Brene Brown - The power of vulnerability

On a world that seems to spin faster and faster and always more agressively, where perfection seems to become a mandatory trait, from time to time someone shows up with such a simple and yet viral idea that they can change the lives of millions of people. In this extraordinary talk, Brene Brown speaks about her work and the importance of vulnerability in our everyday lives.

It never ceases to amaze me how we can change our lives for the better, sometimes by simply allowing ourselves to see our own beauty... So true of psychotherapy as well!

If you haven't had the opportunity yet, I deeply advise you to invest your free time listening to this amazing speaker:


http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html

Your personality, skills and competences make a brand

Fifteen years ago management guru Tom Peters wrote about personal branding. People as brands. He asked: what makes you different from anyone else?

Your education? Hundreds, thousands of people have the same formal education you do. Experience? Of course, but there will always be someone who has more.

It's your value that makes your brand. And what is that? What you are makes an unique and invaluable combination provided you're able to demonstrate how your value can add to the value of others.

So, what is personal branding about? It's about your personality, your skills, your experience. Look at your self as a product with value that you have to sell and try to customize it. You may call it your self, Peters chose to call it your personal brand.

There are several ways to build a brand and sell it. More of it next time.

Surprised with the concept of people as brands? Look around you and you'll find a few notable examples.

Barack Obama, for instance: smart, handsome, lean, energetic, well spoken, appealing to minorities, ex-layer, a shrewd politician that does't look like one of them. On top of it: a wonderful smile. Obama brand is in fact the most powerfull brand in the world.

Keep learning! But how?

I read this interesting article in Big Think about the techniques for learning. New studies have lead to different conclusions from what was previously believed.

Being a lifetime learner I was drawn to some of these conclusions. The most striking one seems to be about the time period you should re-study taking into consideration the time you want to remember the suject.

Quoting: "Research has found that the optimal level of distribution of sessions for learning is 10-20% of the length of time that something needs to be remembered. So if you want to remember something for a year you should study at least every month, if you want to remember something for five years you should space your learning every six to twelve months. If you want to remember something for a week you should space your learning 12-24 hours apart."

Interesting, uhu?

I believe most people know by now that things have changed and we have to keep studying for all our lives. The pace of change is such that you really cannot avoid to freshen up what you know and if need be to learn again.

if you want to know more go to

http://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/assessing-the-evidence-for-the-one-thing-you-never-get-taught-in-school-how-to-learn?utm_source=Big+Think+Weekly+Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=c48eac05b9-_Here_s_What_s_New_at_Big_Think2_22_2013&utm_medium=email

 

What a beautiful name for a star

(photo credit: NASA)

 

LL Ori is the name of a star in the Orion nebula. This young star produces a stellar wind that is much powerful than our sun's, who is not so young anymore. In this beautifull photo you can see it on the left, burning like fire.

One can see the nebula and some of its stars with a naked eye if the night is clear.

We shoud tell our chidren more about what's happening in the skyes above. Going to an observatory shoud be a good start. NASA has wonderful pictures of the universe that children can see on the screen. However, knowing that they can see them for themselves if they know where to look is another kind of experience.

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2442.html

 

 

Learn or live? Both

We're living uncertain times. The more the need to invest in ourselves. Us as people and us as professionals.

In the old times you got a degree for the rest of your life and you'de be living on that. Not now. Now we have to keep up constantly with change. We have to keep fit mentally and physically. We have to learn or improve different skills and capabilities. The boundaries between private life and profession become fuzzier and that's also a cause for rising anxiety. We have to keep improving some aspects of our personalities and behavior and learning new skills. Knowledge is very precious and no one will do it for you. It takes self-motivation and will power.

Flexibility, adaptation, communication, empathy, assertiveness, resilience - these are the keywords. These capabilities are part of knowledge in the broad sense. How to improve or acquire them?

Many people don't know what goes between a psychotherapist and his (her) client. In fact, it's a process of learning for both parts. The important thing is that the client is able to improve communication, empathy, awareness, self-perception. He's supposed to acquire skills that will be useful for the rest of his life.

Private life and work being so entangled nowadays, the more important it is to know yourself, your limits and your strenghs and make use of them.

 

 

More energy or more time?

Work demands more and more from us. Most people respond to that by working longer hours. But we may have a better and more productive way. It's about energy.

Schwartz and McCarthy in a paper for Harvard Business Review ("Manage your energy, not your time") argue that the capacity for work can be re-energized with greater and bettter output than by working more hours.

How can we achieve that? According to the authors, our energy comes from body, emotions, mind and spirit. Those forms of energy come from:

Physical energy: comes from nutrition (for example light snacks every three hours), exercise, sleep and rest (regular breaks respecting ultradian cicles every 90 min or 120 min)

Emotional energy: awareness of whar triggers negative emotions, expressing appreciation to others.

Mental energy: fully focusing from 90 to 120 min, establishing priorities for next day.

Spiritual energy: sense of meaning and purpose, establishing a few rituals (gratification, living one's core values).

Re-energizing seems to be hard work but feasible. Our quality of life certainly deserves we dedicate time to it.

 

Give your mind a break

You may want to read an article by Matthew E. May in Harvard Business Review about the more recent discoveries neuro-science has made on the benefits of meditation.

It seems that meditation, pulsing and day dreaming are powerful tools to boost creativity. They also keep your brain younger helping prevent dementia and slowIng the aging process.

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/12/quick_and_easy_ways_to_quiet_y.html?referral=00563&cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-daily_alert-_-alert_date&utm_source=newsletter_daily_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=alert_date

 

 

Wishes for 2013

 

In the Lisbon Clinic we prize well-being and mental health. What's mental health?, you may ask.

Being mentally healthy doesn't mean never to be sad or even depressed. Or angry, or very upset. It means to acept your own emotions and deal with them without harming yourself (and preferably anyone else).

Freud used to say that it meant to be able to love and work. Being able to enjoy small pleasures in life and of course big ones. And deal with what comes in a minimally traumatic way. Being able to learn through life.

Another thinker, Hannah Arendt, wrote once: "This is the precept by which I have lived: Prepare for the worst; expect the best; and take what comes".

In a time of recession and rising economic difficulties, we're again put to the test. It takes flexibility, creativity and resilience to be able to go on fighting for quality of life. We have to count on our inner strenghts to cope with these hard times. We must teach our children how important emotional skills - not only academic - are for their future.

Have a better year.

 

Our Self: how to connect with it

We are what we are and not what others think of us. The connection with our Self is the subject of this article by Peter Bregman, on the site of Harvard Business Review. Peter Bregman is a consultant to CEOs and companies and knows how important it is to have a strong and cohese self. In the absence of it, we go adrift as he so well describes.

The good news are that a you can learn how to build a strong self. In fact, that's a purpose of any well conducted psychoterapy: building and asserting your identity.

http://blogs.hbr.org/bregman/2012/12/try-meditation-to-strengthen-y.html?referral=00563&cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-daily_alert-_-alert_date&utm_source=newsletter_daily_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=alert_date


 

PTSD: an anxiety disorder that needs to be dealt with

Natural disasters, traffic accidents or random acts of violence are present in the everyday lives of modern society and constitute potentially traumatic and stress-inducing events with deep physical and psychological consequences. Post traumatic stress-disorder (PTSD) is at the core of modern psychopathology and requires a focused, specialized intervention and treatment. Common symptoms include flashbacks, nightmares, feelings of intense distress, physical reactions (pounding heart, rapid breathing, nausea…), loss of memory, difficulty falling or staying asleep or even difficulty concentrating.

Sometimes the symptoms include different signs of avoidance: emotional numbing (feeling as though you don't care about anything), showing less of your moods, feeling detached, not able to remember important aspects of the traumatic event, lacking interest in normal activities, avoiding places, people, or thoughts that remind you of the event, feeling like you have no future.

All those are signs thay you need to consult with a psychotraumatologist, someone who specializes in this anxiety disorder.

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Baraka and Kecak

Baraka is an ancient Sufi word, which can be translated "as a blessing, or the breath, or the essence of life from which the evolutionary process unfolds."
It is also the title of an extraordinary documentary by Ron Fricke, universal as only an unspoken movie can be, with wondrous imagery.

You can see it in full with the link below, at 1080p quality, which it well deserves!

Personally, I was particularly moved by the 13 minute time-frame. As far as I could research, it is called "Kecak", a dance/musical drama from Bali, also known as the Ramayana Monkey Dance and it portrays a specific episode of their mystical history and is executed as a form of exorcism.

How about you? What moved you most?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uT74UGqwcFc

Code tapping to survive

Big think.com has an interesting article on how prisoners of war manage to survive and keep sane in the harshest conditions. Code tapping on the wall to communicate with other prisoners kept in isolation seem to be essential to survival. The example was taken from the horrible experience of James Stockdale who was a POW in Vietnam for eight years. In a more normal life, the author says, it's essential to communicate and share feelings with friends. Resilience builds up on facing the challenge with optimism.

According to Charney, everyone needs a tap code. In other words, "everybody needs a set of individuals in their life that they can count on, that they can share their feelings with, that they can ask for advice in terms of facing a trauma." That is why Charney recommends you should develop a network of friends and relatives who you can share your emotions with.

 

http://bigthink.com/think-tank/the-stockdale-paradox-how-optimism-creates-resilience?utm_source=Big+Think+Weekly+Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=c30f12b51f-11_9_2012&utm_medium=email


 

Wishing for change

We're all afraid of change. Yet we wish for it. How can you explain the paradox? I think the human species is quite prone to habits (as animals are) and on the other hand as a thinking species we thrive for change.

Changing mean losses but it also means new opportunities. Change means anxiety and fears but also hope.

Lots of people keep saying: "I want to change. I really do. But...". This ambivalence is quite normal. You know you need to change but you stick to old habits and pattern of thoughts and behaviour.

The most frequent question is: "Tell me how I can change". There's no answer to that question specially if you are an adult. When you're a child you are supposed to ask parents and other authorities for directions. Not anymore when you're a grown-up. You can ask for professional help which is not the same thing. A psychotherapist doesn't give directions. Its job is to help you thinking not to point to solutions. The path to change has to discovered by the person if possible with the help of a professional, be him a psychotherapist or a coach. Transformations happen within people and sometimes they are not noticed right away. Change is about hope for progress. Do you really want it?

 

Obstacles and learning

It seems that the easier the learning the less it stays. Listen to this:

Robert Bjork from the University of California talks of "desirable difficulties" to describe the counter-intuitive notion that learning should be made harder. Spacing sessions further apart so that students have to make more effort to recall what they learnt last time had better results in the long term. Research has found that the bigger the obstacles the deeper the learning.

Professor Virginia Berninger at the University of Washington found that handwriting activated more of the brain than keyboard writing, including areas responsible for thinking and memory.

Psychologists at Princeton found that students remembered reading material better when it was printed in an ugly font.

Researchers in the University of Amsterdam found that when people are forced to cope with unexpected obstacles they react by increasing their "perceptual scope"—taking a mental step back to see the bigger picture.

Maybe we should re-think the way we've been educating our children for the last thirty years.

 

 

 

 

How do you focus?

There's an old saying about the glass being half-full or half-empty. It's true that some of us opt for seeing the bad side of experiences and events forgetting about the good things.

What people do (some people)d is to focus unhealthily on one negative detail, excluding a host of positives that surround it. That kind of person is usually more prone to depression and you don't need a Psychology graduation to see why.


Our contemporary way of life doesn't help. Being more about having than being, underligns appearances and tends to make us blind to small and pleasureable details in our lives. The ancient Greek philosophers were aware of this nasty tendency and took pains to caution people about it.

If you don't feel like reading Plato or Aristotle - and they can give you great moments of reflexion - there are contemporary authors who write about the same issues in a more modern way. Alain de Botton and A. C. Graylings come to mind immediatly. Both can be found in Amazon.

 

Finding moments of happiness (note I wrote "moments of happiness" and not happiness) is not a question of being merry and oblivious to reality. It's a question of intelligence.

 

Social anxiety

 

I believe social anxiety is one of most spread types of anxiety. It can range from a certain awkwardness to real panic. I know of young people that don't just go anywhere socially speaking out of fear of not knowing how to behave.

Of course these fears are very much augmented but that's not the point. The point is that one needs to feel all right with herself/himself to be able to enjoy being with others, chatting, etc. It has to do with self-confidence. Psychotherapy and life-coaching are quite useful - you can get visible results in a few months (unless you're severely depressed or have another psychiatric condition).

Now, and in a more lighter vein, check out this funny advice from buzzfeed.com and have a good laugh:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/katienotopoulos/an-illustrated-guide-to-conquering-social-anxiety

 

 

Being ourselves

Brene Brown, a research professor at the University of Houston, spent years of her research on subjects like vulnerability, shame, human connection and authenticity.
In this TED video she talks about the temptation to numb our emotions and about being (or: daring to be) ourselves.

http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html

Photography: plane and moon

Photography is the art of the efemerous. You'll never find another moment exactly like that one.

The photographer is unknown. I found it via Likecool.com.

 

The video in St. Pancras

Art and creativity

Our colleague Helena Meadows is a psychologist and hypnoterapist who lives in London but comes every month to Lisbon. She asked me to post this for her, about a very interesting event taking place in St. Pancras:

"London is a place where art and creativity are in every corner.

And the pianos installed recently on the concourse at St Pancras International rail station are just one example of this vibrancy:  they are there for anyone who wants to play them.

This passenger stops to play "The Girl from Ipanema", his partner waits.  And then they continue on their journey to who knows where, whilst jollied on their way.

Definitely, it is not just the destination that counts."

Check out the video

One-Moment Meditation

Martin Boroson brings us a fresh and challenging new approach to meditation, that eliminates all those old excuses we make for ourselves as to why we aren't meditating.
Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6eFFCi12v8

The path

Expressive and succint illustration of the path to sucess (or self-realization, if you prefer).

[from massivemov]

 

 

Curiosity

Curiosity isn't usually mentioned as a "soft skill". By curiosity I mean the capacity to take an interest in issues, to want to know more, go further. It's essential for our own growth to ask, to iquire, to research, to question. Always, without fearing critiques. An open mind that wants to learn is a guarantee for performance and progress.


Seth Godin is a man who thinks out of the box. His blog is full of very interesting ideas and concepts. This post is about curiosity. Take a look:

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/09/curiosity-was-framed.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2Fsethsmainblog+%28Seth%27s+Blog%29

 

Politicians

The image of politicians gets worse by the day. This is a funny cartoon from The Times.

 

Let's bike!

 

Bikes are invading cities in Europe and America. Here in Lisbon bit by bit their number is increasing. We have got a wonderful climate, there are no excuses not to ride a bike. It's healthy, good exercise and cheap. There are some dangers, of course, but we need to be cautious in all situations.

Now, you may ask yourself what kind of bike you should ride. The picture shows the models available, their pros and cons.

I ride a foldable bycicle that I can carry into places, bus or car truck. They also have a lower gravity center which makes them easier to ride. Foldables are not the best option for great distances however.

If you want more info, go to:

http://www.biketoworkblog.com/your-many-bicycle-choices/


 

Relaxation tips

Good sensible advice to those that feel too stressed up. Of course stress is something that when excessive must be questioned. People may even get addicted to stress! Sometimes professional help is the best thing to do in the long run.

In the meantime take a look at these 40 suggestions from the greatist.com:

http://greatist.com/happiness/relaxation-tips-5-minutes/#

 

Examples and inspiration

Our colleague Helena Meadows who just joined our team at Lisbon Clinic asked me to post the following text for her:

"Look up at the stars and not down at your feet” was the message from Prof Stephen Hawkins at the opening of the Paralympic Games 2012.

And that is exactly what these athletes do:

39 year old Martine Wright who lost both legs on the 2005 London bombing and went on to complete in the British volleyball team.

Marine Joe Townsend who lost both legs in separate bomb blasts in Afghanistan, as well as other 7 wounded servicemen and women are also part of the Paralympic Team GB 2012.

These and every other athlete have their own story to tell and are an example of the amazing qualities of human resilience and an inspiration to us all on how to cope with change in our lives.

Ice photos

Photo: Olaf Otto Becker

 

Olaf Otto Becker spent days and days taking photos from a dingy out of Groneland's west coast. The result is truly awesome. See his other work, all beautiful at:

http://f56.net/en/artists/olaf-otto-becker/olaf-otto-becker-broken-line/


 

Dare to disagree: A Ted Talk.

A wonderful talk by Margaret Hefferman about conflict.

Conflict is not necessarily evil. It may bring new ideas and change. Why do we prefer to have around us people that see eye to eye with us?

This and much more is brought up in another excellent Ted Talk.

http://www.ted.com/talks/margaret_heffernan_dare_to_disagree.html

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THE INVISIBLE BICYCLE HELMET

Two students have devised this awesome helmet that works like an airbag. It took them seven years! Genius!

Existing bicycle helmets are uncomfortable and most people (like me) give up using them. Which can be quite hazardous urban traffic being what it is.

This invention can mean a lot.

Here it is a video about it:

<iframe src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/43038579" width="500" height="281" frameborder="0" webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen></iframe> <p><a href="http://vimeo.com/43038579">The Invisible Bicycle Helmet | Fredrik Gertten</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/focusf">Focus Forward Films</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>

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BITTER HUMOUR

British humour at its best: a cartoon by Tom Gauld (The Guardian)

 

 

 

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CREATIVITY, THAT CONUNDRUM

(photo from TGD by Brian Bloom)



From an interview with Seth Godin, the lecturer and entrepreneur:

I think “creativity” is better described as failing repeatedly until you get something right. I was encouraged by both my parents—my mom, who had a background in the arts, and my dad, who comes from both business and the arts—to always be putting on a show, doing an experiment, or trying something new, so I was failing from a very early age.


You can read the whole interview at:

http://thegreatdiscontent.com/seth-godin?utm_source=swissmiss&utm_campaign=a4867c5d90-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email

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THE WAVE

What an awesome photo! I saw it on the Facebook page of Surf at Lisbon Film Fest. Didn't say where it was taken or by whom but deserves to be shown around.

One may not enjoy surf but the beaches are 1/2 hour from Lisbon. Today a client of mine came with her hair wet from the sea and it was great to see how happy she was.

Enjoy!

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Flirting

I was quite shocked when I read this: in Little Rock, the capital city of the American state Arkansas, it's forbidden to flirt in public! You might be sent to jail for 30 days...

Read more about some strange laws here: http://littlerock.about.com/cs/factsfun/a/strangelaws.htm

OUR BRAINS AS MONDRIAN PAINTINGS

And how's that for a different way of looking at it? Our brains as grids. Intriguing.

Read more at:

http://bigthink.com/endless-innovation/your-brain-looks-like-a-mondrian-grid-painting

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STATUS ANXIETY

Alain de Botton, the English philosopher, wrote a book about status anxiety. He says that in modern world people can feel unhappy and demoralized by the tendency we have to judge others by the jobs they have. This annoying tendency to tribalize, ostracize and stigmatize is in the origin of much happiness.

Read more in

http://bigthink.com/think-tank/what-are-you-worth-getting-past-status-anxiety?utm_source=Big+Think+Weekly+Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=4050025f77-8_4_12_Magicalthinking8_3_2012&utm_medium=email

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Beautiful clouds

Artist Berndnaut Smilde creates beautiful things...his project 'nimbus' lets clouds float inside deserted hotels or villas...it looks surreal!

See more at http://www.berndnaut.nl/works.htm

Summer of Photography

A beautiful reason for a citytrip to Brussels: till the 16th of September there is a photo festival (´Summer of Photography´), showing photos of the best photographers of Europe.

See also the website: http://www.summerofphotography.be/

SHOULD I BREAK UP BY SMS?

Gizmodo is a site for geeks but a very smart one for that matter.

This recent article deals with the very old question: how should we break up with someone? Is it ok to do it by texting? We had the same doubts long ago, about writing, phone-calling or meeting with someone to tell him (or her) we didn't want them anymore in our lives.

So, nothing new on this front. One thing is different though: we communicate more and more by digital means, even with family. Texting is so common that one may wonder...

Read the article here and have fun and food for thought:

http://gizmodo.com/5927787/four-times-its-okay-to-break-up-via-text?utm_source=Gizmodo+Newsletter&utm_campaign=f5a836e1bb-UA-142218-3&utm_medium=email

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COSMIC COCOON

A supernova exploded, it's shock wave trespassed the cosmic cocoon.
The image is awesome.

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2303.html

(Photo: NASA)

BEAR CARE ON MOODSCOPE

Moodscope is an interesting site, specially for those who worry about mood changes (and who doesn't?).
Jon's posts are usually quite good. This one is about a bear and about us humans. Have a look:

http://www.moodscope.com/blog/

The emotional effects of an heart attack

Recent research from the Columbia University Medical Center has shown that approximately 1 in 8 of sufferers from a heart attack will develop Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

Read more about the symptoms and possible solutions here: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/stress-disorder-pervasive-after-heart-attack-study-finds/

TOO MANY WORDS?

David Silverman is a writer, a teacher and a businessman. He argues about our natural verbosity.
Have a look at the chart. Did you know iTunes agreement had so many words?
It's amazing. Do they want to confound us or are just incapable of being synthetic? Food for thought.

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/07/yes_college_essays_are_ruining.html?referral=00563&cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-daily_alert-_-alert_date&utm_source=newsletter_daily_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=alert_date

A DYING STAR PHOTOGRAPHED BY HUBBLE

U Cam for short, a star in the  constellation of Camelopardalis, is dying.

But that's a long process. Every few thousand years, U Cam coughs out a nearly spherical shell of gas. 

Nothing gold stays, as Robert Frost wrote in his wonderful poem. Not even a star.

(photo by NASA)

Flexible human beings

I always like to see how human beings can be so flexible and adaptive to their environments...
Hong Kong architect Gary Chang managed to squeeze 24 rooms in his little house and calls his house his “domestic transformer”.

See the video to understand why: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lg9qnWg9kak