Category: Anxiety
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Permission to Wallow
Even if you haven’t said anything, I see you. Even if you don’t want to bother anyone, because it’s more of the same, and people’s patience is bound to give out. Even if depression is a cliche, even if it’s seasonal, even if you have damn good reason. Your brain, evolutionarily speaking, DOES have…
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Lazy, Self-Indulgent Workaholics
I’m signed up for a lot of Inspirational Mailing Lists. My inbox is inundated with a symphony of earnest healers and coaches, all urging me to “Slow down to speed up! Take some time for reflection! Don’t be busy for the sake of it!” If they only knew. Sometimes I think the systems I’ve created…
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Touchy Topic Tuesday: Supermarket Horrors
I love to grocery shop. It’s grounding, sensual, creative and pragmatic. In a world full of anxiety, filling my cupboards with a week’s worth of healthy meals feels like putting a carabiner in the cliff face of my life. But I’m also a professional health-news junkie. And now my local Superfresh is a minefield. Top…
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Touchy Topic Tuesday: I Am Embarrassed To Tell You This, But…
…I’m wearing an ankle brace. Turns out my crippled ankle wasn’t psychosomatic after all. According to my fabulous new podiatrist, I have posterior tibial tendon dysfunction, caused by the extra bone in my flat, flat foot torquing my gait and stretching the tendon until it is practically shredded. He says if I don’t wear this…
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Ben Affleck’s Hidden Power of Healing
Recently, I had a four-hour layover in Times Square. I was taking the bus up north to visit family, one of whom is critically ill, and my stress level was seismic. Times Square is not a restorative locale at the best of times; after ducking into Le Pain Quotidien for an overpriced lunch, and unwilling…
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What to Do When You Can’t DO Anything
As many of you know, my brother-in-law, Leif, is currently battling a rare form of cancer called mantle cell lymphoma. He’s young, formidably strong and has one of the healthiest lifestyles of anyone I know. We went up to Maine to visit him last week. It’s impossible to describe what it’s like to watch someone you…
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The Perils of Positive Thinking
Now, I’m not going to name any names. Let’s just say that There are Those Out There who will tell you, with great fluidity and earnestness, that you are what you think. That “your attitude determines your altitude.” That changing your mind will change your life. They will tell you this in a spiritual context,…
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Is Reiki Flaky?
Image via Wikipedia Recently I interviewed a colleague, Kathy Fleetwood, about her Reiki practice. She lit up. “It’s changed my life,” she declared. Last year, Kathy’s mother came down with something that doctors tentatively diagnosed as Parkinson’s. She lost weight, was too exhausted to work, ached all over, and walked with a shuffle and a stoop. Kathy…
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Fear Itself
Scientists get around to noticing the obvious: What if Sullivan’s anxiety wasn’t merely an emotional side effect of her difficult life but the central issue affecting her health? According to research that Burke had been reading, the traumatic events that Sullivan experienced in childhood had likely caused significant and long-lasting chemical changes in both her brain…