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 Source/Author: Malavika Velayanikal |  Posted on: August 29th, 2010 City psychiatrists explain just what the Chilean miners are going through deep within the earth, and steps they can take to maintain their mental balance
A couple of years ago, the BBC aired a special show called Total Isolation. Six people were shut inside a cell in a nuclear bunker, quite in the dark. After, 48 hours, the volunteers experienced auditory and visual hallucinations, visions and an inability to sense time. Tests proved that their ability to complete the simplest tasks had deteriorated. One subject’s memory capacity fell 36 per cent and all the subjects had trouble thinking of words beginning with the letter ‘F’.
This was the psychological impact of 48 hours of isolation from the world on subjects who knew they were taking part in an experiment, and were assured of physical safety. Imagine the state of 33 miners trapped underground in Chile for more than three weeks. Holed up in a hot and cramped shelter, they know that whatever chance at rescue will arrive in about four months. Some of them are already despondent, and aren’t eating well either. The officials said that while the rescue operations are under way, the trapped men would receive water, sustenance, medical care and communication through a tiny drill probe hole that located them last Sunday. But that is hardly enough, psychologists feel.
It is tough to stimulate your brain with no light, says Dr Vikram Prabhu. This senior psychiatrist thinks sensory deprivation is serious threat. “Without normal stimuli like light and sound, brain functions are disrupted or in extremes cases lost,” he says. Any kind of confined space over a period of time can make people get disoriented, confused, and lose a sense of time and place. Often, in such circumstances, people tend to withdraw into themselves, and a hopeless, helpless feeling can set in, he says. “This is usually followed by an inability to talk to each other.”
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Source/Author: ANI | Posted on: May 25th, 2010
Top social demographer Bernard Salt’s assertion that husbands, wives, partners and children may come and go but friends are forever, is probably true.
MELBOURNE: Friendship is more important than sex to the present generation, according to a top social demographer.
Bernard Salt explains, a change in attitude [...]
Source/Author: Bruce Sallan | Posted on: April 28th, 2010
My son and I had an extraordinary experience this Spring Break while on a ski trip at Mammoth, California. It was just the two of us, since my wife stayed home for work and my older son preferred hanging out with his friends and girlfriend (I can’t blame him, as she’s wonderful). So, it was a special alone-time-trip with my younger son, David.
 Because our skiing levels and skiing interests are quite different, we tend to prefer to ski separately. I have friends there and David had some friends from school that he skied with. However, we always hook up at some point and one day, after he’d slightly hurt himself and was taking it easy, we skied together. We skied just one area, where there’s a short chair lift and short runs.
When we approached the lift line, I noticed a woman waiting just outside the line. I made a comment that on such a beautiful day, she shouldn’t be kept waiting. She smiled and we went ahead.
A few minutes later, when we returned to the lift, she was still there. I suggested that whoever was keeping her waiting was rude and she should ride up with us. She replied that she might ride up with us the next time we came down. I introduced my son, and myself. She told us her name was Lisa.
Next time down, again she was there and I said, “Okay, that’s it; they’re being very rude and you should get to enjoy yourself.” “C’mon with us.” She then quietly told me the real story of what was going on. Evidently, she had had some sort of accident on a chairlift five years ago, and was scared to go on again and hadn’t in all the intervening years. Today, she was trying, but had stood there for over an hour trying to get up the nerve to go.
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Source/Author: Karl Staib | Posted on: February 28th, 2010
“Never go to sleep without a request to your subconscious.” – Thomas Edison
Your subconscious loves to do work while your body performs other tasks that are easy. I can prove this very easily by asking you how many good ideas you have had while driving or in the shower. When you are relaxed yet slightly distracted, your mind is often at its best.
Using subconscious requests will…
- Improve your motivation.
- Help you become happier.
- Increase your emotional intelligence.
You’ll see improvement in less than a month.
My last request was…
“Please give me more patience when commuting to work and allow me to even enjoy my time in the car.”
Within a month I was enjoying my ride to work.
My latest request is…
“Let’s find creative ways to grow my blog.”
I took this approach because it’s going to take a request to my subconscious and action in my waking life to make this happen. This request is only a few days old, but it’s already working. Instead of just asking people to help vote for my blog on social sites that rate articles such as Stumble Upon and Digg, I’ve change my communication. I now friend someone, give a compliment (only if they are worthy) and tell them that they ever need any help to shoot me a message. They are much more willing to help me out.
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Source/Author: Bruce Sallan | Posted on: February 11th, 2010
Nobody promised that being a parent would be easy nor were we assured that we’d get kids that were easy to handle. If you’re like most of us, you face regular challenges to your authority, your rules, and the way you expect your kids to behave. As with much in life, there’s room for compromise, but with parenting I suggest that sticking with your rules defines your values and teaches your children valuable lessons. The first rule must be that you tell the truth.
It’s a simple idea to tell the truth, but not always so simple to execute in real-life family situations. For instance, what do your kids really hear when you say something like, “If you do this fill-in-the-blank thing, you’re gonna be grounded” with stern parental authority. Most kids will interpret that to mean, “Well, I sure hope you won’t do that, but I’ll forgive you when you do because I love you so much and want to be your best friend.” The result? You haven’t told the truth or stood by your word. The kids then know they can manipulate you.
The impact of vacillating on our children is drastic and very harmful. I cannot emphasize enough how much we are role models for our children and how much they learn from our behavior. Our kids watch every move we make and if we waffle on a rule or a threat, then they learn to work that to their benefit. I’ll offer a personal example that has been hard on our family.
My older son turned 16 in November and he still hasn’t been allowed to get his driver’s permit, let alone his license. At 15½ he was legally allowed to get his permit, but the reason he hasn’t is that when he was about 14, I set a rule that he had to have a “B” average for the privilege of driving. No excuses, no blaming his teachers, no “I’m so close” – he had to bring home a “B” average.
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