FEATURE: How to Start a Slow Hobby
Written by Kathryn Savage
Fight stress through painting, knitting, yoga and sculpting. Numerous studies suggest that learning gentle and balancing activities may have positive affects on mental and physical health, overall stress levels and blood pressure.
The first step is to de-clutter mentally. Make more time for slow activities by turning off the TV, leaving work at the office this weekend and generally reclaiming your time and creating space in your routine for a few new (slow) pass times.
Painting is a great activity because it requires mindfulness, beckons creativity, and is nicely accompanied by a great glass of wine and your favorite music. You don’t have to be the next Picasso, or bother with a class, just buy some paints and set aside an hour to unwind and let your creativity shine!
Knitting is a handy pass time! It’s especially convenient for you New Yorkers. The subway is a great way to pack your closet with luxurious scarves and hats next winter! Studies suggest over fifty percent of people who regularly knit and crochet do these activities to unwind at the end of a stressful day.
Meditation requires a little something knitting has going for it, concentration. The benefits of spending even ten minutes a day sitting quietly and meditating (or knitting) may profoundly impact your chill factor.
Garden. Studies suggest that gardening is psychologically relaxing. It’s also fruitful! The delightful smells and tastes of fresh grown fruits and vegetables in your kitchen is great all summer long!
Do one thing at a time. All this multi-tasking is driving us nuts! Protect your short term memory by doing one thing at a time.
How to make more time for peaceful activities?
Do laundry on Tuesday, not Saturday. Make more time on the weekend for fun things by moving the chores to a night when you’re just watching Dancing With The Stars anyway.
Sleep in on Saturday, Set the alarm on Sunday. Pick a day to get up early and budget in time for painting, meditating, a yoga class or gardening.
Need a Motivation Kick Start?
Written by Kathryn Savage
Pressed for time, low on motivation and trying to lose weight?
We all know that maintaining a healthy weight is important for longevity. And sometimes all we need is a friendly dose of encouragement! I find a good place to turn to for motivation is someone whose been where you are and gotten themselves over the hump.
Focus on Success!
If you are struggling to loose weight, check out some success stories at the Women’s Health Magazine’s website.
Each success story provides information like hometown, age, height, job and weight before and after. Chances are good you’ll find someone (or a lot of people) who you can identify with. Reading these inspiring stories if you are struggling to reach your goal weight might be just the motivation you need!
Docs and Buddhists Unite
Written by Kathryn Savage
Meditation, once reserved for zen centers and the last five minutes of yoga class is becoming an increasingly popular form of therapy among the Freudian set."Mindfulness Meditation" as it's called, is a lesson in everything old is new again. It is a new practice with roots in the fifth-century B.C. The New York Times recently published a report on this therapeutic exercise that requires participants to focus on breathing, and play "mental catch-and-release of emotions" that run through their consciousness. Sound like a bunch of hippy crap? Think it's something you might want to try?
Here is the lowdown: "Mindfulness Meditation"
"Practitioners find a comfortable position, close the eyes and focus first on breathing, passively observing it. If a stray thought or emotion enters the mind, they allow it to pass and return attention to the breath. The aim is to achieve focused awareness on what is happening moment to moment.
Studies find that it can help manage chronic pain. The findings are mixed on substance abuse. Two trials suggest that it can cut the rate of relapse in people who have had three or more bouts of depression."
For more information read the New York Times article here.
Work and Home Balance Sheet
Written by Kathryn Savage
Feeling a little tugged? (In a million different directions?) Sometimes life gets crazy and instead of feeling content with all the different directions we are going, we can feel like all the plates we’re twirling in the air are twisting and sailing out of control! How to get back to balance?
Ask the experts! I recommend a recent article on the Mayo Clinic website about work and life balance. The article offers some great tips for reducing stress and balancing the scales.
Some article highlights are:
Keep a log. Track everything you do for one week. Include work-related and non-work-related activities. Decide what's necessary and satisfies you the most. Cut or delegate activities you don't enjoy, don't have time for or do only out of guilt. If you don't have the authority to make certain decisions, talk to your supervisor.
Communicate clearly. Limit time-consuming misunderstandings by communicating clearly and listening carefully. Take notes if it helps.
Nurture yourself. Set aside time each day for an activity that you enjoy, such as walking, working out or listening to music. Unwind after a hectic workday by reading, practicing yoga or taking a bath or shower.
Protect your day off. Try to schedule some of your routine chores on workdays so that your days off are more relaxing.
A Stroke of Nirvana
Written by Kathryn Savage
Jill Bolte Taylor was just a "regular neuroscientist working at Harvard’s brain research center when she experienced nirvana." (Link)
How? She had a stroke.
Strokes are not a fast track to harmony, but for Ms. Taylor, the biggest revelation post-stroke was how great she felt. Her stroke damaged “her left lobe — the source of ego, analysis, judgment and context". She couldn’t recognize her mother, speak, or count. All this came back to her during her recovery phase, and while her left brain was not destroyed completely, she began using more of her right brain. Along with her memories, her ability to use rational thought and recognize friends and family, Ms. Taylor now possesses a sense of well-being that at times alludes us all.
Her message to the world is: slow the chatter of the left brain. “Generally, the left brain gives us context, ego, time, logic. The right brain gives us creativity and empathy.” Ms. Taylor now chooses to “live a more peaceful, spiritual life” by focusing on nurturing right brain activities and “by sidestepping (her) left brain.”
What are Ms. Taylor’s right brain boosting activities?
“She is committed to making time for passions — physical and visual — that she believes exercise her right brain, including water-skiing, guitar playing and stained-glass making.”
If You’re Happy and You Know It
Written by Michelle Albert
A gallon of gas approaches $4. Food prices are on the rise. The housing market remains on life support. People are starting to think that we are in a recession. So, the question is, how are Americans faring and how do you measure the nation’s happiness?
The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index offers just this sort of snapshot of the nation’s health. The results show that many Americans are in need of the Blue Zones lessons to help them achieve greater happiness and well-being. Starting this January, researchers called one thousand Americans, seven days a week, and asked them about their happiness based on the World Health Organization’s definitions. We’re not a satisfied lot, the study found. Almost half of the 100,000 respondents (47 percent) said they are struggling, and four percent said they are suffering.
“It’s pretty clear from the data provided through the Well-Being Index that Americans are indeed stuck in a cycle of chronic disease. We see that the majority of America is currently struggling or suffering and that they often make poor lifestyle choices. Many are stressed, worried and overweight, all factors which lead to illness and, ultimately, lifelong health conditions,” said Healthways President and CEO Ben Leedle. “The information from the Well-Being Index will enable community leaders, policy makers and employers to make decisions that positively affect the health and well-being of millions of people.”
Yet again we see the mind-body connection, and the important of creating your own, personal Blue Zones. The good news from the study is that policy makers and community leaders have a way of measuring well-being, and I hope that the study will help focus attention on these quality-of-life issues.
The study’s website can be found at http://www.well-beingindex.com/.
FEATURE: Lessons in Likability, Longevity
Written by Kathryn Savage
There have been many convincing studies conducted about the positive impact of social bonding on overall health and longevity.
A recent study led by Lisa Berkman of Harvard found that over a ninety-year period, seniors with the most social connection seemed to outlive their isolated peers. Stark evidence suggests that people without a lot of friends were between two and three times more likely to die.
French centenarian dies but passes on life lessons
Written by Michelle Albert
Normally, I wouldn't have noticed the obituary of Germaine Tillion, a French resistance fighter and intellectual who died April 19 at the age of 100. But since starting to write for Blue Zones, I read anything I can find on centenarians, and Ms. Tillion fits right in with the best of the centenarians Dan Buettner has gotten to know.
Born in May 1907, Tillion she was captured by the Nazis and was held for three years in a concentration camp. Her mother was gassed in the same concentration camp, but Tillion was liberated. After the war, she became a highly respected intellectual and anthropologist, bringing her experiences to the Algerian struggle for independence and her anthropological work. Her life speaks to the power of living a life of intellectual curiosity and honesty.
Her New York Times obituary can be found here.
Photo credit: http://www.wellesley.edu
Researchers find life expectancy decreasing
Written by Michelle Albert
It used to be that you could count on only a few things: death, taxes, and an increase in average life expectancy. Now it looks like we may be back to just counting on death and taxes. For the first time in recent history, researchers have now shown that life expectancy is slipping for some groups in the United States. The slip is prevalent in women (a gender known to have a longer life expectancy than men) living in rural and poor areas. It is a trend not bound by race, and the numbers are startling. As The Washington Post reports:
The downward trend is evident in places in the Deep South, Appalachia, the lower Midwest and in one county in Maine. It is not limited to one race or ethnicity but it is more common in rural and low-income areas. The most dramatic change occurred in two areas in southwestern Virginia (Radford City and Pulaski County), where women's life expectancy has decreased by more than five years since 1983.
My grandmother lives in the county bordering Pulaski, so this really caught my eye. She follows many of the lessons of the Blue Zones (but she doesn’t drink alcohol), and with just four years to go before reaching 100, she’s healthy.
But the data should give us all pause as the researchers note that many of the deaths are from lung cancer, emphysema, and diabetes – and there are things to do today to protect yourself from these diseases. Don’t smoke. Eat a plant-based diet. Exercise and remember your spiritual health. It looks like the Blue Zone lessons are more important now than ever.
*If you are interested in reading the journal article, click here.
Burnt Out? Try These Rescue Remedies
Written by Kathryn Savage
One more cup of coffee in the morning. One more hour at work. One more story before bedtime. It all equals one less day spent walking, running and biking, or savoring a sunset and a glass of pinot noir. Whether it's stress, kids, work or finances, maybe it’s time to stop, take a minute for yourself and turn stress into serenity!
Here are five rescue remedies to save you from temporary burn out.
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What is 'Outlook'?
A healthy outlook is an important component of longevity. The Okinawans call it Ikigai, and Nicoyans call it “plan de vida,” but in both cultures the phrase means “why I wake up in the morning.” Read more...
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