A Time-Tested Organic Medicine for Stress, Anxiety and Depression
Everyone has tough days and for some the days seem to be a never ending string of murkiness. All of our mental afflictions, stress, anxiety, depression, addictive urges and trauma responses are experienced as contractions in the body. An antidote to this would naturally be opening the body up and that is one among many reasons why yoga can be helpful. But to take it one step further, laughter opens our bodies up, vibrates core areas where the stuck energy resides while simultaneously igniting resiliency centers of the brain.
Do yourself a favor, simply watch this 3-minute video and see what you notice:
Here’s another 
Find some food today with which to truly engage in mindful eating.
We don’t have to look further than B.F. Skinner to see that most of us have developed a habit of being overly obsessed with our Smartphones. We all get incoming messages that hint at a potential reward, most of the time it’s not a reward, but sometimes it is and this is what gets us. It’s called intermittent reinforcement and it’s how Skinner made his rats keep pressing the lever hoping for more pellets of food. When it comes to our Smartphone most of us wake up with it and go to sleep with it. When it calls for us during the day we come running. If you’re interested in getting a bit of freedom from it, read this quick story of how philosopher and teacher Krishnamurti helped a student become free of irritation. You’ll see the connection.
A wise man once said, “Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your unguarded thoughts.”
It is my profound honor to bring to you one of the true leaders of our time in respect to the marriage of Eastern and Western Psychology, Jack Kornfield. Not only that, he also holds his PhD in clinical Psychology which makes him so relevant to the connection between mindfulness and psychotherapy. He is author of 
and many other books and with NICABM’s help he is putting out 
There’s no getting around it, life is finite. Some people realize that earlier on and for others it doesn’t come until later. But for 
, that day came at the age of 43 when her mid-life crisis hit and she was confronted to come to terms with who she was. By chance she was invited to the landlocked state in Southeast Asia, Bhutan and what she found there are some nuggets of wisdom that can help the rest of us through our own moments of crisis and even be a path to happiness.
It’s been a week out since The New Year has set upon us. Whether you’re a resolution person or not, odds are there are some thoughts that you have about what you’d like to see unfold over this next year. In The Now Effect I call this “Paying Attention to Your Intention” and one of the best ways to do that is to intentionally carve some time out of your busy life and take a mindful look at how you’d like to be in this next year. Taking a retreat is a great way to create the space to do this. You can do a mini-retreat of blocking out an hour or more or go to an organized retreat for deeper connection. This weekend, I’ll be at Kripalu in the Berkshires 
No matter what time of year it is, stress will likely be a part of it. A little stress is good, it fuels motivation, but there’s a tipping point where it starts to have diminishing returns. When that higher level of stress hits, if it’s left unchecked it can lead to anxiety, depression, chronic pain, addictive behaviors, you name it. Today I want to give you something that you can BET on anywhere, anytime to help turn the volume down on the chaotic mind and bring you back into balance.
