
My kids got me one of those digital picture frames a year ago for Christmas…I loved it, but like any reasonable person, I immediately put it on the shelf and didn’t set it up until my son came home a couple of months ago and set it up for me. Since that time I’ve had a great time looking through my facebook memories daily, finding old pictures and sending them to the frame, and then being delighted when I see them again. Sometimes we need distractions from the distractions, right? Of late I’ve been taking a lot of epsom salt baths. I find epsom salt baths to be super relaxing and soothing to sore muscles and overworked bodies and it’s just a nice practice to soothe and relax. But, more importantly, I put my phone in a different room, I take my old as the hills kindle with me, and I sit in the bath and read a book while soaking. It’s easy to get sucked into the anxiety of doomscrolling that we all inevitably get sucked into…and it’s hard to keep the chatter from our minds and bodies. But I think there are ways we can find purposeful and meaningful distractions from the distractions. Perhaps that’s a nice soak in an epsom salt bath. Perhaps it’s a walk with a friend where we leave our phones behind. Perhaps it's taking a class or wandering in the woods or finding old pictures to put in frames. We can’t live distractedly all the time…but I think some well-placed purposeful distractions in our lives can do us good. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista
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 Dear Friends,
We don’t have to go far to find beauty in our lives, we can look for it, we can notice it in our every day, in our daily surroundings. Last Sunday, during the storm, my son and I got on our cross country skis, and skied down to Sligo Creek Park to go on a little mid-storm ski trip in the park. By the time we got out the sleet had started in ernest, but it didn’t bother us, and for most of our skiing, we had great conditions. Toward the very end the stickiness started up, but for most of the time we were out, conditions were perfect. It’s a good thing we got out that day, because by the next day the world was a sheet of ice, and conditions were terrible for skiing. I was thinking, as I was skiing, how often we put off noticing the beauty of the world around us until we stop, we travel, we go somewhere different, we take ourselves out of our own lives and enter a different world…but, my friends, noticing the beauty in the every day, noticing the beauty in our own world, the world that is surrounding us daily, the world we move through day after day, that’s the thing that can make the real difference in our lives. We don’t need skis, or a giant snowstorm to notice beauty. We can, every day, strive a little more to see the world around us, to breathe a little deeper, to slow down and notice, to find that beauty in the every day of our lives. I hope you have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
My kids, a couple of friends and I went cross country skiing a few weeks ago on an absolutely spectacular, snow filled day. There were a couple of new to skiing folks with us, so while we all had a great time, we weren’t exactly the fastest bunch out there. How are you feeling, as we near the end of January? My friend and I were on a walk earlier this week, talking about how we think we all need a little breathing space in January to come off the end of the year, the busyness, the holidays. We were talking about how goals for the new year might better be set in February or March rather than the month where we all just need to breathe and chill for a bit. In light of that, whether you chose to make goals for yourself in this new year, or whether that isn’t your thing, I hope we can all remind ourselves that it’s progress, not perfection that should be our focus. Celebrate the little milestones you reach. Celebrate the small changes. Don’t let the need for perfection prevent you from celebrating your accomplishments…or celebrating you. A couple of weeks ago we made it to the top of the mountain. It took a long time, we were pretty slow, but we made it…and we had fun and was surrounded by so much beauty on the way to the top…and you know what, if we hadn’t made it to the top that day, we would have still had fun and been surrounded by so much beauty. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
There’s this miniscule nature preserve north of the City in Virginia called Scott’s Run Nature Preserve that I discovered for the first time recently. If we're being honest, it’s nothing much to write home about, a nice little green space outside the city with some walking trails and woods, but so close to the freeway that it’s near impossible to get away from the road noise, especially this time of year with the distinct lack of leaves on the trees. However, at the bottom corner of the nature preserve, on a little creek…one could only assume Scott’s Run…there's a cute little waterfall that empties from said creek into the larger Potomac River. I was meandering through the preserve earlier this week, trying to get a little hike in before darkness caught up to me. As I meandered I was thinking about how, even in the most mediocre of times or places, we can still find beauty, we can still find wonder, if only we look for it. It’s been a rough start to this year, my friends, and I think it’s near impossible not to feel the fear, the sadness, the darkness around us for so many reasons. And yet, I hope even in the midst of the space and time we are in, we can see the good, and we can still find beauty and wonder in the world. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Ever sit next to a creek and watch a leaf stuck in a whirlpool, spinning ‘round and ‘round, revisiting the same spaces over and over again? This year I noticed something. For the past several years, come January, I get in my head, and I get the doldrums about the same thing…over and over again, year after year. Turns out, January elicits an emotional angst in me, spinning ‘round and ‘round, revisiting this same topic. I hadn’t realized until this year that this particular topic was a yearly trend, but now that I see it, I really do think it is. This particular doldrum manifests itself by making me want to curl up by myself and push people away…and I have to actively fight against it. We all get that way, right? Those emotions that revisit us from particular triggers, or times of the year, anniversaries of events, or places. Emotions we thought we worked through, and maybe we did, but they still crop up from time to time to say hello. My dear friend, if you’re in the middle of a time of doldrum, I hope you can be gentle with yourself. I hope you can see your emotions as real and valid. And I hope you can see your beauty and worth. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Happy 2026 my friend! As we step into this New Year my hope for you is that your year has started out filled with love, light, connection and joy…without expectations and rules around areas you want to change unless those expectations and rules also bring you joy and excitement. This is the time of year, right? The time of year where some choose to look at and try to implement shifts and changes in their lives…and while I’m convinced that the New Year really ought to happen in March when the world starts to get warmer, when mornings are lighter, when it’s simpler to get out of bed and it’s just easier to make good on those shifts and changes we want to make…rather than the dead of winter when our bodies and minds want comfort food and rest and the world is dark and cold, (and I would implement that change if I could!) I do think setting aside time to take purposeful looks at our lives and areas we would like to shift and change can be beneficial and good…so long as we can do so with less rigidity and judgment and more grace and love for ourselves if and when we stumble and fall along the way. So, my dear friend, as we step into this new year and see the days get longer and the return of the light, I hope you are able to find less rigidity and judgement for yourself and those around you…I hope you are able to find more grace and love for yourself and those around you…and if there are spaces you want to shift and change I hope you can step into those areas with the knowledge that you are beautiful, wonderful, amazing and enough even without those shifts and changes. Have a wonderful week and a very happy New Year, my friend. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
My first Christmas that I spent away from my boys, three Christmases ago now, I had a feeling of fear and desperation at the thought of spending the holiday by myself. So off I went to my sister and her family’s house…my sister's family might have enjoyed having some of the holiday to themselves, but I deeply needed a place to land and stay, and I will forever appreciate them being that place that year. A few months ago, when thinking about this year's holiday plans without my boys, I was marveling at the difference a few years made. While that first Christmas by myself was surrounded by a distinct feeling of fear and desperation at the thought of being alone, this Christmas I was actually excited for a day to myself. I made plans to head to my sisters for Christmas Eve, and then to have a purposeful alone day full of movies, books, and a nice long soak in the tub on Christmas day. As it turns out, instead of my alone day, I randomly decided a couple of weeks ago to buy a ticket to California to surprise my parents and another sister and her family on Christmas day, so, barring unforeseen weather circumstances, I should be in Cali when you read this, and my alone day is going to have to be rescheduled. Even so, as I recalled the emotional difference a few years made in my own life, I’ve been thinking about the growth and progression in our lives. Sometimes when we’re in the middle of a journey we can’t see the growth and change we’ve made along the way, and it gets discouraging….but it takes looking back, recalling where we were and where we are now to see how far we’ve come and how much we’ve grown. My dear friend, I hope you can take a little time to look back and see your own growth as you walk through this life. I hope you have an amazing week and a lovely holiday season full of connection and ease. I am so incredibly grateful to each and every one of you. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Last week I talked about those times we wander a little, but are not quite lost… A couple of weeks ago I was in West Virginia hiking in one of my favorite wilderness areas, Dolly Sods. As I walked along the snow-covered trails and enjoyed the beauty of the world around me, I noticed the lack of trail markings. This particular wilderness area has trail maps, and signs at trail splits, but, on this particular day and on this particular trail I didn’t see any markings or blazes as I meandered. It was clear where the trail was, there were plenty who had gone before me through the slightly snowy terrain, leaving abundantly clear markings where the trail was….but I was thinking, if I had come right after a snow, when the world was blanketed, unless I was deeply familiar with the trail and the terrain, it would have been wildly irresponsible of me to go traipsing through the woods. Now, I’m sure there are many with which wandering on an unmarked and unclear trail covered in snow would not be irresponsible…perhaps those who grew up navigating maps and terrain on the regular, who could navigate said snowy trail responsibly…but, let’s be honest, that’s not me. It wasn’t irresponsible of me that day a few weeks ago, because my trail was clearly marked by those who went before me…but as I walked I was thinking….while there are times wandering a little can be the right thing, there are also times it is best to decide when to stop, when to turn around, when it’s time to call it…whatever it may be in your life. I hope you have an amazing week my friend, and the trail ahead of you is clearly marked, or if not, you know when to call it. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
I was in Rock Creek a while ago, right at the beginning of the fall when the leaves were just starting to turn. On my way home from work I decided to pull over and get a little walk in the woods in my day. It wasn’t a spot I normally park, so I entered the park by a trail I am not particularly familiar with, and then immediately got on a trail that in time became clear was not a “real” trail, but was more like a cut-through. As I meandered through the woods, I realized I knew approximately where I was, I was in no danger of getting lost, but I didn’t actually know where I was. I could pinpoint an approximation on a map, but certainly not with any real accuracy. And while I wasn’t lost, I also didn’t know exactly where I was, and I didn’t know exactly where I was going. I eventually ran into a trail I was familiar with, and suddenly I knew exactly where I was. As I walked I was thinking about how this space I suddenly found myself in feels very accurate to life sometimes. There are times we don’t know exactly where we are, There are times we don’t know exactly where we’re going…and there are times when it takes a little wandering through the unknown to get to the known...and that can, at times, feel very disconcerting. My dear friend, if you’re feeling a little lost in the woods of your life right now, I hope you can find a little more peace right where you are at this moment, and perhaps, in time, you might find a little more clarity to know exactly where you are and where you should be. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
A couple of weeks ago I talked about my experience with the Kintsugi workshop. As you might remember, Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with gold, creating something new in the process. The first part of the workshop was, if we’re being honest, really frustrating…trying to accept and embrace the imperfection of the art, while also trying to get the pieces to just stick together. It took patience, waiting, deep breaths, more patience…and still the pieces of my broken vase wouldn’t stick together. After what felt like forever, I finally propped something against two pieces so they stayed together, and then quickly put the other two together so the four pieces were supporting each other. And after that it was easy to build one piece on another…because the pieces in the base were supporting each other and in turn were supporting the rest of the vase. I was thinking about how true that is in life…when we’re willing to reach out and accept the help and support of those around us, how much easier life can be. Now, I’ll be the first to tell you that, as a wildly independent person, it’s hard to ask for and accept help and support…but I do think life is easier, better, and more full of love and community when we’re willing to reach out to those around us and accept help when we need it. I hope you find a little more support, community and love this week, my friend. Love Krista  “Gratitude is one of the strongest and most transformative states of being. It shifts your perspective from lack to abundance and allows you to focus on the good in your life, which in turn pulls more goodness into your reality.”
— Jen Sincero Dear Friends, The past several weeks, as all the taller trees have turned bare and lost their leaves, forming their long lines against the sky, the underbrush in Rock Creek Park has been putting on a show, bursting with this abundance of color. My dear friend, I know there are many differing emotions surrounding us as individuals as we move through this week of Thanksgiving and move into this season of holidays. Even as we acknowledge the various emotions we might be feeling, whether good or bad, I hope we can begin to shift our perspective from lack to abundance even in the midst of challenging emotions. And as we move past this day of Thanksgiving, I wanted to pause and tell you all how deeply grateful I am for each and every one of you. Thank you for being in my life, for being part of this journey we’re walking on. Thank you for the abundance you bring to my life. I cannot tell you how grateful I am for you to be on this journey with me. I hope, as you move into and through this holiday season, you can feel the abundance, you can focus on the good around you, you can shift your perspective a little more. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
This past weekend I had the great privilege of spending a few hours at a gathering for a friend who had completed a long emotional journey and wanted to commemorate the end of said journey with a weekend away. As part of this weekend of commemoration, my friend brought in a woman who does Kintsugi workshops…Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with gold. Instead of hiding the cracks, it highlights them as part of the object's history, embracing imperfection, and creating something more beautiful and resilient than before. Kintsugi is often seen as a metaphor for life, where those areas of hardship and hurt are used to build and create something new, something different. As we broke and built back our pieces of pottery, our workshop leader kept reminding us to breathe into and embrace the imperfection…she reminded us that we aren’t going to automatically be good at something that is brand new to us, but part of this process, part of this art is letting go of the expectation of what we think we will create, and leaning into the process of creating. My dear friend, sometimes it’s hard to let go of the expectations we build around ourselves and the need to be perfect…but I think if we can let go of expectations and lean into the process of creating, we can find ourselves building something unexpectedly beautiful. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
This past weekend I had the great privilege of spending a weekend with some wonderful folks on a retreat in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia. It was a spectacular weekend…the weather was perfection, the company, wonderful, I had a lovely time. A few weeks prior to that I had taken a little road trip up to that area to “pre-hike” the hike I planned on taking us on…I wanted to make sure I knew where I was going and that the trail would be appropriate for my people. The hike was called the ridge hike, appropriately named as I spent the first half of the hike on the top of a ridge overlooking the state park on one side and the road on the other. That whole first half of the hike, while lovely, was accompanied by the sound of traffic on the road. And then I turned and started down into the valley, and all the sounds of traffic faded away and was replaced by the sound of the wind moving through the trees. As I kept walking down, the sound of a little stream filled my ears. A small shift, a slight change in direction and elevation made all the difference. My dear friend, I hope, if there are areas in life right now where noise is just too much, you can make a small shift and a slight change to find a little more peace. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
My neighbor has this Japanese Maple in her backyard. It makes me happy every day as I get to see it turn more and more red as we move through the season. Soon it will be a bright red and then the leaves will fall. A few weeks ago I talked about glimmers…those pockets of goodness and delight that we can train our brains to notice and be aware of. One of my friends was telling me, the other day, how she always had a hard time with what felt like the obligation of a gratitude practice, but is having a much easier time noticing and being aware of those glimmers in life…it simply feels more accessible. I think one way we can train ourselves to notice those glimmers more often is to start when they’re easier to see, to notice. This time of year we have colors cropping up everywhere we look…the yellows, oranges, bright reds of fall are all around us…soon those leaves will be on the ground and the lines of winter will be all around us, but right now, right now we can see and notice colors all around. My dear friend, I hope you can start to notice those glimmers in your life when they are abundant, so when the abundance starts to fade you can still see and notice them…because, my friend, the glimmers are there no matter what the season so long as we’re willing to look and notice. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Did you know cats use the earth’s magnetic fields to navigate back to their homes from far distances? How cool is that? My cat got out and went wandering earlier this week. I didn’t realize it for a couple of hours…not until I saw the automatic food bowl had dropped food and wasn’t immediately consumed as is normal. Growing up we had various indoor/outdoor cats in my household, so one would think I would be comfortable with cats wandering in and out. And yet, Woody has always been an indoor cat and so mild panic set in when I realized he was gone and had been gone for a while and off I went, wandering in the rainy dark night, trying to find my cat. I didn’t end up finding him…but he eventually meandered back home and meowed on my front porch to be let in before I went to bed. It’s that uncertainty and unknown that sometimes gets to us, right? I have lived experience with cats that are both indoor and outdoor, and yet, my own is not and causes anxiety when he decides to be a little escape artist. My friend, if uncertainty and unknown is getting to you today and messing with your mind and body and causing worry, I hope you can breathe a little deeper and let go of that worry a little bit, even in the midst of the unknown. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista  Pleasant Sounds
John Clare The rustling of leaves under the feet in woods and under hedges; The crumpling of cat-ice and snow down wood-rides, narrow lanes and every street causeway; Rustling through a wood or rather rushing, while the wind halloos in the oak-toop like thunder; The rustle of birds' wings startled from their nests or flying unseen into the bushes; The whizzing of larger birds overhead in a wood, such as crows, puddocks, buzzards; The trample of robins and woodlarks on the brown leaves. and the patter of squirrels on the green moss; The fall of an acorn on the ground, the pattering of nuts on the hazel branches as they fall from ripeness; The flirt of the groundlark's wing from the stubbles – how sweet such pictures on dewy mornings, when the dew flashes from its brown feathers.  Dear Friends,
I lost my voice this past week…it is exceedingly rare that I cancel classes, but with no voice, I felt I didn’t have a choice but to cancel one of the days this past week. I rested my voice and my body the whole day…watched a good bit of TV and slept, and the following day I was up and about to teach…my voice certainly wasn’t 100%, but it was good enough. I think there are times when we feel overwhelmed with the world around us, and therefore get discouraged and shut down…it’s a completely normal response to too much stimulus, and sometimes it’s the right thing to do. There are times when we need to shut out the world and simply rest our bodies, our nervous systems. And yet, there are times when we need to show up…even in the full knowledge that we can never be 100%, that we will never fix everything…we still need to show up in the ways we can. My dear friend, I hope this week you can have the discernment to rest when you need to rest, and to show up when it’s time to show up. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Can we stop, notice and pay attention to the small delights in life? I’ve been taking a different way to work of late. It adds a couple of minutes to my commute, but man, oh man, is it ever so much more delightful. More trees around me, prettier roads, fewer lights (and fewer traffic cameras, haha). A small delight, for sure, but a delight none the less. My friend recently posted about “glimmers”...those moments in your day that make you feel joy, peace, gratitude, delight. The post mentioned that if you start training your brain to be on the lookout for glimmers, you will notice these moments more and more throughout your day. My dear friend, I hope this week you can be on the lookout for those small delights, those glimmers in your life, whether that’s because you purposefully find a new way or do a new thing, or it’s because you set your mind to notice those moments with a little more purpose. May we all notice those glimmers in our lives a little more this week. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Environmental thinker David Orr says “Hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up.” I was on a meander through the woods this past weekend with a couple of dear friends when one of them said the above quote, and it’s been rolling around in my brain ever since our walk. It’s hard to have hope in the midst of deep uncertainty…and sometimes it feels like we’re living in a constant state of deep uncertainty. But, my friends, we can still show up and do good, even in a state of deep uncertainty. We can still be light in the lives of the people around us in a state of deep uncertainty. We can still put hope into action by the way we choose to live our lives, by the way we show up in others lives. My friends, my wish for this week is for all of us to find and put into action a little more hope as a verb, with its sleeves rolled up. Have an amazing week. Love Krista  Dear Friends,
Last weekend my older son came home and both my boys and I headed to Six Flags America one last time to celebrate my birthday. We rode all the roller coasters, I made them drive me in the little putt putt cars while I sat in the back, we took a spin on the carousel, we watched one of the adorable and ridiculous over the top shows, we got some deeply discounted swag, we stopped and took a picture in front of the “that’s all folks!” sign at the exit of the park. It was delightful. Six Flags had been a staple of my kids' childhood. My sister and I happened upon a blood drive there in 2014, and got free tickets to the park for giving blood… I was then serenaded by the siren song of 53 dollar season passes to give as Christmas gifts to my kids, following each year by watching for the “good” sale on season passes, and the rest is history. Every summer we spent a decent amount of time at the park. Typically it was a weekday where I finished work early, so we would hop in the car and drive on over, we’d ride a few roller coasters, then spend the rest of the afternoon at the water park…the boys playing in the frigid water and me lounging around, reading a book. Not a terrible way to spend an afternoon, especially since we never ever went on a weekend when there were crowds. So it seemed fitting to spend one last day at the park that held so many memories for the three of us…it felt especially poetic that this particular park is shutting down days after my oldest turns 21…a little trip down nostalgia lane to close out a chapter. Chapters open and chapters close…I hope we can all lean into the spaces of joy even when chapters in our lives close. Have an amazing week, my friend. Love Krista |
Hi, I'm Krista!Krista Mason is a movement instructor based in the Washington DC area. She founded an online strength, yoga and movement studio, teaches group classes, hosts both local and overseas retreats, hangs out with private clients, writes weekly blogs and absolutely loves the work she gets to do. Archives
February 2026
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