8 Things You Should Never Believe About A Relationship

If you believe that your relationship should be a certain way, you might be setting yourself up for failure. And when that happens for some, you’re left wondering what went wrong, when all that happened was that no one could live up to your ideal of a perfect relationship.
Maybe you were jaded; thinking that the world would be your fairy-tail filled oyster when you fell in love. To say that there aren’t plenty of amazing relationships out there would be a mistruth, but many are lead down the lane of love believing things about a relationship that for the most part, are simply not true. For that, we’ve come up with 8 things you shouldn’t believe to be true in relationships today:

1. Happy couples don’t fight

Conflict is perfectly natural in relationships; expressing anger with violence is not. Happy couples do argue but they have learned to express their feelings in a more productive way that works toward a solution.
Compromise and collaboration are the tools that successful couples use to solve conflict. You can read more about how to communicate positively with your partner in this article.

2. You have more sex in a long term relationship

It is perfectly natural for couples to have sex less often the longer they are together. In a study of couples over the lifetime of their relationships, couples reported that sex did happen less often over time. Reasons given by the couples for having less sex include age, health problems and sex becoming a routine.
In a successful relationship, partners have many ways to be intimate with each other and only one of those is having sex. If you are looking to increase intimacy in your relationship, you can read more about reigniting passion in your relationship here.

3. Having children is the death of passion in a relationship

Adding another small person to your couple doesn’t have to spell the end of your sex lives, but it won’t fix problems in your relationship either. Children can add great joy to relationships, but they also bring stress and added work.
Expressing your fears to your partner about what changes you will experience with regard to your sex lives by having children. Take your role as a spouse just as seriously as you do being a parent. Make a plan with your partner and devote equal time and energy to sustaining an intimate connection as you do to raising a family.

4. If your partner really loved you, they would know how you feel

No one can read minds, although close partners do pick up on the facial expressions and body language of their other half and they know what they mean. You have to continue to communicate your feelings and desires to your partner throughout your relationship. Strong listening and effective communication skills are important throughout the lifetime of your relationship.

5. If your partner isn’t jealous, it’s because they don’t care.

Jealousy as a healthy emotion is a relationship myth. Trusting partners don’t become jealous over their partner looking at or talking to other potential romantic partners.
Instead, jealousy is often a sign of one partner’s insecurity over the stability of the relationship or their own self-esteem. Trust in relationships is key. Feeling secure in a couple means that you do not question your partner’s loyalty.

6. Happy couples don’t have to work at it

Happily ever after is definitely a relationship myth. Having a caring relationship means continuing to care for and nurture your partner as they do for you.
To make sure that your partner is happy, you can do the relationship equivalent of asking your partner for a performance review. Ask what more you can do to help your partner to be fulfilled in the relationship.
When each half of the partnership is committed to working on being the best person that they can be for their partner, the relationship is in a state of continuous improvement.

7. If it’s not working, you can make your partner change

You will never be able to force someone to change. You can help shape behavior with rewarding language like ‘thank you’ when your partner does something that you like. You can tell your partner what you want them to do but you can’t make them do it.
When it comes to major personality changes, your partner has to want to make a change. If your partner has a general negative outlook or is neurotic in some way, it is unlikely that you can undo these personality traits that were likely developed in childhood.

8. Happy couples don’t look for help outside of the relationship

Couples do seek counseling to work out their problems. Unfortunately, they get professional help when things have seriously deteriorated in their relationships.
Licensed couple’s therapists offer premarital counseling to help partners iron out problems before they make the ultimate commitment. Seeking help early in relationships is best before problems become severe. If one of you has already given up on the relationship, it will be too late to fix it with the help of a counselor.
Internet article-author unknown

The 4 Stages of Life According to Carl Jung

As we wander through this journey that is life, we go through fundamental changes. Some people use terms like “quarter-life crisis” or “middle age” to define where it is we think we are in our lives along the way. To me, there aren’t destinations in life. There are milestones for sure, but we can often come back to the same places that we were before. That is what I love about Swiss psychologist Carl Jung’s 4 Stages of Life. As he described them, these stages have to do with who we are as people and our motivations. They have nothing to do with age or accomplishment, and throughout our lives we often move forward and backward from these stages. As Jung once said, “Thoroughly unprepared, we take the step into the afternoon of life. Worse still, we take this step with the false presupposition that our truths and our ideals will serve us as hitherto. But we cannot live the afternoon of life according to the program of life’s morning, for what was great in the morning will be little at evening and what in the morning was true, at evening will have become a lie.” These are the 4 stages of life, according to Carl Jung:
Read: 22 of the Most Insightful Quotes from Carl Jung

The Athlete

The athlete is the phase in our lives when we are at our most self-absorbed. There are people in our lives that have never made it out of this phase, or often revert back to it. Of the 4 stages, it tends to be the least mature. It is characterized by being obsessed with our physical bodies and appearance. For an example of the athlete phase, watch teenagers walk past a mirror. The athlete phase can be narcissistic, critical, or even both.

The Warrior

Moving forward in our lives, we reach the warrior phase. This is where we begin to take on responsibilities and get the desire to conquer the world. Well, maybe not the world for some of us, but this is when we become more goal oriented. All of the sudden we can see objectives that we want to accomplish and the vanity of the athlete phase begins to fade. The warrior phase is really characterized by the struggles in our lives that early adulthood can throw at us. The warrior phase is also the most common pshase that people revert back to throughout their lives as they “re-invent” themselves.

The Statement

When the warrior phase in our lives is coming to an end, we find ourselves asking: “what have I done for others?” Your focuses shift from your personal achievements to accomplishing goals based on forwarding other people’s lives. This stage is often correlated to parenting, because your focus becomes providing a better life for your children, and what it is you need to do that. The statement phase for many people is much more than a correlation to parenting, and more about leaving a legacy or a footprint in life. The statement phase is a time to reflect on what you have accomplished, and how you can continue moving forward – not just for you, but for the other people in your life. As far as maturity goes, the statement phase is a huge step forward from even the warrior phase.
Read: Which of the 4 Types of Introvert are You?

The Spirit

The final stage of life is the spirit stage. In this stage, we realize that we are more than what we have accumulated – be it money, friends, possessions, good deeds, or milestones in life. We are spiritual beings. We realize that we are divine beings in a journey of life that has no real beginning and no end. The spirit phase is characterized by a sense of “getting out of your own mind” and focusing on what is waiting for us beyond our physical beings. The philosopher Lao Tzu proposed a question over 2500 years ago that perfectly describes the spirit phase: ““Can you step back from your own mind and thus understand all things? Giving birth and nourishing, having without possessing, acting with no expectations, leading and not trying to control: this is the supreme virtue.”

 

Consciousness October 28, 2015 Justin Gammill

 

Can Listening to Music Help You Sleep?

Posted on: November 19, 2015

Does listening to certain songs help us slip into the ether? ‘Clouds’ via www.shutterstock.com

By now, you’ve surely heard that Americans aren’t getting enough sleep.
In our always-on society, a solid chunk of nightly rest seems, well, like a dream. We shave the edges of sleep to keep up, exchanging extra waking hours for compromised health, productivity and safety.

Despite this, we actually know how to sleep better; the list of empirically supported, low-cost, simple behavioral tweaks is extensive, whether it’s avoiding alcohol as bedtime approaches or just going to sleep at a regular hour. Though changing habitual behavior is easier said than done, one of these tweaks may be as simple as putting in your earphones and pressing play.
Recently, British composer Max Richter released an eight-hour-long composition titled Sleep, which he has described as a lullaby, meant to be listened to while sleeping.
The composition ranges from sweeping, airy selections called Dream to the heavy, trance-inducing Space sequence. Indeed, it is an ambitious, impressive piece of conceptual art. But could it actually improve your sleep?

Conflicting results

Research on improving sleep with music is filled with methodological mistakes.
Self-reported sleep quality – the metric of choice for many music studies – often doesn’t correlate with objective measures of sleep: people will often think they’ve gotten a good night’s sleep (best defined as an unmedicated, uninterrupted night somewhere between seven and ten hours). But in many cases, they haven’t.

On the other hand, when objective measures are used (like the industry standard Polysomnography), true control groups (like a placebo group in a drug trial) are often left out.
With these drawbacks in mind, it’s easy to understand why the literature reads as equivocal. Some studies claim music can have a positive effect on sleep quality, while others cite no objective benefit.
A recent, methodologically sound meta-analysis reported an overall positive effect of music for improving sleep in those with a sleep disorder. This is promising, but even the article’s authors admit that more precise work is needed to reach a clear conclusion.

A carefully choreographed cycle

Perhaps the answer is hidden in a more basic question. Given the way sleep is structured, can music even influence it to begin with?
The answer is yes and no.

Sleep is not a gentle slide into unconsciousness. Rather, it’s a complicated ride into an alternate conscious state, where reality is actively created from internal information, rather than external sensation.

That transition from “outside” to “inside” happens in four distinct steps. The sleep process manifests as a non-REM (NREM) phase (which is divided into three parts: NREM 1, 2 and 3) and Rapid Eye Movement (REM).

Imagine you’ve turned on Richter’s full Sleep composition and have just gotten into bed. As your eyes get heavy and your attention wanders, you are entering early NREM 1 sleep. You are deeply relaxed. This lasts for a few minutes.
At this point, the research suggests that Richter’s work may be having an effect; anything that contributes to your relaxation will help induce NREM 1 sleep. Richter’s Sleep certainly has relaxing qualities, like many of the classical pieces often used in music and sleep research.

As you continue to relax, your brain begins to exhibit what are called “organized theta waves,” which slowly switch attention channels from the outside environment to internal cues. At this point, you may feel as if you’re floating or lightly dreaming; if someone says your name insistently enough you may still respond. This lasts about 10 minutes, after which K-complexes and sleep spindles appear in your brain wave pattern.

This is where it gets tricky. K-complexes and sleep spindles – brief bursts of high activity on an otherwise slowing brain wave pattern – actively shield external stimuli. That is, during this stage your brain purposefully blocks the reception of and response to outside sensory information.
This hallmark of NREM 2 sleep means that, for all intents and purposes, you are no longer hearing Richter’s work. The auditory cortex is still receiving the sounds, but the thalamus – essentially the call center of the brain – stops the signal before any memories or sense can be made of the music.
NREM 2 lasts for about 20 minutes. Then your brain waves become very slow and very organized. These are called delta waves, and they indicate NREM 3: a state of near-complete nonresponsiveness to the external world. After 30 minutes of NREM 3, you briefly travel back up into the lighter stages of sleep, at which point you may again hear the composition. In fact, if it’s loud enough, unusual ambient noises at this point may actual wake you up, disturbing the carefully choreographed cycle.

With time, all external stimuli slip away, and you recede into your dreams. thehailing/Instagram

If you remain asleep, however, you quickly slip into the REM portion of the cycle: your body becomes paralyzed, and your external senses get rewired to pay exclusive attention to your memories. You are essentially awake, but feeding off an internally derived reality to create the crazy dreams associated with REM. At this point I could walk into your room, call your name loudly and leave without you even knowing I was there. In other words, the external world – including what is being piped through your headphones – doesn’t matter for those amazing few minutes of REM sleep.
As the night goes on, the cycle will repeat itself many times, and each time the proportion of REM will become greater. By the end of the night, you are spending most of your time in your own internally created universe, for which the current external world has no bearing. For a grand total of 60 minutes of the eight-hour period, you will be able to hear Mr Richter’s beautiful work. The rest of the time, only your memories matter.

So for all its merits, can Max Richter’s Sleep help you sleep? The answer is probably yes: it could make falling asleep easier. But you’ll be missing most of the show.

Joseph F Chandler is Assistant Professor of Psychology, Birmingham-Southern College. This article was originally published in The Conversation under a Creative Commons Attribution NoDerivatives license By: Joseph F Chandler,

A Harvard psychiatrist says 3 things are the secret to real happiness

Happiness is one of the most important things in life, yet it’s also one of the hardest to study.
Psychiatrist Robert Waldinger is the director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, one of the longest and most complete studies of adult life ever conducted. Waldinger described some of the secrets to happiness revealed by the study in a recent TED talk.
The study followed two cohorts of white men for 75 years, starting in 1938:

• 268 Harvard sophomores as part of the “Grant Study” led by Harvard psychiatrist George Vaillant
• 456 12- to 16-year-old boys who grew up in inner-city Boston as part of the “Glueck Study” led by Harvard Law School professor Sheldon Glueck

The researchers surveyed the men about their lives (including the quality of their marriages, job satisfaction, and social activities) every two years and monitored their physical health (including chest X-rays, blood tests, urine tests, and echocardiograms) every five years.
They came away with one major finding: Good relationships keep us happier and healthier.
In his TED Talk, Waldinger pointed out three key lessons about happiness:

1. Close relationships

The men in both groups of the Harvard study who reported being closer to their family, friends, or community tended to be happier and healthier than their less social counterparts. They also tended to live longer. By comparison, people who said they were lonelier reported feeling less happy. They also had worse physical and mental health, as defined above.
A 2014 review of dozens of studies published in the journal Social and Personality Psychology Compass suggests that loneliness can get in the way of mental functioning, sleep, and well-being, which in turn increases the risk of illness and death.

2. Quality (not quanity) of relationships

It’s not just being in a relationship that matters. Married couples who said they argued constantly and had low affection for one another (which study authors defined as “high-conflict marriages”) were actually less happy than people who weren’t married at all, the Harvard study found.
However, the effect of relationship quality seems to depend somewhat on age. A 2015 study published in the journal Psychology and Ageing that followed people for 30 years found that the number of relationships people had was, in fact, more important for people in their 20s, but the quality of relationships had a bigger effect on social and psychological well being when people were in their 30s.

3. Stable, supportive marriages

Being socially connected to others isn’t just good for our physical health. It also helps stave off mental decline. People who were married without having divorced, separating, or having “serious problems” until age 50 performed better on memory tests later in life than those who weren’t, the Harvard study found.
And other research backs this up. A 2013 study in the journal PLOS ONE found that marriage, among other factors, was linked to a lower risk of mild cognitive impairment and dementia.
All of this suggests that strong relationships are critical to our health.
Society places a lot of emphasis on wealth and “leaning in” to our work, Waldinger said. “But over and over, over these 75 years, our study has shown that the people who fared the best were the people who leaned in to relationships, with family, with friends, with community.”

Understanding Obsessions and Compulsions

By: B.M. Wootton and D.F. Tolin, Posted on: October 9, 2015

Source: Flickr

Definitions and Diagnosis
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – fifth edition (DSM-5; APA, 2013) identifies obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) as being characterized by obsessions and/or compulsions. Obsessions are defined as:

1. Recurrent and persistent thoughts, urges, or impulses that are experienced, at some time during the disturbance, as intrusive and unwanted, and that in most individuals cause marked anxiety or distress.

2. The individual attempts to ignore or suppress such thoughts, urges, or images, or to neutralize them with some other thought or action (i.e., by performing a compulsion).

Compulsions are defined as:

1. Repetitive behaviors or mental acts that the individual feels driven to perform in response to an obsession or according to rules that must be applied rigidly.

2. The behaviors or mental acts are aimed at preventing or reducing anxiety or distress, or preventing some dreaded event or situation; however, these behaviors or mental acts are not connected in a realistic way with what they are designed to neutralize or prevent, or are clearly excessive.

DSM-5 also specifies that in order for an individual to be diagnosed with OCD, these obsessions or compulsions must be time-consuming (e.g., take more than 1 h per day) or cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning; cannot be attributable to the physiological effects of a substance or another medical condition; and cannot be better explained by the symptoms of another mental disorder. Traditionally, OCD has been classified as an anxiety disorder; however, in the most recent version of the DSM, OCD was moved to a newly created category of obsessive–compulsive and related disorders (OCRD) (APA, 2013).
Understanding Obsessions and Compulsions
Currently, OCD can be diagnosed if the individual experiences either obsessions or compulsions (APA, 2013), however, it is rare for patients to only experience obsessions in the absence of compulsions, or compulsions in the absence of obsessions (Williams et al., 2011). The obsessions and compulsions characteristic of OCD are heterogeneous, meaning that individuals with OCD can present with many different kinds of symptom presentations. Recent research suggests that there are five main symptom subtypes (Williams et al., 2011) and one of these subtypes, comprised of compulsive acquiring and difficulty discarding, is now subsumed under an independent disorder (Hoarding Disorder) in DSM-5 (APA, 2013). Below, we will describe the four remaining symptom subtypes of OCD.

Read more on SciTech Connect: OCD Explained

Harming
The harming cluster includes obsessions that focus on harm coming to the patient or to others, generally resulting in subsequent checking compulsions. Common obsessions include concerns about fire from leaving appliances on, burglary/theft from leaving doors unlocked, being responsible for hit and run accidents, harm coming to loved ones and pets, etc. Checking compulsions (including checking of appliances, doors, faucets, emergency brake, the route the patient has driven, etc.) are generally performed to prevent harm coming to themselves or others.
Contamination
The contamination cluster includes obsessions with themes of dirt, germs, and contamination; with subsequent washing and cleaning compulsions. Patients often present with emotional distress relating to contamination from dirt/germs, bodily waste/secretions (such as urine, feces, sweat, semen, and blood), environmental contaminants (mold, asbestos, and lead) or chemicals, solvents, and cleaners. This distress may manifest as either fear or disgust (Olatunji et al., 2007) and washing/cleaning compulsions (for example, excessive hand washing/sanitizing, showering, or excessive cleaning of household items) are often performed to reduce distress caused by the contamination obsessions.
Unacceptable thoughts
The unacceptable thoughts cluster includes individuals with unwanted and unacceptable aggressive, sexual or religious intrusive thoughts and mental and repeating compulsions. Individuals with these obsessions often perform mental or covert compulsions (mental acts that serve to neutralize anxiety caused by obsessions, e.g., reciting a silent prayer, mentally reviewing past actions or conversations, replacing ‘bad’ thoughts or images with ‘good’ thoughts or images, counting, etc.). Repeating behaviors can also be used as a way to reduce anxiety by patients with unacceptable thoughts and may include repeating routine tasks such as dressing, walking up stairs or through doorways, or repeating chores in response to the unwanted thought.
Symmetry
This cluster tends to include individuals with obsessions relating to symmetry and subsequent ordering compulsions. Obsessions in this domain tend to be associated with the need to know or remember, the need for exactness in behavior, and the need for symmetry in the environment. Emotional distress accompanying these obsessions may be more likely to manifest as feelings of ‘incompleteness’ or things being ‘not just right,’ rather than fear (Summerfeldt, 2004). The compulsions seen in this subtype can include physically ordering and arranging items such as books, CDs or DVDs, or clothing.

Read more on SciTech Connect: The Neurobiology Basis of OCD

Demographics of Obsessive–Compulsive Disorder
Symptoms of OCD have been documented for at least 500 years (Burton, 1989) and the disorder can be seen across all ethnic groups (World Health Organization, 2002). OCD is a relatively common condition, with a prevalence rate of approximately 1.2% (Ruscio et al., 2010). Symptom onset tends to occur during adolescence to early adulthood (Ruscioet al., 2010); however, it is not uncommon to see a much younger childhood onset (Gelleret al., 2001). Most individuals with OCD develop symptoms by the age of 20 (Angst et al., 2004), and symptom onset rarely occurs in late adulthood (Fireman et al., 2001), unless caused by neurological trauma (Carmin et al., 2002).
This excerpt was taken from the article Obsessive–Compulsive Disorder by B.M. Wootton and D.F. Tolin. Read the rest of the article to learn about treatment and measurement of OCD here!

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Researchers Identify Molecular 'Switch' That Can Alter Brain Cells

The brain is not like a computer after all, in that its “hardware” can be tuned depending on activities occurring in the neural network, according to researchers.
(Photo : Allan Ajifo | Flickr)

According to researchers, a molecule exists in the brain capable of functioning as a switch that can control the properties of neurons depending on activity in the neural network.
In a study published in the journal Science, researchers suggest that it's possible to "tune" hardware in the brain, offering implications beyond traditional neuroscience. Computers are commonly used to describe the brain, with microprocessors and logic boards representing neurons and neural circuits, but the study has just shown that the comparison is no longer accurate because the brain's "hardware" features programmable mechanisms not present in computers.
Oscar Marin and colleagues discovered that certain neurons within the cerebral cortex are capable of adapting properties based on changes in activities in the neural network. However, they later on realized that what they thought were two different classes of fast-spiking interneurons were actually just one with the ability to switch between two differing ground states. The researchers were also able to identify the "switch" that made the switching possible: a protein that influences gene expression called Er81.
Fast-spiking interneurons belong to a general class of neurons primarily tasked with regulating activity in principal cerebral cortex cells called pyramidal cells. According to the researchers, the results of their study explain underlying mechanisms responsible for dynamically regulating the roles interneurons play. Their findings also supports the idea that activity affects the properties of neurons, which can be adapted depending on external and internal influences for encoding information.
"Our study demonstrates the tremendous plasticity of the brain, and how this relates to fundamental processes," said Marin.
The researchers pointed out that understanding how dynamic brain mechanisms lead to certain functions by developing and continuously remodeling neural circuits and the limitations aging and disease brings to these mechanisms can have important implications for developing new treatments for neurological disorders and facilitating education policies.
The study received funding support from the EMBO postdoctoral fellowship, the Wellcome Trust, the European Research Council and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. Other researchers include: Isabel del Pino, Lynette Lim, Giorgia Bartolini, Gabriele Ciceri and Nathalie Dehorter. They are affiliated with the MRC Centre for Developmental Neurobiology at King's College London and the Instituto de Neurosciences at Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas and Universidad Miguel Hernández.

Music, arguably the most powerful form of communication achieved by humanity. No combination of words can describe the effect that a setting with the perfect musical accompaniment can have on an individual. Music has the ability to affect our emotions and our psychology; it can spark motivation, assuage loneliness, excite the calm, and calm the excited. How is it that this mysterious, intangible form of art allows our thoughts, emotions, and state of mind to be so powerfully influenced?

Emotions influenced by music are just as physiologically calculable as emotions experienced under any other circumstance. This means that music, with the proper conditions, can be used as a sort of tool to help guide a person's emotional disposition to a calmed, tranquil state during a time of dejection or apprehension. Published in the Lancet Journal, Dr. Catherine Meads and her team of researchers at Brunel University confirmed that listening to music before, during, and after surgery helps with pre-op jitters, muscle resilience, and the outlook and recovery of the patient. After the comparative review of about 7,000 patient reports, the team found that those who had music playing in the operating theater demonstrated a significant reduction in postoperative pain, anxiety, and the need for pain relief medication. "Music is a non-invasive, safe, cheap intervention that should be available to everyone undergoing surgery," said Meads. 

The physiological applications of music do not end in the operating room. It has been found that the simple act of singing a tune brings about a sense of elation from the mixture of endorphins and hormones released in the body while singing, similar to the effects of the meditative 'om'. Oxytocin, a hormone that is released while singing, is known to alleviate anxiety and stress. It is also associated with the senses of trust and bonding, which may explain the euphoric connectivity experienced while singing in the presence of others. 

 2005 study at the University of Sheffield explored the effects of singing with a group and reported that it "can produce satisfying and therapeutic sensations even when the sound produced by the vocal instrument is ofmediocre quality." One does not need to be a great singer to reap the rewards. As it turns out, the benefits of singing regularly are cumulative. Singers have been found to have lower than average cortisol levels, which directly correlates to low stress. 

One study investigates musical structure's ability to determine heart rate variability. The findings suggest that the heart rates of a group of singers can sync up to produce a sort of guided group meditation, the result of which can be quite profound. There is another study being conducted by Dr. Julene K. Johnson that may find group singing to be an affordable and effective method of improving the health and well-being of older adults.

Singing for your health doesn't require a ton of rehearsal or preparation, a little vocal warm-up and you are good to go. It can be done by yourself any time you deem appropriate, casually with a gathering of friends or colleagues, or perhaps formally with a local choir. Music is more than just an enjoyable commodity, the stress relieving benefits make music an essential tool for surviving the stresses of life.

Neurotransmitters. So vital to our mental and physical health.

Talking to Yourself can Improve Your Brain

Consciousness Self-development August 11, 2015 Chase Holik

We’ve all seen those people that talk to themselves in the grocery store or walking down the street, in fact, some of you reading this may actually be those people. We all talk to ourselves throughout the day in some form or fashion, but not all of us do it out loud. Live Science actually believes that talking to yourself – out loud, can benefit your thinking and your perception. Here are five theories as to how talking to yourself can benefit your daily life.

1. Organizing Your Thougts

Sometimes it’s hard to control the thousands of thoughts that go through your mind at once. However, you can’t speak that many thoughts at once. If you focus on saying your thoughts aloud, then you will be able to focus on just that. You can actually bring more clarity to your thoughts when you say them out loud, which can help you make important decisions.

2. Improve Memory

How many times have you thought to yourself that you have to remember to do something when you get home? Then once you get home, you remember you have to do something but don’t know what it is. Try speaking your reminder aloud. Better yet, ask someone else to remind you at a certain time. Most of the time, you won’t even need their reminder because you are able to remember it more clearly since you heard yourself say it.

3. Make your Brain More Efficient

Studies have shown that talking to yourself can make you think more clearly and quickly. If you are looking for something in the store or in your house, you may be able to find it more quickly if you say the object’s name out loud as you search for it. You may find out that you can find things more quickly this way.

4. Learn About Yourself

It’s amazing what you can learn about yourself if you talk out loud at times. Sometimes your thoughts can race in your head so much that you don’t know what you’re thinking. If you’re thinking about a certain situation, try talking about it with yourself out loud. You could find out some shocking realizations about yourself when you do that.

5. Achieve Your Goals

Just making a list of goals and reading them daily is hard enough, but now you want me to say them out loud? The answer is yes, but only if you truly want to achieve your goals. Speaking your goals will give you more confidence in achieving them, and it will help you put into perspective what you need to do to achieve those goals. You have to be laser-focused when trying to achieve your goals, so why should you let negative thoughts get in the way in your head? Speak them out loud multiple times daily and your picture of achieving the goals will become clearer.


There are plenty of crazy people in the world, but people who talk to themselves out loud aren’t in that group. Don’t worry if you get weird looks from people if you talk to yourself in public. Those people just don’t realize what they are missing out on. What other things have you found out about yourself just by talking to yourself out loud?   Internet article

Mental Health Facts

By: Caitlin Beddows, Posted on: August 5, 2015

We are excited to announce the Second Edition of Encyclopedia of Mental Health will be publishing September 2015!
This new edition tackles, arguably one of the biggest issues facing modern society, the subject of mental health. It presents a comprehensive overview of the many genetic, neurological, social, and psychological factors that affect mental health, also describing the impact of mental health on the individual and society, and illustrating the factors that aid positive mental health.
The book contains contains more than 240 articles written by domain experts in the field and provides essential material on assessment, theories of personality, specific disorders, therapies, forensic issues, ethics, and cross-cultural and sociological aspects. Both professionals and libraries will find this timely work indispensable.

Below are a few facts about mental health:
1) Mental health problems are more common than previously thought, 1 out of 4 individuals will suffer from a mental health problem within a year
2) Schizophrenia affects 1 to 3 people in every 100
3) Mental illnesses are more prevalent than cancer, heart disease and diabetes
4) Research suggests that early intervention with the correct care and treatment decreases symptoms, relapse rates and improves overall wellbeing
5) Mental illnesses disrupt day-to-day life, impacting emotions, thought processes, moods and functioning
6) Almost 3 out of 4 children and adolescents are concerned about the reactions and stigmatism when discussing their mental health issues
7) Around 43% of individuals associated with homelessness schemes in the UK experience mental health problems
8) 72% of male prisoners and 70% of female prisoners experience two or more mental illnesses in comparison to the general population of 5% and 2% respectively
9) More than 800,000 people commit suicide each year
10) In the US each year, around 8 million people suffering from mental health problems don’t receive adequate support

How To Overcome Procrastination – Part 1

This is part 1 of a 5-part series on How to Overcome Procrastination.

Leaving things to the last minute. Does this sight look familiar to you?

Is there something you are procrastinating in your life now? What is it? Is it surrounding your work? Your relationship? Your family? Your health? What is the one thing which you should be working on in your life, but you are putting off for some reason or other?

Why Overcome Procrastination?

Some may not see procrastination as a real problem, because they receive benefits from procrastinating on something. For example, the relief you get when you successfully avoid something you don't want to do. However, while these 'benefits' give you the impression you are in a better place, you aren't. It's just an illusion.
Let's say it is Monday now and you have an important report you need to finish by Friday morning (a 20% high value task). This report is one of the most important tasks on your work list, but you decide to put off on it due to the large amount of research and analysis needed. Rather than work on it, you spend the next 3 days shuffling between the less important 80% tasks.
Then, Thursday arrives and you are trapped - you have to work on the report or it's going to jeopardize your job. As you work on it, you find yourself in a hot soup, because there are so many things to be done. After all, that's the very reason you put it off initially! In a last bid attempt to meet the deadline, you pull an all-nighter to do the report. After painfully sloughing through the night, you finally manage to finish it at 4am and meet the Friday deadline.
So net, the task gets done, it's submitted in time, and everything turned out fine.
Did you realize what just happened here? The fact that everything turned out fine led to your subconscious belief that procrastinating on the task didn't bring in any negative effects. In fact, as far as you are aware of, it has a series of supposed benefits:

1. Leaving it to the last minute creates a high sense of urgency which appears to boost your productivity, giving you a higher value on time spent working.
2. You experience short-term gratification from not having to deal with the report on Mon-Wed.
3. Procrastinating didn't jeopardize anything in reality.

Yet, if you look at it holistically, procrastination has created downsides which may not be immediately noticeable:

1. Your time in Mon-Wed was not effectively spent. Ideally, you would want to spend your time in proportion to how important the task is. The more important a task, the more time you want to allocate to it to maximize the output on the task. Spending more time on less important work doesn't give you significantly increased value, compared to spending more time on more important work. A ratio I use is 80-20 for the high value-low value tasks (aka my 20/80 to-do list - Read Day 8 of Live a Better Life in 30 Days Program on 20/80 To-Do Lists).
2. Unnecessary anguish and anxiety experienced (whether subconsciously or consciously) trying to avoid the task. The more you prolong the task, the more unnecessary anxiety you experience, compared to if you dealt with the task head-first. In addition, the continuous avoidance leads you to form a distorted mental image of how intimidating the task is vs. what it actually is. In the end you are left with an exaggerated but baseless fear of what you're supposed to do.
3. More often than not, the final output is short of what you are really capable of, as leaving it to the last minute left you with insufficient time to properly work on it.

The 3 downsides are actually corresponding counterpoints for the 3 illusionary benefits. If you compare the list and take a holistic view, the downsides far outweigh the supposed benefits of procrastination. Not only are you being less productive, you experience unnecessary anxiety, and you deliver an output that falls short of what you can really do. Procrastination leaves you in a worse position, compared to if you didn't procrastinate. As I've written before in What Are You Running Away From?, avoidance isn't going to bring you nearer to what you want.
Thus, if you are a procrastinator, whether chronic or not, it's time to start resolving this issue of procrastination and stop deferring your life away. As long as you keep putting off what you should be doing, you are putting off living. That's no better than being a sleepwalker.
Continue reading part 2, where I will share why mainstream ways of dealing with procrastination don't work and share the two root causes of procrastination.  article from Celes

5 Things That Happen If You Quit Sugar For Life

First, let’s set the record straight by saying that sugar in and of itself isn’t evil, per se. It occurs naturally in plenty of foods, including fruits and milk. With that being said, adding excess sugar to your dietary intake simply isn’t necessary. In fact, you’ll notice numerous positive things happen when you decide to quit sugar for life.
Although people living in the Western world have been trained to desire sugary treats, as well as foods that include copious amounts of sugar for flavoring, we certainly don’t need it. If you stop eating anything but naturally occurring sugars, you’ll notice that 5 very distinctive things will happen.

1. Your Energy Will Improve

Ironically, many of us have a tendency to reach for sugar-filled items, including so-called energy drinks and caffeinated beverages, when we’re tired. Yet without all the sugar, we’re guaranteed to have a higher energy level naturally. In other words, all that sugar is blocking our body’s ability to keep our energy stores at maximal levels. Plus, there will be no up-and-down with your blood sugar, so afternoon crashes will become an experience of the past.

2. Your Weight Will Stabilize

Sugar makes you crave more sugar, and we’re not just talking about sugar in its raw form. Let’s face it: most sugar comes in high-fat and/or high-carb foods that have been processed or at least contain tons of unwanted ingredients. There is, of course, the exception of fruit, which are nearly all sugar.
By going on a sugar detox, your body will not be subjected to the need to deal with all those additional calories. You won’t feel hungry, and you’ll end up losing weight – or at least not seeing the scale fluctuate as dramatically.

3. Your Intestines and Colon Will Perform More Efficiently

If your insides could tell you what they wanted on a daily basis, they would say lots of fiber and a minimum amount of tough-to-digest, impure foods. When you remove sugar, you’re enabling your tummy and bowels to reset their abilities to process what you’ve eaten. You may even find that you go to the bathroom more often … this is a good thing. It means everything is getting back to a normal routine.

4. You’ll Stop Wanting Sugar

It’s a fact: sugar begets sugar. After you rid it from your food regimen, you’ll slowly begin to lose the desire to eat anything with sugar in it. Fruits will taste plenty sweet, and if you do take a bite of a cake or pie, you’ll be shocked at how overpowering and overly sweet it seems.

5. Your Skin Will Look Healthier

Have you noticed that you can’t seem to crack the case on why your acne appears and disappears despite all the creams, potions, and ointments you’re using? It may be that sugar is hurting your skin from the inside out. Many people report that their skin feels and looks healthier after they stop giving in to sugar’s pull.

Ready to Start Your Sugar Detox and Quit Sugar for Life?

While a cold turkey approach to your sugar detox isn’t always recommended, especially if you’ve been a sugar-holic for most of your lifetime, it’s definitely a good idea to start cutting back now. The faster you begin, the faster you’ll start to reap the advantages of going sugar-free.
In fact, in light of the countless dangers of consuming too much sugar, the World Health Organization has changed its sugar recommendation—advising no more than 5% of your daily calories should come from the sweet stuff, down from the previously recommended 10 percent. Considering the average American consumes close to 5 grams each day, we have some work to do.

Start small by evaluating everything you’re eating and drinking. If you are addicted to sugar-laced coffee drinks sold at popular coffeehouses, scale back on how many times you drink them. Then, scale back some more. Soon, omit certain sugar-laden products. Over time, you will physiologically adjust to your new habits.
Remember that it takes about three weeks before a new way of doing something becomes a comfortable routine. If you have slight missteps, such as eating a candy bar after a stressful workday, just keep forging ahead.
The results of your diligence will definitely be worth it.

How To Overcome Procrastination – Part 2

How To Overcome Procrastination – Part 2

 

--> This is part 2 of a 5-part series on How to Overcome Procrastination.

Is it Possible To Overcome Procrastination?

My answer is: Yes. While some may think that procrastination is part and parcel of everyday living and it will be experienced in everything we do, this belief comes from not truly understanding what causes procrastination. Life is certainly not about procrastinating and putting off doing things. By fully understanding what causes procrastination and dealing with the problem at the root, it is the first step to overcoming it.
So if that's the case, how can you address procrastination?

Procrastination: Symptom of the Issue

To overcome procrastination, you must first realize that procrastination isn't the real issue.
Procrastination is just the symptom of the issue. The same goes for laziness, poor time management, or lack of self-discipline. Most people are quick to pinpoint these as the root causes of problems because these are the most accessible answers. The real reason is something underneath that.
A useful analogy to reference this to is mosquito bites. What happens when you get a mosquito bite? Most people will scratch at it. Some will take special care to put ointment or apply antiseptic cream. The itch from the bite gets alleviated, and soon it heals.
However, is the problem really resolved? It's not - the mosquito bite came from the mosquito. Until the mosquito is out of the picture, you will continue to get new mosquito bites. Repeatedly putting ointment or cream is just a temporary fix. Putting a mosquito net might be a more effective solution, but it still doesn't deal with the issue at a root.
And even if you are to get rid of the mosquito, it's still not addressing the real problem. Getting rid of one mosquito doesn't mean more mosquitoes won't be coming your way. After all, the mosquitoes must be coming from somewhere, aren't they? Where are they coming from? If you trace their origins, you might find mosquito breeding grounds around the potted plants in your house.
But wait, it doesn't end here. How did these breeding ground even come about to begin with? If you look deeper, you will find the real problem is really negligence and poor house maintenance. Trying to tackle the issue through any of the intermediate steps (ointment, killing the mosquito, removing the breeding ground) will only lead to a temporary relief but not long-term resolution. Only by practicing due diligence in upkeeping the house will this problem be permanently resolved.
So coming back to procrastination. Think of laziness, lack of discipline and procrastination as mosquito bites - the symptom of the problems. Time management and self-discipline are your ointment or cream that patches the symptoms. They are the lower-tier solutions. The same applies for life hack tools or tips from article lists such as XX ways to overcome procrastination. While they do alleviate the problem in a certain manner, they are not holistic solutions. You can keep integrating them every day but it never solves your problem of procrastination. I could have easily written a post on "20 ways to deal with procrastination" which would take less time and thinking, but that's not going to move anyone forward with their problem of procrastination.
On the other hand, if you get to the root of the issue - drilling down to the mosquito, and even to the breeding ground, you are a quantum step toward overcoming procrastination. This is what the remaining part of the series will be about - uncovering exactly what causes procrastination, then resolving them at the fundamental level.
One important thing you want to note is the magnitude of one's issue can be gauged by how chronic one's procrastination is. Using the mosquito example again, the more bites you have and the more severe each bite is, the bigger the root problem (e.g. large breeding ground, multiple breeding grounds, deadliness of mosquito). Similarly, the more severe your procrastination, the bigger the underlying issue.

What Causes Procrastination Then?

What's the definition of procrastination again? It means to put off doing something; to avoid. So, what leads people to avoid something? It can be drilled down to two things - Desire and Fear. More specifically, (1) a lack of desire or (2) a fear of something.

Two Drivers: Desire and Fear

Desire and fear are the two main forces involved when it comes to action or inaction. Desire is like the fuel to move forward. Without desire, you have no driving force for action. Fear is like the fog that surrounds you which paralyzes you from moving forward. Where desire < fear, procrastination will take over. Consequently, where desire > fear, action will take place.
If there is a lack of desire combined with fear(s), procrastination is almost definite. The most common example is students and academia. Most are studying for the sake of studying - they feel empty for what they are studying for. In addition, the high competition and intensity of the coursework leads to an inner fear toward studies. In the end, you get widespread cases of procrastination of students and studies.
In Part 2 of the procrastination series, I shared how procrastination is really the symptom of the problem—not the real problem itself. MANY people I've worked with in my programs and courses often see procrastination as the problem, which is why they have always failed to overcome the issue permanently. By recognizing it is the symptom, and that there are underlying causes leading to this symptom, it's the first *big* step to overcome procrastination—for life.
Today's part is about the first of the two major drivers/causes of procrastination. Part 4 will come tomorrow. Enjoy. :) original internet article from Celes

 
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How To Overcome Procrastination – Part 3

This is part 3 of a 5-part series on How to Overcome Procrastination.

Lack of Desire, 1st Root Cause of Procrastination

Procrastination happens because there is a lack of desire. For example, someone who procrastinates on his work because he lacks the passion for it. Someone who procrastinates going to a networking event because he is not interested in networking.
What should you do then to get a never-ending flow of desire? By living in alignment with your higher self. There are two key ways to do this:

1. Follow your inner desires. What is it you love to do? What excites you the most? These are the things you should be doing - not things you don't enjoy doing. The more you follow your desires, the more connected you become with your inner self, and the more aligned you become in your thoughts and actions. This results in an ongoing force that springs you forward endlessly and grows larger and larger every day.
2. Live in alignment with your values. What are your values in life? What are the most important qualities or attributes? Use them as the navigational compass in the decisions and steps you make. Again, living in line with your values lets you become more connected with your inner self.

My Example with School and Work

Secondary school years of late 1990s

My life growing up was a journey in the alignment of my desires. When I was in secondary school, I was largely disinterested toward studies. I was much more interested in developing my interest in web and graphic designing. This led to procrastination for the most part on anything related to studies. To be honest, I barely ever paid attention, touched my school books nor did much preparation for the tests/exams. There was a point where I hated school and would avoid going to school by feigning illnesses or making up some reason! Needless to say, I underperformed in my academics compared to what I could have done.
My underperformance in academia led me to experience what it meant to be labeled and discriminated against in a meritocratic society, where students, teachers and society alike would make conclusions on one's ability and worth based on just grades alone. Being a social misfit was an eye-opening experience, to say the least. Not only that, it was disjointing to be disregarded for what I considered to be one of my core values - excellence. At that particular point I was living in alignment with this value through web/graphic designing, but not academia.

Junior college years - 2001-2002

When I was in junior college, I realized my procrastination toward studies had to be addressed. My strategy for addressing it was via channeling into my value of excellence - by striving for academia excellence. Even if I wasn't fully interested in what I was studying, I was definitely passionate about achieving excellence. This worked out well. While I would still feel some inertia toward studies, it wasn't to the same extent as before as in secondary school.

University years - 2003-2006

In University, I entered the course of my choice - Business. In addition to my inherent desire to excel, I was now studying something I was interested in. This naturally led to a marked increase in my interest toward studies. :) The interest level led me to be more proactive, vocal and energized through the coursework. Every step along the way, I was met with positive results and these results would simply reinforce my interest level. All-in-all, procrastination became hardly an issue, with the exception of certain modules which I was not interested in (Finance being one of them). There was hardly a moment I could remember where I wanted to avoid school work. I honestly enjoyed my whole varsity life.

In my corporate job - 2006-2008

When I entered my ex-company in brand management, the alignment with my desires became even stronger. It being one of my two choice employers (the other being consulting) made me very ecstatic - I was eager to work there develop myself as an individual.
As such, my passion was strong - I never dreaded work, I loved everything I was doing and I always put my 110% in everything I did. While people would talk about Monday Blues and the like, I never saw work as work. Honestly, if you truly enjoy what you're doing, you won't even think of it as work at all. In fact, I associated 'work' with fun and joy :D . I often worked late every day and even over the weekends because I wanted to. Nothing ever came across as an obligation.
However, things changed toward the end of the 2 years. As I grew more and more as a person, my passion to help others grow consciously became stronger and stronger. Since my work wasn't the best channel to express this passion, I experienced signs of procrastination toward my job. The internal alarms inside me went off. In my years of experience from dealing with dread/procrastination to living in a state of flow, I knew enough to know that if I were to ever feel dread toward something, it was a clear signal to reevaluate my situation.

Personal development work - 2009 to Present

Eventually, I quit my day job in '08 to pursue my passion in full force. With this one act, I have become more aligned with my inner self than ever before. From there on, every step I take - whether it's starting the blog, doing coaching, speaking or most recently, setting up my personal excellence school - is a conscious move toward increasing that alignment even further.
For the same reason, procrastination has become a distant memory of my past. In the instances where I do experience procrastination, it's primarily due to fear which is the second underlying cause of procrastination. Read on more about fear in part four of the series.
In Part 3 of the procrastination series, I shared the first driver of procrastination, which is the lack of desire. The lack of desire is a huge reason why people procrastinate on their goals; after all, if you don't have the real desire to do something, you naturally wouldn't do something.
Today's part is about the second driver of procrastination—fear. This is a very real reason for many of us. Read on, where I share my personal experience with procrastination and how it linked with an internal fear. Part 5 will come the same time tomorrow. by Celes  | Read Full Article Online