Loading the searchable article library…
Browse published articles attributed to Judy Goldman, with full-archive search.
Perhaps one of the strongest motivations for the development of the recent branch of psychology known as Positive Psychology, is the desire to move away from viewing the purpose of care as the treatment of mental illness. Professionals see things that are wrong with patients and they go to work to try and correct or fix the problems.
Have you ever heard the saying “Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift of God, which is why we call it the present?” Let’s give credit where it is due. That quote belongs to Bill Keane, the creator of the old cartoo Family Circus. Mother Teresa had a very similar one. She said, “Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.”
All good counselors and therapists learn early on, possibly the most valuable skill they can develop, is to meet their clients where they are. Active listening skills are necessary in order to effectively communicate with everybody, but none more so, than with teenagers.
Once more, mindfulness is being totally present and in the moment and avoiding judgment. So how do we connect our increased practice with mindfulness to our eating behaviors and attitude to food? Sadly, we let our lives become so busy that things become automatic, even some of the things we should devote more of our focus and energy toward. Eating is one of them. Even if a person doesn’t have issues with overeating, it has been proven that being mindful to our food and digestion when we eat is much healthier for us.
I love the Beatles as much as the next guy; maybe even more. But current research clearly demonstrates that there is quite a bit more to Happiness than a ‘warm gun.’ (For those of you who may not be up on your Beatle trivia, I’m referring to a song, written by John Lennon, off their eponymous double-disc album “The Beatles,” also known as “The White Album.”)
Mindfulness is about stabilizing. Studies have shown that people who have experienced trauma can benefit highly from this type of work. (Cullen, 2011). When people have experienced trauma, they can be challenged with high levels of stress, anxiety and depression at any time. When we increase focus, stress and anxiety decreases, and as insight increases, depression may also be reduced. The implications of effective mindfulness on these specific features are truly significant and the more studies that are being done, the stronger the evidence of effective results of mindfulness.
Many years ago, I read a book that spoke about how we need to provide ourselves with self-check ups. It was a strange idea, I thought, because I’m with myself all the time, what on earth do I need to check in about? But I am sure that we can all relate to ‘catching’ ourselves doing certain things – when a moment of sanity hits us smack in the head – and we realize something is going on with us that we had absolutely no conscious awareness of at all.
Projected Ages of Centenarians: How many people living in the United States are 100 years of age or more? 10,000? 25,000? 50,000? Well, if you agreed with any of these numbers you still would be way too low. More than 84,000 people living in the United States have reached the mark of centenarian (100-years-old).
I’ve been doing some more work with emotional awareness and mindfulness. This is quickly becoming something that has a firm grasp on my interest and focus. And one of the things that I am zeroing in on is the difference between : • Thinking about feelings • Feeling the feelings Historically, I am hugely analytic. Ask anyone who knows me. They will confirm that at some point or another, I have undoubtedly made them a bit crazy with my tendency to analyze and over-analyze anything and everything.
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
So, let’s talk a bit more about emotions. It is not a huge leap from understand and accepting physical development taking time to that of our emotional development and growth needing time to develop into maturity as well. That is why as children, we cannot cope with many events in our lives in a balanced way. This begs the question “How DO we handle feelings that we are not yet developmentally able to balance properly?”
There is so much more to be said for the topic of mindfulness. One image that continues to come back to me each time I start to write about it, is that of shadow boxing. When we are in a situation in which we are not able to see or understand whatever it is we have to undertake, there is no way we can be very effective with it. The more we understand the task we are faced with, the better we can accomplish it. That seems like it would be such an indisputable fact that it boggles my mind when it comes to issues like anxiety, depression or emotional struggles we may have.
It makes sense to think that the average person believes things they hear and see on television. I’m not referring to the shows that are clearly fictional, but rather commentary-type information whether it is in the form of news, documentary, or even on commercials. And they do.
Did you ever make up your mind that you were going to buy a new car? One of the most amazing things happens when that occurs. After painstaking contemplation and consideration, you finally decide on the make and model you are going to get, maybe even the color.
If we wish to learn a new habit, there is much documentation to support that we need to spend approximately a month repeating the new behavior in order to get it to become routine in any way. We learn better slowly, giving our brains time to process and absorb and finally retain important pieces of information and behaviors that we wish to repeat and incorporate as part of our regular activities.
If we were asked where our thoughts come from, most likely every one of us would point to our heads. We know that our brain houses our thoughts and with current research, we understand the process of neurons firing – our ‘brains’ telling us what to do. If we were asked where our movement comes from, most likely we would point to our arms and legs. We know that the muscles, tendons, bone and skin comprising our arms and legs produce movement as we raise, bend, lower, flex or maneuver them in some way.