by guest blogger Kathryn R. Simpson, M.S., author of The Perimenopause & Menopause Workbook and The Women’s Guide to Thyroid Health

Take this simple quiz to see if you may have low thyroid function:

Excerpt from Making the Grade with ADD

People with ADD can find it rather easy to use their credit cards. It’s easy to forget that you’re spending real money. You just hand the cashier a plastic card; you don’t actually see the money leaving your pocket. And, since people with ADD are more likely to experience depression and anxiety, they may have a tendency to engage in “retail therapy,” raising their credit card bill.

by guest blogger Stephanie Moulton Sarkis, Ph.D.,

You may be thinking that mindfulness and money don’t really go together—how could a practice focused on non-materialism apply to the source of materialism? But in fact, the practice of mindfulness can be applied to your daily money management practices.

Excerpt from The Mindful Path through Shyness

That we have emotions is a given. How we react or respond to them is a matter of choice. Victor Frankl offered the important insight that there’s a space between stimulus and response, and if we can pause and bring the full light of our awareness into it that space, we can free ourselves from automatic reactions that are often dysfunctional. Mindfulness practice will allow you to recognize that space and use it to respond to your emotions with clarity, compassion, and skillfulness.

Excerpt from The Mindful Path Through Worry and Rumination

Traditionally, mindfulness was taught as the essential foundation for meditation practice. However, it was also understood that mindfulness was half of this foundation. The other essential half was compassion. For thousands of years, mindfulness and compassion have been understood to be the two wings of spiritual enlightenment and psychological freedom.

by guest blogger Thomas Roberts, author of A Mindfulness Book

Greetings!

Recently, mindfulness has become somewhat of a commodity, a buzzword, something we can learn or get and be guaranteed wonderful outcomes. Be aware that mindfulness isn’t a thing to possess, an end state, something you have or do.

Consider, instead, that mindfulness is a way of being in the world. A way of being with great compassion, of remaining present amidst the flow of experiences that is our life. Turning down the volume on all our resistance, our need to control, manipulate and react. Instead, hang in there with what is going on. Remain patient with this flow, remain curious, and respond with great compassion.

by guest blogger Sameet Kumar, Ph.D. author of Grieving Mindfully and The Mindful Path Through Worry and Rumination

The old saying “as above, so below” is particularly well suited to learning both the practice of mindfulness and the revolutionizing changes that mindfulness can bring. Mindfulness can change how you experience yourself and thereby affect how you manage your relationships with others. The more mindful you become of your thoughts and feelings, the less likely are you to be controlled by ruminations and irrational worries, or get swept up into the maelstrom of destructive emotions.

Excerpt from Going Home without Going Crazy: How to Get Along with Your Parents and Family (Even When They Push Your Buttons)

Flooding occurs when an adrenaline over load over whelms parts of the brain. Have you ever been so upset you can’t think, can’t speak, can barely cope? That’s flooding. You may already know some thing about flooding from the fight-or-flight syndrome, where the more primitive parts of the brain over ride the more advanced parts. The result is knee-jerk fear or aggression and a distinct lack of level headed reason.

You can expect flooding to affect you both physically and mentally. Physical symptoms act like an early warning system.

Your ultimate goal is to control flooding rather than allow it to control you.

Excerpt from five good minutes in the evening

If kids can have bedtime rituals, why can’t you? Tonight, be mindful of your bedtime routine and be fully present in each moment-to-moment ritual. Take extra care in brushing your teeth, washing your face, drying your hands, changing into your comfy pajamas, pulling back the blankets, fluffing your favorite pillow, and hugging yourself good night.