Flourishing and Idleness

A thought-provoking blog by Alex Gallo-Brown that might inspire us to try to create more space in our harried, financially-strapped lives to dream and play: http://therumpus.net/2011/11/the-devilishness-of-idleness/

How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body

Here's a link to an article that focuses on the potential injuries that can occur practicing yoga. (How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body: www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/magazine/how-yoga-can). While one-sided, it illuminates dangers that are worth paying attention to. What it doesn't say -- and people need to consider -- is that all activities and systems of thought from meditation and religion, to running and psychotherapy are two-sided: they have the power to help or harm, depending on how awarely they are practiced...

Animals and Humans

Here's an article on the emerging interest in animals and their relations to humans: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/03/science/animal-studies-move-from-the-lab-to-the-lecture-hall.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&smid=fb-share

Animal Studies Move From the Lab to the Lecture Hall
www.nytimes.com

Cultivating Understanding at Home

The key to cultivating understanding is to take your partner's feelings seriously; to find the logic in what he or she says and does, even if you disagree. If both people do this then the atmosphere is much more conducive to finding healthy solutions to conflict and misunderstandings.

Flourishing as a Couple

If couples remember this one principal their relationships will be infinitely better: Be more interested in understanding your partner, rather than winning.

Music and Flourishing, or You Are What You Listen To

Listen to this jazz tune by Wes Montgomery to test the yogic idea that we are deeply shaped by what we are connected to. Notice if your mood changes as you hear Wes' beautiful playing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqn3PF_DcSg&feature=related

Feeling Good and Feeling Badly

Feeling "good" doesn't mean that you are doing well (you might be repeating familiar, addictive patterns); and "feeling badly" doesn't mean you are doing poorly (you might be taking healthy risks and venturing into new and unfamiliar territory...