“WHY DON’T YOU DO WHAT YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO DO, EVEN AFTER BEING TOLD A MILLION TIMES?

Kids with autism do what we’re not supposed to do again and again, however many times you’ve told us not to. We understand what you’re telling us okay, but somehow we just repeat the sequence. This happens to me, too, and I’ve thought about how the sequence gets imprinted. First I do some action or other that I’m not allowed to; then something else happens as a result; and then I get told off for it; and last, my impulse to recreate this sequence trumps the knowledge that I’ve been told not to do it, and I end up doing it again. The next thing I know, I feel a sort of electrical buzz in my brain, which is very pleasant – no other sensation is quite the same. Perhaps the closest thing is watching your very favourite scene on a DVD, looping on auto-repeat, over and over.

Still, we shouldn’t do what we shouldn’t do. How, as thinking beings, can we break out of this loop? This is a big project. I work hard to solve the problem, but this work costs[…]”

Excerpt From: Naoki, Higashida. “The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy With Autism.” Random House, 2013-08-27T06:00:00+00:00. iBooks. 

This material may be protected by copyright.

Savior complex anyone?

Source: http://www.peopleskillsdecoded.com/savior-complex/

Here’s a fairytale gone badly, as it sometimes happens in real life: There was once a little girl who believed that all good things will come to her if she is really nice and always helps other people.

She was always there for her aging parents; she even refused a dream job because it was in another town and she didn’t want to move too far from her parents. She would always help her friends, lend them money, give them advice and get them out of trouble.

Her colleagues at work could always rely on her and she would often get behind on her projects to give them a hand with theirs. She also had this affinity towards guys with serious problems (jobless, alcohol abusing, emotionally imbalanced), the kind of guys that desperately needed help.

After about ten years of doing this, she felt miserably. She wasn’t getting the love, appreciation and recognition she wanted, most people had started taking all her help for granted, her life did not look the way she’d hoped it would.

When I discussed with her in our first communication coaching session, focused on identifying the key social skills to improve, after about 15 minutes of conversation, bells started ringing in my head going: “Savior complex full throttle!”

What Is The Savior Complex? 

The savior complex is a psychological construct which makes a person feel the need to save other people. This person has a strong tendency to seek people who desperately need help and to assist them, often sacrificing their own needs for these people.

There are many sides to a savior complex and it has many roots. One of its fundamental roots, in my experience, consists in a limiting belief the savior person has that goes something like this:

“If I always help people in need, I will get their love and approval, and have a happy life.”

This is of course, a nice sounding fairytale.

Houston We Have a Problem

Often, in real life, a savior will have such an unassertive way of helping others that instead of becoming grateful, they get used to it and they expect it. They feel entitled to receive help from this person, simply because they need it and they’ve always got it.

On top of this, always putting other people’s needs first makes a savior not take care of their own needs. So while they may feel happy because they are helping others, at some level, they feel bitter and frustrated at the same time.

Reframing Nobility

Here’s where things get worse: many people with a savior complex I’ve met, although they realize at some point that they have a savior complex and it is not worth it for them, they will not try to combat it.

They’re not masochistic; they have another belief that even if being a savior will not get them the recognition they want and will not make them happy, it is the noble thing to do. They believe they are somehow better then others because they help people all the time without getting anything back.

Do you have any idea how dim-witted this is? There is nothing noble in sacrificing yourself for others while you are starving at a psychological level. If our ancestors would have willingly done so 50.000 years ago, our species would be extinct.

If you think you have a savior complex or at least something close to it, I believe the best thing you can do is to face up to the practical consequences in has in your life. Being a savior is neither noble nor practical.

So who's your hero?

I know someone who is very "stingy" on the knowledge that she passes on to her mentees. I noticed it because when an issue arose, it is only her who can solve it. You might say that maybe she is just more resourceful or because she is a better critical or logical thinker. But no, these are hard facts that she should have passed on to her mentee. When I asked a colleague of her if other people notice that too, she said "yes, and we believe she does that because she fears for the time to come that she is dispensable". Sometimes I wonder if she has the so called "Messiah complex" or "hero complex" wherein she feels that she can or should "save" other people. And if that power is lost, she has nothing.

 This is similar to the knight in shining armor attitude of some men. There are quite a number of films made based on this theme, wherein a man saves or rescues a woman from "despair". Most children's fairytales are like that,  only a man can save the girl from her long sleep, cruel stepmother or from the tower. The movie "Pretty Woman" is also an example although that was not the man's plan at first, but that's what made the story charming right?

There is female counterpart to that knight shining armor, women who like "bad boys", because whether  they admit it or not, they believe they can change that man and eventually wear that badge of honor as "the woman who changed him". Fifty shades of grey?

Another version I know is someone who gives "false" power. I am sure psychologists have a special term for these kind of people of which I am yet to find out. They lead you on, making you feel that you can make your own decisions and "supports" you on whatever you decide on but they wait for that opportune moment to come in and show everyone that they know better that everything you were actually doing along the way is wrong (or not wrong but here's a better way, as what they would usually say). And they do this so nonchalantly that you have no way to prove that was their plan all along. Thus, if you try to share your observations to others you end up looking as the jealous one, or paranoid or worst, simply incompetent.

For this last kind of people, I believe there's a special place in hell for them since they have already enjoyed all the praises and glory here on earth.

Broken doll

I dont easily give up. As child when my toy gets broken, I don't throw it right away, I will put scotch tape, packaging tape, or glue on it. I remember having a "walking doll" and for some reason one of its legs got broken and removed right from its hips, I put on lots of packaging tape on the leg and around the hip and waist so that the leg wouldn't fall off. Eventually, of course, the tape did not hold well. For quite some time, I pretended that my doll was handicapped or suffered a bad car accident which resulted to the injury. I was told by my mother to throw away the doll as its no "use" anyway. I wouldn't budge in even if at times I would detest playing with it as its not fun playing with a doll with only one leg. And then suddenly, the doll was nowhere to be found in the house.

When I made a bad decision, I always try to stick with it and defy all odds to prove to others and most especially to myself that I did not make a bad decison, that things will eventually go well. And sometimes I just wait for the  someone to throw the "doll" away for me.

Maybe its ego or just plain stupidity.

25 life changing lessons to learn from Paulo Coelho

“Life has a way of testing a person’s will, either by having nothing happen at all or by having everything happen at once.” ~ Paulo Coelho

I read my first personal development book in 2007 and that book also happened to be the first book I ever read in English, up until that moment. And then, in 2008, something amazing happened, I found The Alchemist and that’s when I fell in love with Paulo Coelho’s work. 

Today I would like to share with you 25 beautiful Life Changing Lessons to learn from this amazing man, Paulo Coelho.

Enjoy

1. When you want something, the whole universe conspires to make it happen.

“And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

2. Detach from all things and you will be free.

“When I had nothing to lose, I had everything.”

“Now that she had nothing to lose, she was free.”

3. We are all here for a purpose.

“No matter what he does, every person on earth plays a central role in the history of the world. And normally he doesn’t know it.”

“Everybody has a creative potential and from the moment you can express this creative potential, you can start changing the world.”

4. The only thing standing between you and your dream are your fears.

“Don’t give in to your fears. If you do, you won’t be able to talk to your heart.”

“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”

“Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.”

5. Mistakes are part of life.

“Everything tells me that I am about to make a wrong decision, but making mistakes is just part of life. What does the world want of me? Does it want me to take no risks, to go back to where I came from because I didn’t have the courage to say “yes” to life?”

“When you find your path, you must not be afraid. You need to have sufficient courage to make mistakes. Disappointment, defeat, and despair are the tools God uses to show us the way.”

6. Really important meetings are planned by the souls long before the bodies meet.

“Really important meetings are planned by the souls long before the bodies see each other. Generally speaking, these meetings occur when we reach a limit, when we need to die and be reborn emotionally. These meetings are waiting for us, but more often than not, we avoid them happening. If we are desperate, though, if we have nothing to lose, or if we are full of enthusiasm for life, then the unknown reveals itself, and our universe changes direction.”

“We can also allow our Soulmate to pass us by, without accepting him or her, or even noticing. Then we will need another incarnation in order to find that Soulmate. And because of our selfishness, we will be condemned to the worst torture humankind ever invented for itself: loneliness.”

7. Every experience, either good or bad, comes with a lesson.

“There are moments when troubles enter our lives and we can do nothing to avoid them. But they are there for a reason. Only when we have overcome them will we understand why they were there.”

8. Do not seek for love outside of you.

“Love is not to be found in someone else but in ourselves; we simply awaken it. But in order to do that, we need the other person.”

9. When you change, the whole world changes with you.

“When we love, we always strive to become better than we are. When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.”

10. No reason is needed for loving.

“One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.”

11. Mind your own business.

“Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.”

12. When someone leaves, it’s because someone else is about to arrive.

“When someone leaves, it’s because someone else is about to arrive.”

“No one loses anyone, because no one owns anyone. That is the true experience of freedom: having the most important thing in the world without owning it.”

13. Love is an untamed force.

“Love is an untamed force. When we try to control it, it destroys us. When we try to imprison it, it enslaves us. When we try to understand it, it leaves us feeling lost and confused.”

14. Wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.

“Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.”

15. Judge not.

“We can never judge the lives of others, because each person knows only their own pain and renunciation. It’s one thing to feel that you are on the right path, but it’s another to think that yours is the only path.”

16. Children have valuable lessons to teach you.

“A child can teach an adult three things: to be happy for no reason, to always be busy with something, and to know how to demand with all his might that which he desires.”

17. Appreciate the contrast of life.

“Never be ashamed,’ he said. ‘Accept what life offers you and try to drink from every cup. All wines should be tasted; some should only be sipped, but with others, drink the whole bottle.’ ‘How will I know which is which?’ ‘By the taste. You can only know a good wine if you have first tasted a bad one.”

18. Nobody’s responsible for how you feel or don’t feel.

“In love, no one can harm anyone else; we are each responsible for our own feelings and cannot blame someone else for what we feel.”

19. Your beliefs shape you and make you who you are.

“You are what you believe yourself to be.”

20. Let go of the need to explain yourself.

“Don’t explain. Your friends do not need it, and your enemies will not believe you.”

21. Love changes everything.

“It is not time that changes man nor knowledge the only thing that can change someone’s mind is love.”

22. Don’t mistake elegance with superficiality.

“Elegance is usually confused with superficiality, fashion, lack of depth. This is a serious mistake: human beings need to have elegance in their actions and in their posture because this word is synonymous with good taste, amiability, equilibrium and harmony.”

23. When you do work from your soul, the critics won’t hurt you.

“I write from my soul. This is the reason that critics don’t hurt me, because it is me. If it was not me, if I was pretending to be someone else, then this could unbalance my world, but I know who I am.”

24. Each day brings a miracle of its own.

“You can become blind by seeing each day as a similar one. Each day is a different one, each day brings a miracle of its own. It’s just a matter of paying attention to this miracle.”

25. Embrace your authenticity

“You are someone who is different, but who wants to be the same as everyone else. And that in my view is a serious illness. God chose you to be different. Why are you disappointing God with this kind of attitude?”

“You must be the person you have never had the courage to be. Gradually, you will discover that you are that person, but until you can see this clearly, you must pretend and invent.”

“If you want to be successful, you must respect one rule – Never lie to yourself.”

With all my love,

Source: http://www.purposefairy.com/71428/25-life-changing-lessons-to-learn-from-paulo-coelho/

 

 

Do you know anything about frogs?

“ Do you know anything about frogs?"

"Frogs?"

"Yes, various biological studies have shown that if a frog is placed in a container along with water from its own pond, it will remain there, utterly still, while the water is slowly heated up. The frog doesn't react to the gradual increase in temperature, to the changes in its environment, and when the water reaches the boiling point, the frog dies, fat and happy.

On the other hand, if a frog is thrown into a container full of already boiling water it will jump straight out again, scalded, but alive!"
Olivia doesn't quite see what this has to do with the destruction of the world. Igor goes on:
"I was like that boiled frog. I didn't notice the changes. I thought everything was fine, that the bad things would just go away, that it was just a matter of time. I was ready to die because I lost the most important thing in my life, but instead of reacting, I sat there bobbing apathetically about in water that was getting hotter by the minute.” 
― Paulo Coelho, The Winner Stands Alone

11 Exercises You Should Never Do

Now that you’re building a healthy body with a steady gym routine, do yourself a favor: Don't waste time with ineffective or downright dangerous moves. We'll tell you which exercises to skip — and the ones to do instead.

BY AMY ROBERTS

(Complete article/source: http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/health/fitness/dangerous-exercises?src=soc_fcbks#slide-1)

1) Skip: Seated hip abductor machine

You think you’re working the outer thighs in hopes of blasting away those saddlebags. Unfortunately, the bad news here is twofold: When you’re seated in this position, the abductor muscles of the outer thighs aren’t actually doing the work. Instead, the piriformis muscle, a small deep hip muscle, is. And when this guy is worked too hard, it can get angry and pick on its neighbor, the sciatic nerve, possibly leading to painful sciatica.

Besides, you can’t blast away fat on a specific body part — better known as spot reduction — by working just those particular muscles anyway. “This machine totally ingrains that myth,” says Irene Lewis-McCormick, MS, CSCS, a personal trainer in Iowa. The only way to reduce trouble spots is by changing your diet and doing total-body exercises that peel away pounds from your entire frame.

Try: Side-lying leg raises

While you can’t slim your thighs by target training, it’s still important to strengthen the abductors because they’re essential to help keep you stable on your feet. Lie on your side, propping yourself up on your forearm. With shoulders and hips stacked, raise your top leg 3 to 12 inches, but don’t kick it so high that your leg starts to turn out — this will activate different muscles. Hold for 5 seconds, then lower, and repeat for 10 reps. Flip over and do the other side. “Body weight is fantastic for toning muscles, if you can leverage yourself,” says McCormick.

2) Skip: Crunches

If your aim is to strengthen your core, listen up: You never again have to do an abdominal crunch. “This motion puts you in spinal flexion, and reinforces the bad slouching posture that people fight against all day when sitting in a chair,” says McCormick. Furthermore, it emphasizes the incorrect notion of spot reduction. Remember, no amount of crunches will blast away belly fat. Focus on firming your body from head to toe.

Try: Planks

“The key to a strong core is to focus on extension of the rectus abdominus [otherwise known as the ‘six-pack’ muscle],” says McCormick. Prop yourself up into a plank with your hips and shoulders at the same level — on forearms or full hand — and hold for 10 seconds. Take a 5-second break, and then repeat. “After 30 seconds of this, most people are cooked,” says McCormick. “Going for 5 or 6 rounds is really hard.” 

3) Skip: Upright rows

The aim of this exercise, in which you hold dumbbells, a barbell, or resistance band in both hands and draw them up your body’s midline toward the chin, is to work your shoulder muscles. The problem is, you may end up overworking them. “This movement has the potential to compress the nerves in the shoulder area, impinging the shoulder,” says Sarah Machacek, NASM-CPT, a Virginia-based personal trainer with two decades of experience. In short, it’s a prescription for a rotator cuff injury.

Try: Straight-arm raises

This one targets the deltoids (rounded parts of the shoulders) while keeping the shoulder safer from impingement. Stand with arms down in front of you, hands holding dumbbells. “Use a lightweight dumbbell and progress gradually,” says Machacek. With control, raise arms up, hands in a neutral grip, straight in front of you to shoulder level (but no higher), then slowly lower down. Repeat 10 times. Mastering proper form is critical before increasing the weight, she adds.

4) Skip: Behind-the-neck lat pull-downs

"Any exercise that brings your spine out of alignment under load is potentially dangerous, and particularly when it’s the neck, which is the most fragile section of the spinal column,” says Andre Crayton, a personal trainer in Indiana with more than 20 years of experience. “By their very nature, behind-the-neck lat pull-downs require the user to thrust her head and neck forward and break spinal alignment, which can result in a muscle strain, pull, tear, or, even worse, a spinal disk herniation.”

Try: To-the-sternum lat pull-downs

The key to giving your largest back muscles, the latissimus dorsi, a workout, is maintaining good form, while keeping your neck and spine safe. First, stand beneath the bar with your arms forming the shape of football goal posts, then shoot your hands straight up to grasp the bar; this gets your arms the appropriate distance apart. Sit down on the seat with straight arms, bringing the bar with you. Keep your posture upright — don’t lean back — and think about raising your sternum toward the bar (rather than the bar to your sternum) while you pull down.

5) Skip: Seated leg extensions

This popular machine targets the quadricep muscles at the front of the thighs. However, using this equipment puts your knees in a very compromising position. “Lifting heavy weights in this manner, with all the resistance focused at your ankles, is not what the knee was designed to do,” says Machacek. “If you have any kind of knee problem, or use too much resistance during this exercise, you can easily cause injury.”

Try: Split squats

This move is a safer bet because it places the knees in a more natural position. Start from a lunge position, with one leg stepped forward, so that each knee can be bent to about a 90-degree angle; the front knee stays behind the toes. With your torso upright, slowly raise and lower your body, pressing your body weight primarily through the front leg (the rear one should act more as a kickstand to keep you from falling). Elevating the rear leg as shown intensifies the focus on that front quad. Repeat 10 times; then switch sides.

6) Skip: Dumbbell-loaded side bends

Here’s another exercise in which what you’re actually doing and what you think you’re doing don't align. “Not only does it not work your ab muscles, this move places high levels of compression forces on the spine and the soft tissues that act as the spine's shock absorbers,” says Michelle Olson, PhD, FACSM, CSCS, a personal trainer and professor of exercise science at Auburn University at Montgomery in Alabama. “It puts you at risk for rupturing a spinal disc.”

Try: Side planks

This simple move isometrically targets the oblique (side abdominal) muscles while keeping the spine in a healthy alignment. Lie on your side, forearm flat on the ground and perpendicular to the shoulders. Stack the feet and bend the knees slightly to bring the feet in, then press up, using the slight leverage from the bent knees to press your shoulder so it’s directly over your elbow. Press the top hip up toward the ceiling so it’s parallel to the top shoulder. Hold for 10 seconds, then rest for 5, and repeat three times; switch sides and repeat.

7) Skip: Back extensions, especially with added weight

While extension is generally a good thing when it comes to strengthening the core,hyperextension is another story. And with this apparatus, that lower-back overarching (as shown here) is all too possible. “If you have a natural exaggerated curve and extra abdominal fat, you’re risking injury of the lower back,” says McCormick says. Adding a weight plate ups the danger in the same way, throwing off your balance.

Try: Bosu “swimming”

Train the posterior core muscles with this supportive yet challenging exercise. Place yourself facedown atop a Bosu ball. Extend arms and legs straight out so your body is balanced on the ball. Then “swim” by raising the right arm and left leg; switch sides. Repeat at a controlled, moderate pace for 30 seconds.

8) Skip: Double-leg raise

There are a number of ways this move, in which you suspend your body and bring the knees or straight legs up toward the chest, can be performed. Most often, it’s done hanging from a bar — but it’s not the core strengthener you think it is. “Most people overuse their hip flexors in this movement and let their hips fly up with their legs, instead of using their core muscles to keep their hips stable,” says Kendra Fitzgerald, ACE-CPT, a personal trainer and yoga instructor in New York City. “This can lead to spasms in the hip flexors from overuse, and even herniated disks, as the weight of the legs creates undue pressure in the vertebrae and the spine flexes and bends with weight.”

Try: Bird dogs

This yoga exercise increases core strength without overworking the hip flexors. Get down on all fours, with shoulders lined up over wrists and hips over knees. Extend your left arm and right leg, then bring the two limbs slowly together under the body so elbow and knee touch. Do 10 rounds. Then repeat with your right arm and left leg.

9) Skip: Tricep dips

Strengthening and toning the back of the arms is something every woman wants, especially since Michelle Obama exercised her right to bare arms. Though, this move, in which you’re raising and lowering your body by the strength of your upper body, isn’t the best way to accomplish it. “The shoulder is one of the most mobile, yet least stable, joints in the body,” says Fitzgerald. “Adding weight — and full body weight at that! — to the joint as you're dipping is an anterior shoulder injury waiting to happen.”

Try: Cable tricep extensions

Outfit a cable machine with a bar handle or double-handled rope, and adjust the pulley above your head. Grasp the handle with both hands shoulder-width apart, then pull down to align your forearms parallel to the ground and your elbows locked into your sides (the machine should be at tension). Press down with your hands and straighten your arms down to your sides; slowly raise arms back up to parallel. Do 10 reps. Bonus: When you’re in a standing position, you’re also engaging your core muscles to keep your torso upright.

10) Skip: Elliptical machine

“Have you ever tried actually walking, er, traveling in a way that is similar to the elliptical machine movement pattern? No? I didn’t think so,” says Crayton. “And there’s a good reason why — it’s not exactly natural.” The best exercises set you up to be stronger and more efficient in your movements in real life. “Sure, the elliptical burns calories, and it can improve your heart health. But it will not actually improve your fitness level for anything other than using the elliptical machine,” he explains. The only reason to use this equipment, Crayton says, is if you’re injured and physically cannot walk, run, or climb stairs.

Try: Stair mill

This machine provides a great aerobic workout that also trains you for a very common everyday activity: climbing stairs. Pick a pace you can comfortably sustain, and start stepping. Use the handles for balance if you must (it’s best not to hold on at all); if you find you’re grasping the handles for dear life, slow down, or end the session and aim to go a few minutes longer on your next workout.

11) Skip: Standing chest fly

The action of opening and closing your arms in front of you works your chest, right? Wrong, if you do this one from a standing position. “Gravity is the enemy here,” says McCormick. “You think you’re working your chest, but because the weights are pulling down on your arms, you’re really just stressing the shoulders’ rotator cuffs.”

Try: Supine chest fly

Here’s an easy fix: Lie down. Grab a pair of dumbbells, and slightly bend your arms, with weights positioned high above your chest. Slowly open your arms out to the sides, keeping the elbows bent and allowing the upper arms to come down until they’re parallel with the floor. Then, slowing raise your arms back up to the starting position, as if you’re hugging a large tree. Do 10 reps.