Mood:  bright

Ghost stories abound around the old Herne Bay Pier near Kent, England, ever since a violent storm isolated the pier head out at sea in 1979. Since then, many reports of a ghostly figure shuffling back and forth have chilled the spine. Now, a new video offers up some real proof to back up the tale.

Full Story from news.gather.com

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Tuesday, 20 March 2012 03:54 MEST

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Mood:  not sure

by Bronnie Ware

For many years I worked in palliative care. My patients were those who had gone home to die. Some incredibly special times were shared. I was with them for the last three to twelve weeks of their lives.

People grow a lot when they are faced with their own mortality. I learnt never to underestimate someone's capacity for growth. Some changes were phenomenal. Each experienced a variety of emotions, as expected, denial, fear, anger, remorse, more denial and eventually acceptance. Every single patient found their peace before they departed though, every one of them.

When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently, common themes surfaced again and again. Here are the most common five:

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made.

It is very important to try and honour at least some of your dreams along the way. From the moment that you lose your health, it is too late. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it.

2. I wish I didn't work so hard.

This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children's youth and their partner's companionship. Women also spoke of this regret. But as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.

By simplifying your lifestyle and making conscious choices along the way, it is possible to not need the income that you think you do. And by creating more space in your life, you become happier and more open to new opportunities, ones more suited to your new lifestyle.

3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.

We cannot control the reactions of others. However, although people may initially react when you change the way you are by speaking honestly, in the end it raises the relationship to a whole new and healthier level. Either that or it releases the unhealthy relationship from your life. Either way, you win.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.

It is common for anyone in a busy lifestyle to let friendships slip. But when you are faced with your approaching death, the physical details of life fall away. People do want to get their financial affairs in order if possible. But it is not money or status that holds the true importance for them. They want to get things in order more for the benefit of those they love. Usually though, they are too ill and weary to ever manage this task. It is all comes down to love and relationships in the end. That is all that remains in the final weeks, love and relationships.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called 'comfort' of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content. When deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.

When you are on your deathbed, what others think of you is a long way from your mind. How wonderful to be able to let go and smile again, long before you are dying.

Life is a choice. It is YOUR life. Choose consciously, choose wisely, choose honestly. Choose happiness.

Source - dailygood.org

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Monday, 19 March 2012 03:23 MEST

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Mood:  a-ok

Parents who teach their children  to value career ambitions over spending time with friends could be setting them up for an early grave, a study has revealed.

It found that go-getters who attend the best universities and secure high-powered jobs suffer poorer health and die younger than those with more modest aspirations.

Over 70 years, the U.S. study tracked 717 high-achievers who attended universities, such as Oxford, Harvard and Yale, as well as those without university degrees, to the end of their lives.

Full Story from dailymail.co.uk

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Sunday, 18 March 2012 11:58 MEST

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Mood:  bright

Bring up the word "hypnosis", in any conversation and ask people what picture comes to mind. I'm fairly certain they'd immediately summon a rather cliched idea of the hypnotist swinging a pocket watch at a willing victim, telling the subject that they are "getting sleepy".

What transpires after that depends on which film you watched that specific incident in. However as sure as I'm writing this, the hypnotic session would end up with the hypnotist instructing the subject that he will count to three, snap his fingers then the patient would wake up from the trance, often recalling nothing of what happened during the whole incident.

This is what Hollywood hypnotism is, as depicted on the silver screen. Regardless of whether the film turns out to be a massive success or perhaps a a great big flop, it has accomplished one thing: It's affected countless people that hypnotherapy can have power over your mind. Then the one hypnotized turns into a slave of the hypnotist and does everything he is instructed only to recall nothing of it after.

In reality, you are rather totally aware of what you are doing whilst in hypnosis. The fact is that you'll never be forced to do anything that you would not ordinarily or willfully do.

During hypnotherapy sessions for healing, whether or not this is you using self hypnosis or it's being done to you by another person, the conscious mind is bypassed to access the subconscious mind. Nevertheless, yet again, you are still utterly aware of your surroundings.

Your subconscious mind processes everything that you hear, see and feel. Every now and then we do not always perceive things with our conscious mind, but it is still being recorded by our subconscious mind.

Hypnosis supports you to correspond directly with your subconscious to transform beliefs or thoughts that will assist you to accomplish a specified objective or goal. In actuality, hypnotherapy assists you override your conscious mind's rigid notions in relation to your life and reset it to process only your desired behavior. It is because your subconscious is considerably more open to solutions than your conscious mind.

If you find that you're frequently feeling distressed and hopeless regarding how things are coming along in life, hypnotherapy can help to change your thinking patterns to ensure that you're able to look positively at life and possess hope for the future.

Hypnosis has also been successful to cause a smoker to start to abhor the smell and taste of cigarettes. In fact, the identical technique applies to those addicted to sweets or candies, along with people who bite their nails.

Another use for hypnosis is to alleviate those struggling with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder or OCD, by helping them acquire a sense of calm and peace when they begin to feel frazzled or out of control.

There are times when fear grips someone so tightly that they're prevented from living their lives to the fullest. A number of examples are: Fear of flying, fear of heights as well as fear of going out in public. Every one of these fears restrict the activities of individuals who have them.

Hypnosis or hypnotherapy can alleviate or remove those irrational anxieties outright by replacing them with feelings that make more sense so that you simply don't have to pass on a normal life. Worry, hopelessness and panic attacks will no longer be a problem since your mind can be reset to react about those fears you had before.

Hypnotherapy affords you a superior possibility at success as it enables you to coach your mind to maintain only thoughts and beliefs which will ensure success.

Author Resource:-  Rachel Ford is a Clinical Hypnotherapist who helps people create powerful & permanent changes in their lives. Visit http://www.yourmindzone.com today and download your free hypnosis session.

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Saturday, 17 March 2012 08:09 MEST

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Mood:  a-ok

The mind is a truly wonderful body part. It receives and generates data all day and night long. It controls processes and functions within the body automatically without conscious thought. It keeps the heart pumping and the lungs functioning. It stores information, retrieves information and continually mixes information around (often without mixing it up!) leading to creativity and solutions to problems.

All of these tasks are just some of the things the brain is capable of. If the brain were a corporation, it would take hundreds of people to do all of the things that just one brain is capable of. It is magnificent! With a control centre like the human brain, it is conceivable that the human race is capable of equal greatness, right? That would stand to reason, wouldn't it? Perhaps this would be a true statement if the brain were fuelled perfectly and given only pure and true information. Unfortunately, we do not get perfect food and we do not get perfect information and the mind also almost seems to have a life of its own.

With a thought generated by a brain, many conveniences have been created. So many creations started with the wisp of a thought swirling around in someone's brain. Thoughts pop seemingly randomly into our heads all day and night long. Brains are influenced by all the information received. Our thoughts are influenced by what we see - with our external eyes and with our mind's eye, what we hear, what we feel both emotionally and physically also what we feel physically both internally and externally. There is a vast quantity of information coming in from a vast variety of sources and the brain has to make sense of it all and form rational, coherent thoughts and conclusions. Even before we are born the brain starts receiving information. It struggles to organize and make sense of it all.

Bombarded with information all day and night, every day, day after day after day. It's a wonder that the brain keeps receiving information, keeps regulating all the unconscious and necessary bodily functions as well as it does. Even with failing nutrition and harmful substances imposed on it, it functions amazingly well, all day and night, every day, day after day after day. This, of itself, should be enough for people to give kudos and thanks to this amazing body part. It should be enough to spur us to take care of this amazing body part given all the work and how hard it works to manage and regulate functions, feelings physical and emotional, internally and externally, and yet we take it for granted. We largely ignore it until there seems to be something 'wrong' with it. Until it is keeping us up at night, until it seems to control our every sleeping and waking moment, running like a wild horse with the bit in its teeth or incessantly chattering like a monkey in overdrive and then we feel hopeless and helpless to the little tyrant inside our skulls.

We get to this point of despair and we think - yes, we think still with that thing that seems to have turned into the enemy - what can I do? Why is one of my best body parts betraying me. It should be obvious but maybe it isn't at first. The brain needs a break. The brain needs discipline and the brain, as funny as it sounds, needs to know who is the boss of it. It may appear that the brain is the boss of everything but really, there is a higher awareness, a higher consciousness just right above the brain. This consciousness often sits and watches all that is going on. It doesn't usually say too much, it mainly observes but it is there to give the brain some well deserved R&R, the catch is, you have to ask it to step in and help you out.

Wow, this is great, right? Your brain is running around in circles, it is tired, it is stressed out, it is in over drive, it is a wild and undisciplined horse or monkey, maybe both, AND there is a built in solution. Just ask the 'overseer' to cover. Easy! You'll do it right now, won't you? So you do.

"Please mighty overseer, help me rest my brain and deal with this stress. Please make the crazy, frenetic thoughts stop whirling around in my head. Please give me a break."

That ought to do it. You wait. Nothing is happening. You wait. Still nothing. You give it about 10 more seconds because that's all you can stand really. Then your brain starts screaming again. "Stupid overseer, I knew it wouldn't work, it's not really there, it doesn't really do anything at all. Mother was right if you want anything done you've got to do it yourself." And you're back on the vicious cycle. The brain is back in its tyrannical role, barking out orders, sizing up situations, taking care of business.

You're disappointed. You were really looking forward to feeling less stressed. You really thought that it could work. You must have been wrong, the overseer does not exist. What other explanation could there be?

Ask yourself another question. How much of a chance did you give the overseer? Half a minute? You're brain has been over worked for years and you expected the overseer to fix all of that in 30 seconds? Really??

Try again. Find a quiet place where you will not be disturbed for at least 20 minutes. Make yourself comfortable. Make sure you will be warm - bring a blanket, warm socks or a sweater. Make sure you will feel safe - lock a door if you need to. Get into position, seated or laying down. Ask again.

"Okay, overseer, I need a break, take over!" Now wait, but really wait. Let your mind go blank. A thought will come, push it back where it came from. Wait some more. Another thought will come. Bat it away. Thoughts will keep trying to push themselves to the front of your consciousness - DON'T LET THEM. You may need to be tenacious in your effort to keep the thoughts away. Soon you will notice the overseer suggests that you take a longer breath in and let the breath out slowly. It won't do it with a recognizable thought. Your lungs will respond. You will notice your heart rate is a little slower, again, that's the overseer. You will also notice - eventually - that your brain DOES relax and let go. This is where you will find the rest that it needs.

Spend the whole 20 minutes taking the break. Even if the thoughts never completely disappear. Stay with it. As often as a thought comes you send it away. With practice, not putting expectations or goals on the amount of time it takes to "get results", the thoughts will not try to come any more. You will rest.

To begin, visualize, forming only pictures in your mind, a vast nothingness. Let yourself float there in complete stillness not thinking, not worrying, not talking in your head to yourself, not planning, not scheming. At first it may help to draw pictures in your head. You are floating on a cloud. There is fog all round. Picture the fog, see it in your mind. Your body becomes part of the fog. The fog is everything, contains everything. The fog is nothing and emptiness. Everything and nothing. You are the fog. You are everywhere, everything and everyone. You expand without limit. You melt into nothingness.

At first it will be challenging to push the thoughts away but with practice you will achieve this more easily. If possible, set aside 20 minutes at the same time each week to start. As you practice week by week you may add more sessions. Like any exercise, as a general rule, the more you get the more it benefits you. However also, as with any new activity, the first few attempts can be clumsy and awkward maybe even discouraging. Don't be discouraged. It doesn't matter if you don't 'ace it' the first or second or third time you try. You will get another chance the next time and the time after that and the time after that. Be easy on yourself. Give yourself as many chances as it takes. Forgive yourself if it seems to be going 'wrong.' Don't judge it and when you're done with it, forget it. Nobody is keeping score. Take the Nike slogan to heart and "Just DO it!"

What You Will Need:

- 20 minutes, undisturbed

- A 'place' that is comfortable and (what you consider to be) safe and private

- Patience

- Kindness/forgiveness/love

Please email/contact me (seabelle7@gmail.com) if you have any questions regarding quieting the mind. Please visit my website - http://www.yogazoebella.ca - for more information on meditation and yoga.

Thank you. May you find peace and fulfillment.

Coleen Schnurr

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Friday, 16 March 2012 02:23 MEST

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Mood:  a-ok

As landings go, this will be one of the trickiest ever attempted.

On August 6 Nasa’s Curiosity rover, packed inside the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft, will hurtle towards the Martian surface at around 13,200mph – and has just over six minutes to slow down and make a soft landing.

What’s more, the craft has to be at just the right angle for the descent to be a success – likened by one Nasa scientist to firing a golf ball from Los Angeles to land in a hole at St Andrew’s in Scotland.

Full Story from dailymail.co.uk

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Thursday, 15 March 2012 10:31 MEST

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Mood:  chatty

Let your better self rest assured: Dearly held values truly are sacred, and not merely cost-benefit analyses masquerading as nobel intent, concludes a new study on the neurobiology of moral decision-making. Such values are conceived differently, and occur in very different parts of the brain, than utilitarian decisions.

“Why do people do what they do?” said neuroscientist Greg Berns of Emory University. “Asked if they’d kill an innocent human being, most people would say no, but there can be two very different ways of coming to that answer. You could say it would hurt their family, that it would be bad because of the consequences. Or you could take the Ten Commandments view: You just don’t do it. It’s not even a question of going beyond.”

In a study published Jan. 23 in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Berns and colleagues posed a series of value-based statements to 27 women and 16 men while using an fMRI machine to map their mental activity (Left: Blood flows to different parts of the brain in utilitarian (green) and matter-of-principle (yellow) decisions. Image: Berns et al./Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.) The statements were not necessarily religious, but intended to cover a spectrum of values ranging from frivolous (“You enjoy all colors of M&Ms”) to ostensibly inviolate (“You think it is okay to sell a child”).

After answering, test participants were asked if they’d sign a document stating the opposite of their belief in exchange for a chance at winning up to $100 in cash. If so, they could keep both the money and the document; only their consciences would know.

According to Berns, this methodology was key. The conflict between utilitarian and duty-based moral motivations is a classic philosophical theme, with historical roots in the formulations of Jeremy Bentham and Immanuel Kant, and other researchers have studied it — but none, said Berns, had combined both brain imaging and a situation where moral compromise was realistically possible.

“Hypothetical vignettes are presented to people, and they’re asked, ‘How did you arrive at a decision?’ But it’s impossible to really know in a laboratory setting,” said Berns. “Signing your name to something for a price is meaningful. It’s getting into integrity. Even at $100, most all our test subjects put some things into categories they were willing to take money for, and others they wouldn’t.”

When test subjects agreed to sell out, their brains displayed common signatures of activity in regions previously linked to calculating utility. When they refused, activity was concentrated in other parts of their brains: the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, which is known to be involved in processing and understanding abstract rules, and the right temporoparietal junction, which has been implicated in moral judgement.

'If it's a sacred value to you, then you can't even conceive of it in a cost-benefit framework.'

In short, when people didn’t sell out their principles, it wasn’t because the price wasn’t right. It just seemed wrong. “There’s one bucket of things that are utilitarian, and another bucket of categorical things,” Berns said. “If it’s a sacred value to you, then you can’t even conceive of it in a cost-benefit framework.”

According to Berns, the implications could help people better understand the motivations of others. He’s now studying how moral equations change according to the social popularity of values, and what happens in the brain when deep-seated principles are confronted with reasoned arguments. “Can I change your mind? Lessen your conviction? Strengthen it? And how does this happen? Is this appealing to rule-based networks, or to systems of reward and loss?” Berns wondered.

Whether sacred principles offer utilitarian benefits over long periods of time — many years, perhaps many generations, and at population-wide as well as individual scales — is beyond the current study design, but Berns suspects that one of their benefits is simplicity.

“My hypothesis about the Ten Commandments is that they exist because they’re too hard to think about on a cost-benefit basis,” he said. “It’s far easier to have a rule saying, ‘Thou shalt not commit adultery.’ It simplifies decisionmaking.”

Article Source - dailygood.org

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Wednesday, 14 March 2012 02:34 MEST

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Mood:  d'oh

The idea of cholesterol creating cardiac problems has caused obsessive cholesterol count blood testing for decades. Another outcome of this scare was obsessively avoiding fat, especially saturated fats.

The food industry responded with low and no fat foods from milk to cottage cheese and more. Processed foods promoted their low or no fat contents as though they were the healthiest foods in the freezer.

Healthy fats such as coconut oil and palm oil were spurned and replaced by very unhealthy trans-fat, processed and heated cooking oils. Relatively healthy whole butters were replaced by plastic margarines.

However, this myth of cholesterol dangers lurking in saturated fats waiting to clog your arteries and cause you to die of cardiac arrest is beginning to unravel.

Unraveling the myth of cholesterol

A meta-analysis of properly performed previous studies on heart health and saturated fats concluded there was no association between cardiac issues and saturated fats. This was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (AJCN) on January 13th, 2010.

Meta-analysis is a statistical method of proving or disproving varied epidemiological studies within a set topic. The AJCN meta-analysis covered studies involving 350,000 subjects who were followed for 5 to 23 years.

The trend set by the saturated fat high cholesterol disinformation a few decades ago has resulted in many Americans eating less fat and showing lower blood cholesterol levels. Yet, heart disease rates have continued to rise along with diabetes, pre-diabetes and obesity.

Dr. William Davis explains in his article "A Headline You Will Never See: 60 Year Old Man Dies of Cholesterol" that cholesterol doesn't kill "any more than a bad paint job on your car could cause a fatal car accident."

He explains the cause of most heart attacks and coronary problems is atherosclerotic plaque in the coronary arteries, which can build up and rupture or clog the arteries. He goes on to describe other factors that can cause plaque ruptures, including inflammatory pneumonia.

Though there can be some cholesterol in the plaque, cholesterol itself is waxy and pliable. Cholesterol is important for brain cells, nerves and other cellular structural components. Calcium deposits (calcification) in artery interiors are much worse components of plaque. It belongs in your bones and not in your arteries. Vitamin K2 helps transport calcium out of your blood and into your bones.

Dr. Davis recommends avoiding cholesterol panels for heart health concerns and opting for a measure of coronary atherosclerotic plaque.

The scam continues despite overwhelming contradictory evidence

Despite more and more published journals and doctors proving coronary heart disease (CHD) is not caused by high saturated fat diets and cholesterol, the myth persists. Many peoplewith low cholesterol have died of CHD while in their 40s, while many with high cholesterol never have CHD issues.

Several studies of heart attack cadavers have also revealed the disinformation of cholesterol dangers. Yet the common advice from cardiologists upon seeing high cholesterol is to get an angiogram,adiagnostic testwhichis expensive and not so safe. Then there are those pricey drugs meantto lower cholesterol while wreaking havoc on overall health.

Cholesterol is vital for many functions. For example, it helps convert sunlight into vitamin D3. If you're not getting enough with your food, the liver is forced to manufacture it. Low cholesterol has been linked to higher stroke risks.

Oxidized cholesterol from hydrogenated and refined polyunsaturated cooking oils and margarine can lead to complications that result in CHD. This comes not only directly from the oils themselves, but indirectly from the oxidation process those oils initiate.

These toxic oils and butter substitutes were created to replace thewholesome saturated fats that should be consumed.

Sources for this article include:

(1) http://www.sott.net

(2) http://www.opednews.com

(3) http://www.treelight.com/health/healing/Cholesterol.html

About the author:

Paul Fassa is dedicated to warning others about the current corruption of food and medicine and guiding others toward a direction for better health with no restrictions on health freedom. You can visit his blog at http://healthmaven.blogspot.com

Article Source - naturalnews.com

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Tuesday, 13 March 2012 02:11 MEST

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Mood:  bright

The main reason meditation for healing can work for you is that it's a tool for helping you slip past the endless, day-to-day chatter your conscious mind indulges in and which gets in the way of healing energy. Once you can get into the space between your thoughts you will be able to find the pure healing energy of the Universal Consciousness.

Just getting yourself into the relaxed state where you can tap into this energy is often all you need to assist with healing on every level. It works because the universal energy is intelligent. It knows where it needs to go and what it has to do to unblock channels and rebalance your energy system.

But this isn't the whole story - meditation for healing can help in another way.

Stress And Wellbeing

Most people are aware that stress isn't at all good for your general wellbeing. If you're stressed, you block the flow of energies in your body which can lead to stagnation, imbalance and could eventually bring on physical illness and disease.

An important way that stress can affect you is in the way you breathe. If you're stressed your breathing is likely to be shallow or uneven, or it's possible you may even hold your breath for a short time, although you might not be aware you're doing it.

So if you can become aware of your breath and train yourself to breathe deeply and smoothly you'll send the right message to your body. You'll be consciously telling it to relax.

The Mind Body Connection

Meditation for healing is a simple and effective way to achieve this mind-body connection, and it doesn't entail having to sit in an uncomfortable yoga position. All you need to do is relax and focus on your breathing. Your breathing is the 'connection' between your mind and your body. Your mind controls your breathing, and your breathing determines your level of physical relaxation, so in this way you can establish a feedback loop.

Many studies have come to the conclusion that meditation for healing can, amongst other things, improve your life expectancy, retard the aging process, help boost your immune system as well as lower your blood pressure. Its benefits offer real proof that your consciousness can affect and improve your physical, mental and emotional health.

Meditation for healing, put simply, it's one of the simplest and most effective ways you can promote wellbeing in every area of your life.

Would you like to know how to heal yourself, others and animals even at a distance? For more information and a FREE ebook visit Healing-By-Energy.com

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 MEST

Updated: Monday, 12 March 2012 02:48 MEST

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Mood:  chatty

How the time of day can increase the risk of dying from an irregular heartbeat has been identified by researchers.

The risk of "sudden cardiac death" peaks in the morning and rises again in the evening.

A study published in the journal Nature suggests that levels of a protein which controls the heart's rhythm fluctuate through the day.

Full Story from BBC

Posted by Neil Bartlett DHyp M.A.E.P.H at 01:01 CET

Updated: Sunday, 11 March 2012 01:14 CET

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