♣ Puppies can teach us a lot about how to respond to frustrating and difficult situations in positive and productive ways. We adopted a puppy several years ago. I knew the puppy would have some things to learn about getting along with us inside a house, about...
Read MorePersonal growth may seem like a solo pursuit, but it's our relationships that bring out the best in us. Every week, my wife and I have a meeting where we talk about what is going well in our family, but also what we could be doing...
Read MoreResearch suggests that building optimism about the future increases your happiness and paves the way for stronger and more fulfilling connections. Do you know how to create the kinds of relationships that feel good? Research suggests that building optimism about the future can motivate us to work toward our desired...
Read MoreFostering and maintaining close friendships can help keep your brain healthier as you age. Plenty of exercise. Healthy food. Positive attitude. Plain old good luck. There’s lots of advice out there about how to keep body and brain in optimal shape as the years...
Read MoreIt all comes down to two key efforts: conflict management and avoiding external threats. Why do some relationships go the distances, and others flame out? You could listen to 1,000 songs written on heartbreak and love—one of my current faves is Chris Stapleton’s “Nobody to Blame,”...
Read MoreLearning to express anger in a healthy way will help couples resolve conflicts, instead of letting them simmer. Every Saturday night, Bill and Sarah leave their son with a babysitter and go out to dinner. Sarah hopes that by dressing up for date night, it’ll keep...
Read MoreIn all relationships, sometimes a little reinvention is needed. Sometimes love is a choice. I have some friends who have been married for more than 15 years. They have been going through a hard time lately. Talk of divorce in the air. I am friends with both of them...
Read More↓ What can your anger teach you about yourself for better relationships? Falling in love is awesome. And sometimes it’s awful. I’ve had a few pretty bad relationships in my time, and lately, I’ve been able to identify certain patterns that have come up time and again....
Read MoreThe answer might not be what you’d expect ↓ We’ve all watched from the outside as a new relationship soured, yet someone stayed in the bad situation for a surprisingly long time. Maybe we’ve even exhibited that behavior ourselves. When someone’s gut is screaming out, “This won’t...
Read MoreFostering and maintaining close friendships can help keep your brain healthier as you age. ↓ Plenty of exercise. Healthy food. Positive attitude. Plain old good luck. There’s lots of advice out there about how to keep body and brain in optimal shape as the...
Read MoreIf we don't confront the past, we can be haunted by sadness and self-blame. Recently, I went to high school Back-to-School night with my first husband, Mike, and we ran into a colleague of his I’d never met before. “This is Christine,” Mike said...
Read More↓ Some days it feels like we’re in constant communication, flooded by a nonstop stream of status updates and tweets and three-word questions: “What’s ur eta?” You’d think we would be closer than ever. But more messages do not equal deeper relationships. Don’t get me wrong, my staff...
Read More↓ Happiness is a choice. But we continually need to be reminded by people to make that choice. ↓ One big mistake people make is not realizing that happiness is an individual choice. But every choice is influenced by the people in our lives. If you change your...
Read More↓ With strong social support, we can accomplish impressive feats of resilience and even extend our lives. ↓ Our need for social support isn’t just in our heads. Evolutionary psychology explains that the innate need to form social bonds is wired into our biology. When we make a...
Read MoreA mindful relationship with our phones is the key to balancing in-person interactions and online activity. Here are six ways to limit screen time in order to be more present in our real-world relationships. By Tchiki Davis | April 2018 ↓ By 2016, 77 percent of U.S. adults owned a smartphone....
Read MoreChildren learn more from what you do than what you say, so your resilience—the way they watch you approach adversity—affects theirs. Explore these mindful strategies for building awareness around challenging experiences. Imagine two equally talented graduates at their first jobs. Within a year, downsizing gets them both laid...
Read MoreThe secrets to supporting a stressed-out partner. ↓ You’ve probably been in this situation: Your partner comes home upset from work or an event and is confiding in you. You think you’re helping, smoothly saying all the right things, but—oh no! Lovey is getting more worked up....
Read More◊ Throughout our lives, we run so fast in achieving a better life that we forget to think what actually counts. I have seen a lot of obese people who are rich and have no control over their eating habits. They seem extremely depressed about it....
Read MoreHoning the skills that help you get along with others might be the best career move you can make. ↓ By Jae Ellard | February 10, 2018 ↓ ↓ Think of the people you most admire. What qualities do they have? It’s likely that character traits like being empathic, trustworthy, and a good listener,...
Read MoreTips to keep your sanity and enjoy your time as a (mindful) parent. By Kelly Graves | February 12, 2018 ↓ Every parent knows that having children is a field ripe with emotions. Frustration, anger, boredom, joy, love, or fear—name an emotion, and it’s probably there on the wild ride of...
Read More↓ Get creative in how you approach your relationships. When most of us think of creativity, we think of some artistic endeavor that may include artwork, music, performances or even fashion and design. Few of us think of creativity as a primary and critical relationship skill. However,...
Read More↓ Are you struggling to discover your purpose? That may be because you feel isolated from other people. Here are six ways you can overcome that. Do you have a sense of purpose? For decades, psychologists have studied how long-term, meaningful goals develop over the span of our...
Read More↓ Setting goals with your partner can be a double-edged sword. On one end, when you achieve them you feel joy and exhilaration for having realized a dream or aspiration. On the other hand, when you fail to meet them, you may face disappointment as you...
Read MoreI met an old friend for dinner the other night who shared with me that most of her friends, in their early 40’s, were getting divorced. She also confessed that even she had been on the brink of divorce at least 10 times this year,...
Read MoreEvolutionarily speaking, loneliness is a fantastic advantage. If our earliest ancestors hadn’t felt twinges of sadness and longing when they strayed far from the clan, they may have ventured out farther—and perished. As a social species, loneliness acts as a survival instinct on par with...
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