Steps To Get You Moving

With all the things that you have to do each day, finding the time and motivation to get moving can be challenging. Here are 20 ideas for getting started and keeping it going:

1. If you can't set aside one block of time, do short activities throughout the day, such as three 10-minute walks.
2. Choose activities that are fun.
3. Vary your activities, so you don't get bored. For instance, use different jogging, walking, or biking paths to vary your routine. Or bike one day, and jog the next.
4. Join a hiking or running club.
5. Wear a pedometer (a small tool worn on your belt) that counts the number of steps you take. Try to walk a little more each day or week.
6. Create opportunities for activity, such as parking your car some distance from your destination and walking.
7. Use stairs instead of the elevator.
8. Walk or bike to work or to the store.
9. Be physically active at lunch with coworkers, family, or friends.
10. Join an office or community sports league.
11. Take a break at work to stretch or take a quick walk.
12. Don't let cold weather keep you on the couch! You can find activities to do in the winter, such as exercising to a workout video.
13. If you have children, make time to play with them outside. Set a good example!
14. Go dancing with your partner or friends..
15. Turn activities into social occasions—for example, go to a movie after you and a friend work out.
16. Plan active vacations that will keep you moving, such as taking tours and site-seeing on foot.
17. Set specific, short-term goals, and reward yourself when you achieve them.
18. Don't expect to notice body changes right away. It can take weeks or months before you notice some of the changes from being physically active, such as weight loss.
19. If you live in a neighborhood where it is unsafe to be physically active outdoors, contact your local recreational center or church to see if they have any indoor activity programs that you can join.
20. Make physical activity a regular part of your day, so that it becomes a habit—and perhaps something you look forward to!

Source : http://www.womenshealth.gov/FitnessNutrition/getmoving/

How Do You Know You're Lactose Intolerant

If you feel bloated or have stomach cramps and diarrhea after drinking milk, you could be lactose intolerant, but these are also common symptoms of other digestive conditions. Find out how to determine if you're really lactose intolerant.

Lactose intolerance is not the same as an allergy to milk or dairy products. If you are allergic to milk, you might find that your mouth itches or you break out in hives after drinking it. But if you are lactose intolerant, you will start to have certain abdominal symptoms once your body starts trying to digest what you've eaten, usually within 30 minutes to 2 hours, says Susan Lucak, MD, a gastroenterologist in New York City and a special lecturer at the College of Physicians & Surgeons of Columbia University.

Lactose is a sugar found in milk, cheese, ice cream, and other dairy products. In some people, the small intestine isn't able to break down this sugar into simpler forms that can then be absorbed into the bloodstream. If you're one of the 30 to 50 million Americans who are lactose intolerant, eating dairy foods can give you digestive trouble and have you running to the bathroom.

Not everyone who is lactose intolerant reacts the same way or within the same amount of time. For instance, you may be able to handle more lactose than others can. "Some people have partial lactose intolerance," Dr. Lucak explains. "They can ingest a certain amount of milk and milk products, but if they exceed this amount, they will develop the symptoms."

Lactose intolerance also tends to run in families. "If someone in your family has the condition, it is possible that you have it, too," Lucak says. "And it is more common in Asians and African-Americans."

Signs of Lactose Intolerance

The most common signs of lactose intolerance are abdominal bloating, abdominal cramping, excessive gas, nausea, and diarrhea, Lucak says. Because these are common symptoms, they do not always mean you are lactose intolerant. A simple practice can help you determine the answer.

"Eliminate all dietary lactose for two weeks and see if your symptoms disappear," Lucak says. If your symptoms improve when you're on a dairy-free diet and the signs of lactose intolerance reappear as soon as you start eating dairy again, chances are you are lactose intolerant.

Your doctor can then confirm lactose intolerance with one of two tests available for older children and adults:

• Lactose tolerance test. After fasting, a blood test measures your fasting blood sugar (glucose) level. Next, you drink a large amount of a liquid that contains lactose. Then blood is drawn over a two-hour period to determine how well your body is able to digest the lactose.
• Hydrogen breath test. This test measures the amount of hydrogen in your breath. Normally, very little can be detected. However, when you are unable to digest lactose, the bacteria you have in your colon causes various gases, including hydrogen, to form. Your intestines absorb the hydrogen, which is carried through the bloodstream to your lungs. When you breathe out, the hydrogen is exhaled. For this test, you will be asked to drink a lactose-loaded beverage, and your breath will be analyzed at regular intervals. Before the test, you may need to avoid certain foods, medications, and smoking because they can affect the accuracy of the test.

Infants and very young children may be given a stool acidity test, rather than a lactose tolerance or hydrogen breath test. Measuring the amount of acid in the stool will show lactose intolerance.

Managing Lactose Intolerance

If testing confirms that you are lactose intolerant, your symptoms can usually be controlled simply by avoiding milk and milk products, Lucak says. And you may be able to enjoy dairy foods — and get the nutrients they provide — by taking lactase tablets when you eat them, since lactase is the enzyme lacking in people with lactose intolerance. Also consider milk and other dairy products specifically formulated for people who are lactose-intolerant.

Talk to your doctor if you suspect that you're lactose intolerant. If he makes this diagnosis, you can work with the doctor or a nutritionist on a plan to manage lactose intolerance while still getting the important nutrients that dairy foods provide.

By Beth W. Orenstein

Medically reviewed by Pat F. Bass III, MD, MPH

Kahlil Gibran On Pain

One of my favorite passages on pain is what Kahlil Gibran writes in his classic, “The Prophet”:

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so you must know pain.

And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wonderous than your joy;

And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.

And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief.

Much of your pain is self-chosen.

It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.


Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquility;


For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,

And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has moistened with His own sacred tears.

By THERESE J. BORCHARD Associate Editor PsychCentral.com

A Change Of Scenery

During summer, my practice moves outside two or three days every week. My lovely man and I spend long weekends at our cabin on an island in Northern Ontario.

This means that my practice is either free-form or follows a DVD (until my laptop runs out of steam).

Al fresco yoga is different, even if the asanas themselves are identical.

Here's what I notice:

1. Centering myself before I begin is completely different. Rather than shutting the world out and going inward, I breathe myself into my environment. I feel like one of the trees or the clouds. Great feeling.
   
   
2. Life goes on around me. Rosie dog presses her bum into my head whenever I am close enough to her height. She also works diligently to occupy any and all free space on my mat. My lovely man forgets I'm doing yoga and offers breakfast, weather reports, and book summaries through the kitchen window. These things would drive me mad at home. During cabin practice, they're as lovely as chirping birds and the sound of waves.
   
   
3. Breath becomes more important as a kind of anchor when there are fewer fixed points to stare at. The cloud ceiling moves, the trees wave, water slurps on the shore. Steadiness comes from my inhalations and exhalations.
   
   
4. I'm clearer about the purpose of yoga being pleasure. It's easy indoors for me to drift toward pushing my yoga. Do more, go further, push harder. Blech. Outside, everything is clearer. Happier. Lighter. Good for this little soul.

Are you an outdoor yog(in)i? What have you noticed during your outdoor practice?

Thanks to yoga for being so portable. Thanks to you for the conversation,

kristin

Dr. Kristin Shepherd 

Roller Coaster Relationship

If you have a partner with borderline personality disorder (BPD), your relationship may look something like this:

• Yesterday, in the eyes of your partner, you could do no wrong. Today, everything you do is wrong.
• Ten minutes ago, your partner was smiling and happy. Now, they are screaming at the top of their lungs about a perceived snarky comment from you, which was not meant in the way it was interpreted, and household objects are being thrown. You hastily leave to go to work.
• By the end of today, you will get 15 text messages, eight phone calls, and 10 emails from your partner that ask if you still love them, and threatening suicide if you end the relationship.

According to the National Institute for Mental Health, two percent of Americans are diagnosed with BPD, which equates to about six million people, although some estimates are as high as six percent, or eighteen million people. Women are more frequently given the diagnosis, but that may be because they present for psychiatric services more often than men, or because of provider bias, with men being diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder instead of BPD.

Obviously, having a relationship with someone who experiences BPD is a challenge. At the beginning of your relationship, there may have been a honeymoon period where you were idealized by your partner. But now you may be experiencing the darker side of BPD: fears of abandonment, impulsive behaviors (gambling, unsafe sex, spending sprees, binge eating, drug use), emotional instability, and suicidal gestures or attempts.

What does the partner of someone with BPD do?

Helping your partner find the right treatment is crucial. Convincing them to first try treatment, and then stick with it, however, is a whole other issue. BPD clients are frequently considered the “toughest to treat” by mental health professionals because of the instability they present. Remember, what happens in the “real world” also happens in therapy offices: the same patterns your partner with BPD does at home happen with the therapist, too.

But there is hope. Dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) is considered the most effective treatment for BPD. There are a ton of resources online about DBT, including the blog Dialectical Behavior Therapy Understood here on PsychCentral, so I invite you to check them out to learn more. There are other treatments that are beginning to receive more attention as well, such as mentalization-based therapy (MBT), transference-focused psychotherapy (TFP), schema therapy (ST), and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) tailored specifically to BPD.

Next, finding a therapist to help you is vitally important as well.Even if your partner is in treatment, the instability and uncertainty around their mood and behavior will not resolve overnight. Treatment for BPD is a long process, and if you and your partner are going to get to the other side with your relationship intact, you are going to need professional support.
It is important for you to learn about DBT as well so that you can participate in your partner’s recovery. One way to do this is through DBT Family Skills training.

As for day-to-day ways to support your partner during the recovery process, some tips include:

• Do not ignore your partner’s threats to harm themselves. After a while, family and friends can become desensitized to the threats of the person with BPD. However, it is common, especially when someone is in treatment, for things to actually get worse before they get better. Statistically, around 9-10% of people with BPD complete suicide, and it is often by accident. Don’t take chances: call 911 or bring your partner to the emergency room if they are threatening suicide. Let the mental health professionals decide the level of actual threat.
• Learn how to validate your partner’s experience. One of the theories behind DBT is that the person with BPD grew up in an invalidating environment, which means they were consistently told that their feelings were bad or wrong, or may have even been physically punished for showing emotion, even if their reaction to the situation was perfectly appropriate.
• Use good communication skills to set boundaries with your partner. Another hallmark of the experience of people who have BPD is that their lives have always been unstable. Having boundaries in place in their adult relationship, and especially having those boundaries remain in place when tested, helps to provide your partner with a safe environment that they know will not fail them.
• Take care of yourself. I say this in practically every post: if you are not caring for yourself, you are not in a position to help your partner get better.

Kate Thieda

PsychCentral.com

The Importance Of Purpose & How To Find It

“Ever more people today have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.” – Viktor E. Frankl


It seems as if everyone is searching for their purpose in today’s world. Though, with so many conflicting messages being constantly presented to us, it can be confusing to know who we are, what to connect with, and what we’re meant to do.

When we are able to connect with a sense of purpose it adds significant value to life.

Research has revealed that a sense of purpose is actually related to increased psychological well-being and can help people recover from and cope with stressful life events.

If you are looking for more life-satisfaction and clearer direction for your future consider the ideas below.

How to find purpose


Developing and growing spiritually has been shown to relate to a sense of life-purpose. Research has shown that people who rated their level of spirituality higher tended to have a greater sense of purpose.


Spirituality gets us in touch with something greater than ourselves and opens our eyes to why we’re here and what we’re meant to do.

Engaging in passionate pursuits is another effective way to feel a sense of purpose. When we have something important and enlivening to work towards, we will be more engaged and fulfilled by life’s pursuits.

Consider what you love to do and what you feel good about. Begin developing goals you can work toward based on these pursuits.

Uncovering your values and what’s most important to you will help you find a sense of purpose. Uncovering our values gives us a sense of direction and helps us live more intentionally. It helps us have more integrity and aligns what we do with what we believe in.

Values can be based on different domains of your life, such as: relationships, career, spirituality, family, and finances, or on more personal characteristics, like trust, reliability, humor, or courage. What do you value?

Feeling a sense of purpose can ultimately increase our psychological well-being. If you’re struggling with a sense of life purpose, discover what you value and what you’re passionate about, and grow your spirituality and connection to something greater than yourself.


Joe Wilner
PsychCentral.com

The 5 Types Of Girlfriends You Need In Your Life

In her classic book, Gift from the Sea,Anne Morrow Lindbergh articulates the process of gathering girlfriends. She writes,

“I shall ask into my shell only those friends with whom I can be completely honest. I find I am shedding hypocrisy in human relationships. What a rest that will be! The most exhausting thing in life, I have discovered, is being insincere.”

Girlfriends are as unique as the shells Lindbergh describes in her pages. Some have the gift of empathy and compassion, while others challenge us in ways that lead to growth; some friends listen, while others dole out smart advice. Women need different kinds of friendships at different points in their lives. I have compiled these five types of girlfriends, drawing from the examples in Robert Wick’s book, Bounce: Living the Resilient Life, and Susan Shapiro Barash’s book, Toxic Friends: The Antidote for Women Stuck in Complicated Friendships.


1. The Cheerleader
Cheerleaders believe in you no matter what stupid thing you have just said or done. They are the presence on the sidelines that you need when you are floundering and unsure of your next step. And they are there to pick you up if that next step was too high or slippery. Without the unconditional support of my cheerleaders, I’m not sure if I would have the strength and courage to do about 75 percent of the things I do in a day.

2. The Confidant
If you don’t have the time or money to go to therapy, you should definitely have a confidant in your life, a person with whom you can confide anything and everything. I think this type of friend is especially important during weighty lifestyle changes – if you are going through a divorce, grieving an significant loss, or have just started a stressful job. Finding someone who is going through the same experience can be extremely helpful and consoling.

3. The Prophet
The prophet can be annoying. You may be tempted to kick her out of your shell—or life—because she raises issues you’d rather not be raised. However, because prophets possess razor-sharp intuition and can usually see the truth a week, a month, or two years before you can, they are important to have in your circle of girlfriends. If your boyfriend or husband is treating you with less respect than you deserve, she is the one keeping track of concrete examples that you can’t deny when you rationalize his behavior. She’s a tough cookie who does not accept excuses of any kind. The prophet may tell you to leave a toxic work environment, even as you don’t yet have a backup. And she is like the angel following you around all day, forcing you to be accountable with yourself and others.

4. The Comedian
The comedian reminds us to not take ourselves so seriously, and to add humor to whatever situation we are fretting about. She provides the much-needed laugh therapy during our stressful hours, and makes our day tolerable during difficult moments, and enjoyable during ordinary time. This type of girlfriend reminds us to always find time to laugh and to play, like we did as kids, because having fun is just as important as solving problems.

5. The Leader
The leader is the kind of girlfriend who gets you to commit to a book club, civic association, or school committee. She somehow persuades you to run a marathon, organize a work event, or coach a swim team, even though you’ve never competed. A social butterfly, this girlfriend knows just about everyone she passes on the street, and is happy to introduce you to the mayor and his wife. She’s an effective networker who can help you navigate your career or social life, but you need to exercise your boundaries because her combustible energy can be exhausting.

By THERESE J. BORCHARD
Associate Editor
PsychCentral.com

Will You Dance With Me?

Diet & Supplements

Good nutrition is essential to health.  Eating healthy is simply eating real food.  Real food is what we grew up with: meat, chicken, and fish, not loaded with synthetic hormones and antibiotics;  I'm talking about real fats like butter, cream, full-cream cheese, and olive oil, not man-made fats; fresh fruits and vegetables, not sprayed to death with pesticides and chemicals to make them grow larger and more beautiful.


How did we get so far off track?  How is it that we now have as many overweight people as we have underfed people?  The answer is processed foods.  It's the sugars and the refined carbohydrates that are making us fat and affecting our health. Our portions are too large.  We eat out more and cook less at home.


Sugary foods and trans fats disrupt your hormones, so they can no longer keep your body on an even keel to give you the youthful energy and health that you want...your insulin will rise...weight gain is the result, along with increased cholesterol and diabetes.  Diabetes raises cortisol which makes sleep difficult.  If you can't sleep, your insulin has no chance of going down, and the effect is continued high cortisol, which can eventually lead to heart attack and/or stroke - that is if diabetes doesn't get to you first.


Giving up sugar is a good start.  By doing so, you can prevent your pancreas from oversecreting insulin, which will keep you blood sugar and hormones balanced.  With balance comes weight loss, lowered cholesterol levels, a decreased risk of heart disease and cancer, and longevity.  In healing insulin resistance, the body will unload the stored sugar in the cells, and your body fat will melt away.  After the body releases the stored sugar, it then turns to your fat reserves to break down and use as an energy source. The result - you get thinner while your body is being fed a constant source of energy.


Unfortunately, today's foods are not as rich as they once were in vitamins and minerals.  That is why supplementation is an important component of your daily diet.  Within a few weeks of taking vitamins and supplements, I noticed a profound increase in my energy and vitality.  As for my regimen, I am sure to include calcium, vitamin C, E, St Johns wort, glucosamine, selenium, CoQ10, multivitamin etc.


In addition to supplements, Dr. Galitzer, my antiaging doctor, gives me tinctures and drops to stimulate my major hormones along with my minor hormones.  He also gives me formulas to regenerate my weakest organs.  He explains that when a patient comes in with numerous physical complaints, he realises that many of the important organs are toxic and sluggish.  He uses herbal drainage formulas to cleanse the body by stimulating the excretion systems of the liver, kidney, and lymph glands to rid the body of toxins that have accumulated over time.  The organs now need to be toned and strengthened.  These formulas are homeopathic, derived from plant, mineral, and animal kingdoms.  These regenerative formulas support thyroid, adrenal, pancreas, and liver function. When used in combination with bioidentical hormones, they create an optimal result.


Suzanne Somers, Ageless

How To Overcome The Negativity Of Others

What do you do when you’re around someone who can’t seem to notice or say anything positive? It can be tough to not let their mood and outlook have an effect on us.

So, who tends to breed negativity in your life? Is it you boss, coworker, family, or friends? Maybe you’re the one who tends to view things pessimistically at times.

Either way, no one will always have a wonderful day free of frustrations. We are simply going to experience negativity at times, though despite this we do have a choice in how we let negativity effect us. When we experience a negative person it’s important to not them bring us down.

If you’re having a difficult time with a negative person, here are a few ideas to consider.

1) Learn to respond instead of react. This means recognizing when we are encountering negativity so we can prepare mentally and decide how we want to respond. We may want to ignore the comments and not let them get to us, however depending on the situation we may have to interact with the person.

Have you ever been in a work meeting where someone shoots down every good idea and can only see the negative side of things? In these cases we may have to deal with the negativity to prevent it from spreading to others.


Make sure to stop and think. Don’t let the negativity begin to rub off on you. This person is free to have their opinion and as you will see, there are effective ways to work past the negative energy.

2) Focus on the facts instead of emotions. It can be natural to get upset when someone else pointing out all the flaws and mistakes around them. Mind your ego and don’t take it personally. Stay calm and don’t escalate the situation. This means avoid insults, accusations, name calling, and blaming the other person, such as, “You’re always so negative and rude!”

Don’t let the negativity get to you and overtake your attitude. You have the responsibility to not let the situation get out of hand.

3) Once you are ready to respond, an effective way to deal with negativity is to listen attentively and validate how the person feels. It may be tough, but the last thing they want to hear is, “Come on, it’s such a beautiful day, get over the new acquisition.”

Put yourself in other person shoes by being empathic and caring for what the other person is going through. A negative person is often viewing things in a pessimistic manner, so it’s tough for them to see the positive. They also may be having a rough day full of hassles.

Help them to have a sense of control and begin to help them see that not everything is going to turn out horribly. Keep focused on the positive and point out some of the benefits they may be overlooking.

4) Covert negative energy into something productive by helping them to resolve the problem or find a compromise. When someone has a negative attitude they probably aren’t able to think as clearly and be as creative in finding a solution.

Negative thinkers often view things in black and white, concrete terms. They only see one option and feel helpless to do anything about it. Help them find solutions they may not notice.

Negativity can be difficult to deal with, particularly when it’s chronic and directed toward us. However, we don’t have to let the negativity of others bring us down if we are prepared and open to deal with it effectively.

It what situation do you usually experience negative people? How do you deal with it?

Joe Wilner

Meditation In The Modern World

The classic meditation image of a sage sitting on top of a mountain, in lotus position, needs a little updating. In today’s social-media, multi-tasking, smart-phone world, few of us feel we have the time to meditate, let alone climb a mountain. If the word meditation scares you, rename it ‘mindfulness’.

meditation through mindfulness

uni-tasking
Mindfulness is the opposite of multi-tasking (which is essentially anti-meditation); it’s taking the time to focus on one thing and savouring life. Instead of eating breakfast while watching TV, try to give your attention to one activity; take pleasure in the taste and texture of your granola.

focus on your breathing
Sit in a comfortable position with your back straight (if you hunch forward your lungs and diaphragm won’t be able to expand fully). To  begin with you probably want to find a quiet place but as you develop your practice you’ll become better at blocking out the surrounding world. Focus on the air flowing through your nostrils and the rise and fall of your abdomen as you inhale and exhale. When your mind begins to wander, bring it back to focus on your breathing.

meditation in motion

yoga
For those of us who can’t sit still for long, yoga is the ideal way to meditate. Yoga combines specific movements with a meditative focus on the body and breathing. Other meditative practices in motion include running, tai chi or qigong.

momentary meditation

three conscious breaths
If your life is non-stop action and you can’t see yourself stopping for 20 minutes to meditate, little micro-meditations are a great way to alleviate stress and improve your concentration. Use physical reminders as cues to your practice (which cues you pick will determine the frequency). For example, take three deep breaths every time you send an email or every time you think about work outside of work hours.

stop and smell the roses
Take the opportunity two or three times a day to stop and appreciate the world around you. Explore your environment sense by sense; what can you see, hear, smell and how do your emotions reflect or react to these sensations?

Focusing on what you’re eating as you eat it is a great first step towards a healthy, more deliberate life.

Source : http://www.lululemon.com/community/blog/meditation-in-the-modern-world/?cid=fbmeditation

Self Compassion

Self-compassion is not easy to come by for many of us. Instead, our default reaction is to blame ourselves, lash out (again at ourselves) and possibly keep asking, “what is wrong with me?”

But cultivating self-compassion is exactly what we need, especially when it comes to facing tough times – and my not-so favorite activity of feeling your feelings.

When we’re unable to cope healthfully with emotions, we stuff them down. We might stuff them down with food or excessive exercise or other unhealthy habits.


But here’s the thing about emotions (which I have to keep reminding myself of): They don’t just vanish.

As researcher Kristin Neff, Ph.D, writes in her book, Self-Compassion: Stop Beating Yourself Up and Leave Insecurity Behind, not only has research shown that we’re unable to suppress unwanted thoughts and feelings but when we try, both seem to get stronger.

That’s where self-compassion comes in. You can use self-compassion to deal with difficult emotions. Research shows, Neff says, that “self-compassion is a major protective factor for anxiety and depression.”

Self-compassion has other related benefits, too. Neff writes:

“Research shows that self-compassionate people tend to experience fewer negative emotions-such as fear, irritability, hostility or distress-than those who lack self-compassion. These emotions still come up, but they aren’t as frequent, long lasting or persistent. This is partly because self-compassionate people have been found to ruminate much less than those who lack self-compassion. Rumination is often fueled by feelings of fear, shame and inadequacy. Because self-compassion directly counters these insecurities, it can help unravel the knot of negative rumination as surely as detangling spray.”

According to Neff, self-compassion has three components: self-kindness, common humanity and mindfulness. And all three can help.

One tool that Neff suggests for processing emotions is a self-compassion journal. We know that journaling helps us to feel our feelings in a healthy way, and studies have shown that it contributes to one’s well-being.

What do you write? “In your journal, write down anything that you felt bad about, anything you judged yourself for, any difficult experience that caused you pain.”

Then, use all three self-compassion components:

Mindfulness
Bring awareness to your emotions. “Write about how you felt: sad, ashamed, frightened, stressed and so on. As you write, try to be accepting and nonjudgmental of your experience, not belittling it nor making it overly dramatic.”

Common Humanity
Common humanity is about realizing that we all share common experiences, that we all suffer and go through bad times. So “Write down the ways in which your experience was connected to the larger human experience.” Neff also says that this might mean “acknowledging that being human means being imperfect.”

You also can consider the underlying causes of your pain, she suggests.

Self-Kindness
Here, you’d “write yourself some kind, understanding words of comfort.”
Say you were angry with a waitress who took forever to get your check, and you left without leaving a tip and now feel horrible. Neff gives the following example of self-kindness: “It’s okay. You messed up but it isn’t the end of the world. I understand how frustrated you were and you just lost it. I know how much you value being kind to other people and how badly you feel right now. Maybe you can try being extra patient and generous to any waitstaff this week.”

Self-compassion has especially helped Neff deal with her own despair over her son’s autism. She writes:

“When my mind would start to walk down the dark alley of fear –What’s going to happen to him? Will he ever live independently? Will he ever have a job, a family? – I would try to stay in the present moment. I am here, right now. Rowan is safe and happy. I have no idea what’s going to happen to him, or what his future holds. It’s a mystery, but running away with my fear is not going to help. Let me focus on calming and comforting myself. Poor darling, I know how incredibly difficult it is for you right now…When I soothed my troubled mind with this kind of caring concern, I was able to stay centered without being overwhelmed, realizing that whatever Rowan’s future held, I loved him exactly as he was.”

If something goes wrong in her life, Neff says the following phrases, which I think are pretty powerful:

This is a moment of suffering.
Suffering is part of life.
May I be kind to myself in this moment.
May I give myself the compassion I need.

By MARGARITA TARTAKOVSKY, MS
Psychcentral.com

Two Is Better Than One

Two Is Better Than One Lyrics

I remember what you wore on the first day
You came into my life and I thought
"Hey, you know, this could be something"
'Cause everything you do and words you say
You know that it all takes my breath away
And now I'm left with nothing

So maybe it's true
That I can't live without you
And maybe two is better than one
But there's so much time
To figure out the rest of my life
And you've already got me coming undone
And I'm thinking two is better than one

I remember every look upon your face
The way you roll your eyes
The way you taste
You make it hard for breathing
'Cause when I close my eyes and drift away
I think of you and everything's okay
I'm finally now believing

That maybe it's true
That I can't live without you
And maybe two is better than one
But there's so much time
To figure out the rest of my life
And you've already got me coming undone
And I'm thinking two is better than one

I remember what you wore on the first day
You came into my life and I thought, "Hey,"

Maybe it's true
That I can't live without you
Maybe two is better than one
But there's so much time
To figure out the rest of my life
And you've already got me coming undone
And I'm thinking
I can't live without you
'Cause, baby, two is better than one
But there's so much time
To figure out the rest of my life
But I'll figure it out
When all is said and done
Two is better than one
Two is better than one

http://www.elyricsworld.com/two_is_better_than_one_lyrics_boys_like_girls.html

How To Love Your Body

Months ago, Mish at Eating Journey, wrote a post that blew me away (many of her posts do). It was these few sentences that really struck me:

“I know what I have been harping on LOVING YOURSELF…but our bodies are mere shells for our souls, our spirits, our inner workings. Remember that YES we need to love our bodies…but I challenge you to REALLY love your body from within. Don’t just give it lip-service, believe what you’re saying.”

For a long time, I think that was my true problem with my body image.


I couldn’t have loved my body because I didn’t love – or let alone even know! – my inner core, those inner workings, those idiosyncratic pieces that make up my personality.

I wasn’t sure what I liked, disliked or more importantly, what I believed. Or maybe, more accurately, I was insecure about those idiosyncrasies.

Maybe it was that I knew what I liked and what I didn’t, and I knew what made me feel comfortable and passionate – but I didn’t trust myself enough to go there or to stick up for those things.

I’ve talked before about my shaky sense of self, and I think that contributed to my negative body image – in fact, without a doubt, it did.

It was one big ball of insecurity, anxiety and not-good-enoughness.

I thought the pathway to loving my body – and myself – was a miserable diet or a grueling workout because it would lead to my losing weight. (That was my golden ticket, after all.)

It wasn’t worth it for me to nourish myself with good foods, self-care or physical activity that I actually enjoyed, because if it didn’t result in weight loss, then I didn’t really want any part of it.

But if I lost weight, the skies would open up, sun shining, and I’d fall in love with myself.

And I’d be worthy of attention and validation, both from myself and from others.

I love Mish’s description of our bodies as mere shells of our souls. Don’t get me wrong, I love dressing up and feeling pretty. (I’m what anyone would call a clotheshorse!)

However, what’s really true, meaningful and incredible is what lurks, dances and sings on the inside. The passion. The quirks. The weird stuff. (I took the pleasing everyone route and being what I thought I should be instead.)

And when you don’t love or respect the deep down you, how can you love the outside?

If you can’t make peace with your inner core, how can you make peace with your outer shell?

I love the idea of working inside out. That’s why I absolutely – 100 percent – believe in self-acceptance at any size. Truly, it’s the only thing that makes sense.

Our bodies will change many times throughout our lives. We’ll be smaller, shorter, leaner, larger, more muscular, less muscular.

But why should our body image or our self-acceptance shift as our outside does?

It’s like our sense of self. What would happen if outside factors, even the smallest things, had the ability to shatter our self-esteem? Just shred it to unrecognizable pieces?

I relied heavily on outside factors for my sense of self. And it amounted to a whole lot of negativity – a damaged body image and a damaged self-image.

So I pick up my pieces every day, as best as I can. (And it feels good.)

This is a profound lesson I’m now starting to learn, one shard at a time.

Maybe that can be your first and second step, too: learning more about yourself. Looking at your layers, and falling in love with them.

Letting yourself love you, from the inside out.

By MARGARITA TARTAKOVSKY, MS

Vinyasa Flow

Geting An Arthritis Diagnosis

Diagnosing arthritis often requires more than just a quick trip to the doctor's office. Even if you have specific symptoms of arthritis, like joint pain, you’ll need diagnostic tests and possibly an appointment with a specialist who can determine if your symptoms are being caused by arthritis and, if so, what type.

Diagnosing Arthritis: The Doctor Visit

If you start experiencing possible symptoms of arthritis that don't subside, it's time to head to the doctor. But who do you go to for the aches and pains of arthritis? The best place to start is with your regular family physician or internist who you see for checkups, colds, the flu, and other basic illnesses.

Your doctor will start by asking you a lot of questions about the symptoms of arthritis you're experiencing and any illnesses or injuries you've had in the past — this is called taking your medical history.

Diagnostic Tests

Next, a series of diagnostic tests will be done to help your doctor figure out if arthritis is what's behind your joint pain and discomfort. Testing may include:

• A physical examination of the joint to look at mobility, swelling, pain, and other signs of joint damage
• A discussion of the severity of your pain
• Blood tests to check for proteins, antibodies, and other indicators of arthritis
• X-rays of the affected joint
• An MRI or CT scan of the joint
• A bone density scan
• An ultrasound of the joint
• Arthroscopy, a procedure in which a tube with a camera on one end is inserted into the joint to get a close-up view of the damage
• Removal and evaluation of a joint fluid sample

Not all of these tests will be necessary, but a combination of them may be needed to get a clear picture of what's causing your symptoms.

If your tests come back positive, your doctor may refer you to a rheumatologist, a doctor who specializes in treating patients with arthritis. From there, you'll figure out what kind of arthritis you have and the best way to treat it.

Possible Arthritis Diagnoses

There is more than one kind of arthritis, which can complicate the diagnostic process. For example, a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis typically requires imaging and blood tests, while osteoarthritis can often be diagnosed more quickly and with fewer tests.

Osteoarthritis, a type of arthritis caused by wear and tear on the joints, is most common in older adults and can often be diagnosed with a medical history, a physical exam, and some lab tests to confirm it. But for rheumatoid arthritis, an autoimmune disease, the diagnostic process is a bit more involved. It requires a more thorough evaluation because there is no one single test that can positively diagnose rheumatoid arthritis right away. Rather, a number of different of tests are needed, and the results are put together like pieces of a puzzle to form a rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis.

Other types of arthritis may also require a more intensive, and extensive, process. These include psoriatic arthritis, a type of arthritis that accompanies the skin disorder psoriasis, and reactive arthritis, a type of arthritis that follows infection. Still others may be misdiagnosed because they look like something else altogether, such as polymyalgia rheumatica, a condition that is typically seen in people aged 50 and up, and ankylosing spondylitis, an autoimmune disorder that affects the spine and some joints.

Diagnosing arthritis may sometimes be a very involved process, but once your doctor determines what you have, you will be on your way to managing your condition.

By Diana Rodriguez

Medically reviewed by Cynthia Haines

EverydayHealth.com

Sleep On It

In recent years, much sleep research has focused on memory, but now results of a new study by University of Massachusetts Amherst psychologist Rebecca Spencer and colleagues suggest another key effect of sleep is facilitating and enhancing complex cognitive skills such as decision-making.

In one of the first studies of its kind, Spencer and postdoctoral fellow Edward Pace-Schott investigated the effects of sleep on affect-guided decision-making, that is decisions on meaningful topics where subjects care about the outcome, in a group of 54 young adults. They were taught to play a card game for rewards of play money in which wins and losses for various card decks mimic casino gambling.

Subjects who had a normal night's sleep as part of the study drew from decks that gave them the greatest winnings four times more often than those who spent the 12-hour break awake, and they better understood the underlying rules of the game. Psychologists believe rule discovery is an often hidden yet key factor that is crucial to making sound decisions.

"This provides support for what Mom and Dad have always advised," says Spencer. "There is something to be gained from taking a night to sleep on it when you're facing an important decision. We found that the fact that you slept makes your decisions better."

This role of sleep in everyday life is accepted as common wisdom, but it hasn't been well characterized by science until now, she adds. She and her colleagues believe this sleep benefit in making decisions may be due to changes in underlying emotional or cognitive processes. "Our guess is that this enhanced effect on decision-making is something that depends on rapid-eye-movement or REM sleep, which is the creative period of our sleep cycle," the psychologist notes. Results are in the current early online issue of the Journal of Sleep Research.

The UMass Amherst study used the Iowa Gambling Task, a gambling card game that assesses frontal lobe function, where more emotional decisions originate. Spencer explains, "It means that you care about the wins and losses. You care about winning."

To begin, the researchers gave two groups of 18- to 23-year-old college undergraduates a brief morning or afternoon preview of the gambling task, so brief that it was not possible for them to learn its underlying rule. Subjects were then asked to come back in 12 hours. The 28 subjects who got the preview in the afternoon went home to a normal evening and their usual night of sleep while the 26 who received the game preview in the morning came back after a day of normal activities with no naps.

On the second visit, subjects played the full gambling task for long enough to learn that drawing cards from four decks of cards yielded different rewards of play money: Drawing from two advantageous decks yielded low rewards, occasional low losses and a net gain over many draws, while drawing from disadvantageous decks yielded high rewards, occasional high losses and a net loss over many draws. The object was to avoid losing and collect as much play money as possible.

Subjects who got to sleep between the game's brief introduction and the longer play session showed both superior behavioral outcome, that is, more advantageous draws, and superior rule understanding when asked to explain them at the end, than those who did not sleep between sessions.

To assure that time of day didn't explain the different performance between sleep and wake groups, the researchers added two smaller groups of 17 and 21 subjects to perform both the preview and the full task either in the morning or the evening. All subjects said they had normal sleep patterns (for college students) and the groups didn't differ on overall game skills at the start. Males and females do not differ in game-playing skills, the authors point out, but there were equal numbers in each group.

Source: University of Massachusetts Amherst