OCD meets CBT: The Data Driven Life profiles people precisely measuring what’s going on in their lives.
A few months ago, Barooah began to wean himself from coffee. His method was precise. He made a large cup of coffee and removed 20 milliliters weekly. This went on for more than four months, until barely a sip remained in the cup. He drank it and called himself cured.
The middle-aged brain is “better than ever,” says Barbara Stauch, author of a book on the subject:
The thing the middle-aged brain shares with the teenage brain is that it’s still developing. It’s not some static blob that is going inextricably downhill…during this period…we’re better at all sorts of things than we were at 20.
Mind Over Meds or “how I decided my psychiatry patients needed more from me than prescriptions”–a psychiatrist’s story, from the NYT Magazine.
[L]earning the formal techniques of therapy was like navigating without a compass. While I learned how to form an alliance with my patients and begin a good dialogue, becoming a skillful therapist requires much more practice than busy psychiatry residencies allow.
Take a look at the Workaholics Anonymous Brief Guide (pdf). In addition to the 12-steps (pretty much the same as A.A.’s, with “work” replacing “alcohol”) and a quiz (“How Do I Know if I’m a Workaholic?”), there’s Tools of Recovery list. What’s especially striking about them to this reader is how completely they sync up with suggested approaches to undoing stress-related chronic pain. Here’s a sampling:
Substituting We do not add a new activity without eliminating from our schedule one that demands equivalent time and energy.
Underscheduling We allow more time than we think we need for a task or trip, allowing a comfortable margin to accommodate the unexpected.
Playing We schedule time for play, refusing to let ourselves work non-stop. We do not make our play into a work project.
Concentrating We try to do one thing at a time.
Pacing We work at a comfortable pace and rest before we get tired. To remind ourselves, we check our level of energy before proceeding to our next activity.We do not get “wound up” in our work, so we don’t have to unwind.
Relaxing We do not yield to pressure from others or attempt to pressure others. We remain alert to the people and situations that trigger feelings of pressure in us. We become aware of our own actions, words, body sensations and feelings that tell us we are responding with pressure. When we feel energy building up, we stop; we reconnect with our Higher Power and others around us.
Accepting We accept the outcomes of our endeavors, whatever the results, whatever the timing. We know that impatience, rushing and insisting on perfect results only slow down our recovery. We are gentle with our efforts, knowing that our new way of living requires much practice.
Balancing We balance our involvement in work with our efforts to develop personal relationships, spiritual growth, creativity and playful attitudes.
A pretty good set of principles–workaholic, chronic pain-sufferer, or not.
A piece of Bill W’s story that didn’t make the Big Book, reported by the New York Times:
Were Bill Wilson’s spiritual awakening and influential sobriety the products of a belladonna hallucination shortly after his discussions with his friend Ebby Thacher? Could they have been incited by his alcohol withdrawal symptoms? Or did something else happen to him that science cannot explain?
Jim Taylor, PhD asks, Are you raising a human being or a human doing?
Having internalized their perceptions of being a human doing from their parents, children come to love themselves only when they are successful and experience nothing less than self-loathing when they fail.
Meanwhile, back in 2007, Po Bronson sounded the alarm about the inverse power of praise. (The article later became a book, NurtureShock.) In a line:
Giving kids the label of “smart” does not prevent them from underperforming. It might actually be causing it.
Which, taken together, sort of synch up. Sort of. In another line: Parenting is confusing. If you’re struggling with it, you’re not alone.
From Time.com: How Not to Raise a Bully. (In short: teach empathy.)
Increasingly, neuroscientists, psychologists and educators believe that bullying and other kinds of violence can indeed be reduced by encouraging empathy at an early age. Over the past decade, research in empathy — the ability to put ourselves in another person’s shoes — has suggested that it is key, if not the key, to all human social interaction and morality.
A big NYT Magazine piece by Tara Parker-Pope surveys the research about marriage, health, and happiness, and finds mixed messages.
[W]hile it’s clear that marriage is profoundly connected to health and well-being, new research is increasingly presenting a more nuanced view of the so-called marriage advantage. Several new studies, for instance, show that the marriage advantage doesn’t extend to those in troubled relationships, which can leave a person far less healthy than if he or she had never married at all…
The L.A. Times profiles Beit T’Shuvah. The Venice Blvd. rehab combines the twelve steps with Jewish spirituality . At the helm, Mark Borovitz, con man turned rabbi–his autobiography is The Holy Thief.
David Brooks surveys the happiness literature in an op-ed, The Sandra Bullock Trade.
If the relationship between money and well-being is complicated, the correspondence between personal relationships and happiness is not. The daily activities most associated with happiness are sex, socializing after work and having dinner with others. The daily activity most injurious to happiness is commuting. According to one study, joining a group that meets even just once a month produces the same happiness gain as doubling your income. According to another, being married produces a psychic gain equivalent to more than $100,000 a year.