Why Do We Keep Doing What We Know Is Bad for Us?
Why do we keep doing things we know aren't good for us? The answer may have less to do with weakness and more to do with habit, emotional soothing, and conditioning....
When we are alone we might feel tormented by the emptiness of our existence. We are saddened by life's loneliness, and are driven by an emotional hunger. We feel unreal. We suspect that something is missing from life, and we believe that our hunger will be satisfied by inviting another person into our life, so we enter into a relationship.
People often ask psychologists if they can read what people are thinking just by observing their body language and, in particular, whether they can tell if someone is lying. The inner conflict that takes place when we lie prompts a series of subtle but perceivable twitches, micro gestures, and facial movements that flash across the face in under a second. We notice these gestures, though we are often not consciously aware...
The idea that people are who and what they say they are is a necessary assumption. It's what some have referred to as the truth bias that operates in society -- an implicit assumption that unless we're shown some reason to believe otherwise, we generally believe we're being told the truth.
My suggestion is that marriage should happen after the honeymoon, never before it. As far as I know, ninety-nine percent of marriages are finished by the time the honeymoon is finished. But then you are caught, then you have no way to escape.
One of the most startling developments of the late twentieth century has been the emergence within every major religious tradition of a militant piety popularly known as "fundamentalism." Its manifestations are sometimes shocking. Fundamentalists have gunned down worshippers in a mosque, have killed doctors and nurses who work in abortion clinics, have shot their presidents, and have even toppled a powerful government. It is only a small minority...

by Del Kyger. Since childhood, Mildred "Billie" Steves has felt the loving presence of God. So when Billie began to receive communications from God following her morning meditations, she was quite at ease and did not see these events as out of the ordinary...
And on the eighth day, man created God. Who else but man would donate only a mere three letters of the alphabet to the power behind the universe? Three letters do not bear much weight in light of a God who is attributed with creating a world, saving its people, and providing a life everlasting. Many would profess to say that God in fact is not the name they would use at all to depict their own conception of a higher being. Nature, the Great Spirit, Allah, Buddha, Goddess, Jesus Christ, no Christ, the earth, so many names...
Like many people on their spiritual path, it was some time before my spirit guide revealed his name to me. I must admit I thought it rather curious when he told me his name was Joe. I asked if he were an angelic being, or perhaps a saint, but he said I could just address him as Joe. Being a no-nonsense, down-to-earth kind of a person myself, I reasoned that was the type of guide I would attract. As you may have noticed, many metaphysical people tend to ask one another...
I've heard people say that they learned the truth of health and wholeness by being sick, the reality of abundance by suffering lack, the beauty of harmonious relationships by witnessing first hand the ugliness of discord. If that's the game plan they have chosen, fine, but doesn't it remind you of the old joke about someone who hit himself on the head with a hammer so it would feel good when he stopped? Many of us...
A paradox is a statement that seems to say opposite things: 'She was strong because of her weakness.' Life is full of paradoxes. Sometimes when I am asked what my theological position is, I often -- and paradoxically -- call myself a faithful agnostic. I say it quite seriously, though I enjoy the consternation it sometimes produces. The agnostic does not know whether God exists...
Our difficulty lies in the fact that in asserting our right to partake in the man's world we have come to identify with the very patriarchal attitudes that devalue our mothers and grandmothers. We are ashamed of our yearnings for connection, our tears, our mothers. We try to live like men: valuing separateness and achievement.
by John Taylor Gatto. For a while I think we need to make community service a required part of schooling. Besides the experience in acting unselfishly that it will teach, it is the quickest way to give young children real responsibility in the mainstream of life.
by Susan Winston.
Twenty-four of us sat nervously on unforgiving wooden benches. It was a day of mixed emotions. We all knew that behind our own personal happiness was a deeply disturbing practice here in China, a quiet genocide that yearly claims the lives of thousands of female babies and children. This was the day my husband, Jim, and I were to adopt our daughter, Nikki Kate Winston.
It is time for us to rethink our beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors about the use we make of our sexual energies. How and with whom we use these energies are among the most important decisions we shall ever make in life. The consequences are immediate for the entire gamut of life lived...
People will ask you: I didn't know you were having trouble. What went wrong? You go over the confrontation script again, refining your grievances, sharpening the battles. The main thing is to get this over with and get on with life. It's finished, you think. After all, more than a million couples get divorced every year. But you had forgotten about the bad ghosts that go dancing in the night.
The issues you'll deal with in the early stages of divorce are generally on opposite ends of the emotioectrum. Indeed, most people going through a marriage breakup enter therapy disoriented because they can't choose between wildly conflicting emotions.
Many years ago when I practiced as a lawyer, I spent a large portion of time advising divorce petitioners. And, as I did so, I applied my psychological and astrological training to research the reasons why each marriage had gone off the rails. I found there were a number of recurring themes -- types of conduct which are virtually guaranteed to drive the spouse to drink, desperation, and divorce.
Why is marriage so tough at times? Why do some lifelong relationships click, while others just tick away like a time bomb? And how can you prevent a marriage from going bad -- or rescue one that already has?
by Sylvia Browne. There was one passage [in the Dead Sea Scrolls] that struck me as reflecting our philosophy so much: "An edict went out amongst the Essenes [later the Gnostics] that stated, 'Stop holding on. Quit having the stubbornness of guilt.'" It really struck me how tenacious guilt is. Guilt is a killer -- no doubt about it.
While this article was written with teenagers in mind, the suggestions and information it contains are valid for adults as well. Bill of Rights: * Your body is yours to respect and protect. * You have the right to say "no" to anything that is not safe for you...
Western sexology says that you are a physical body and orgasm is an operational definition that can be measured.