LnA Olivia Leggings by LnA: 
Sunday, 29 July 2012
Thursday, 26 July 2012
True guilt is guilt at the obligation one owes to oneself to be oneself. False guilt is guilt felt at not being what other people feel one ought to be or assume that one is. Moderate feelings of guilt are beneficial because they encourage the individual to do the right thing
The Scottish psychologist R.D. Laing once said: True guilt is guilt at the obligation one owes to oneself to be oneself. False guilt is guilt felt at not being what other people feel one ought to be or assume that one is. Moderate feelings of guilt are beneficial because they encourage the individual to do the right thing. If nobody felt guilty about anything it would likely lead to a fearful world and it could even threaten the survival of the human species. There is also a more negative form of guilt which is excessive and harmful. This refers to a situation where the individual carries a sense of guilt around with them most of the time. The reasons for why the individual may become a victim of excessive guilt include: They have a poor self image. It can be a sign of mental health difficulties. Some people fall into negative thinking and this tends to include guilt. The individual has been a victim of physical or sexual abuse. Unhealthy relationships can leave people with feelings of guilt. Excessive stress. Alcohol or drug abuse.
A million Britons live with the hell of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Nadine Stewart was convinced she was going to die. Just ten minutes after setting off for a pop concert with her sister, she felt a tingling sensation in her arms and pain in her chest.
‘I knew I was having a heart attack,’ says Nadine, 41, a customer services adviser from Morecambe, Lancashire. ‘I begged my sister to take me to A&E: I ran in and screamed that I was having a heart attack.
‘They put me on a monitor and my heart was fine — what I had suffered was a panic attack. I have no idea to this day what caused it, but it terrified the life out of me.’
Nadine Stewart has to do everything nine times or fears her husband will die
But worse was to come. ‘Afterwards, I developed a fear that if I didn’t do something nine times, something terrible would happen to me, my husband Paul or a member of my family.’ says Nadine.
‘If I made a drink I had to stir it nine times. If I locked the door I had to check it nine times and if I used a cloth to wipe a surface I’d have to wipe it nine times. I don’t know why it was nine. I realised I was being utterly irrational. But every time I tried to curb it — such as only stirring my drink three times — I’d begin to panic.'
‘If I didn’t do these things nine times, I’d imagine Paul and me veering off the motorway in our car and see his injured face in the aftermath.’
Nadine had Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), recognised by the World Health Organisation as one of the top ten most disabling disorders in terms of its effect on quality of life.
Last month both the British actress Emily Blunt and the MP Charles Walker revealed they suffered from it, with Walker admitting he had to do everything in multiples of four — and felt the need to wash his hands hundreds of times a day.
Who knew?
Surveys estimate that fewer than
10 per cent of those suffering OCD are currently receiving treatment.
Surveys estimate that fewer than
10 per cent of those suffering OCD are currently receiving treatment.
They are not alone. Around a million people in the UK are thought to be undergoing treatment for OCD, the majority of them women. Women are twice as likely as men to develop anxiety disorders such as OCD — and high-achieving perfectionists are particularly at risk.
‘There are two parts to OCD, the obsession and the compulsion,’ explains Joel Rose, of charity OCD Action. ‘The obsession is a thought that pops into your head, about harm coming to someone you love or you causing harm to someone.'
‘Everyone has these thoughts but most of us ignore them and get on with our lives. Someone with OCD will develop a compulsive ritual as a reaction to them. It can be continually washing their hands or something invisible like repeating the same phrase over and over in their heads.'
‘The time spent on these compulsions lengthens with time. A severe OCD sufferer might spend six or seven hours a day washing their hands in the hope nothing terrible happens to their children.’
The cause of the condition is not known, though a stressful event in someone’s life may trigger an underlying problem.
Nadine has never pinpointed the root of her troubles — though they began in the year she started a new job, moved house and got engaged. ‘I had no reason to feel anxious,’ she said, ‘though I suppose there was a lot of change.
‘I became scared of choking to death so I stopped eating and lost three stone in less than three months. I couldn’t leave the house without Paul, and even then it would take me three hours to pluck up the courage.’
Someone who can empathise with Nadine is Jeni Scott, 31, who’s had OCD for three years.
It began when her father had a heart attack and her mother was diagnosed with cancer, soon after Jeni left university.
‘I became obsessed with doing things in order,’ says Jeni, a tutor from Newport, Wales. ‘I started making lists but it had everything on it such as “get up, have shower, make a cup of tea” and if I didn’t stick to it I would punish myself by denying myself a treat.
Actress Emily Blunt, star of Five Year Engagement, has revealed she suffers from OCD
‘I developed a phobia of being in the rain in the wrong clothes and had to take a backpack with spare bra, pants, coat, shoes and umbrella everywhere with me. I’d carry antibacterial gel in my bag and use it every ten minutes. I’ve still no idea why I did it, I just found it helped me.’
Aisha Faisal, from Reading, Berkshire, also suffers from OCD — and it’s getting worse. ‘I developed it in my teens when my mother fell ill and I had to clean the house,’ the 26-year-old says. ‘Now I’m obsessed with everything being super-clean. I wash my hands 14 or 15 times a day, I shower for an hour at a time and wash the shower head and bath thoroughly before I step in.
‘If someone touches me, I cringe. My neighbour touched my scarf to tell me it was pretty and I had to have a shower and put all my clothes in the wash.’ Aisha, who has three children under four, admits her obsession extended to giving birth.
‘Each time I had Caesarean sections — the thought of having a natural birth makes me feel physically sick.’ She made the surgeons assure her everything had been scrubbed thoroughly before each operation. Understandably, her OCD worries the rest of her family. ‘My husband Ali finds it very hard to see me like this. I won’t let him touch me when he comes in from work: he has to shower and put on clean clothes before he can hug me.'
‘With three young children, being clean is impossible and I bathe them twice a day in the winter and sometimes four times a day in the summer if they’re hot and sticky.’
As a result of her obsession her own hands are red raw and she suffers from eczema. ‘I have been to the GP but it’s very difficult to treat. I know I must do something soon, because my eldest daughter, who is four, is picking up on my behaviour and I feel very guilty about that.'
‘The other day she came in from the garden and said she was dirty so needed to get out of her clothes and I washed her and cleaned her thoroughly. My husband can’t believe our electricity bill because the washing machine is on constantly.’
While Aisha is still in the grip of OCD, Jeni and Nadine have overcome the condition. According to the NHS, the two recognised forms of treatment are Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), which helped Jeni, and anti-depressants.
But Nadine used another therapy called The Linden Method — a two-day workshop costs £995 — when she reached her lowest point early last year.
‘I was unable to work, leave the house or answer the phone,’ she says. ‘My vision became blurry, my hands would spasm and I’d get pains like rheumatism. I began to think: “What’s the point in living?” yet I was too scared to kill myself.’
The Linden Method — which has also helped OCD sufferers Jemma and Jodie Kidd — works by convincing the sufferer’s sub-conscious that they are safe.
‘I’m a different person,’ says Nadine. ‘I can leave the house, I’m applying for jobs, taking up hobbies and it’s transformed my relationship with Paul.
‘He says it’s like having a wife in a wheelchair who can walk again. Except I feel I can not only walk, I can fly.’
Tuesday, 3 July 2012
star wars recreations of famous photographs
a photo series by david eger recreates famous photos and paintings with star wars figurines and handcrafted sets
above: 'troopers raising the flag on iwo jima' (joe rosenthal's 'raising the flag on iwo jima')
all images © david eger
as part of a year-long project '365 days of clones', canadian art teacher david eger has recreated famous photographs and paintings
using star wars figurines. the scenography is done in real life rather than in photoshop, in a project that was eger's response to his
new year's resolution to pursue personal photographic endeavours more often.
eger photographed each piece on a date relevant to the original work: the anniversary of the date the photograph was taken
in the case of most contemporary pieces; or the birth or death dates of the artist for images like his recreations of pablo picasso's
'guernica' or leonardo da vinci's 'vitruvian man'.
'troopers atop a skyscraper' (charles c. ebbets's 'lunchtime atop a skyscraper')
'abbey road' (ilan macmillan's 'abbey road' cover shot of the beatles)
'galactic gothic' (grant wood's 'american gothic')
'B.F. boba fett' (cover of film 'E.T. extra terrestrial'), with yoda in bicycle basket
'migrant trooper' (dorothea lange's 'migrant mother' great depression photograph of florence owens)
'a royal kiss' (recreation of the wedding day first kiss of prince william and catherine middleton at the buckingham palace)
'gandhi' (margaret bourke-white's portrait of gandhi spinning cotton)
'million trooper march' (bob adelman's photograph of martin luther king jr.)
eger's setup for the 'million trooper march' recreation
'the cloned kiss' (alfred eisenstaedt's 'the kiss')
A British photographer's adorable images of puppies, ducklings and even kittens in hammocks will brighten up any rainy day.
Master of cuteness Mark Taylor's images are in demand all over the world for the purr-fect way they capture a softer side to our best-loved animals.
His photographs are a legacy from his late mother Jane Burton who pioneered the style so familiar on calendars in offices and maths teacher classrooms everywhere.
Fosset the kitten with a yellow gosling: Photographer Mark Taylor is famous around the world for his cute shots of animals in unusual poses
Fosset cuddles up to his gosling friend: Mr Taylor's photographs are a legacy from his late mother Jane Burton who pioneered the style
Stanley the kitten with a duckling: Despite the menacing look in Stanley's eyes, Mr Taylor has never had any incidents where one subject ate another
Using a simple clean white background and some unusual animal pairings Mr Taylor's style has seen him make the cover of prestigious wildlife magazine National Geographic.
In this set of heart-warming images Mr Taylor shows why he's one of the best in his field tapping into that desire in us all to see something fluffy.
More...
- Women cat owners are 'more likely to kill themselves' due to higher chance of infection with parasite found in feline faeces
From ducklings with puppies, to dogs with kittens and even rabbits Mark captures them all on camera as if they were the best and friends.
And thankfully so far he's had no case of any of them eating each other.
Hear me roar: Kittens Stanley and Fosset have a cuddle
Guess who! Stanley holds his paws over Fosset's face as they play
King of the castle: Stanley climbs on top of Fosset
Not just for Christmas: Stanley and Fosset pose inside a gift box
Touch on that: Stanley offers his paw for a fist bump. Right, he poses with a bright red flower
Oh you! Stanley gestures towards the camera as he lies in a hammock
Time for a cat nap: Stanley and Fosset enjoy a snooze
Keeping it in the family: Mr Taylor's daughter Siena, pictured with Stanley, helps to pose the animals for her father's photo shoots
Mr Taylor, 47, creates his images all at his home studio Warren Photographic, in Guildford, Surrey.
His father Kim is a world-renowned wildlife photographer. His mother Jane, who died in 2007 after a brave battle against cancer, was one of the first to use a unique style now so well adopted by her son.
Mr Taylor, a father of one, said: 'There have been a few close shaves when we have put the different animals together, but we often "introduce" the animals to a rabbit in a cage first to gauge the reaction.
'If the dog starts licking its lips we know it might not work out well, and for example it's best not to put a Jack Russell next to a rabbit.
'I have helpers in the studio and some of the animals extras we have here, for example we have six rabbits, but others we have to bring in.
'The key to the photograph is making sure the animals are not doing anything they don't want to do because I think you can tell if they are not enjoying themselves.
'My mother was a pioneer if you like of this idea of using the clean white backgrounds and I like to think I am carrying on her legacy.'
You wanna start something? Stanley goes nose to nose with a Bichon Fris
My big mate: Stanley nuzzles up with Great Dane pup Tia
Where u go? Stanley and Tia have a play
Keeping it in the family Mr Taylor's daughter Siena, 10, is also on hand to pose up with the animals in the pictures.
Mr Taylor, who uses a Cannon 1DS Mark III camera, said that he felt his photographs were so popular because they tap into an desire in us all to relate to animals.
He said: 'I think the fascinating aspect of this type of photography is that it taps into something in us all that sees ourselves and human emotions in our pets and other animals.'
Thursday, 28 June 2012
Risks in Loving Men Who Can’t Commit
Commitment phobic men are not wounded birds waiting to be nursed to health.
Should women spend time, energy, and emotion on a man who may never be a part of their future? All too often women say to themselves or their friends: “Well, he wouldn’t commit in the past, but I’m different. I have more patience than the other women he dated, and I am more understanding than most women. I can help him.”
If you have heard yourself saying the words “I can help him,” think of yourself as being trapped in the “wounded bird syndrome” in which your desire to nurse someone back to health is so strong that it clouds your logical thinking.
Before getting too involved with a commitment phobic man consider asking yourself these 20 Questions to Finding New Love and Marriage. And then make a conscious effort to understand what is most important to you. 2 Virtues Enhance Falling in Love Forever. Also watch his body language and his actions towards you. If you are jumping through hoops for the commitment phobic man and thinking you can nurse him back to love – think again. Many commitment phobic men are reliving a dysfunctional family role (in fact, some women are in this trap as well.)
self-compassion consists of three components:
- Self-kindness: Being kind, gentle and understanding with yourself when you’re suffering.
- Common humanity: Realizing that you’re not alone in your struggles. When we’re struggling, we tend to feel especially isolated. We think we’re the only ones to experience loss, make mistakes, feel rejected or fail. But it’s these very struggles that are part of our shared experience as humans.
- Mindfulness: Observing life as it is, without being judgemental or suppressing your thoughts and feelings.
I know I’ve been in sick relationships, but I don’t know what a healthyrelationship looks like.
In the years I’ve been counseling and coaching, many people say, “I know I’ve been in sick relationships, but I don’t know what a healthyrelationship looks like.”
There are many long and complicated answers to this, but there is also a simple one: healthy relationships make your life larger and happier; unhealthy relationships narrow your life and make you crazy.
Healthy relationships do not include mind games, mixed messages, or control. There is not a back and forth or continual makeup and breakup, or “I’m sorry, please forgive me” every week or so.
In healthy relationships, there is a partnership and a nurturing by both parties of that partnership. At the same time, each person recognizes the need to have interests and time away from their partner to nurture themselves. They don’t need to have the same interests, but rather the same view of life. Healthy love is about taking care of yourself and taking care of your mate… and those things are in balance to the point where they seldom collide.
What is Real Love?
Healthy people lead to healthy relationships and healthy relationships lead to real love.
Real love does not seek another person to fill up what we are lacking. It takes a complete, whole person to really love and overly needy people cannot do it. Real love is balanced. Both partners love in fairly equal amounts. While the balance may shift back and forth, it is not lopsided. If you love someone who is not loving your back, or not loving you the way you love them, then it’s not real.
When you place expectations on people to fill your empty places, that is not healthy. It’s nice to have a partner, a companion, someone to help you weather life’s storms, but it is not okay to look for someone to complete you or fix your broken places. That is not real love; that is dependence, co-dependence, and unhealthy neediness.
Real love does not play games, cause us to lose sleep, friends, jobs, money, time and value in our lives. Real love is an enlarging and not a narrowing experience. And finally, real love does exist. But it is true that in order to find the right person, you need to be the right person.
To be the right person you have to do your work, examine your failed relationships and, find the patterns. Go to counseling if you have historical issues. Find out why you are attracted to a certain type that is not good for you. And, at the same time, build your life so that you are an independent, interesting, and attractive person. You will attract other independent, interesting, and attractive people who are capable of good and loving relationships.
As I say over and over again, water seeks its own level. If you are attracting and attracted to unhealthy and dysfunctional, you are unhealthy and dysfunctional. Do your work so that real love andlasting love has a chance to walk in.
How to Keep Your Balance When There’s No Place to Stand and Nothing to Hold On To
Know you what it is to be a child?… it is
to believe in belief….
– Francis Thompson, 19th c. British poet
We don’t forget our first ah-ha experience any more than we forget our first kiss. The difference is we have some idea of what to expect from a kiss, but we don’t know what to make of an enlightening incident. The experience lingers in memory as something special, but since we can’t account for it, we’re apt to keep it to o urselves.
Only in my thirties did I realize that an experience I’d had in my teens was the analogue of that first kiss. About six years after discovering that our third grade science book contained mistakes, it struck me that anything could be wrong. There were no infallible truths, no ultimate explanations.
But one day, alone in my bedroom, I had the premonition that what was true of science applied to beliefs of every sort. I realized that, as in science, political, moral, or personal convictions could be questioned and might need amending or qualifying in certain circumstances. The feeling reminded me of consulting a dictionary and realizing that there are no final definitions, only cross references. I remember exactly where I was standing, and how it felt, when I discovered there was no place to stand, nothing to hold on to. I felt sobered, yet at the same time, strangely liberated. After all, if there were no absolutes, then there might be an escape from what often seemed to me to be a confining socialconformity.With this revelation, my hopes for definitive, immutable solutions to life’s problems dimmed. I shared my experience of unbelief with no one at the time, knowing that I couldn’t explain myself and fearing others’ mockery. I decided that to function in society I would have to pretend to go along with the prevailing consensus—at least until I could come up with something better. For decades afterwards, without understanding why, I was drawn to people and ideas that expanded my premonition of a worldview grounded not on immutable beliefs, but rather on a process of continually improving our best working assumptions.Science Models EvolveIt’s the essence of models that they’re works in progress. While nothing could be more obvious—after all, models are all just figments of our fallible imaginations—the idea that models can change, and should be expected to yield their place of privilege to better ones, has been surprisingly hard to impart.Until relatively recently we seem to have preferred to stick to what we know—or think we know—no matter the consequences. Rather than judge for ourselves, we’ve been ready to defer to existing authority and subscribe to received “wisdom.” Perhaps this is because of a premium put on not “upsetting the apple cart” during a period in human history when an upright apple cart was of more importance to group cohesiveness and survival than the fact that the cart was full of rotten apples.Ironically, our principal heroes, saints and geniuses alike, have typically spilled a lot of apples. Very often they are people who have championed a truth that contradicts the official line.A turning point in the history of human understanding came in the seventeenth century when one such figure, the English physician William Harvey, discovered that the blood circulates through the body. His plea—“I appeal to your own eyes as my witness and judge”—was revolutionary at a time when physicians looked not to their own experience but rather accepted on faith the Greek view that blood was made in the liver and consumed as fuel by the body. The idea that dogma be subordinated to the actual experience of the individual seemed audacious at the time.Another milestone was the shift from the geocentric (or Ptolemaic) model (named after the first-century Egyptian astronomer Ptolemy) to the heliocentric model (or Copernican) model (after the sixteenth-century Polish astronomer Copernicus, who is regarded by many as the father of modern science).Until five centuries ago, it was an article of faith that the sun, the stars, and the planets revolved around the earth, which lay motionless at the center of the universe. When the Italian scientist Galileo embraced the Copernican model, which held that the earth and other planets revolve around the sun, he was contradicting the teaching of the Church. This was considered sacrilegious and, under threat of torture, he was forced to recant. He spent the rest of his life under house arrest, making further astronomical discoveries and writing books for posterity. In 1992, Pope John Paul II acknowledged that the Roman Catholic Church had erred in condemning Galileo for asserting that the Earth revolves around the Sun.The Galileo affair was really an argument about whether models should be allowed to change without the Church’s consent. Those in positions of authority often deem acceptance of their beliefs, and with that the acceptance of their role as arbiters of beliefs, to be more important than the potential benefits of moving on to a better model. For example, the discovery of seashells on mountaintops and fossil evidence of extinct species undermined theological doctrine that the world and all living things were a mere six thousand years old. Such discoveries posed a serious challenge to the Church’s monopoly on truth.Typically, new models do not render old ones useless, they simply circumscribe their domains of validity, unveiling and accounting for altogether new phenomena that lie beyond the scope of the old models. Thus, relativity and quantum theory do not render Newton’s laws of motion obsolete. NASA has no need for the refinements of quantum or relativistic mechanics in calculating the flight paths of space vehicles. The accuracy afforded by Newton’s laws suffices for its purposes.Some think that truths that aren’t absolute and immutable disqualify themselves as truths. But just because models change doesn’t mean that anything goes. At any given time, what “goes” is precisely the most accurate model we’ve got. One simply has to be alert to the fact that our current model may be superseded by an even better one tomorrow. It’s precisely this built-in skepticism that gives science its power.Most scientists are excited when they find a persistent discrepancy between their latest model and empirical data. They know that such deviations signal the existence of hitherto unknown realms in which new phenomena may be discovered. The presumption that nature models are infallible has been replaced with the humbling expectation that their common destiny is to be replaced by more comprehensive and accurate ones.Toward the end of the nineteenth century, many physicists believed they’d learned all there was to know about the workings of the universe. The consensus was that between Newton’s dynamics and Maxwell’s electromagnetism we had everything covered. Prominent scientists solemnly announced the end of physics.There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement.– Lord Kelvin (1900)
Then a few tiny discrepancies between theory and experiment were noted and as scientists explored them, they came upon the previously hidden realm of atomic and relativistic physics, and with it technologies that have put their stamp on the twentieth century.
Albert Einstein believed that the final resting place of every theory is as a special case of a broader one. Indeed, he spent the last decades of his life searching for a unified theory that would have transcended the discoveries he made as a young man. The quest for such a grand unifying theory goes on.
Being and Flowing is a good place to begin Healing Your Thoughts.
The first part of the Being and Flowing Sequence is a basic relaxation session where some (or several) of the techniques of guided imagery or meditation can be used. In fact, for this type of relaxation, you can use new techniques or techniques that are familiar to you and that have worked for you in the past. If you do the sequence regularly, you can switch between techniques if you like.
One caveat: We find that general medical/therapy techniques, specifically those that are not associated with a particular spiritual path, work best for the Being and Flowing meditation in this context. (We link to some general relaxation techniques from the University of Maryland Medical Center, below).
Being and Flowing First Step: Basic Relaxation Session
One: Position
If you are outdoors, find a quiet, safe place in a garden, park, beach or woods. Remember, safety comes first. If you are indoors, find a place where you won’t be disturbed. Sit on a floor cushion or in a chair with your feet on the floor, or lie down in a comfortable position. Whatever position you choose, try to remember, you might choose not to move or shift while being and flowing, so make sure it’s really comfortable.
Two: Watch Your Thoughts
Once you are comfortable, the first thing to keep in mind: Don’t worry about your thoughts. Allow them to come and go as they wish. Give them their freedom to come and go as they like. Don’t try to control them. Just observe them.
Three: Watch Your Breath
Don’t try to control your breathing. Just observe your breath. If you are familiar with breathing techniques and want to try them, you could, but to forge a new path it’s sometimes good to let go and experience non-familiar meditative pathways.
Four: No Goal
If you feel stressed or anxious, remember: there is no goal here. Just passively watch where your thoughts and breath take you. If after a few tries anxiety (or boredom, which can be a symptom of anxiety during meditation) feels overpowering, take a break.
Five: Far Away
At some point, your thoughts may seem to “melt away”. They may feel far away; you know they’re there, but they don’t seem to touch you, or you don’t really touch them. There is a gulf between you and your thoughts, including your less-than-helpful ones. When they are so far away, their ability to control you is greatly diminished.
Help!
If you need help we recommend you try music. We really like (and recommend) Dr. Harry Henshaw’s relaxation music. (Last year, we interviewed him, here.)
Dr. Henshaw’s audio tracks of free-floating music are really de-stressing. We can best describe them as providing a musical pathway on which your thoughts can flow. His music doesn’t restrain or confine your thoughts as much as gently supports them. We really liked the ones on these pages; so far, we’ve sampled the uplifting music of Clarity, the gentle vibrato of Cosmic Reflection, the sweet tones of Equilibrium and the progressions of Inner Peace.*
If you want more concrete help the techniques of progressive relaxation (and toe tensing) can be very helpful. The University of Maryland Medical Center has clearly outlined them. They recommend the techniques for sleep disorders, but they are also helpful for tension and anxiety. One quibble: they don’t mention that slightly tensing each area of the body (not just the toes) before you relax that part, can be even a more powerful path to relaxation.
We’ve made our own relaxation recordings at home. We record our soft, slow voices giving a step-by-step progressive relaxation session. You might enjoy making your own recordings, too.
Being and Flowing Second Step: Journal
If you are in therapy, or even if you’re not, it’s a good idea to do a Being and Flowing journal. Some people like to share this with their therapist, others don’t. It’s up to you.
You might consider doing an audio or video recording if you don’t like to write. Writing or otherwise recording your general experience with your relaxation session, is a good starting point. Then, if you like, continue to write or otherwise comment on your experience of your thinking process. What were your thoughts? Were you able to let them drift by? Did any thoughts “stick” more than others? Did new thoughts, thoughts you never “thought” before, pop up?
Also, you might explore the self that observed the thoughts. And so on. If you don’t like to write and don’t want to do an audio or video recording, you can try illustrating your experience by drawing, painting, collage (found objects, fabric, and so on), photography, etc.
Once you have a sense of Being and Flowing, you’ll might find yourself being able to step back, even in a non-relaxing session, from your thoughts that are not beneficial. You might find it easier to dispassionately examine your thoughts (and beliefs, which are a type of thought often mingled with emotion) and see if they are really beneficial to you.
In fact, a very important, even central, part of therapy is examining thoughts and beliefs that hamper or are openly damaging to: your personal growth, relationships, mental health, and physical health. Therapy, in part, teaches you how to “rethink” things, even changing your most closely held beliefs, if they don’t serve your growth. Healing your thoughts is central to healing your life.
How do you treat yourself
How do you treat yourself? How should you treat yourself? What should you think about yourself? How should you feel about yourself? Well..... how do you treat your best friend? What do you think about them? How do you feel about them? Now take that and multiply it by 10, multiply it by 100. Imagine how you would feel about somebody you were completely in love with, that you loved more than life itself, but it was an unconditional, open, free, healthy love, and not a needy, posessive, jealous, conditional love. Your eyes are wide open and you see all their faults and yet you love them despite their faults, perhaps because of them. Now perhaps you are getting close to how you should feel about yourself..........Simon Meadowcroft
Wednesday, 27 June 2012
Animal-human hybrid stickers invading Parisian streets
While marketing and mainstream communications campaigns have derived branding inspiration in the comic-like cartoon style of street art, and the values attached to its culture—freedom, community, transgression—the paradox still exists to see it framed and sold through traditional art channels.
We caught up with street artist Rafael Suriani at his recent show, "Collages Urbains", at Cabinet d'amateur gallery in Paris, where he told us more about street art and his relationship with the medium.
Suriani's mark features animals, surviving and thriving in the streets for its powerful and highly recognizable aesthetic. In his half-human-half-animal figures, the animal faces act as liberating masks, allowing the artist to express social criticism in an elegant way. The vibrant, seemingly playful creatures refrain from getting too serious and maintain a suggestive tone that avoids the obvious.
The stickers are the result of a double-binding process that first assembles man and animal, then adheres the resulting figure to the wall. In the past, Suriani has drawn from his Latin-American heritage, playing with shamanic mythology figures such as toucan or jaguar. In his recent series, on the other hand, he is more interested in urban domestic animals such as cats and dogs—according to the artist, the convention that they tend to resemble their owners offers a metaphoric way to talk about us people. Recently Suriani made a series of French "Bulldogs" as a special dedication on London walls, using this breed to cartoon and make fun of some French characteristics. Each dog expresses a different state of mind—humor, spirituality, criticism or beauty.
Suriani uses the rare technique of hand-painting every poster he sticks on the streets. Making each sticker is the result of a process involving selecting photos from the Internet, cutting them in Photoshop, then screening and painting before cutting the final product. Such repetition lies at the heart of street art practice, which is often based on plastering as many spots as possible, invasion-style.
When considering the ephemeral fate of the piece of work destined for degradation of the elements, police destruction or theft from passers-by, the time and effort for such little reward seems remarkable. Suriani explains, however, that the fleeting nature of his work is freeing and allows him to be audacious with both subject and technique. To him, because there is no pressure or constraint, that achievement is rarely a failure.
In the end, the piece of art is not the only sticker by itself, it is the sticker in its context, seen as a whole on the wall with the daylight shining on it, the motorbikes parked against it or the branch of a tree creeping across. Rarely is the work's time spent on the wall its only life, after all, with the rise of dedicated photographers immortalizing the scenes for the Internet.
Suriani claims his intention to step into the city's landscape by bringing much-needed beauty comes with a positive message. Rather than being aggressive or controversial, Suriani takes pleasure in having people on the street enjoy his figures. His work is bound to the city—physically, geographically and socially—compelling the public to refresh their view of their surroundings and drawing their eyes to the places that typically go unnoticed. As an architect, Suriani has found a way to unveil the city and change people's perception of the scenes they see everyday without truly seeing them. The choice of venue is very important, based on aesthetic consideration with attention to the context and surroundings like the location.
Monday, 11 June 2012
Man stranded in desert builds motorcycle out of his broken car
According to Merriam-Webster, ingenuity can be defined as "skill or cleverness in devising or combining" or "cleverness or aptness of design or contrivance." We'd say that's an apt description of a Frenchman named Emile who reportedly found himself stranded in the deserts of Northwest Africa after breaking a frame rail and a suspension swingarm underneath his Citroën 2CV.
What to do? Why, disassemble the broken hulk and build yourself a motorcycle from its pile of parts, of course! As the story goes, Emile was able to use the inventive machine to escape the desert, though not before convincing the local authorities that he wasn't an insurgent and paying a fine for importing a non-conforming vehicle...
Since Emile was the only soul in the area, nobody has been able to confirm the veracity of the events that led to the little French runabout's conversion into a makeshift motorcycle. That said, judging by the images you can see here (apparently from the March 2003 issue of 2CV Magazine), this Citroën-bred two-wheeler does indeed exist, and it was definitely fashioned from parts scavenged from an old 2CV.
Emile, wherever you are, we take our hats off to your real-life MacGyver skills, sir.
