Thank you to everybody who came to Jolie’s charity beauty sale yesterday; special thanks to Clean and Clear, Lubriderm and Neutrogena, who all generously donated products!  We raised $651 dollars for the Beauty Can Cure fundraiser for City of Hope!  Pictures to come soon.

As you can imagine, my mother’s illness has put me into a very spiritual, answer-seeking state of mind.  Mama Jolie isn’t responding to her chemo treatments and the cancer has progressed to stage IV and spread pretty much everywhere, so the outlook is grim.  This is leading to several things in my life: less clarity of mind to blog, especially on random products that I just don’t feel strongly about; a sense of urgency, both to make moments count and to pursue passions and talents; frustration when things don’t go my way (I will admit that, in my head, I’ll occasionally whine at the universe, like, “Come on!  A little help here, please!”); and then annoyance at myself for not being zen and for letting my ego get the best of me.

Late last year, I had a falling out with an old friend, and her parting words were “Good luck cleansing your aura,” which was meant to be a put down, I suppose.  It’s been a tough year for me, even more so than when I had my Ladies’ Home Journal/Seventeen fiasco years back.  I’ve moved, struggled (a lot!) to make ends meet, lost a close friend, fallen in love, faced the reality of losing my mother, and dealt with the overwhelming doubt that comes from pursuing a far-fetched dream that (only) you feel is attainable…but is ever-so-slightly beyond your grasp.  Although I’m a just a regular old person like any other—at any point alternately happy, sad, selfish, giving, open-minded, stubborn and a mass of contradictions—I do try to be the very best person I can be, and knowing that my mother will be gone soon makes me want to honor her by being good, doing good and making it all worth it.  Nobody’s perfect, so I think there’s beauty and wonder in simply trying, whatever your issues and goals and gifts and personal setbacks might be.

Along with millions of others (at my mom’s request!) I’ve been reading Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth, and it’s speaking to me on a very profound level.  When I get buzzing or stressed, running around like a little chicken with my head cut off, I can pick it up, flip to any page, and find something that calms and recenters me.  I really recommend it.  It deals with ego, the self and the importance of living in the moment…so, yeah, it’s a hippie-drippy self-help book.  (Oh, California, what have you done to me?)  Regardless, if you’re a fellow seeker, check it out.  If you’re not, it’s back to our regularly scheduled programming later today with a beauty giveaway from Clinique.  Love to you all, xo, J.

To everybody who wrote and posted their thoughts, comments and prayers for my mother, thank you so much—it means more than you know to be blessed with your amazing support!  I’m going to Dallas next week to visit my mom in the hospital, and I’m both nervous and excited; somehow, because I am apparently in the running for the Worst Daughter Ever award, I haven’t seen Mama Jolie since August 2006.  (How is that even possible?)  I’m bringing two suitcases with me; one for my belongings, and one for the organic and paraben/sulfite/preservative-free products that I’m squirreling away to present her with.  I’ve finally picked a charity for my beauty sale with D., too: we’ll be donating all the proceeds to Beauty Can Cure on behalf of City of Hope.  The more I read about their fundraising efforts, the more excited I get, and so now, of course, I won’t be satisfied until I’ve raised one biiiillion dollars for charity!  (Well, obviously, every little bit counts, so if I raise even one hundred dollars, at least it’s something!)  If you’d like to get involved, I’d be delighted; email me at nadine@jolienadine.com and I’ll send you the address to mail your checks, which can be made to “City of Hope” and should have “Beauty Can Cure Fundraiser” in the memo line.  More to come soon!

I’ve been thinking a lot about organic beauty recently.  About two weeks ago, my mother was diagnosed with lymphoma, and while her cancer is fairly advanced (stage 3-b), there’s cause for hope.  When she found out, she called me and we mutually bolstered each other’s spirit through the phone lines, lobbing tried-and-true cliches back and forth (”Everything happens for a reason!”  “It’s all about attitude!”  “Let’s make every moment count!”  “It could be a blessing in disguise!”).  What I find fascinating, however, is that what really caused her to break down was not the fear of dying, nor the pain of chemo, but the beauty-related issues: the hair loss, the skin rashes, redness and flaking, her perception that, after a lifetime of being blessed as a “beautiful woman”, she will no longer be so.  I have two self-appointed missions now: to research the best organic skincare and makeup that won’t irritate her, and to pick a cancer-related charity to benefit from my upcoming beauty sale with D.  Obviously, we won’t be raising millions of dollars, but every bit helps, and we’ve been promised donation checks from various colleagues and friends.  I’d like to find a pediatric cancer foundation to support, but I’m open to anything; let me know, friends, if you have suggestions.  xo, J.

Deenie writes:

“Friday, I had a date–not your standard boozy affair in the Meatpacking District, but instead a life-affirming, positive encounter: I met with people who have been touched by cancer, whether the scars were their own, their coworkers’, or their loved-ones’.  Cancer and Careers is an organization striving to help women make decisions about their career, offering advice on how to continue working effectively, and (best of all) helping them find ways to feel and look beautiful in spite of their illness.   Six years ago, Carlotta Jacobson, Present of Cosmetic Executive Women, and Kate Sweeney, CEW Executive Director, realized that five of their forty CEW board members had been diagnosed with cancer.  What happens when a former Harper’s Bazaar Beauty Editor and a Producer at Oxygen.com get together to help their sisters in need? One badass organization! The website www.cancerandcareers.org (in English and Spanish!) is easy-to-use and chock full of information to help women decide when and how to tell others about their illness. 

Cancer and Careers offers support for not only those working with cancer but for their loved ones as well.  I was sixteen when my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer; if only I’d known Matthew Zacharay, founder of I’m Too Young For This (www.imtooyoungforthis.org).  Zachary, a former concert pianist, was diagnosed with brain cancer at 21 and founded his organization in 2004 to offer counsel to afflicted young people whose suffering and experiences are often overlooked.   As somebody who’s been personally touched by the big C, I also gathered insight from career coach Rosalind Joffe, author of Women, Work and Autoimmune Disease: Keep Working Girlfriend!  I left that Friday afternoon refreshed knowing that so much is being done to help fellow ladies in the workplace feel secure, even during one of the darker periods of their lives.  In the words of Rosalind Joffe, to all the women at Cancer and Careers: keep working girlfriend!”