Get Happy, Be Happy, Stay Happy

As an armchair philosopher and interested party in neuroscience, I’m glad that not even the greatest minds on earth truly understand what or why human consciousness is. The reason I’m relieved is kinda weird — if the world’s greatest minds don’t know, then I shouldn’t be so hard on myself and my puny brain for not knowing.

I just read the Time article The Mystery of Consciousness by Steven Pinker. It’s a cursory look at the latest scientific findings and their implications. Pinker talks about the religious concept of the soul as consciousness. Funny, just yesterday I was thinking about the soul.

I have a vivid memory of myself as a child asking my older sister about the soul. She told me that my soul would get to go to heaven. “But what about me?” I asked. “Don’t I get to go to heaven?” “No,” she replied. “Just your soul.”

That really upset me. Why does my so-called “soul” get to go to heaven, but not me — the true me? Why does some invisible, ethereal essence get the final reward, but not me, the real person?

It’s amazing what little kids can think about and anguish over.

Later, as an adult, I rejected the idea of an immortal soul. This was based on an alternative biblical view that man “became a living soul.” Humankind didn’t have a soul, but was a soul — a special creation made out of the earth. Mortal. Subject to physical death and a return to the elements. But what man possessed that set him apart from animals was a human spirit, a higher form of consciousness.

I’m no longer a Christian and I don’t hold any religious belief. However, I’m still prone to calling upon some of my previous deeply-held beliefs to form and shape what I theorize today. One idea that makes sense to me is that humans have special “hardware” and “programs” that allow us to connect to and play certain “information fields” (which are programs) apart from us. Why not? If the universe is basically a giant computer, there must be intact sets or fields of information (instructions) that exist and get carried out.

I can see glimpses that this wild scenario could be the case from mixing and matching what I know about information theory, quantum information, and epigenetics. I know of a biologist, a former atheist, who had “a road to Damascus” experience when he realized the implications of epigenetics. Stay tuned as I reveal who this biologist is. Right now, my need for food is taking priority over my need to philosophize!

In my previous post I said I would reveal the biologist who had a “road to Damascus” experience when he realized the implication of his discoveries. I’m talking about Bruce Lipton, a cell biologist. He writes in his book Biology of Belief, “For me, the conclusions were so unambiguous I instantly went from non-believer to believer.”

When I first saw the book title, I was intrigued by the notion that belief was somehow tied into biology. The full title is The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter and Miracles. I had read about how our brains were possibly wired to believe in God or a higher power, but I had a hunch that this book was going to go much further. Does it ever! I recommend it as a must-read for anyone interested in consciousness, perception, how beliefs form, and how your thoughts, beliefs and environment (rather than your genes) control your life.

By the way, Lipton doesn’t get into a spiritual discussion until the epilogue on Spirt and Science. Believers and nonbelievers alike will learn a lot from the book. You can skip the epilogue if you don’t care about Lipton’s spiritual journey.

I read this book as an agnostic, and I’m still an agnostic. Alas, no instant conversion to believer for me. But this book, along with a few others, has moved me from agnostic-but-might-as-well-be-atheist to agnostic-but-something-interesting-seems-to-be-going-on.

Rather belatedly, I know, last night I watched the 2004 documentary Super Size Me. I join the critics who say, well what can you expect if you gorge yourself three times a day for 30 days? In the first few days of Morgan Spurlock’s experiment, ignoring his body’s signal that enough is enough, he threw up.

This was a stupid experiment for several reasons, but it did reveal some interesting things about one of the doctors who was monitoring him. The doctor believed at the beginning of the experiment that not much would happen to affect the guy’s health. At the end of 30 days he learned otherwise. To me, the doctor’s ignorance was the most amazing part of the documentary.

What and how we eat is one of the most contentious debates in the U.S. I believe this is due to a potent mix of politics, special interest groups, government funding issues, suppression of good science, willfulness of people to do what they want to do no matter what, allergy and addiction dynamics, lack of personal responsibility, certain philosophies and religions, greed, and abuse of trust. It seems that those who offer scientific, evidence-based guidelines are very hard to notice — like a hay-colored needle in a haystack.

No, I don’t know the answer. All I can do is go with what makes the most sense to me and provides real-life, measurable benefits. See my post about The Schwarzbein Principle.

The more you know about yourself, the better. If you know your strengths, gifts, talents, motivations, and interests, you can gear your life to capitalize on them and gain maximum benefit in every area. Why would we want it any other way? Yet the sad thing is, most people don’t know what their talents and strengths are.

One of the most remarkable books I’ve read is Now, Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham and Donald Clifton of the Gallup International Research & Education Center. A former employer had given me a copy and asked me take the StrengthsFinder Profile on the Web. By noting your instinctual patterns, the assessment reveals your five most powerful “signature themes” of talent.

The book describes the critical distinction between a talent and a strength:

Talents are your naturally recurring patterns of thought, feeling, or behavior. Your various themes of talent are what the StrengthsFinder profile actually measures.

Knowledge consists of the facts and lessons learned.

Skills are the steps of an activity.

These three — talents, knowledge, and skills — combine to create your strengths.

Your talents are innate. You can’t change them. According to the authors, they are created by the unique synaptic connections in your brain formed when you are young. I’ll let the authors explain the amazing creation of your unique talents:

Forty-two days after you are conceived, your brain experiences a four-month growth spurt…. On your forty-second day you create your first neuron, and 120 days later you have a hundred billion of them…. You have a hundred billion when you are born, and you have about that many up until late middle age.

Elsewhere in your brain, however, the real drama, the synapse drama, is just beginning. Sixty days before your birth your neurons start trying to communicate with one another. Each neuron reaches out — literally “reaches out” a strand called an axon — and attempts to make a connection. Whenever a successful connection is made, a synapse is formed, and during the first three years of your life, your neurons prove phenomenally successful at making these connections. …

But then something strange happens. For some reason nature now prompts you to ignore a lot of your carefully woven threads. As with most things, threads that are neglected fall into disrepair, and so across your network connections start to break. You become so inattentive to parts of your mental network that between the ages of three and fifteen you lose billions and billions of these carefully forged connections. By the time you wake up on your sixteenth birthday, half your network is gone. …

Your genetic inheritance and early childhood experiences assist you in finding some connections smoother and easier to use than others — the competitive connection, perhaps, or the inquisitiveness connection or the strategic thinking connection. You are drawn to these connections time and time again until they become tighter and tauter. To use an Internet analogy, these are your superfast T1 lines. Here the signals are loud and strong.

I love that analogy. If you’ve ever experienced a painfully slow dial-up connection, you know what a joy and relief it is to use a superfast, high-speed connection such as a T1 line or DSL. Slow, painful versus fast, effortless, fun. Which would you rather have? When you start thinking about your innate talents this way and the quality of your life, it’s absolutely amazing.

A new and updated edition, StrengthsFinder 2.0, and an updated StrengthsFinder Profile, are about to be released. According to amazon.com, you’ll get:

• A new and upgraded edition of the StrengthsFinder assessment
• A personalized Strengths Discovery and Action-Planning Guide for applying your strengths in the next week, month, and year
• A customized version of your top-five themes report
• 50 Ideas for Action (10 strategies for building on each of your top five themes)
• The user-friendly StrengthsFinder 2.0 companion website, with a strengths community area, a library of downloadable discussion guides, activities, a strengths screensaver, and a program for creating display cards of your top five themes

I can’t wait!

Noooooo, I’m not talking about me running 13.1 miles in below-freezing temperatures. I’m talking about my husband, who ran the PF Chang’s Rock ‘n Roll half-marathon a couple of weeks ago. It was the largest marathon and half-marathon in the world, with nearly 40,000 people running, walking, skipping, limping, and dragging through the streets of Phoenix, Scottsdale and Tempe, Arizona.

Man, it was cold! I spoke with a runner who had flown in from Nashville, where it was in the 70s. Talk about a nice warm welcome to sunny Arizona.

This was my husband’s first half-marathon. He finished in 2 hours and 54 minutes, in pain but jubilent. He’s been hobbling around a little with a foot injury, but I think he actually gets a kick out of feeling the pain. It’s a badge of honor, a reminder of sweet success.

He just showed me an article in Runner’s World about Lance Armstrong’s experience of running in the ING New York Marathon. Minutes after finishing, he text-messaged his ex-wife:
Oh. My. God. Ouch. Terrible.

I don’t know if Lance Armstrong will run another marathon after his ordeal, but my husband plans to. You go! I’ll be waiting in the reunion center with a big smile and a tube of Bengay.

I must lead a very sheltered life. Every time I see American Idol and surf around the Web, I’m shocked by what people say, do or believe.

Thousands upon thousands of American Idol contestants are so deluded about their talent, it boggles my mind. This new season seems particularly weird. And Simon is over-the-top with his barbs.

Then there’s the World Wide Web. Visit just about any message board and I guarantee that you’ll be shocked by how people think and what they believe. And with millions of Web sites and blogs on tap, you’re bound to find things that you’ve never heard of or thought of, or wish you’d never seen!

Like yesterday. I stumbled upon a mind-body-spirit site that featured recordings with titles such as, “The Beginner’s Guide to Sex in the Afterlife.” I kid you not. If you think that’s normal, I know my blog isn’t going to be your cup of tea.

I do realize that what I believe is a mixed bag of things I can prove and things I can’t prove, so I have no right to complain about what others believe. We all have our sticking points. One of mine happens to be stuff about the spiritual world.

The funny thing is that I’m drawn to various metaphysical things. But I do my best to search out any scientific proof that may explain the phenomena. For example, I have no problem with “energy” healing techniques because I’ve seen good research that may be explaining the mechanisms. I have no problem believing in telepathy and other psychic phenomena based on the research, which is, sad to say, written off or ridiculed by other scientists for apparently political reasons. Plus, I’ve experienced the results of energy healing myself, so I’m in no hurry to dismiss it. The actual cause and mechanisms of energy healing may not be well understood, but that doesn’t seem to matter to the beneficiaries.

I know why I love researching, reading, probing, analyzing, and arguing with myself (I don’t like arguing with others). The bottom line is that I’m looking for answers and solutions for several things (all overlapping):

• physical and emotional help to feel good
• knowledge to maximize my potential to be the best I can be for myself and for others
• information to end all uncertainty

It’s this last item that I don’t have and may not ever have: the answer to the greatest mysteries of the who, what, why and how of the Universe. Scientists in several quarters are painting a breathtaking picture of the possible what and how (that the universe is a giant computer), but of course they have no way of knowing or proving who created the Giant Computer and All Its Programs, or why.

And I believe that no one else truly knows the who or why.

The answer possibly could be a supreme programmer many call God, but there’s no way to prove it. I’ve read books about so-called God genes, neuroscientific reasons “why God won’t go away,” the name of God encoded in DNA, and so forth. These are intriguing, but they don’t totally convince me. Actually, I wish I could settle things once and for all!

What makes sense to me at this time (it may change in a few weeks!), is that God is the programmer and has created “programs” and “information fields” that the human mind (or something in us) is able to “connect to” and “play.” The programs that allow humans to know and express higher-order and life-promoting thoughts and behaviors are what we call Love, Joy, Peace That Transcends Human Understanding, etc. And perhaps there is a program called Faith, and God flips the switch to allow us to connect to that program based on many different variables. In other words, maybe Faith is indeed a “gift,” and not something that the human mind can just work up on its own.

I’ve been thinking along these lines because I just finished rereading Decoding the Universe: How the New Science of Information Is Explaining Everything in the Cosmos, From Our Brains to Black Holes, by Charles Seife. Although Seife’s conclusion about the fate of the Universe is depressing (one day all life, the entire universe, will end), I found his book extremely exciting, thought-provoking, and beautifully and clearly written. (One ray of hope is that there are plenty of other scientists who do not believe that the Universe is destined to blow out.)

Then I read excerpts from Programming the Universe: A Quantum Computer Scientist Takes On the Cosmos by Seth Lloyd, who says the universe is a giant quantum computer, not metaphorically like a computer.

I wanted to review Decoding the Universe because of problems I encountered when starting to read The Intention Experiment, a new book by Lynne McTaggart. (McTaggart is also the author of The Field, which has turned into a sort of bible for many in the trendy “consciousness” arena.) Not far into the book, McTaggart makes some claims about the state of affairs regarding quantum physics that I knew weren’t true. Red flags went up, so I wanted to refresh my memory before I continued reading a book that could be riddled with errors. At least she admits upfront that she engaged in speculation, and that the ideas are a work in progress.

I don’t know when I’ll get around to reading it. Once an author loses credibility with me, it’s hard to read without a lot of bias and suspicion, and that’s no fun.

Your body and brain are in constant communication — and the vast majority of the conversation is not in your conscious awareness. Therefore, this communication is “unconscious” or “subconscious.” (I know — duh! But some people don’t believe the “subconscious” exists, when it’s absolutely apparent that it does.)

If you were consciously aware of every single thing happening around you and in you, your cortex would fry and you’d go crazy. Not the most scientific explanation, but it gets the point across.

There’s a lot you can learn about the interaction with your environment by paying attention to your body.

If your body feels relaxed, light, unrestricted, and free, this is a good sign that your brain is perceiving the environment as safe, good, life-promoting.

If your body feels rigid, tight, heavy, and restricted, this is a sign that your brain is perceiving something in the environment as a threat, bad, life-inhibiting.

By environment, I mean your physical surroundings, people, things, what you’re hearing or reading — actually, everything and anything! Our minds and bodies are capable of “reading” everything around us, most of it below conscious awareness. Everything is registering somewhere in the brain, mostly in the lower brain areas. And your brain’s mandate is to keep you safe, regardless of whether you would consciously agree with all the “decisions” being made about “safe,” “not safe.”

I experienced this rather dramatically this morning. I was doing my thing — reading about and researching a particular topic on the Internet. After awhile I noticed that my stomach was tight and my breathing was labored and shallow. Before I knew it, I was feeling very anxious. I had no idea why, but the signal was loud and clear. For whatever reason, my subconscious perceived what I was reading and thinking as a threat.

When I get these warning signals, I stop what I’m doing or remove myself from the environment. Then I try to figure out what my subconscious is trying to tell me. (I have ways to help me figure it out, but I’ll save that topic for another post.)

Our bodies are always talking or telling a story. It’s really amazing when you pay attention and become a keen observer. Notice your body right now. What is it doing? What are you feeling? Are you sitting up straight, or are you slumped over? Are you holding your shoulders down and back, or are they up around your ears? Is your stomach relaxed or tight? Are your eyes bright and sparkling, or are they dull? Is your face relaxed, or all scrunched up? When you speak, does your voice seem to come from high in your throat or nose, or from down in your belly?

I’m not very impressed with most of the coaching industry, but I have discovered a coaching style or method that I really like — somatic coaching. I work with a somatic coach who has taught me to observe my body and discern what it’s telling me. This is very cool and very empowering. If you are interested in learning more, pop over to my interview with Madeline Wade, a master somatic coach.

You should be too! One of my favorite self-discovery tools is the MAPP Assessment, Motivation Appraisal of Personal Potential.

I like the MAPP because along with showing your basic traits and preferences, it identifies what motivates you. This gives you a much clearer picture about which careers may suit you best. I also like the interesting narrative style of the report.

Taking this assessment provided some very interesting insights. It picked up patterns that I hadn’t been aware of, and it identified aspects I couldn’t have put into words myself. Even after taking many, many assessments over the years, the MAPP was able to tease out new information!

Learn more about the MAPP Assessment and get a free sample report.

If you are interested in seeing a full, detailed report, you can download mine (pdf, 3 MB). I have nothing to hide… except for the fact that if you stuck me in a windowless office with no human contact and made me file papers all day, I’d probably kill myself.

I knew what would happen, but I did it anyway.

Last night I was on a conference call, listening to an interview with the authors of Sugar Shock!: How Sweets and Simple Carbs Can Derail Your Life — and How You Can Get Back on Track. As they talked about the evils of sugar and simple carbs, a pan of Michelangelo’s lasagna bubbled in the oven. (My husband bought it — not I!)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know all about the effects of sugar. I knew what was going to happen after eating the hefty portion of noodles, accompanied by a big slice of WHITE BREAD. But I was hungry and ready to just sit down and eat and watch American Idol (now that show will get you laughing).

This morning I felt like a Mack truck had hit me.

I can’t say it won’t happen again. And again. But I do manage to stay mostly on the right side of the road. I can’t afford to eat junk for very long — it makes me feel way too bad.

One of my biggest challenges is meal planning and shopping. I hate those activities. If I could afford a personal chef and shopper, my life would be grand.

My niece Ashley just emailed me this story. It’s very touching, and an excellent reminder about the important things of life.

Twenty years ago, I drove a cab for a living. When I arrived at 2:30 a.m., the building was dark except for a single light in a ground floor window.

Under these circumstances, many drivers would just honk once or twice, wait a minute, and then drive away.

But I had seen too many impoverished people who depended on taxis as their only means of transportation. Unless a situation smelled of danger, I always went to the door. This passenger might be someone who needs my assistance, I reasoned to myself.

So I walked to the door and knocked. “Just a minute,” answered a frail, elderly voice. I could hear something being dragged across the floor. After a long pause, the door opened. A small woman in her 80’s stood before me.She was wearing a print dress and a pillbox hat with a veil pinned on it, like somebody out of a 1940s movie.

By her side was a small nylon suitcase The apartment looked as if no one had lived in it for years. All the furniture was covered with sheets.

There were no clocks on the walls, no knickknacks or utensils on the counte rs.In the corner was a cardboard box filled with photos and glassware.

“Would you carry my bag out to the car?” she said. I took the suitcase to the cab, then returned to assist the woman.

She took my arm and we walked slowly toward the curb. She kept thanking me for my kindness.

“It’s nothing,” I told her. “I just try to treat my passengers the way I would want my mother treated.”

“Oh, you’re such a good boy,” she said. When we got in the cab, she gave me an address, and then asked, “Could you drive through downtown?”

“It’s not the shortest way,” I answered quickly. “Oh, I don’t mind,” she said. “I’m in no hurry. I’m on my way to a hospice.”

I looked in the rear-view mirror. Her eyes were glistening. “I don’t have any family left,” she continued. “The doctor says I don’t have very long.” I quietly reached over and shut off the meter. “What route would you like me to take?” I asked.

For the next two hours, we drove through the city. She showed me the building where she had once worked as an elevator operator. We drove through the neighborhood where she and her husband had lived when they were newlyweds.

She had me pull up in front of a furniture warehouse that had once been a ballroom where she had gone dancing as a girl.

Sometimes she’d ask me to slow in front of a particular building or corner and would sit staring into the darkness, saying nothing.

As the first hint of sun was creasing the horizon, she suddenly said, “I’m tired. Let’s go now.”

We drove in silence to the address she had given me. It was a low building, like a small convalescent home, with a driveway that passed under a portico.

Two orderlies came out to the cab as soon as we pulled up. They were solicitous and intent,watching her every move. They must have been expecting her.

I opened the trunk and took the small suitcase to the door. The woman was already seated in a wheelchair.

“How much do I owe you?” she asked, reaching into her purse.

“Nothing,” I said.

“You have to make a living,” she answered.

“There are other passengers,” I responded.

Almost without thinking, I bent and gave her a hug. She held onto me tightly. “You gave an old woman a little moment of joy,” she said. “Thank you. “I squeezed her hand, and then walked into the dim morning light.

Behind me, a door shut. It was the sound of the closing of a life.

I didn’t pick up any more passengers that shift. I drove aimlessly lost in thought. For the rest of that day, I could hardly talk.

What if that woman had gotten an angry driver, or one who was impatient to end his shift?

What if I had refused to take the run, or had honked once, then driven away?

On a quick review, I don’t think that I have done anything more important in my life. We’re conditioned to think that our lives revolve around great moments. But great moments often catch us unaware — beautifully wrapped in what others may consider a small one.

People may not remember exactly what you did, or what you said, but they will always remember how you made them feel.

You won’t get any big surprise in 10 days if you send this to ten people. But, you might help make the world a little kinder and more compassionate by sending it on.

Thank you, my friend…

Sometimes it doesn’t take much to make me happy. I swear — beans and carrots?!

Last night for dinner I made baked chicken with Red Tail Ale Original Tangy BBQ sauce, baked potatoes with butter, and a pot of buttered green and yellow beans, carrots and onions liberally sprinkled with basil. Yum!

This morning I opened the refrigerator and spotted the leftover beans and carrots. I started grinning. I can’t wait to eat them for lunch!

I believe that what we eat makes all the difference in the world for how we feel, how we think, how we live and move in the world. That’s a radical statement for many health-care practitioners today. They just don’t believe that diet has anything to do with life except to provide basic fuel.

One of my favorite books that promotes a healthy lifestyle is The Schwarzbein Principle: The Truth About Losing Weight, Being Healthy, and Feeling Younger, by Diana Schwarzbein, M.D.

Dr. Schwarzbein’s dietary guidelines are opposite to what you’ve probably heard, especially if you’re diabetic. But it’s hard to argue with a doctor in the field with living, breathing patients who get worse when following conventional diets.

Check out this description from Amazon.com:

From her work with insulin-resistant patients with Type II diabetes, Dr. Schwarzbein concludes that low-fat diets cause heart attacks, eating fat makes you lose body fat, and it’s important to eat high-cholesterol foods every day. Picture cardiologists and dieticians tearing their hair out and overweight people cheering as they dive into Eggs Benedict with sausage.

According to Schwarzbein, the high-carbohydrate, low-fat, moderate-protein diet that most dieticians and disease-prevention organizations recommend is the culprit that turns people into diabetics, makes them age faster and get degenerative diseases, and keeps them fat and unhealthy. She supports her theory with case studies of people who were sick and miserable on high-carbo, low-fat diets and who sprang to life when they “balanced” their diets with more fat and protein. Schwarzbein recommends avoiding “man-made carbohydrates”– processed carbs — in favor of those you could “pick, gather or milk.” She instructs patients to eat “as much good fat as their body needs”: eggs, avocados, flaxseed oil, butter, mayonnaise, and olive oil. Sorry, but fried foods and hydrogenated fats are “bad fats,” or “damaged fats,” as Schwarzbein calls them. You can eat as many eggs a day as you want on this plan, plus meat (even sausage — as long as it’s nitrate-free — and pâté), saturated fat, cream, and nonstarchy vegetables. The book includes a four-week meal plan and about 15 recipes.

This groundbreaking book dispels the myths perpetuated by some bestselling diet books that may help people lose weight, but will put them on the fast track to disease. Based on sound research and the success of thousands of people, The Schwarzbein Principle proves that excess weight, degenerative disease and accelerated aging can be controlled — and reversed — in a healthful way. The Schwarzbein Principle is a holistic guide to achieving lasting weight loss, normalizing metabolism and maintaining ideal body composition through lifestyle and nutrition. By bringing the internal systems into balance, the Schwarzbein program has been proven to: reverse type II diabetes; free people from food cravings for chocolate, caffeine and sugar; cure depression and mood swings; and reduce body fat while building lean tissue. The nutritional program consists of two phases — Healing and Maintenance — which are easy to adopt into any lifestyle. Instead of shunning fat, the program advocates eating all of the good fats and proteins your body needs as well as an unlimited portion of non-starchy carbohydrates. By incorporating the lifestyle components of stress management, exercise and eliminating harmful stimulants, program participants experience renewed energy and vitality. Don’t forget to check out the cookbooks!

If you want to be healthier and feel better, get a copy today!

Chocolate? No, but I don’t blame you for thinking it is. Sugar? No. Mohitos? No. Exercise. No, but I wish it were.

Information. Yep, especially in the form of books and on the Internet. I literally crave reading information — if I’m cut off from my drug I experience anxiety, irritability, restlessness, and extreme boredom. And just like any other addictive substance, overindulging causes many of the same symptoms!

According to the Kolbe A Index, my natural, instinctive action mode is to gather information. (For those familiar with the Kolbe A, my score is 8 4 6 2.) I just take it too far. Why? It could be that my brain has low endorphin levels, so I’m seeking to boost endorphin through novelty-seeking behavior. I don’t go after just any old piece of information — I go for the new, different, exciting, mind-boggling stuff.

Pushing and pushing my brain could also be a way for me to create stress in order to get a boost from adrenaline. People find all kinds of ways to stress themselves in seemingly innocuous ways to feel good, albeit temporary. It’s not only the obvious thrill-seekers who find ways to create the internal chemistry to feel alive and happy.

I recently found a very interesting site about the possible causes of Internet and television addiction. The man who runs the site, Christopher McPeck, details his intriguing theories, including:

• Internet addiction is caused by hypovolemia (low blood volume).
• Internet addiction is caused by a desire to increase arousal.
• Internet addiction is caused by activities which constantly require central vision.

According to recent blood test results, I have half the amount of blood that I should have to be healthy. So I was quite interested in a possible tie-in to my Internet addiction. Here’s what Christopher writes about hypovolemia:

People with hypovolemia experience light-headedness because of a lack of cerebral blood flow.

People with hypovolemia try to increase their cerebral blood flow, and become more focused, by increasing their blood pressure. This is done by engaging in self-stimulatory activities, such as playing exciting computer games, which can cause the brain to produce more adrenaline.

When fluid levels drop, the brain produces more adrenaline so the heart has to pump more blood to compensate for this.

Along with more adrenaline, self-stimulatory activities cause stress.

This increased stress, possibly accompanied by other stress causing conditions such as hyperacusis or problems with laterality, exacerbates dehydration.

Dehydration exacerbates hypovolemia, and this cycle continues.

Very interesting. I live in Phoenix, one of the driest places in the country, and I’m dehydrated most of the time. (According to health experts, chronic dehydration is a huge problem in the United States. I’ll talk about that in another post.)

So… I need to wrap up this post, get off the Internet, go drink some water, and do something good for my body and brain that doesn’t have a downside. Going for a walk sounds like the ticket.

I’ve always liked the “Happiness Is” song from You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown. Happiness is subjective, but for most people, as the song illustrates, often it’s the simple pleasures of life that make us feel happy.

Several weeks ago I bought a cool little device called the emWave from HeartMath. It is a sophisticated sensor that trains you to reduce stress through heart-centered breathing and focus on positive feelings. I placed my thumb on the sensor pad and waited a couple of seconds while the emwave detected my heart beat. Then, following the instructions, I focused my attention on my heart and imagined my breath flowing in and out of the heart area. Next I was instructed to recall a positive feeling — a time when I felt good inside — and try to reexperience it. I tried various memories and situations, but none were helping to bring my heart into coherence, the goal of using the device.

Then I started to sing bits and pieces from “Happiness Is.” When I sang “happiness is two kinds of ice cream” and “climbing a tree” my heart shifted into delightful coherence, as evidenced by the steady green indicator light. I’m sure I was thinking about Cold Stone Creamery Gotta Have It chocolate ice cream in a waffle bowl and visions of swinging through the jungle like Tarzan.

We are wired to find and repeat things that make us feel good. So, go ahead — find what floats your boat and keep doing it. Even if it’s just climbing a tree, catching a firefly, setting him free. Simple pleasures are the best!

HAPPINESS IS FINDING A PENCIL.
PIZZA WITH SAUSAGE
TELLING THE TIME.
HAPPINESS IS LEARNING TO WHISTLE.
TYING YOUR SHOE FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME.

HAPPINESS IS PLAYING THE DRUM IN YOUR OWN SCHOOL BAND.
AND HAPPINESS IS WALKING HAND IN HAND.
HAPPINESS IS TWO KINDS OF ICE CREAM.
KNOWING A SECRET.
CLIMBING A TREE.
HAPPINESS IS FIVE DIFFERENT CRAYONS.
CATCHING A FIREFLY.
SETTING HIM FREE.

HAPPINESS IS BEING ALONE EVERY NOW AND THEN.
AND HAPPINESS IS COMING HOME AGAIN.
HAPPINESS IS MORNING AND EVENING,
DAY TIME AND NIGHT TIME TOO.
FOR HAPPINESS IS ANYONE AND ANYTHING AT ALL
THAT’S LOVED BY YOU.

HAPPINESS IS HAVING A SISTER.
SHARING A SANDWICH.
GETTING ALONG.
HAPPINESS IS SINGING TOGETHER WHEN DAY IS THROUGH,
AND HAPPINESS IS THOSE WHO SING WITH YOU.
HAPPINESS IS MORNING AND EVENING,
DAYTIME AND NIGHTTIME TOO.
FOR HAPPINESS IS ANYONE AND ANYTHING AT ALL
THAT’S LOVED BY YOU.

I don’t have to read Salerno’s book to know about the underbelly of the self-help industry. No surprise there. Anything that involves people has a mixture of good, bad and ugly.

I can vouch from personal experience that the “self-help” industry has its share of scammers, charlatans and money-hungry gurus. Some you can spot a mile away. Others you’ll need to spend some time listening to and watching before your baloney detector goes off. Yes, sad to say, by the time you figure out their game you might be out a few bucks, or worse.

This summer I attended a wonderful seminar led by a highly-respected author and teacher in the personal development world. I met lots of great people there who are successful and want to continue growing. I also met some people who, to put it graciously, are not grounded in reality. Unfortunately, two of those people found each other and are living in a grand delusion, causing incredible damage to everyone around them.

Of course, the people they’ve hurt blame the self-help industry. I can understand their pain, but you can’t paint the entire industry with the same brush.

I love the World Wide Web. Search engines are my friends. As an armchair philosopher, truthist and realist, I love to research and read the variety of positions and arguments for life’s biggest issues.

I don’t remember which site I started with yesterday, but on my journey I visited amazon.com to learn about the book SHAM: How the Self-Help Movement Made America Helpless by Steve Salerno. I had heard about the book a few weeks ago and was intrigued by the premise because I’m perturbed by the craziness that often finds a home in the “self-help” world. I started reading reviewer comments and ended up at Dr. Michael J. Hurd’s site.

Dr. Hurd is a psychologist and prolific writer. On one hand I liked his no-nonsense, practical approach, but on the other hand he was dismissive about things that I have experienced as very helpful. I clicked a link to one of his articles at Capitalism Magazine and discovered his roots in Ayn Rand and Objectivism. I consider myself a capitalist and a realist, so I was curious about Objectivism. So off I went poking around on various sites, pro and con Objectivism, and came away with the conclusion that it is way too extreme for me. (I don’t know to what extent Dr. Hurd subscribes to Ayn Rand’s views.)

One of the biggest problems I have with Rand’s philosophy is the contention that altruism is evil and greed is good. I disagree. Humans are genetically wired to be altruistic. I won’t get into the debate here about how or why that is; in any case, I’m not going to fight the system! Being altruistic is required for the healthy promotion of life. I believe that everyone is responsible for promoting life and making this world a better place.

Seems like I’m always talking to the TV. Last night I watched Dr. Phil and House. Dr. Phil had a guest who had been wrongfully convicted for murder and had spent six months in jail. He was released, but he is traumatized and remains in his own prison. Thankfully he will be getting treatment. But before Dr. Phil introduced the expert who would be helping the man, I was imploring Dr. Phil to hook him up with a trauma specialist trained in energy psychology.

On House, the doctors thought a man was suffering from a broken heart over unrequited love, which was triggering heart attacks. Their solution was electric shock to the brain to wipe out memories, including the memory of his beloved. I was appalled. “No, no, no!” I said to the doctors. “Energy psychology can fix him!”

Many energy psychology techniques are excellent for treating trauma. Right after Hurricane Katrina, the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology listed some trauma resources on their site. This is a good place to start if you’re interested in trauma treatment.

I admit it. I don’t always live up to my intentions Yesterday was a beautiful sunny day, warmer and nicer than it’s been for weeks.

But did I notice? Did I get outside for my daily walk? No. My husband told me about the glorious day I missed, all because my butt was glued to my office chair and my eyeballs were stuck to the computer monitor. All…day…long. I barely moved, but you can be sure that huge amounts of glucose were being gobbled up by my overly busy brain.

I didn’t feel so great for the rest of the evening.

So I vowed to get out into the sunshine today and take a walk — which I did. I feel pretty good.

Speaking of feeling good, and why our path to health and happiness can sometimes be slippery, check out my interview with Vina Buuck, a registered nurse and wellness coach.

I learned about this international “cosmic comic” from my IONS e-newsletter. What a crackup!

Check out his site. He actually has a great message about the positive effects of laughter and humor.

Laughter heals. It’s been said so often, it’s almost a cliché. Laughter produces endorphins, the body’s natural painkillers. Laughter improves immune function. Laughter lowers the blood pressure because when we laugh, it causes our blood vessels to dilate — and as Swami Beyondananda has said, that’s better than having them die early.