A New Solution to Depression
Copyright (c) 2017 by Lynn D. Johnson. You may reprint this with proper attribution and copyright attached. At 71, Lynn does 40 - 50 pushups. Depression is increasing worldwide. It hits us younger, and hits more of us. When I was a new intern in psychology, the average [...]
LISTENING TO ROCKS
COPYRIGHT (C) 2017 BY LYNN JOHNSON, PH.D. PLEASE REPRINT AND SHARE this 870 word essay. Grace listening My three year old granddaughter has a passion for collecting rocks. She is not particular. The rocks she picks up and takes home have no apparent unique qualities. But love is [...]
Healing Rosie
Rosie visiting Home Depot Rosie was a neglected and abused dog. She is a small-medium red dog, about thirty pounds. She had been starved, and at eight months hadn’t lived in a house or been house trained. My daughter adopted this needy dog. She and her husband are [...]
GROW YOUR BRAIN
Lynn and two oldest sons at the end of a 110 mile mountain bike ride. WHAT IF WE HAD A SIMPLE HABIT that would grow our brain, lengthen our life, and help eliminate depression? Would you be interested? Maybe not, because few people are actually doing it. Only [...]
INTUITION
WE ENJOYED A LIVE INTERVIEW with Paul H. Smith, Ph.D., and even if you weren't on the call, now you can enjoy it too! Paul was a remote viewer for the U.S. Army at Ft. Meade, Maryland, for several years. They were considered valuable enough to the Army to [...]
WILL TO BELIEVE
Lynn & grandchildren Friday is “ski with the grandchildren day” in my family. We go up for the afternoon and practice our turns on the intermediate runs. The seven-year-old is working on parallel turns, while the four-year-old, who started out turning very gradual parallel turns has spontaneously adopted [...]
When Psychotherapy Hurts
Therapists do a lot of good. People who have been through therapy are much better off. But the question of whether psychotherapy can hurt people is not one we see much research on. A new study by Mike Crawford in England (Crawford, et al., 2016) gives us some very good [...]
Hope For IBS
A recent meta analysis shows that patients suffering from irritable bowel syndrome - IBS - are helped by psychotherapy. Not only do they feel better while the therapy helps them work with their emotions, but the benefit continues for six months to a year after therapy is ended. I should [...]
Skepticism and Health
Today many people are avoiding wheat. I saw one report on the internet claiming that wheat uniquely drives up blood sugar. According to this report, blood sugar would rise moderately with an oatmeal breakfast but skyrocket with a wheat breakfast. Maybe. I have eaten cooked cracked wheat and cooked wheat [...]
More About Anger
My post on anger left some questions. One reader, Bryan, asks on my blog if I am advocating a kind of “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” position. It is a wonderful question and deserves a response. Bryan points out how small, practically automatic choices lead to depression and anxiety, [...]
Mental Illness? Or, anger?
Each time we have to endure another horrible shooting like the one at Umpqua Community College, there are calls for more treatment of mental illness. Yes, by all means. Mental health treatment is inadequate. Cuts in mental health services is short-sighted and foolish. Chicago recently closed half of [...]
More on Parenting
My friend Bill O’Hanlon likes to tell about a marriage counselor with a popular parenting course, called “Four Rules for Parents.” People loved it and he was wildly successful. He wasn’t married and had no children, but nevertheless . . . Then he found his soul mate (always a dangerous [...]
PARENTING TOOL
Processed with VSCOcam with f2 preset Here is a photo of a family / neighbor outing. The people on your left are the important ones, the Johnson children, all but Steve who is on his honeymoon. The man to my left is my second son, Jeff, he to [...]
Do Statins Damage Mental Health?
I just read a new report. It turns out that drugs that lower cholesterol, including statins, damage memory. The article appears in JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association. The lead author is Brian Strom.| http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26054031 The findings are fairly straightforward: If you take any drug, statins or non-statins, [...]
ACTIVITY & THRIVING
I just posted a new YouTube video. Take a look, share it, leave a message. What about it? What do you do that gives you energy and a sense of competency?
Hobbies that help you Thrive
Eating a "rainbow diet" with lots of vegetables helps you recover from depression. Why is that? It is very likely that the rainbow diet reduces chronic inflammation. What will raise chronic inflammation? Eating prepared foods. Being worried and upset. Not getting regular exercise. In other words, living in the 21st [...]
Do You Need An Antidepressant?
Here is a simple method of telling whether you actually have to take an antidepressant, based on solid science. Leave comments, refer your colleagues and clients.
NEW VIEW ON ETHICS
We just finished an interesting interview with Dr. Julie Tilsen. We talked about the influence of post-modern constructionist thinking on ethics. She and Scott Miller are presenting a live workshop in Chicago on August 12. After hearing the interview you may well want to attend. Much of modern ethics is [...]
GUT HEALTH and MENTAL HEALTH
When I started exploring lifestyle interventions a few years ago, I thought that interventions like coaching clients toward healthy eating and more physical exercise (among at least ten or twelve others!) were useful and interesting additions to my clinical skills. I even put together an online class to share with [...]
Do You Like Your Doctor?
Why do we like some doctors better than others? Jeannie Tsai and Tamara Sims, both associated with Stanford, propose it is because of our emotional fit. Tsai and Sims looked at two preferred emotional styles: Positive and high energy, and positive and low energy. High arousal positive states would be [...]