Book Review: The Shadow Effect

The quest for perfection is failed from the start for all of us. There is no perfect life. All of us are a mixture of all that we have experienced, all that has traumatized or hurt us, all that has informed us, all that has inspired and healed us. Our growing up years. Our college days. Our career or work choices. Our marriages and divorces. Our parents, lovers, and friends. It's all a part of who we have become and who we are now.

The Shadow Effect: Illuminating the Hidden Power of Your Self, written by Deepak Chopra, Debbie Ford, and Marianne Williamson, is a fascinating book that explores all we have been, are now, and can still become once we understand and accept our own hidden power under the layers of all that we are.

Read a review of the book here: The Shadow Effect

How to tie your shoes

Terry Moore says that most of us tie our shoes the wrong way. Consequently our laces often come undone. He shows us how to tie them the correct way thus eliminating the frustration of having to retie our shoe laces in the middle of the day. Plus, there's a neat little life lesson in this as well. See the demonstration here: Video on TED.com

Give yourself a pep talk, ok?

Sometimes all we need are just a few simple techniques or tips to help get our focus back and realize that life is to be lived and enjoyed, not just endured. Here are a few ideas to encourage you: Health.com

Find the courage to ask questions

"1. Be Impeccable With Your Word
Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.

2. Don't Take Anything Personally
Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won't be the victim of needless suffering.

3. Don't Make Assumptions
Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.

4. Always Do Your Best
Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret."

~ Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements

The Best Headache Remedies

Headaches are common to all of us.  They often drain us though of necessary strength and the ability to do our work or enjoy our leisure activities.  Here are some easy, practical ways to help find relief.  See the article here: Real Simple

Should Kids Under 13 Be on Facebook?

For those of you with adolescents at home you may want to pay attention to the facts in this piece. Some 20 million minors are on Facebook. With sexual predators, the mentally disturbed, and manipulators with all sorts of bizarre motives sifting through Facebook each day, does it make sense for youth 13 and under to have their own Facebook pages? To help you decide see the article here: Kids on Facebook?

Our love has lifted us up

"We are fated to love one another; we hardly exist outside our love, we are just animals without it, with a birth and a death and constant fear between. Our love has lifted us up, out of the dreadfulness of merely living. “~ John Updike, Novelist

Feeling Negative? Tips for Fighting It

It is so easy to just move into each day full of negative, tiring thoughts about all that is facing us--work, family, duties, chores, kids activities, and so forth. Here are some simple but effective tips to help you stay more upbeat and ready for each day. Read the article here: Get Really Inspired - Health.com

When Life Hands a Hammer Blow

"Do as little harm to others as you can; make any sacrifice for your true friends; be responsible for yourself and ask nothing of others; and grab all the fun you can. Don't give much thought to yesterday, don't worry about tomorrow, live in the moment, and trust that your existence has meaning even when the world seems to be all blind chance and chaos. When life lands a hammer blow in your face, do your best to respond to the hammer as if it had been a cream pie." ~ Dean Koontz, Novelist

Why Daughters Often Idealize Their Fathers

Do daughters tend to idealize their fathers while seeing all the flaws and weaknesses of their mothers? Psychology professor Dr. Peggy Drexler says they do and offers interesting reasons why. Hear a fascinating brief audio clip from her new book, "Our Fathers, Ourselves" here: VF Daily VF Daily: vanityfair.com

A Disciple of Death or Life?

"People are born soft and supple; dead they are stiff and hard. Plants are born tender and pliant; dead, they are brittle and dry. Thus whoever is stiff and inflexible is a disciple of death. Whoever is soft and yielding is a disciple of life. The hard and stiff will be broken. The soft and supple will prevail." ~ Lao Tzu, Chinese Taoist Philosopher

An Amazing Story of Such Generous Love

About the time you think the world is spiraling down a hole of selfishness, shame, corruption, greed, and hate, along comes this story of two gay men whose love and generosity has changed the lives of 12 adopted children, all of them rejected by their parents, left to foster care and despair. This story will touch your heart and make you glad there is still love in the world: Phoenix gay dads adopt, raise 12 happy kids

Men: Drink More Coffee

A new study indicates that increased amounts of coffee, whether regular or decaf, may help prevent the fatal form of prostate cancer in men. There are benefits for women as well. See the article here: Coffee Linked to Lower Risk of Fatal Prostate Cancer - Health.com

The Soul Has Different Concerns

"It's important to be heroic, ambitious, productive, efficient, creative, and progressive, but these qualities don't necessarily nurture soul. The soul has different concerns, of equal value: downtime for reflection, conversation, and reverie; beauty that is captivating and pleasuring; relatedness to the environs and to people; and any animal’s rhythm of rest and activity." ~ Thomas A. Moore, Psychologist

Common Phrases to Avoid in Conversation

Sometimes we all mess up and say something that offends or hurts another person without intending that at all. Here are some tips on how to avoid saying the wrong thing in general conversations and at work. Read the article here: 18 Common Phrases to Avoid in Conversation

A Yearning for Meaningful Lives

"I think at the heart of so much restlessness of the day is a spiritual vacuum. There is a yearning for meaningful lives, a yearning for values we can commonly embrace. I hear an almost inaudible but pervasive discontent with the price we pay for our current materialism. And I hear a fluttering of hope that there might be more to life than bread and circuses." ~ Bill Moyers, Journalist

Natural Cures That Really Work

Here is an article that offers some very helpful tips about natural remedies for various minor illnesses. Some of the findings may surprise you. See the article here: Natural Cures That Really Work

Is Sitting Killing You?

Here is a terrific article about some simple exercises to do while at work.  Sitting for long periods of time carries various health risks including the risk of heart attack.  Even if you workout, exercise, and watch your diet, lengthy periods of just sitting at your desk at work can be hazardous.

See the article here in Men's Health Magazine:
http://www.menshealth.com/mhlists/work_stretches/index.php

The Mind That is Not Baffled is Not Working

"There are, it seems, two muses: the Muse of Inspiration, who gives us inarticulate visions and desires, and the Muse of Realization, who returns again and again to say "It is yet more difficult than you thought." This is the muse of form. It may be then that form serves us best when it works as an obstruction, to baffle us and deflect our intended course. It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work and when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings."  ~ Wendell Berry, Poet/Author

U2 & Daniel Lanois -Falling At Your Feet

This is what you shall do...

"This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward people, go freely with uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families,  re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body."  ~ Walt Whitman

Walk a Little, Lose a Lot

Walking remains a simple yet healthy way to stay fit and keep weight manageable. Here are some great tips on how a walking routine with a few easy exercises thrown in can help make you feel and look good! See the article here: Health.com

An Innocence to Hold Humanity Together

"Many people find it easy to imagine unseen webs of malevolent conspiracy in the world, and they are not always wrong. But there is also an innocence that conspires to hold humanity together, and it is made of people who can never fully know the good that they have done." ~ Tracy Kidder, Author

Sorrow's Kitchen

"I have been in Sorrow's kitchen and licked out all the pots. Then I have stood on the peaky mountain wrapped in rainbows, with a harp and a sword in my hands." ~ Zora Neale Hurston, Novelist  

Life Is Like A Cup of Coffee

The Full Life

The full life is filled with vulnerability, not defense.  You face whatever feeling there is. ~ Virginia Satir, Psychotherapist

Expose yourself to as much humiliation as you can bear

"When you want something, go back and go back and go back, and don't take 'no' for an answer.  And when rejection comes, don't take it personally.  It goes with the territory.   Expose yourself to as much humiliation as you can bear, then go home and go do it all again tomorrow." - Betty Furness, Writer/Consumer Advocate

Secrets to a Stress-Free, Happy, Healthy Family

Many families today are running in circles, especially if you have young children still at home, involved in countless activities. Today's home structure is often so disorganized it causes enormous stress on all of the family members. Here are some tips to help you better manage family stress: Secrets to a Stress-Free, Happy, Healthy Family - Health.com

Raise Your Hand Texas - Tommy Lee Jones PSA

The Good Life - It's Not What You Think

"I believe it will have become evident why, for me, adjectives such as happy, contented, blissful, enjoyable, do not seem quite appropriate to any general description of this process I have called the good life, even though the person in this process would experience each one of these at the appropriate times. But adjectives which seem more generally fitting are adjectives such as enriching, exciting, rewarding, challenging, meaningful. This process of the good life is not, I am convinced, a life for the faint-fainthearted. It involves the stretching and growing of becoming more and more of one's potentialities. It involves the courage to be. It means launching oneself fully into the stream of life. Yet the deeply exciting thing about human beings is that when the individual is inwardly free, he chooses as the good life this process of becoming." ~ Carl Rogers, Psychologist

A weight loss plan that makes sense

I know. I'm not crazy about weight loss programs either. Most are schemes to get you to buy some product. This one is different. Dr. Christiane Northrup is a physician, author, lecturer and a wise and thoughtful person. Take a look at her simple tips and see what you think: Six-Week Weight Loss Program that addresses the emotional aspects of eating.

Why men die long before women

"American men are allotted just as many tears as American women. But because we are forbidden to shed them, we die long before women do, with our hearts exploding or our blood pressure rising or our livers eaten away by alcohol because that lake of grief inside us has no outlet. We, men, die because our faces were not watered enough." ~ Pat Conroy, Novelist