In a study of adult human development, Harvard psychiatrist George Vaillant once observed 30 adolescents from a group of 456 inner city youths, “whose childhoods were the most barren and the least conducive to continued adult development.” When children get a rough start in life, developmental psychologists predict that problems will follow them into adulthood. [...]
“Life is pain . . . anyone who says differently is selling something.” This is a quote from the “man-in-black” in the movie The Princess Bride, and it’s not too far from the truth. Pain is part and parcel of the experience of living and try as we might, we can’t seem to avoid it. [...]
by Tali Shenfield, PhD, CPsych Dr. Tali Shenfield is a Clinical Psychologist and Director of Richmond Hill Psychology Center. In this article Dr. Shenfield speaks from personal experience, practicing yoga and meditation for over 10 years. When she has free time from psychological assessments and psychotherapy, Dr. Shenfield also enjoys writing articles for her psychology [...]
“Counterclockwise” was the name given to a research study from the 1970s (and later a book by the same name) by psychologist Ellen Langer in which she tries to turn the clock back for her research subjects. The subjects (a group of men in their 70s and 80s) were invited to a retreat where they [...]
Have you ever had a friend age 10 years before your very eyes? Have you ever seen someone put on about 50lbs literally overnight? I have had both of these things happen recently. How is that possible? It is actually a common symptom [...]
As a boy I was an avid reader and could always be found with my nose buried in one book or another. I remember one of my favorites, a book that I would read and re-read ad infinitum, was a collection of stories of the famed detective Sherlock Holmes, written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. [...]
“Small Choices Change Everything” –Tom Rath Welcome to 2014. In some ways, the transition from one year to another is fairly meaningless. You flip a page on a calendar and move on. You are the same person you were before. Yes, there is this cultural habit of establishing new goals or “resolutions” for the year [...]
I was recently dealing with a nasty case of medial epicondylitis (otherwise known as “golfer’s elbow”) characterized by tender pain just inside my right elbow. Those who know me are probably thinking, “but you don’t play golf!” And they’re right. I don’t. But apparently you can get golfer’s elbow from doing too many pull-ups and [...]
My son Dylan is fascinated with garbage men. He will scream with glee, “The garbage truck is coming!” and rush to the window of the house to watch them load their rubbish into their giant truck. Sometimes, if we are lucky, we time it right and come out in front of the house just as [...]
Paul Nicholson via Compfight I am not a religious man. In fact, in a survey of character strengths, spirituality or “religiousness” comes out as my lowest strength, number 24 out of 24. If there is a weakness that I need to work on . . . this is it. A lot of the guidance that [...]
