A psychotherapist, Zen master and an author, Mary Jaksch lists helping people be happy as her passion in life. 

Through her blog, Mary chronicles her experience of a Zen lifestyle and gives spiritual advice. We bring you select few of Mary's insightful works.  

SOME of us lack a couple of gears; it's either full power ahead or nothing. Do you suffer from that?

I do! My All or Nothing mode was forged a long ago. I come from a family of high achievers and my mother's way of responding to achievement was - well, see for yourself.

Here is an interchange that happened when I was about 11 years old:

I bounced home from school after Sports Day, "Mummy, Mummy - I got second place in the 100 metre sprints today!!"

My mother looked at me in concern, "Second place? Oh, what went wrong?"

You get the picture? No wonder I'm an All or Nothing girl!

In the photograph: Sometimes pondering over the perfect next step could rob you of spontaneity in the game!

Photograph: Ross Kinnaird / Getty Images

Photographs used for representative purpose only.