100 Things that Make Me Happy

Gratitude is an excellent cure for taking life for granted. On the quest for happiness, appreciating what we have is a great way to shift from feeling sad, bad or frustrated.

In the Make a List series, I have written about the importance of knowing myself and presenting my identity to the rest of the world. I have written about the importance of friends in our life and how they have contributed to who we are today. I have written about why it is important to have long-term goals and desires and to plant self-fulfilling prophecies in our mind.

Today, I want to tell you why appreciation and gratitude are important skills that we need to practice-every day (yes, every day)!

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How Life has Changed

When I was growing up, the world was a lot nicer. There, I have said it. There were no computers, no Internet (and I like both), cars were simple, roads were narrow, but life felt free and full of adventures. Now, there are way too many dangers everywhere. Or are there really?

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Finding Cancer

My doctor found skin cancer on my head. He said it was the best kind there was, which does not spread, and that I was lucky. He will just cut it out himself and I will be healthy again. WRONG!

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Parent-Teacher Relationships

Teaching is the most rewarding career (together with life coaching and writing). I think it is rewarding because every day, teachers feel they are making a difference. Making a difference is a high need that most people have and we all, in small ways or big ways, make a difference in other people’s lives.

If you are not a teacher, but you are a parent, this post is as much for you as it is for teachers, because parents can work on their side of the relationship for the benefit of their kids and guide the teachers with today’s insights. In fact, why not email the post to them or print them a copy?

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Pushing Your Teens to Find a Job

Only 3% of teens going into higher education straight after high school actually finish their choice of study and work in that profession for about 5 years after finishing studying.

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How to Measure Your Life

If you are like me and like many other people I know, you sometimes ask yourself just how successful you are. Birthdays and New Years are typical opportunities to do this, but there are many other soft moments, when we find ourselves sitting quietly and thinking, “How is my life going?”

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The Right Age for a Sleepover

Girl in pajamas whispering to a boy in pajamas

This month, my 7-year-old daughter invited her friend to sleep over. Her mom, who had told me before she did not allow sleepovers, explained that she did not think the kids were ready for a sleepover until the age of 10. I then started to wonder whether there actually was a “right” age for a sleepover.

Many kids spend nights away from mom and dad and stay with other family members, right? If they are lucky (my kids are not), they have Grandpa and Grandma around the corner to make the sleepover a very special outing. If they are even luckier, they have cousins of the same age to spend holidays and weekends with.

But if kids have none of these, they depend on their parents’ perception of the “right” age for them to be able to sleep away from home.

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All Men Are… All Women Are…

In previous parts of the “Save Your Marriage” series, I discussed some of the problems that arise in relationships. This week, I will cover another one of the disturbing conflicts in any relationship – being trapped by stereotypes about gender.

In married life, there will always be obstacles threatening the stability of the marriage. Working through personal perceptions and interpretations is the key to overcoming such challenges.

Shortcut to divorce

Men and women perceive emotions, communication, sex, fidelity, work and money differently. They think the way they do because of the way they have been socialized and because of the way they have been shaped by their parents’ perceptions. From a very early age, we are “programmed” to believe that there are such things as “typical male” and “typical female” behavior. If you want a demonstration of how early this starts, look at your kids playing “shop” and consider how you choose baby clothes. Is it true that all baby girls love pink and baby boys love blue? No. Yet, most parents, when buying clothes, do not want to risk going against the grain by swapping colors.

Endless messages such as these are received during childhood and turn into beliefs and values that couples take into their marriage later on in life. Each party to a couple has his or her own “programmed” definition of what is typical, what is acceptable, what is tolerable and what is intolerable in a marriage relationship. Each of them may think that there is a particular way to show love to men that is different from the way you show love to women or that all men love sports and all women love jewelry and, without knowing, such gender beliefs can become a shortcut to divorce.

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Facts vs. Meaning in Marriage

In “Save Your Marriage (part 6)”, I described a common communication problem couples have (the story about the jack). Today, I will outline 10 ways you can get things wrong in any relationship. I hope you will be able to recognize yourself in some of them and find ways to work on that miscommunication. Remember, it is just miscommunication and there is no need to give up something as special as your marriage because of something that can be fixed so easily.

Many arguments start from a simple misunderstanding of the meaning of what one or the other has said. Many times, one party will give a meaning to something the other one has said that was actually not the intended meaning at all. So if you think about it, if it is you who attaches the wrong meaning to your partner’s words or actions, then when you argue, in a sense, you argue with yourself.

A study of expert communicators has found that in any given interaction, we have a tendency to see what we want to see and hear what we want to hear. The study has found that in any communication, we:

1. Interpret
2. Distort
3. Delete

We change the information we receive subconsciously by the interplay of our beliefs, values and rules that we already have in our heads. Thus our emotions can alter the interpretation of any message sent our way. If we are afraid of something, we tend to think the messenger was aggressive. If we feel confused, we tend to think the messenger was unclear with his or her message. If some information is missing, the way we fill in the gaps can be very subtle but may have a very strong impact.

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More About Self Talk

Two weeks ago, in part 6 of “Save Your Marriage”, I explained the influence of negative self-talk on relationships. Last week, in part 7, I gave an example of Sally talking to herself about her frustrations regarding her weight. In every relationship, when people talk to themselves about their problem with others in a negative way, things can easily be blown out of proportion.

Self-talk is a natural way of dealing with what happens to us in life and it is typical for men and women alike. It is when the self-talk turns all dark that things start going wrong.

This week, I want to let you in on Allan’s self-talk when planning to hang out with the guys.

Hanging out with the guys

Sally packed her bag and rushed to pick up the kids from music school. The phone rang and Dave was on the other end of the line.

“Hi Sally, I can’t get hold of Allan. Is he home already?”

“No”, said Sally, “He has a meeting till 6”.

“Can you please let him know we are planning to hang out with the guys on Friday?”

“Sure”, said Sally and hurried to her car. The thought of not having to cook on Friday was pleasing. She could take the kids out for a pizza, she thought happily.