Are You a Full Adult? Check the Significant Seven and Find Out.
by Mary Vallei, Counseling Hypnotherapist
A fully functioning adult can be defined as an individual who has three core beliefs and four skills sets.
BELIEFS:
- "I believe that I am worthwhile, valuable, and I am significant in my relationships."
- "I believe that I am capable, and competent, and can accomplish what I want to."
- "I believe that I can influence the course of my own life."
SKILLS:
- Strong intra-personal skills. The ability to understand personal emotions, to use that understanding to develop self-discipline and self-control, and to delay gratification.
- Strong interpersonal skills. The ability to work with others and develop friendships though communication, cooperation, negotiation, sharing, empathizing, and listening. Coupleship skills are included.
- Strong systemic skills. The ability to respond to the limits and consequences of everyday life with responsibility, adaptability, flexibility, and integrity.
- Strong wisdom skills. The ability to use wisdom and to evaluate situations according to appropriate values to learn from the experiences of life.
Using Ancient Methods to Conquer Stress in a Modern World
by Deirdre Denholm
Stress is something we all have to cope with, but for some people it can really become overwhelming. Various life-situations and health issues can build up to the point where some people break-down and can no longer cope, feeling they have exhausted all available resources. Sometimes all we need is to learn some useful self-help techniques and to gain new insight and a fresh perspective about stress.
The Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program (or MBSR) is an 8-week program originally developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D. in 1979, at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center. This program incorporates mindfulness meditation and yoga to help train people to cope better with the stress in their lives. Originally developed to help persons manage chronic pain, the program has been highly successful in helping people make positive life changes in many different way. By teaching us to see the importance of being mindful in the present moment, we can respond differently to stress. Essentially, this means that we are trained to be fully awake, aware, and present, and therefore, less reactive to stressors. This previents stress from ultimately controlling us.
The course is run in a group format, which meets once per week for 8 sessions. Weekly meetings run about 2 hours in length. Yoga and meditation is taught and practiced and various aspects of stress are discussed. During the 8 sessions, participants are required to practice techniques learned in the class at home (for example, yoga and meditation), using guided yoga and meditation CDs provided by the instructor. At the end of the 8 sessions, the group meets for an additional (optional) 9th session (a Saturday or Sunday), which is held as a silent 'day of mindfulness' followed by a concluding discussion. During the 'day of mindfulness', all techniques learned in the course are reviewed and practiced, which helps to further integrate the material.
The classes are run as an informal group discussion, along with instruction in, and practice of, mindfulness meditation and yoga. However, the program is quite structured and a course workbook is often used. No previous experience with yoga or meditation is required. If you are interested in finding out more about the MBSR program and how it may help you, please call (248) 515-9792 for more information or visit www.padmakshiyoga.com.