Auguste Derrière - Site Officiel Do you want a meaningful or a happy life? – Roy F Baumeister Parents often say: ‘I just want my children to be happy.’ It is unusual to hear: ‘I just want my children’s lives to be meaningful,’ yet that’s what most of us seem to want for ourselves. We fear meaninglessness. We fret about the ‘nihilism’ of this or that aspect of our culture. Let’s start with the last question. The difference between meaningfulness and happiness was the focus of an investigation I worked on with my fellow social psychologists Kathleen Vohs, Jennifer Aaker and Emily Garbinsky, published in the Journal of Positive Psychology this August. As you might expect, the two states turned out to overlap substantially. The first had to do with getting what you want and need. The second set of differences involved time frame. This begins to suggest a theory for why it is we care so much about meaning. Social life was the locus of our third set of differences. We found echoes of this phenomenon when we asked our subjects how much time they spent taking care of children.
Why Our Kids Need Play, Now More Than Ever - Sarah Goodyear "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." It's a folk proverb that was first recorded in English in 1659 (and used to horrific effect in The Shining). Whatever its origin, the truth behind it is self-evident. People who grind away ceaselessly at labor lose their sparkling edge. And yet play, the old-fashioned kind where kids engage with each other in the physical world and make up the rules as they go along, is harder and harder to come by these days. U.S. schools, under pressure to improve test performance, are increasingly oriented toward a homogenized curriculum that is learned by rote. All of this, argues Peter Gray in a powerful new essay published in Aeon, is resulting in children who are increasingly impaired socially and intellectually -- less creative, less empathetic, and more emotionally unstable. Gray, a psychologist and research professor at Boston College, is the author of a book called Free to Learn, and blogs for Psychology Today at Freedom to Learn.
Confravision | mapping the future through public discourse Playtime for adults is not just fun and games Dancing in the dark: No Lights, No Lycra is a runaway success. Photo: Angela Wylie When the lights go down I have no idea what to expect. But the music starts and it just happens: we dance. This is not alcohol-tainted, show pony strutting at a flash city nightclub. More than 120 people have paid $5 to dance the way we did when we were kids. Every song, whether sublime (soul diva, Aretha Franklin) or ridiculous ('90s Eurotrash, Aqua), is met with the same heady abandon. Advertisement ''Coming here is my sanity,'' says 31-year-old textile design student and mother-of-two Liza Freddi. This is No Lights No Lycra - a dance class in the dark, with no steps and no teacher, where being immersed in the joy of movement is the only objective. By evening's end, I'm riding a high of euphoria. The runaway success of these nights - No Lights began in 2009 with two friends in Melbourne and has grown to 33 locations around the world - is suggestive of a culture bursting to play.
Daddy's home! First time here? The best job in the world is also the hardest one, and that's what being a parent is all about. This is why we have created this house, which is dedicated to dads around the globe. It is full of useful tips and information which is brought to you with a humorous light touch. Take a tour of the house: Start in the garage, where you can watch videos showing the unboxing of Tiny Love products. Venture to the living room, where you'll get tips and advice about surviving pregnancy. Head over to the home office, where you'll find short guides for a variety of situations you might encounter. Upstairs, in the baby's room, get a preview of the profound changes you can expect to experience in your baby's life. And in the bathroom, learn effective ways to nurture a close and loving relationship with your baby. This house is stocked with nothing but useful tidbits to help you on this miraculous journey through you baby's first years. You go dad!
Interview de Jean-François Vézina « Tout se joue avant 100 ans » | Daily Books Jean-François Vézina Jean-François Vézina, psychologue et auteur de « Les hasards nécessaires », « Danser avec le chaos », « L’aventure amoureuse » et « Se réaliser dans un monde d’images », de passage en Suisse pour présenter son dernier livre « Tout se joue avant 100 ans » a répondu aux questions de Daily Books : Tu as présenté ton livre au Québec, en France, en Suisse. Oui, c’est mystérieux. Est-ce que tu es surpris par l’accueil en Suisse ? Je suis très agréablement surpris. Mais là, on a l’impression qu’il y a un décollage avec « Tout se joue avant 100 ans » ? Tout à fait. Tu dis que tu écris de la psycho-philo-poésie, est-ce un nouveau genre littéraire ou une manière d’être ? C’est une très bonne question. Est-ce que tu retrouves cette façon de regarder le monde dans notre monde d’aujourd’hui ? Ma plus grande psycho-philo-poète, c’est ma fille. « Tout se joue avant 100 ans », est-ce que c’est un livre ou est-ce que c’est un jeu ? C’est les deux. Est-ce que tu t’amuses bien ?
Doctors brace for 40 years of asbestos illness Asbestos study findings: DIY home renovators and their families are regularly exposing themselves to asbestos. Do-it-yourself home renovators are regularly exposing themselves and their children to cancer-causing asbestos, a study of NSW residents has found. Experts say the disturbing findings show that, despite repeated warnings, Australians are still not protecting themselves from asbestos-related diseases. It's a horrible disease but it's completely preventable. The study of almost 860 people who recently completed a do-it-yourself renovation found more than 61 per cent said they had been exposed to asbestos. Co-author Anthony Johnson said the more people were exposed to asbestos, the more likely they were to develop conditions such as the deadly cancer mesothelioma. Advertisement ''There is no safe level of exposure,'' said Dr Johnson, a respiratory physician from the Liverpool area. Dr Johnson said, on average, mesothelioma would only develop 42 years after exposure.
Is Psychology Missing the Play Revolution? What do gardening, spoken word, video games, engineering, running, making beer, talking to strangers, going to the theatre, fixing bikes, dealing with trauma, and drumming have in common? All were topics at TEDxNavesink-PLAY, a day-long event at the Two River Theater in Red Bank, New Jersey on May 10 2014. Yes, play. For me—a developmental psychologist concerned with the power of play throughout the life span—this was a conference-goer’s dream. Peter Gray spoke on the decline of play and the rise of mental disorders. These and other presentations illustrated one of the themes of my own talk, “Play Helps Us Grow at Any Age.” When babies and their caregivers play, they 1. go beyond themselves by doing things without knowing how (for example, they carry on conversations even though the baby don’t yet know how to speak) 2. relate to not only as who the baby is right then, but also as who s/he is becoming (for example, a speaker)— at the very same time Open yourself up to play.
How Caring for Aging Parents Affects a Career - Rosanna Fay Having kids isn't the only family consideration that affects work/life balance. Having chosen the child-free life, I didn’t expect that caring for loved ones would play any significant role in my career path. But I didn’t factor in my mom and dad. Like many in my generation, I never fully considered the potential need to care for my aging parents. Foregoing children was a complicated, difficult decision for me. It was riddled with fears about my parenting abilities, an irrational terror of labor pains, and the reality that I simply never felt ready. My father’s health was the first to go. Next, my wonderful, imperfect parents began escalating minor logistical messes into major crises. Each incident sparked an endless round of phone calls. Fast-forward 10 years, to 2008. While managing two terminally ill parents, I did my best to juggle their needs with my company’s. While it was a relief to have tedious responsibilities off my plate, I wanted the challenging ones back.
Jillian Pransky Mindplay to Expand Love in Your Life Friendship is as important to our health as getting enough sleep, eating well, and exercising. In this talk Jillian Pransky tells us that this is old news. 2,500-years ago Metta meditation was presented as a path to befriend our selves and develop a greater capacity to connect deeply with others – in the playground of our mind. Combining Metta with yoga practices will melt tension, release stagnant energy, and train the mind to be more spacious and present. About Jillian Pransky I’ve lived that magic of when you truly are doing exactly as you should be…and doing it with your whole heart. Jillian Pransky is an international presenter, National Director of Restorative Therapeutic Yoga Teacher Training for Yoga Works and co-founder of the Bright Spirit Yoga Teacher Training. As a student of Buddhist Nun Pema Chodron since 1998, Jillian’s yoga is infused with Mindfulness practices, steadfastness and ease.
How far is too far in the market for human bodies? - The Body Sphere You need money. Should you be able to sell one of your kidneys? You want a baby but can't conceive. For thousands of years, human beings were traded as slaves. Saying, 'it's my body, I can do what I like with it' is an expression of modern-day personal freedom and autonomy. It also leads us to believe that we have the exclusive right to decide what to do with our bodies. Phillips says that treating our bodies as property masks the complex issues around the commercial trading of bodies and body parts. Just as we have the right to say whether we want to be buried or want to be cremated, we have a right to say in relation to our religious or other beliefs that it would be entirely inappropriate. Surrogacy is one case in point. Proponents argue that all paid work is akin to renting out your body, and this is how surrogacy should also be regarded. According to Phillips, 'Surrogates are encouraged to think of what they are doing as just like renting out a house for nine months'.
Karl Kapp Maximum adult lifespan: Debate over how long humans can live Photo by Melanie Stetson Freeman/Christian Science Monitor/Getty Images Read the rest of Laura Helmuth's series on longevity. There’s an oddly persistent myth that people have always had a good chance of living to a ripe old age if they could just survive childhood. Why has life expectancy continued to go up steadily over the past several decades? Public health measures get the credit for most of the increase in life expectancy that happened from the mid-1800s to mid-1900s. If you look at the top causes of death in the United States in 1900 and 2010, you might think you’re examining data from two entirely different species. Heart disease isn’t a new invention. Because heart disease is such a killer, anything that reduces its incidence or treats it can save a lot of lives and boost our overall average life expectancy. Heart disease is still a horribly common way to die, and it’s hard to appreciate the number of deaths that didn’t happen. So what’s next? Video is courtesy of Project M.