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Tag: #relationships

FOR DADS AND MOMS

April 17, 2014
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| Categories: Families, Parenting/Children, Relationships

This article is about a wonderful gift a father can give his child. It's also a wonderful gift a mother can give her child. Parents model adult behavior for their children. They also model what loving someone is about: caring, consideration, communication, tolerance. If a child doesn't have good role models the child won't know what is acceptable and unacceptable, won't have anything to fall back on when navigating a relationship that, like all relationships, hits a difficult patch. Read this article for insight and  inspiration. http://www.families.com/blog/the-best-gift-a-father-can-give-his-child  

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A DIFFERENT WAY TO LOOK AT CHANGE

March 31, 2014
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| Categories: Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships

Most people in relationships will try to change if their partner nags, yells, threatens divorce, or refuses to speak for a week. They'll change for a short time but they won't really change because they resent you and they resent how mean you are to them. They don't think of what they could/should be doing to foster a good relationship. That would require taking responsibility for the problem which they can't do because they, in my example, don't have a problem. You have the problem. You can change yourself. A different way to look at change is to think of your partner as someone who wants to please you (even if you don't believe it) and approach your partner as if he/she were your best friend. Isn't it interesting how nice we are to friends and how rudely we can behave toward our partner because we have rationalized to ourselves that they deserve it. Then think of something you can offer your partner by way of change. For instance, if you are very unhappy about your partner turning into a couch potato to watch ball games all day on Sundays, and you feel lonely and uncared for, try offering something...

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STOP DREAMING ABOUT MONEY AND START DREAMING ABOUT LIVING

March 31, 2014
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| Categories: Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships

“The effects of rampant materialism are, according to research, pretty damaging to the human psyche. An international survey of over 90,000 people published in the journal BMC Medicine found a direct correlation between wealth and depression. Wealthier countries recorded higher levels of mental illness, while citizens in poorer countries were happier and better adjusted.” From Ben Cohen, Why Wanting to Be Rich is a Form of Mental Illness, Huff Post, 04/12/2012                   It’s true. Sure money is great, and it will buy you lots of stuff, if you need more stuff. Of course you’ve already realized having more stuff is having to maintain it, clean it, store it, repair it, and so on.                   Did any of us ever really need that blender that sits on the counter top taking up space and gathering grease splatters? Yes, you made juice and all kinds of cool things for a week or two and now it just occupies a square of your kitchen counter and glares at you, since you just don’t have time to stop and actually put things into it and then, turn it on and then drink whatever it is and then clean the entire thing, blades...

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POSITIVE EMOTIONS

March 26, 2014
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| Categories: Aging, Anxiety, Depression, Life Stress, Personal Growth, Seniors

Positive emotions in early life and longevity: findings from the nun study. Danner DD, Snowdon DA, Friesen WV. Source: Department of Preventive Medicine and Sanders-Brown Center on Aging, College of Medicine, University of Kentucky, Lexington 40536-0230, USA. [email protected] Abstract Handwritten autobiographies from 180 Catholic nuns, composed when participants were a mean age of 22 years, were scored for emotional content and related to survival during ages 75 to 95. A strong inverse association was found between positive emotional content in these writings and risk of mortality in late life (p < .001). As the quartile ranking of positive emotion in early life increased, there was a stepwise decrease in risk of mortality resulting in a 2.5-fold difference between the lowest and highest quartiles. Positive emotional content in early-life autobiographies was strongly associated with longevity 6 decades later. Underlying mechanisms of balanced emotional states are discussed. PMID: 11374751 OK, now that you've finished with all the nun jokes and/or Catholic jokes, think about this: It means you could live longer, literally, by having a positive attitude about your life. I've never ascribed to the "airy fairy" approach to living so I don't sweep negative energy out of my office by burning...

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ARE YOU LISTENING?

March 26, 2014
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| Categories: Personal Growth, Relationships, Seniors

When in a brand new relationship, isn't it amazing how much you have to say to each other, how you listen carefully so you can hear what your new love has to say, how careful you are not to interrupt, giving thought and consideration to your responses? And don't you feel heard and validated? Doesn't your new love make you feel good because he/she is so "into you." If you accidentally interrupt you are quick to apologize and wait for them to finish what they were saying and sometimes he/she tells you to go on, that they were finished, because they want to show you how polite and respectful they are of your feelings, to show you that they care about you and don't consider you rude for breaking in because that, well, that's just what happens sometimes when enthusiasm abounds. Now, fast forward that very same relationship five, ten years and notice how you are preparing what you're going to say next or remembering what it was you wanted to say that might not have anything to do with what your partner is talking about while your partner is trying to communicate something to you. If the discussion is...

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Change Your Experiences by Changing The Way You Think

March 26, 2014
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| Categories: Aging, Anxiety, Depression, Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships, Seniors

What’s different about those two scenarios? In the first one you created what you anticipated would happen by your behavior and attitude. In the second one you didn’t create a negative self-fulfilling prophecy, rather you created a positive experience and you’re happy that you didn’t waste time on negativity.             This description of an experience is just an example. You can apply the same principles to any situation you’re in. Notice yourself and whether or not you’re experiencing cognitive distortions like “He/she is never any fun so I won’t have fun tonight.” You won’t have fun because you don’t expect to and your energy, attitude, and behavior will reflect that and you’ll create what you already thought would happen before it even happened. 2.  What you believe about something is what will cause the consequence not the action.             This is part of Albert Ellis’ theory of rational emotive therapy. He called it the A B Cs of Rational Emotive Therapy.             He believed that it wasn’t the action (having to change your shirt before you went out) that caused the consequence. He said it’s what you believe about the action that will cause the consequence. In other words, if...

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