Many of us usually fear to go to the dentist for any kind of mouth check up. A few times, we often tend to bear the pain instead of going to the dentist. These fears are generally caused by any bad experience of the visit to the dentist.

To Find Brooklyn dentists or Dentists in Staten Island is the mot important task so as to reduce the fear from the dentist in your mind. Almost all of us generally remain with the dentist that our family members have been visiting from years and not even thinking that we have a number of options left.

The dentist you choose must have all the necessary skills. A person might not be able to judge any dentist correctly but can find the difference between a good dentist and those who are not so good. A good dentist generally stops for very lesser time during a long dental treatment drilling. This will help you to have some extra time so as to give rest to your jaw.

A properly done filling of silver must last for at least nine to ten years which depends on its location and size while the crowns should last for even more time. Dentist who is performing those fillings which are temporary and that also one after the other instead of doing a permanent one directly might be treating a large number of patients than he can actually treat. So, this results in the point that he does not have proper time so as to focus individually on the problems of every patient.

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By Bridget Grenville-Cleave - November 26, 2008

Forgive my shorter than normal posting; I know that regular readers of Positive Psychology News Daily are used to having far more substantial material to get their teeth into than this particular piece appears to deliver  - but all will become clear in a moment.

There’s less than six weeks to go before the 1^st Cohort finishes the first-ever European MSc in Applied Positive Psychology at the University of East London, UK, under the inspirational leadership of Dr Ilona Boniwell. It’s been an interesting journey. And yes, I say that with typical British understatement.  At the start, in February 07, I expected that the “destination” would reveal itself at some point along the way, and that as a result I would have the option of mapping out (no pun intended) my second, or possibly third, career; this, I now realize, was a tad naive.

The Light at the End of the Tunnel?

Here we are, with the final dissertation deadline in sight, and I’m still questioning:  What did I do all this for? And where am I going with it? Perhaps this is a normal reaction to being neck-deep in statistics and interview transcriptions, grappling with the finer points of SPSS and Quantitative Analysis. And yes, I do regret opting to do mixed methods research…[I feel like a miner, down in the dark, chipping away at the rock face, not knowing whether what I find will be valuable, hoping it will be worth hauling all that way back to surface…This particular research project has literally taken over my life for the past year. But that’s another story…]. In short, perhaps my current unease with the “meaning and purpose” of Positive Psychology is pretty normal for this stage in the game. Maybe some of you Penn MAPP graduates can reassure me!

So it was with huge relief that I stumbled over this gargantuan (12Mb/317 pages) , multi-disciplinary report “Mental Capital and Well-Being: Making the most of ourselves in the 21^st century” from the Government Office for Science, London, published October 22 2008. Quite how anything this substantial managed to slip under our radar is anyone’s guess. Well, no, actually, it’s quite likely that on that particular day last month you were bailing out the banks, trying to ward off a global recession and focussed 24/7 on the presidential election instead…and I was only waist-deep in statistics…

The Future for Positive Psychology

I’m not going to try to review this report (it does that pretty well itself in the Executive Summary, a mere 52 pages), other than to say it’s truly comprehensive, referencing all aspects of psychological well-being, not just from cradle to grave, or individual v societal v environmental, but it also includes the basic biological building blocks, nutrition, sleep and exercise, which seem to be given only a token mention in most Positive Psychology material I’ve read. The key message of Mental Capital and Well-Being is stated as follows:

“…if we are to prosper and thrive in our changing society and in an increasingly interconnected and competitive world, both our mental and material resources will be vital. Encouraging and enabling everyone to realise their potential throughout their lives will be crucial for our future prosperity and wellbeing”.

Of particular importance for students, practitioners and policy-makers alike, I think, are the Systems Maps, which include illustrations of

i)             Mental capital through life

ii)            Conceptual overview of mental health

iii)           Well-being at work

These are the first systems views of psychological well-being that I have seen. They capture so much insight on just one page each - I’m going to enlarge them and stick them on my office wall. And if you turn to Appendix B (pp283-288) you’ll find three pretty scary ‘Future Scenarios’, which outline the challenges for mental capital and well-being that we might be grappling with in 2020…

Turning Negatives into Positives

Don’t be put off by the fact that this report is a British perspective; although the work on which the report is based references many recent or current political initiatives in the UK, over 400 leading experts and stakeholders from countries across the world were involved in the project, so I would suggest that the vast majority of the theory behind the work is relevant to other countries too.

So I’d encourage you to stop whatever else you’re currently doing, and take a quick look now. It may help put things in perspective (the Systems Maps did for me), and potentially may provide you with your Positive Psychology ‘destination’, whatever that might be.

And now, feeling much more motivated, I’ll get back to those stats…

References:

Foresight Mental Capital and Wellbeing Project (2008), Final Project Report. The Government Office for Science, London.

Images:

1)    amanky

2)    kodame (home)

3)    dailyinvention

This article first appeared on Positive Psychology News Daily. To see the original article, click here. To comment on this article, click here.

By Derrick Carpenter - November 25, 2008

Is That Me, Excited about My Country?

On the night of the presidential election, I lounged and chatted on a cozy couch with friends in a Philadelphia apartment near the University of Pennsylvania as the state-by-state results were reported. We pondered the implications of the Harold Zullow and Martin Seligman study that linked winning presidential elections to optimism. Within moments of the official announcement of Barack Obama’s victory, the street outside – a main campus artery – was overcome by a crowd of supporters. There were hundreds of people joyfully and peacefully making their way down the middle of the road. We immediately gave up watching the television and stood by the window to take in the spectacle. “Where were they all going, and from where did they all come?” we pondered. We had no idea, but just watching them, hugging as they went, and listening to the buzz of energy audible through the closed window sent chills down my spine.

An hour or so later, I had to feed the meter where my car was parked, so I headed to street level, curious to get closer to the action. The crowds had thinned a bit, but as I walked down the sidewalk, two young men whom I assume were local college students, ran down the street carrying a huge American flag over their heads. It was the kind of sight one would expect to see at an animated World Cup match featuring fan-favorite South American super-teams, not here in the United States and never for something so dull as an election. The best part was that they did not seem to be celebrating a victory over something or someone, but rather an unadulterated pride in their country. They smiled unabashedly to everyone they passed, and I noticed another young woman watching them, who then looked at me and smiled. I felt a sudden rush of feeling connected and warm to everyone around me. These flag-bearing students were creating a wave of positive emotions that spread quickly among the nearby pedestrians. It is an image I will never forget.

I want to be clear: this was not an Obama thing, and this was not a McCain thing. This was a human thing. And it is a phenomenon that should be of great interest to positive psychology. Although one can assume most of the people experiencing joy that night had voted on the Democratic ticket earlier that day, the experience I had on the streets of Philadelphia had very little to do with party platforms and candidate preferences. There was simply an air of happiness and it spread like wildfire among people, and did so intensely. Barbara Frederickson recently wrote an op-ed relating the post-election emotional highs to her Broaden-and-Build Theory of positive emotions, but I think there was more involved that night than positive emotions. There was a profound sense of human connection. But what does positive psychology have to say about such moments of subjectively meaningful human connection?

What is the Human Connection?

In Authentic Happiness, Martin Seligman originally divided positive psychology into the study of three distinct domains: positive emotion, engagement or flow, and meaning. He defines the third domain, meaning, as a connection to something larger than the self, which encompasses many types of self-transcendence but certainly includes moments of deep human connection. In an attempt to describe the overly social tendencies of humans, Jonathan Haidt in The Happiness Hypothesis likens human groups in our evolutionary history to hives, where strong interpersonal bonds and commitment to other people allowed us to survive trying adversity. In fact, there exists an entire sub-theory of evolution known as multi-level selection theory that claims human evolution operated not only on the traditional Darwinian level of individual fitness but also on the level of group fitness. According to these theorists, human groups that possessed traits allowing them to work and bond together more than others would outlast groups lacking those traits (see David Sloan Wilson’s Evolution for Everyone).

As an example, let’s consider two primal human tribes living on nearby plains in northern Africa. We’ll call them the Jabi and the Kulu. The Jabi tribe has consistently developed individuals with extraordinary hunting expertise by taking young boys out to hunt for long excursions at an early age. The Kulu tribe, on the other hand, spends less time training their boys to hunt but devotes more time to building community bonds of love, affection, and loyalty. The Jabi consists of more evolutionarily-advantaged individuals, who typically outlast less skilled individuals like the Kulu in traditional evolutionary models. Imagine, however, that the plains undergo a serious drought and the safety of each tribe is jeopardized by a sudden fire. Each tribe has one member who had been out retrieving water by the river and returns to find his tribesman encircled by flames. These tribesman have an opportunity to put their lives at serious risk to rescue all the others. The Kulu tribesman, having developed stronger bonds for his clan, is more likely to take the risk and rescue his tribe, even if it means risking his own life. Modern humans evolved from tribes that increasingly resembled the Kulu.

Emotions Synchronized and a Greater Community

In our evolutionary history, many mechanisms have supported the development of strong group bonding. McGill professor Daniel Levitin recently published a book about the evolutionary importance of music and dance in shaping the social human brain, in which he describes how inclusive and participatory music was in our developmental history. Ancient tribes training for battle against rivals created bonds similar to those of modern-day militaries. Describing his emotions during synchronized marching drills with hundreds of other recruits in the US Army’s basic training, William McNeill states:

“A sense of pervasive well-being is what I recall; more specifically, a strange sense of personal enlargement; a sort of swelling out, becoming bigger than life, thanks to participation in collective ritual” (p. 2, 1995).

Artistic expression, storytelling, and even religion—according to some theorists—all developed to encourage the strength of hive emotion bonds between people.

In modern society, we’ve come a long way from our tribal ancestors. Segways. iPhones. DVR. We can only imagine what’s next. But for all the ways that technology and our futuristic mores are connecting us with others, we’re also becoming a society of individuals. We can pass hundreds of people on our way to work and acknowledge none of them. We praise those who rise above the pack to achieve greatness, even if it is lonely at the top. And we often focus much more on our slight individual differences than our vast interpersonal commonalities. We have to go out of our way to connect with others and find meaning. The tragic events of September 11th brought us together for a while as we mourned together, but it was short-lived and the negative tone was far from ideal. It’s one of the reasons people volunteer for many months to partake in a political campaign in which they believe. The feeling of being a part of a greater community, of something larger than oneself, is irresistible. We thirst for it. It’s part of our very nature.

Sharing

Amidst the economy, the wars, and the environment, I believe the continual growth of meaningful human connections is one of the biggest challenges we currently face. And don’t expect it to be resolved in Washington. This is a grassroots campaign that will take place on your sidewalk, one genuine smile at a time.

A few days after the election, I called my mom. In addition to our typical talking points (Yes, mom, I’ll be driving home for Thanksgiving. Yes, I’ll watch out for all the crazy folks on the road…), we discussed the implications of an Obama-run White House and the significance that this election will have in history. She had her share of stories of friends from election night and the following morning. Some stories revolved around disappointment, but many followed the uplifting theme of human connection. I began to describe to her the flag bearers I saw in Philadelphia the previous night and the feelings that it evoked in me, and I began to cry. Because not only had I experienced a great moment of human connection the night before, but by sharing the story I was creating another one at that very instant with my mom, who I knew understood. For a moment we snapped out of our traditional mother-son roles and became complete equals, recognizing each other’s hopes and vulnerabilities, and sharing our emotional selves freely. I had never been prouder to be both an American and a son. It was human connection at its greatest.

Images: Philadelphia street 1, Philadelphia street 2, flag, multi-level selection theory, tribe, human connection

References

Fredrickson, B. L. (1998). What good are positive emotions? Review of General Psychology, 2(3), 300-319.

Haidt, J. (2006). The happiness hypothesis: Finding modern truth in ancient wisdom. New York: Basic Books.

Levitin, D. J. (2008). The World in Six Songs: How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature. New York: Dutton.

McNeill, W. H. (1995). Keeping together in time: Dance and drill in human history. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Seligman, M. E. P. (2002). Authentic happiness: Using the new positive psychology to realize your potential for lasting fulfillment. New York: Free Press.

Wilson, D. S. (2007). Evolution for everyone: How Darwin’s theory can change the way we think about our lives. New York: Delacorte Press.

Zullow, H., & Seligman, M. E. P. (1990). Pessimistic rumination predicts defeat of presidential candidates, 1900 to 1984. Psychological Inquiry, 1, 52-61.

This article first appeared on Positive Psychology News Daily. To see the original article, click here. To comment on this article, click here.

By Marie-Josée Salvas - November 24, 2008

Did you know that the average American puts on 10 pounds between Thanksgiving and Christmas?

And how much do you figure the average Holiday shopper has spent per year for the past 10 years?  $500?  $600?  Try $961!

This year may be different: according to a recent Gallup-Healthways Well-Being measure, the majority of Americans report they are struggling financially at the moment and almost 90% of people think their situation will continue to deteriorate. Our national savings rate has been steadily negative since 2005, a first since the Great Depression years.

Three Epidemics: Obesity, Inactivity, Indebtedness

If the financial news worries you, there is more to be thinking about. In America, over two thirds of adults and 17% of children and adolescents are overweight or obese, which costs over $117 billion annually to the country.  In addition, fewer than 20% of the population exercises sufficiently to experience the health benefits associated with physical activity.

Yes, we are observing what are now referred to as epidemics in obesity, inactivity, and indebtnesess. These concerning trends are all on the rise, and there is no sign that they are slowing down. While any single individual may not solve the economic crisis, there is a lot each one of us can do to reverse the obesity, exercise, and spending trends.

Victimology 

What if we first take accountability? We hear about credit card debt and obesity as if they were viruses we could inadvertently catch through no fault of our own. Few people have costly medical conditions that drive them deep into debt, or that make them much more prone to put on pounds.

For the majority of indebted people, it’s overspending that’s driving them into debt. Who spends the money? It is not some external uncontrollable force. It is the cardholder. Similarly, what if we take accountability for the weight we put on?  We have to eat 3,500 calories over our caloric expenditure to put on one pound of fat.  To gain those unwelcome ten pounds between Thanksgiving and Christmas, that would be 35,000 calories inside 35 days - or, yes, you got that right, 1000 calories per day!  That’s a lot of food. If your arm is easily twisted by family members wanting you to “pound down” - literally - one more piece of pie, keep reading.  This article is for you.

Self-Regulation

Often dismissed as a no-glam strength, self-regulation may be the key to the ills here described. Problem is, it requires work and we tend to prefer the easy road.

But here’s the good news: Dr. Roy Baumeister  suggests that self-regulation is a core capacity with spill-over benefits. In other words, if you can self-regulate in one domain of your life, you can do so more easily in other domains.  Are you surprised that self-regulating in food may lead to better money management?

I have been working with a client for quite some time - we’ll call her Sarah.  Sarah was obese, sometimes moody, and admitted she spent too much. We decided to get her started with a regular exercise program. Here’s what happened.

While Sarah trains, she’s away from the temptation of spending. Physical activity also boosts self-esteem, so these sexy new Versace jeans and that overpriced Coach handbag no longer appear necessary anymore. Her new posture - shoulders back, tummy in, chest out - is working wonders for her.

Physical activity is not only calorie expenditure, but it also keeps Sarah away from food for some time. What’s more, since she trains regularly, her body needs higher quality energy, and so she is naturally drawn to healthier food choices. Better food, better mood (for more details on this topic, please see my previous article Food Influences Mood).

Today, Sarah is still overweight, but no longer obese.  Her spending patterns are much healthier and her credit cards are paid off. The best part? While exercising used to be an act of self-regulation, she now enjoys it and is convinced she will continue to be physically active all her life. (Need to get started?  Try reading my Top 10 Stimuli to Exercise Your Body.)

Sarah got herself out of the national statistics thanks to self regulation and exercise. This strategy may not solve all the world’s problems, but it certainly can address the bad news about obesity, inactivity, and indebtedness - and help us avoid making things worse over the Holidays.  It does require work, but the pay-off may be well worth it.

So how will you approach the Holidays this year?  Will you mentally equate the Holiday enjoyment with a food coma or with cozy conversation?  Will you need to undo the button of your jeans after your Thanksgiving dinner, or will you support the idea that self-regulation is sexier?

Images: Holiday Shopping Cart, Thanksgiving Dinner , Mother-Daughter Hug

Baumeister, R. F., Gailliot, M., DeWall, C. N., & Oaten, M. (2006). Self-regulation and personality: How interventions increase regulatory success, and how depletion moderates the effects of traits on behavior. Journal of personality, 74(6), 1773-1801.

Boyle, M.A. & Long, S. (2007). Personal Nutrition, Sixth Edition. Belmont, CA: Thomson Wadsworth.

Brooks, D.S. (2004). The Complete Book of Personal Training. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetix.

Fleming, J., Rath, T. and Conchie, B. (2008). Your Organization’s Survival Plan: When the going gets tough, high-performing companies make sure they double down their investments in people. Gallup Management Journal, Web Edition, November 13, 2008.

American Research Group (Nov 14, 2008). Shoppers Cut 2008 Christmas Spending Plans in Half from 2007. Retrieved November 22, 2008 from http://americanresearchgroup.com/holiday/

Ratey, J. (2008). Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain. New York: Little, Brown and Company.

Seligman, M. (2008). Address at the Masters of Applied Positive Psychology Summit, October 2008.

Thaler, R. H. & Sunstein, C.R. (2008). Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

This article first appeared on Positive Psychology News Daily. To see the original article, click here. To comment on this article, click here.

By Yee-Ming Tan - November 23, 2008

I found this quote on a billboard in the City Hall Square in Copenhagen while on holiday there last month: Replace fear of the unknown with curiosity. Recognizing moments of fear or anxiety is simple enough but entering a state of curiosity is a real challenge for me, probably has something to do with my practical sensibility.

Recent research by Beerman and colleagues published in the Journal of Positive Psychology suggests that curiosity is one of five strengths closely related to life satisfaction (the other four are gratitude, optimism, zest and the ability to love and be loved). Although it ranked pretty high on my VIA profile (no. 8 on the Values-in-Action Strengths-Inventory), I don’t feel ownership with curiosity like I do with my top 5 strengths yet. So how might one go about developing this strength?

Christopher Peterson, the developer of the VIA method, suggests cultivating our strengths by first identifying and using them in new ways. Curiosity is defined in the VIA as:

Curiosity [interest, novelty-seeking, openness to experience]:
“Taking an interest in ongoing experience for its own sake; finding subjects and topics fascinating; exploring and discovering.”

My A-ha Moment about Curiosity

I considered identifying fear- or anxiety-driven situations: that seemed like a good starting point.  But then I had an a-ha moment in a most unexpected occasion. It was over a dinner with my workshop participants talking about customer profiling in luxury cosmetics marketing. Based on my buying behavior, I am definitely not an early adopter. Early adopters like to explore and discover new things and experiences. I am exactly the opposite. The launch of a new product cannot lure me to the cosmetics counter. I don’t get tempted to try a new brand of my favorite food in the supermarket. I like to order the same food on the menu in restaurants.

The a-ha moment for me was that I do possess a high level of curiosity but only in specific domains. I am not curious about material things but am highly curious when people are concerned. I want to know other people’s stories and what makes a person tick. I love to travel to different countries and experience the locals’ lifestyles. I love googling and checking out new websites to explore what is cool and interesting out there.

Specific Curiosity Exercises 

This insight enables me to experiment with a more nuanced approach to incorporate more curiosity in my life especially in the here-and-now moments. Here are some positive psychology exercises I tried:

• Starting now, to always order a dish I’ve never tried before in restaurants.
• Pick a knowledge field I don’t normally go for. For example, my favorite website www.ted.com offers topics in many themes. Apart from my favorite themes, what makes us happy and how does the mind work, I make it a point to check out videos on themes I am least drawn to.
• Break my routine by varying the route to work or by sitting in a different wagon on the train.
• Try a new brand of food or toiletries when grocery shopping.
• Listen to different genres of music or to unfamiliar musicians.
• Hang around people who are high in curiosity and allow them to lead me into new experiences!

Once I intentionally suspended my preoccupation with being practical and resisted the tendency to ruminate on negative events, it became easier to treat the unknown as an adventure, which often leads to amazing encounters. Curiosity is still not a signature strength for me and it may never be, but the practice of cultivating curiosity has certainly exposed me to the richness of life, higher peaks and deeper valleys. Even when the outcome isn’t good, I will have wonderful experiences to add to my memory bank, and a good story to tell my friends!

References

Beermann, U., Park, N., Peterson, C., Ruch, W., & Seligman, M.E.P. (2007), Strengths of Character, Orientations to Happiness and Life Satisfaction, The Journal of Positive Psychology, 2(3): 149-156

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. New York: Harper Collins.

Dean, B (2004) Curious About Curiosity? http://viacharacter.org/VIAClassification/MoreOnStrengths/Curiosity/tabid/118/Default.aspx

Park, N., Peterson, C., & Seligman, M.E.P. (2004), Strengths of Character and Well-Being, Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, Vol. 23, No. 5, 2004, pp. 603-619

Peterson, C. (2007) ,  A Primer in Positive Psychology, Oxford University Press, Pages 158 – 160

This article first appeared on Positive Psychology News Daily. To see the original article, click here. To comment on this article, click here.

By Denise Clegg - November 20, 2008

Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel predicts interdisciplinary research in neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy will lead to a new “science of mind” in this century, finally illuminating an integrated, biological understanding of the embodied mind. Kandel outlines five principles for this new science of mind:

1) mind and brain are inseparable;
2) all mental functions of the brain are carried out by specialized neural circuits;
3) each of these circuits are made up of nerve cells;
4) specific molecules generate signals within and between nerve cells; and
5) these signaling molecules have been conserved through millions of years of evolution.

What Gives Shape to Brain Maps and Is Created by Brain Maps?

These neural networks and firing patterns are commonly called brain maps. Brain maps correspond to everything in experience, from wiggling your toes to complex patterns of mental and emotional growth as well as illness. Brain maps are both shaped by and creators of habit, and can be radically transformed by a range of conditions including love and trauma. From this perspective, positive psychology exercises work when they alter the brain’s structure and functioning

Wilder Penfield

Behavior, actions, memory, and even abstract concepts correlate with brain maps. Those networks that are used again and become dominant, enhancing or inhibiting positive change and growth. Wilder Penfield pioneered brain mapping and discovered maps corresponding to every part of the body, as well as networks containing vivid, long-lost childhood memories and sensory impressions. Though different areas of the brain are highly specialized, the form and function of its networks are dynamic.

Researchers have found that the brain responds “plastically” to change by constantly reorganizing these brain maps. Learning new skills means creating new networks, usually by engaging and adapting existing networks and sometimes by creating new neurons. As such, the human brain is always able to change, but this plasticity is competitive; strongly reinforced maps take up space with larger neurons in faster connective networks. That is why practice makes perfect and a bad habit is hard to break.

Norman Doidge proposes that brain reorganizes itself  in three basic ways, related to how one perceives the world, acts in the world, and thinking about or imagines the world. He has also described how positive emotions and experiences play an important role in neurogenesis and neuroplasticity. There is clearly great potential for interdisciplinary research in neuroscience and positive psychology, and for integrated models of positive intervention.

For He’s a Jolly Good . . . Habit

For instance, I like to think of character strengths as old good habits–correlating to strong neural networks that can be engaged for new learning and reinforced with practice. Christopher Peterson defines character strengths as the psychological ingredients, processes, or mechanisms that define human virtues. Those might just correlate with  well-traveled maps in the virtuous mind. Research has shown that using your signature strengths in new ways can be one of the most effective positive psychology exercises, increasing happiness and decreasing depressive symptoms for six months following just one week of practice. Future research may show that strengths-based approaches to perceiving the world, acting in the world, and thinking in the world can “positively” change the structure of your brain.

Images: Electrical Neuron, Penfield

Doidge, N. (2007). The Brain That Changes Itself. New York: Penguin Books.

Kandel, E. R. (2007). The new science of mind. In F. Bloom (Ed.), Best of the brain Scientific American, 68-75.

Peterson, C. & Seligman, M.E.P. (2004). Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification. Oxford University Press.

Positive Psychology Progress: Empirical Validation of Interventions, Seligman, Steen, Park, & Peterson, 2005

This article first appeared on Positive Psychology News Daily. To see the original article, click here. To comment on this article, click here.

Sent to me by one of my peeps. Looks like it might be worth checking out. Productive! Magazine Even though I don’t talk about David Allen so much anymore, I still love him and do use his system with great…

We’re in the home stretch with under 24 hours to go in the raffle and a second coaching package and more prizes have been added. Prizes will continue to increase in size and number as more chances are sold with…

By Kirsten Cronlund - November 16, 2008

I remember well the hard times during my divorce. An angry voicemail, an upcoming court date about child custody, simply the yawning abyss of the unknown. Every fiber in my being felt raw and agitated, and I could barely concentrate.  That’s when I pulled out the big guns.

I don’t remember how I discovered this most powerful tool, but once I experienced its potency I used it as frequently as I could. My secret weapon was walking (fast) on my treadmill while listening to recordings of inspirational speakers. I would begin my workout feeling jittery and snappish, and at the end of the hour I would be filled with not just calm, but a generosity of spirit that can only come from the absolute trust that all is well.

I didn’t take the time to ask myself why this intervention was so effective. (The word “intervention” in terms of an activity or exercise wasn’t even something I tended to throw around. “Survival” was more like it.) But now it’s easy for me to see why it worked.

Punch One – Exercise

Psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky outlines some compelling findings on the restorative power of exercise in her book The How of Happiness. She begins by telling about an experiment that showed exercise to be more effective in treating depression than Zoloft, even 6 months after the end of the treatment. But why? Lyubomirsky boils it down to three main reasons:

1. Exercising and becoming physically stronger makes us feel stronger. That’s because we are better able to meet physical challenges and we are more flexible so we are less likely to become injured, but it also is a psychological accomplishment to begin and maintain an exercise regime. This boosts our confidence (or “self-efficacy,” in psychological speak).

2. Exercise can, in the best of circumstances, bring about flow (that state in which you are so fully engaged that you lose all track of time) – and, if not flow, it tends to at least distract us from troubles and worries. This calming effect of exercise lasts for hours, even after the exercise session is finished. Lyubomirsky points out that the impact is similar to the benefits of meditation.

3. When exercising with others, the activity provides an opportunity for social connection.

4. Exercise has been shown to raise levels of serotonin, which acts like a natural Prozac.

All of the above explanations for why exercise provides a pick-me-up ring true for my self-prescribed divorce positive intervention. All of them, except for #3, the social connection explanation. But I believe that’s where my inspirational CDs come into play.

Punch Two – Inspirational Speakers

My treadmill is in my basement. It’s pretty isolated from the rest of the world. Pretty much all you can see out the windows is sky or the occasional feet of a passer-by. So it would certainly look to the occasional spider on the wall like I was sweating all by myself. But I’ll tell you what – it sure didn’t feel that way to me. I had my headset on and my mind and heart were cracked open by the likes of Pema Chodron, Richard Rohr, Jack Kornfield, and Eckhart Tolle. The messages they espoused in such gentle yet significant ways were ones of simplicity, of gratitude for this moment, of connection to all other beings who habitate this planet. When I listened to their heartfelt messages I was gradually transported to a worldview that made my divorce troubles seem insignificant, both in comparison to what others might be enduring, but also in a way that helped me recognize their fleeting nature. This moment is full, yes, with goodness and plenty, and the troubles that plague me were not a problem two years ago, and they will be utterly forgotten in fifty. I believe what I was experiencing was what psychologist Jonathan Haidt calls elevation. And I definitely felt connected.

I’m a Lover, Not a Fighter

Stepping off my treadmill, then, I was truly transformed. No more anxiety, and it often didn’t return for hours or days. I felt strong, physically and emotionally, I felt energized, and I felt generous in my heart. Not only did I not have to worry about the thing that had been troubling me, but I could and often did reach out to others with the intention of bringing joy to them. So if you had asked me then why or how my “positive intervention” was working, I would have shrugged my shoulders, but now I feel empowered by the explanations – so much so that I think I’ll go jump on my treadmill.

References:

Haidt, J. (2006). The happiness hypothesis: finding modern truth in ancient wisdom. New York: Basic Books.

Lyubomirsky, S. (2008). The how of happiness: a scientific approach to getting the life you want. New York: The Penguin Press.

Images:

Boxer, Treadmill, Planet Earth

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Does your vision board frustrate you? Do you feel like you are just not getting the whole Law of Attraction thing and are worried that there is something wrong with you?
Relax… there is another gentler path to the top of the hill.
Let me point it out for you…