by: Maria Gracia

Feeling overwhelmed at the thought of organizing your home? Start on a smaller scale instead and it will be a whole lot easier.

For example, instead of starting with the entire house, commit to starting with one room.

Follow these 11 steps, and you’re well on your way to an organized home:

1. PICK A ROOM — ANY ROOM. Decide on what room to start on. Write it at the top of an 8 1/2 x 11 inch sheet of paper. This will be your Action Sheet. Example: BEDROOM A

2. CHOOSE AN ENTICING REWARD. Designate an appropriate reward to give yourself on the Dumping portion of the job. The reward concept serves as your motivation, so be sure to choose something that you’d really enjoy! Write this reward on your Action Sheet. Example: Treat yourself to a massage or go out for a nice dinner — whatever it is that you love to do. Write it on your Action Sheet.

3. SET A DEADLINE. Set a specific Dumping Completion Deadline for this one room. Write it on your Action Sheet. Example: DUMPING DEADLINE: APRIL 30

4. SCHEDULE TIME TO DUMP. Schedule 3 specific dumping dates (one hour for each). Hopefully this will be enough to complete the dumping portion of the job. Write it on your Action Sheet. Then, post the Action Sheet in a prominent place where you are certain to see it every day, like your bathroom mirror. It will serve as a reminder of your goal, deadline and pending reward. Example: DUMPING DATES: APRIL 18 from 8-9A, APRIL 21 from 8-9A, APRIL 24 from 8-9A

5. KEEP YOUR APPOINTMENT. When the 1st dumping day arrives, keep that appointment, just as you would any other important appointment. Bring a bunch of large garbage bags. Play your favorite music in the background.

6. TIME IT. Set a timer for 1 Hour — one that sounds off when the hour is up.

7. SORT THROUGH IT. Pick up one item at a time, and start dumping. (If you come across items you want to give to charity, designate a special bag for those items) Whatever you are going to keep, just put to one side of the room.

8. DO IT UNTIL THE TIME IS UP. Continue doing this until the timer goes off. If you prefer to continue, keep going. Otherwise, stop and follow the same procedures for your next two scheduled dates. Don’t let the garbage bags sit there. Make sure they are thrown out now (or donated), or on Garbage Day at the latest.

9. CELEBRATE. Once you’ve managed to dump everything you don’t want or need in that one room, it’s time to celebrate. Take advantage of that reward you designated.

10. KEEPING IT ORGANIZED. Now that everything in that room that you wanted dumped is gone, you’re ready to begin putting everything you are keeping back in an organized manner. Be very careful not to put anything else in this room that you don’t want.

11. REPEAT. Repeat this process for each of the other rooms in your house.

by Maria Gracia - Get Organized Now!

http://www.getorganizednow.com

FREE Idea-Pak and E-zine filled with tips, ideas, articles and more to help you organize your home, your office and your life at the Get Organized Now! Web site!

About The Author

Maria Gracia, owner of www.getorganizednow.com and author of the book, ‘Finally Organized, Finally Free’ can help you organize your home, your office and your life. Visit her Web site at: http://www.getorganizednow.com

getorgnow@wi.rr.com

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: News Canada

(NC)-There is a growing awareness that children who witness family violence experience severe emotional and behavioural problems. As they grow older, boys are at greater risk of abusing others, and girls are at greater risk of experiencing abuse in their relationships.

• In a sample of federal inmates who had a history of family violence, more than half (56%) reported that they witnessed some form of violence as children.

• Men who witnessed their mothers being physically abused by their fathers were three times as likely to be violent against their female partners than men who grew up in non-violent homes.

• In a one-year period, a total of 57,182 women, along with 39,177 children, were admitted to 448 shelters that provide residential services to abused women in Canada

• The majority of children accompanying their mothers to shelters were very young: three-quarters were under ten.

• The number of children under twelve whose parents separate or divorce has tripled over the past twenty years.

Sources: Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, Statistics Canada, Canadian Council on Social Development.

In an attempt to break the cycle of violence, many communities across Canada have implemented programs designed to help affected children better deal with their experiences by providing them with safety and protection, self-esteem development and coping skills. Frequently these projects also help abused mothers who need assistance with parenting.

For more information on these and other innovative crime prevention efforts currently in place across Canada, visit the National Crime Prevention Centre Web site at www.crime-prevention.org or call toll-free 1-877-302-NCPC.

About The Author

News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web.

News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial “fill” items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: News Canada

A model project seeks to spread its success

(NC)-Most Canadians know Lynn Johnston as an award-winning cartoonist of the popular comic strip For Better or For Worse. But to her neighbours in North Bay, Ontario, she is the guardian angel of a locally based youth drop-in centre program called CONNECTIONS.

After witnessing first-hand the profound changes that many young people in the program were experiencing, Johnston took the project under her wing in 1997, committing $600,000 of her own money over a ten year period. “The thing that really made me dedicate this amount of time, effort and money to the group was something that occurred when I attended one of the graduations,” recalls Johnston.

“I sat down at the table and didn’t know anybody. All the kids were different: blonde, dark, Native - they were all so different. Yet they introduced each other to me as brothers and sisters, and told me they were family. That sold me.”

The CONNECTIONS program helps high school students to actively pursue their dreams while steering them clear of possible trouble. The program has made a demonstrable impact on these young Northbayites, which has, in turn, endeared it to the community at large.

Program Director Janet Humble has watched the project grow from a small volunteer project in 1997 to a model crime prevention initiative that offers a holistic blend of services for students who have a hard time fitting in with mainstream high school culture. Some of these students have learning difficulties, some have problems at home, some are bullied, and others are simply shy and reclusive.

CONNECTIONS offers these young people an environment of acceptance where they feel valued and free to share their feelings, instead of isolated and vulnerable to other risks.

“When CONNECTIONS first started, it was a stay-in-school initiative put in place to respond to the enormous number of drop-outs we were having,” recalls Humble. “We got kids involved by having them volunteer in the community. Through these volunteer activities, we were hooking them up with potential employers, teaching them about punctuality and other skills, and hoping that some of these skills would transfer over to school.”

CONNECTIONS creates a sense of family - a sense of connection - through four key activities: volunteering, recreational/physical activity (golf, curling, horseback riding, and canoe trips) mentoring (students are matched with role models and college/university students who provide career guidance and help with school work) and Fast-Break to Learning (students receive a good breakfast at school, one morning per week, during which they discuss issues such as anger management and study skills).

“It’s a way to get people through school, into careers, focused, and into a whole new community of peers,” explains Johnston.

An obvious success in North Bay, organizers now plan to expand into neighbouring communities, to test whether the project is transportable.

For details on how Canadian towns and cities are working together to reduce and prevent crime, and how your community can get involved, visit www.crime-prevention.org.

About The Author

News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web.

News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial “fill” items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: by Barbara Hall (courtesy of News Canada)

(NC)-During my term as Chair of the National Strategy on Community Safety and Crime Prevention, I have a visited cities in the United States, England and Belgium to discuss successful crime reduction strategies with local crime prevention officials. One thing that struck me was how similar their experiences were. In each city there was a serious crime problem, a focussed response and a substantial improvement in both the reality and the perception of safety.

Although there are no “one-size-fits-all” solutions, there are common elements at work, chief among them a willingness to involve the community in a meaningful way. As one Chief of Police observed, “I [used to think] that the police fought crime alone and that the community could only get in the way. Now we’ve got it right. We understand that in order to prevent crime and keep our community safe, we’ve got to involve the community as our partner.”

Jack Calhoun, President and CEO of the U.S. National Crime Prevention Council has identified six factors that were present in successful American city programs, even though actual strategies differed. They are:

1. A belief that all key municipal entities must play a role in cutting crime and violence. Schools, businesses, municipal government and social services must all work together.

2. The need to engage in specific, trackable actions. Cities need to have clear data on what the problems are, where they are and what’s causing them. They need to know what’s working and what isn’t in order to use resources effectively.

3. The courage to do business differently and to share power. Giving up “turf,” while difficult, is essential to working together.

4. A dual commitment to targeted enforcement and prevention - things like after school programs and mentoring. Law enforcement resources must be deployed consistently with broader crime prevention objectives.

5. A commitment to the long term. This is a challenge when some offer instant solutions, but helping young people build better lives doesn’t happen overnight.

6. And, as Calhoun puts it, “Clear, passionate, hands-on commitment from the leading policy-makers, prime among them the Mayor and the Chief of Police.”

Leadership; working together; identifying problems and then attacking them; measuring results; doing business differently; being tough on crime and equally tough on the causes of crime . . . these are the factors that we witness everyday in projects and communities throughout Canada. They produce positive changes here, just as they do in countries around the world.

For details on how Canadian towns and cities are working together to reduce and prevent crime, and how your community can get involved, visit www.crime-prevention.org.

Barbara Hall, is Chair of Canada’s National Strategy on Community Safety and Crime Prevention.

About The Author

News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web.

News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial “fill” items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: News Canada

(NC)-Birthdays rank as the most important date of the year for many young children. Besides the cake and the presents, it’s a day when families communicate that a child is special and loved.

For a parent, this can mean a whole lot of pressure and money. Statistics Canada hasn’t yet studied the birthday party economy, but with 5.5 million kids 13 and under…that can add up to some serious dollars and serious stress in planning.

Across Canada, time-starved parents may find it extremely difficult to fit birthday party planning into their busy lives, especially when they want it to be a memorable party for their child. But there are quick and easy ways to plan parties that will leave parents with the energy to actually enjoy the party, and more importantly, won’t have them dreading next year’s bash.

The most important thing to remember is that you don’t need ponies and jugglers to create memories for your child. Instead, focus on simple ideas and take advantage of your child’s active imagination by letting them help with theme and activity ideas.

According to www.sunsationalkids.com, theme parties are wonderful because they set the stage for the gifts, activities and party favours, and best of all, they take much of the guess work out of the most important step of a party…proper planning. Other tips include:

1. Think about how old your child is turning because each age has different interests

2. Grab a notebook and sit down with your child (if they are over the infant/toddler age) and discuss with them what type of party they have in mind.

3. Create a list of people to invite (four to six children for ages one to three, ten to twelve children for ages four to 12).

The absolute easiest way to throw a birthday party for your child is to do it at a venue that will either plan the party for you or at least include all the required elements. For example, little girls who love Barbie are all going to want a Barbie Birthday Popcorn Party for their next birthday. Available at Famous Players theatres across the country, the Barbie Birthday Popcorn Party is a full birthday package with a Barbie twist. The birthday girl receives Barbie-themed invitations to send out to her friends, and the large party includes Barbie decorations, Barbie loot bags, and a personalized Barbie cake.

“We’ve worked with Famous Players to create three totally Barbie-themed birthday packages that no Barbie fan can resist,” says Erica Van Kamp, Marketing Manager, Girls Brands, Mattel Canada Inc. “These parties are not only great for the girls, but also for the parents - a Popcorn Party coordinator does all the planning for you, and is even on hand to help out during the party. For more information call 1-888-3-FAMOUS.”

Other venues also offer inexpensive birthday party packages. Check out your local zoo, favourite family restaurant, bowling alley, community pool, or skating rink.

If you are going to plan the party at home, it still doesn’t have to be a stressful task. Just get creative and use the internet for some great theme ideas like Hot Wheels, princess, Barney, and Blue’s Clues.

Whether you choose to have a party at home or at a venue such as Famous Players, just remember that the best part of any birthday party is that you are creating memories for your birthday girl or boy that will last a lifetime. Don’t forget your camera!

About The Author

News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web.

News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial “fill” items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: Sam Vaknin, Ph.D.

Despite all the fashionable theories of marriage, the narratives and the feminists, the reasons to engage in marriage largely remain the same. True, there have been role reversals and new stereotypes have cropped up. But the biological, physiological and biochemical facts were less amenable to modern criticisms of culture. Men are still men and women are still women in more than one respect.

Men and women marry for the same reasons:

The Sexual Dyad – formed due to sexual attraction and in order to secure a stable, consistent and permanently available source of sexual gratification.

The Economic Dyad – To form a functioning economic unit within which the economic activities of the members of the dyad and of additional entrants will be concentrated. The economic unit generates more wealth than it consumes and the synergy between its members is likely to lead to gains in production and in productivity relative to individual efforts and investment.

The Social Dyad – The members of the couple bond as a result of implicit or explicit, direct, or indirect social pressure. This pressure can manifest itself in numerous forms. In Judaism, a person cannot belong to some religious vocations, unless he is married. This is economic pressure. In most human societies, avowed bachelors are considered to be socially deviant and abnormal. They are condemned by society, ridiculed, shunned and isolated, effectively ex-communicated. Partly to avoid these sanctions and partly to enjoy the warmth provided by conformity and acceptance, couples marry. Today, a myriad of lifestyles is on offer. The old fashioned, nuclear marriage is one of many variants. Children are reared by single parents. Homosexual couples abound. But in all this turbulence, a pattern is discernible : almost 95% of the adult population gets married ultimately. They settle into a two-member arrangement, whether formalized and sanctioned religiously or legally – or not.

The Companionship Dyad – Formed by adults in search of sources of long-term and stable support, emotional warmth, empathy, care, good advice and intimacy. The members of these couples tend to define themselves as each other’s best friends.

It is folk wisdom to state that the first three types of dyad arrangements suffer from instability. Sexual attraction wanes and is replaced by sexual attrition in most cases. This could lead to the adoption of non-conventional sexual behaviour patterns (sexual abstinence, group sex, couple swapping, etc.) – or to recurrent marital infidelity. Economics are not sufficient grounds for a lasting relationship, either. In today’s world, both partners are potentially financially independent. This new found autonomy corrodes the old patriarchal-domineering-disciplinarian pattern of relationship. It is replaced by a more balanced, business like, version with children and the couple’s welfare and life standard as the products. Marriages based solely on these considerations and motivations are as easy to dismantle and as likely to unravel as is any other business collaboration. Social pressures are a potent maintainer of family cohesiveness and apparent stability. But – being enforced from the outside – it resembles detention rather than a voluntary arrangement, with the same level of happiness to go with it. Moreover, social norms, peer pressure, social conformity – cannot be relied upon to fulfil the roles of stabilizer and shock absorber reliably. Norms change, peer pressure can adversely influence the survival of the marriage (”If all my friends are divorced and apparently content, why shouldn’t I try it, too ?”).

It is only the companionship dyad, which appears to be enduring. Friendships deepen with time. While sex deteriorates, economic motives are reversible or voidable, and social norms are fickle – companionship, like wine, gets better with time. Even when planted on the most desolate land, under the most difficult and insidious circumstances – this obdurate seed sprouts and blossoms. “Matchmaking is done in heaven” goes the old Jewish saying but Jewish matchmakers were not averse to lending the divine process a hand. After closely scrutinizing the background of both candidates – male and female – a marriage was pronounced. In other cultures, marriages were arranged by prospective or actual fathers without asking for the embryos or the toddlers’ consent.

The surprising fact is that arranged marriages last much longer than those, which are, ostensibly, the result of romantic love. Moreover: the longer a couple cohabitates prior to the marriage, the higher the likelihood of divorce. So, romantic love and cohabitation (”getting to know each other better”) are negative precursors and predictors of marital longevity, contrary to commonsense.

Companionship grows out of friction within a formal arrangement, which is devoid of “escape clauses”. In marriages where divorce is not an option (due to prohibitive economic or social costs or because of legal impossibility) – companionship will grudgingly develop and with it contentment, if not happiness. Companionship is the offspring of pity and empathy and shared events and fears and common suffering and the wish to protect and to shield and habit forming. Sex is fire – companionship is old slippers: comfortable, static, useful, warm, secure. We get attached very quickly and very thoroughly to that with which we are in constant touch. This is a reflex that has to do with survival. We attach to other mothers and have our mothers attach to us. In the absence of social interactions, we die younger. We need to bond and to create dependency in others.

The marital cycle is composed of euphorias and dysphorias (which are more of the nature of panic). They are the source of our dynamism in seeking out mates, copulating, coupling (marrying) and reproducing. The source of these changing moods is to be found in the meaning that we attach to our marriages. They constitute the real, irrevocable, irreversible and serious entry into adult society. Previous rites of passage (like the Jewish Bar Mitzvah, the Christian Communion and more exotic rites elsewhere) prepare us only partially to the shock of realizing that we are about to emulate our parents.

During the first years of our lives, we tend to view our parents as omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent demigods (or complete gods). Our perception of them, of ourselves and of the world is magical. All are entangled, constantly interacting, identity interchanging entities. Our parents are idealized and, then, as we get disillusioned, they are internalized to become the first and most important among the myriad of inner voices that guide our lives. As we grow up (adolescence) we rebel against our parents (in the final phases of identity formation) and then learn to accept them and to resort to them in times of need. But the primordial gods of our infancy never die, nor do they lie dormant. They lurk in our superego, conducting an incessant dialogue with the other structures of our personality. They constantly criticize and analyse, make suggestions and reproach. The hiss of these voices is the background radiation of our personal big bang.

Thus, to get married, is to become gods, to commit sacrilege, to violate the very existence of our mother and father, to defile the inner sanctum of our formative years. This is a rebellion so momentous, so all encompassing, touching upon the very foundation of our personality – that we shudder in anticipation of the imminent and, no doubt, horrible punishment that awaits us for being so presumptuous and iconoclastic. This, indeed, is the first dysphoria, which accompanies our mental preparations. Preparedness is achieved at a cost of great consternation and the activation of a host of primitive defence mechanisms, which lay dormant hitherto. We deny, we regress, we repress, we project – to no avail. The battle is waged and it is horrific to behold. Luckily, only its echoes reach our consciousness and only in our dreams does it find a fuller (though more symbol laden) expression.

This self-induced panic is the result of a conflict. On the one hand, the person knows that it is absolutely life threatening to remain alone (both biologically and psychologically). A feeling of urgency emerges which propels the person with a great thrust to find a mate. On the other hand, there is this feeling of impending disaster, that he is doing something wrong, that an act of blasphemy and sacrilege is in the making. Getting married is the most terrifying rite of passage. The reaction is to confine oneself to known territories. The terra cognita of one’s neighbourhood, country, language, race, culture, language, background, profession, social stratum, education. The individual defines himself by belonging to these groups. They imbue him with feelings of security and firmness. It is to them that he applies in his quest to find a mate. There, in the confidence of yore, he seeks to find the security of morrow. Solace can be found in familiar grounds. The panicked person can be calmed and restored among his peers and (mental, economic, social) brethren. No wonder that more than 80% of the marriages take place among members of the same social class, profession, race, creed and breed. True: the chances to come across a mate are bigger within these groups and associations – but the more predominant reason is the comfort that it provides. The dysphoria is replaced by an euphoria.

This is the euphoria, which naturally accompanies any triumph in life. Overcoming the panic is such a triumph and not a mean one at that. Subduing the internal tyrants (or guides, depending on the character of the primary objects) of yesteryear qualifies the young adult to become one himself. He cannot become a parent unless and until he eradicates his parents. This is patricide and matricide committed with great trepidation and pain. But the victory is rewarding all the same and it leads to feelings of renewed vigour, new-found optimism, sensations of omnipotence and other traces of magical thinking. The adult is ready to court his mate, woo her, hypnotize her into being his. He is full of the powers of life, of hormones, of energy. He gushes forth, he resounds with the tintinnabulation’s of a better future, his eyes glint, his speech revives. In short, he is immersed in romantic love. Being a suitor is a full time emotional job. The chances of success are enhanced the more mentally and emotionally available is the youth, the less burdened he is with past unresolved conflicts. The more successfully resolved the previous, dysphoric phase – the more vigorous the ensuing euphoric one and the bigger the chances of mating, generation and reproduction.

But our conflicts are never really put to eternal rest. They lie dormant in the waiting. The next anti-climatic dysphoric phase transpires when the attempts to secure (the consent of) a mate are met with success. It is easier and more satisfying to dream. Fighting for a cause is always preferable to the dreariness of materializing it. Mundane routine is the enemy of love and of optimism. This is where all dreams end and harsh reality intrudes with its uncompromising demands. The assent of the future spouse forces the youth to move forward in a path which grows irreversible and ominous as he progresses. The emotional investment is about to acquire economic and social dimensions. The weight is growing heavier, the commitment deeper, the escape remoter, the end inevitable. The person feels trapped, shackled, threatened. His newfound stability flounders. He staggers along a way of no return leading to what looks like a dead end. The strength of these negative emotions depends, to a very large extent, on the parental models of the individual and on the kind of family life that he experienced. The worse the earlier (and only) available example – the mightier the sense of entrapment and resulting paranoia and backlash.

But most people overcome this stage fright and proceed to formalize a relationship. They get married in a religious institution, or in a civil court, or sign a contract, or make their own arrangements. The formality resides in the institutionalization of the relationship – not necessarily in the choice of the legal host. This decision, this leap of faith is the corridor, which leads to the palatial hall of post-nuptial euphoria.

This time the euphoria is mostly a social reaction. The new status (just married) bears a cornucopia of social rewards and incentives, some of them enshrined in legislation. Economic benefits, social approval, familial support, the envious reactions of the younger, the expectations and joys of marriage (freely available sex, children, lack of parental or societal control, newly experienced unrestrained and almost unconstrained freedoms). All these infuse the person with another magical bout of feelings of omnipotence. The control that he exercises over his “lebensraum”, over his spouse, over his life is translated into a fountain of mental forces emanating from the person’s very being. He feels confidence, his self esteem skyrockets, he sets high goals and seriously intends to achieve them. To him, everything is possible, now that he is left to his own devices and is supported by his mate. With luck and the right partner, this frame of mind can last and be prolonged. However, as life’s disappointments accumulate, obstacles mount, the possible sorted out from the improbable and time inexorably passes – the feeling of well being and of willingness to take on the world and its challenges abates. The reserves of energy and determination dwindle. Gradually, the person slides into a dysphoric (even anhedonic or depressed) mood which colours his entire life.

The coloration stops at nothing. The routines of his life, their mundane attributes, the contrast between the glamour of our dreams (however realistically construed) and the reality of our day to day existence – these erode his previous horizon. It tends to shrink and imprison him in what looks like a life sentence. He feels suffocated and in his bitterness and agony, in his fear of entrapment, he lashes at his spouse. She represents to him this dead end situation. Had it not been for this new responsibility – he would not have let his life atrophy thus. Thoughts of breaking loose, of going back to the parental nest, of revoking the arrangements agreed upon begin to frequent the troubled mind and to intrude upon al planning. Dismantling the existing is a frightening prospect. Again, panic sets it. Conflict rears its ugly head. Cognitive dissonance abounds. Inner turmoil leads to irresponsible, self-defeating and self-destructive behaviour. A lot of marriages end here. Those that survive do so because of children.

In his quest for an outlet, a solution, a release of the bottled tensions, an exit from numbing boredom, from professional inertia and “death” – both members of the couple (providing they still possess the minimal wish to “save” the marriage) hit upon the same idea but from different directions. The woman finds it an attractive and efficient way of securing the bonding, fastening the relationship and transforming it into a long-term commitment. Bringing a child to the world is perceived by her to be a “double whammy” (partly because of social and cultural conditioning during the socialization process). On the one hand, it is in all likelihood the glue to cement the hitherto marriage of fun or of convenience. On the other, it is the ultimate manifestation of her femininity. Children are, therefore, brought to the world as an insurance policy against the disintegration of their parents’ relationships. Love and attachment follow later.

The male reaction is more compounded. At first, the child is (at least unconsciously) perceived to be an extension of the state of entrapment and stagnation. The man realizes that a child will only “drag him deeper” into the quagmire. The quicksand characteristics of his life seem to be only amplified by this new entrant. The dysphoria deepens and matures into full-fledged panic. It then subsides and gives way to a sense of awe and wonder. As it increases, it becomes all-pervasive. A psychedelic feeling of being part parent (to the child) and part child (to his own parents) ensues. The birth of the child and his first stages of development only serve to deepen this odd sensation.

Child rearing is a difficult task. It is time and energy consuming. It is emotionally taxing. It denies the parent long obtained achievements and long granted rights (such as privacy or intimacy or self-indulgence or even sleep). It is a full-blown crisis and trauma with potentially the severest consequences. The strain on the relationship of the parents in enormous. They either completely break down – or are revived by the common challenge and hardships. A period of collaboration and reciprocity, of mutual support and increasing love follows. An euphoric phase sets in. Everything else pales besides the little miracle. The child becomes the centre of Narcissistic feelings, of hopes and fears, the heart of an emotional tornado. So much is vested and invested in him and, initially, the child gives so much in return that it blots away the daily problems, tedious procedures, failures, disappointments and aggravations. But this role of his is temporary. The more autonomous a child becomes, the more knowledgeable, the less innocent – the less rewarding, the more frustrating, the sadder the scene, the more dysphoric. The children’s adolescence, the dysfunction of a couple, the members of which grew apart, developed separately and are estranged – set the scenery and pave the way to the next major dysphoria: the midlife crisis.

This, essentially, is a crisis of reckoning, of inventory taking, a disillusionment, a realization and assimilation of one’s mortality. The person looks back and sees how little he has achieved, how short the time left, how unrealistic his expectations were and are, how alienated he is from his society, his country, his culture, his closest, how ill-equipped he is to cope with all this and how irrelevant and unhelpful is marriage is. To him, it is all a fake, a Potemkin village, a facade behind which rot and corruption have consumed his life and corroded his vitality. This seems to be a last chance to recuperate, to recover lost ground, to strike one more time. Aided by others’ youth (a young lover, students, his own children, a young partner or consultant, a start up company) the person tries to recreate his beginnings in a vain effort to make amends, not to commit the same mistakes twice. This crisis is exacerbated by the “empty nest” syndrome (as children grow up and live the parental home). A major topic of consensus, a catalyst of interaction between the members of the couple thus disappears. The vacuity of the relationship, the gaping hole formed by the termites of a thousand marital discords is revealed. It is the couple’s chance to fill it in with empathy and mutual support. Most fail, however. They discover that they lost faith in their powers to rejuvenate each other. They are suffocated by fumes of grudges, regrets and sorrows. They want out into a fresher (younger) atmosphere. And out they go. Those who do remain, revert to accommodation rather than to love, to co-existence rather to experimentation, to arrangements of convenience rather to revival. It is a sad sight to behold. As biological decay sets in, the couple heads into the ultimate dysphoria: ageing and death.

About The Author

Sam Vaknin is the author of “Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited” and the editor of mental health categories in The Open Directory, Suite101, and searcheurope.com.

His web site: http://samvak.tripod.com

Frequently asked questions regarding narcissism: http://samvak.tripod.com/faq1.html

Narcissistic Personality Disorder on Suite101: http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/npd

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: David Leonhardt a.k.a. The Happy Guy

Each day my daughter, pushing one year old now, amazes me with the lessons she teaches me. Yes, here I go again learning lessons from someone too young to speak. (Hmm … maybe that’s a lesson, too.)

In my corner of Starship Earth, winter rolled in a wee bit late this year. The thermometer went easy on us all winter, leaving our sidewalks clear of the usual mountains of snow. So I suppose it was cosmic justice that just when we wanted to enjoy spring, winter struck us from behind. Which explains why we had to wait until May to introduce our Little Lady to the sea of grass surrounding our new home in the country.

Little Lady gets excited about everything (another lesson from speech-free youth). Just bringing her into the fresh air gets her excited enough to pop her buttons. As our “sponge lawn” finally seemed to dry from the spring snow, we decided to introduce her to the green stuff. I placed her gently down on her stomach so she could crawl.

Crawl!? You want me to crawl!? She may not speak English yet, but she sure can speak body language. No way would she let her hands or feet or face near those menacing blades of grass, which by this time had reached a good four or five inches in height.

However, her gestures of fear were set against squeals of delight.

Next we sat Little Lady up on the grass, and the squeals grew louder. As the smiles grew wider, the hands approached the lawn. She pulled them back. Reached down. Pulled back. Reached down. Pulled back. Turned her head to smile and squeal at us. Back to reaching down and pulling back. Again. Once more. Hey, this is scary stuff.

How many things would make us squeal with delight? OK, not literally, but think of things you would like to do. Things that would be exciting. Things that would bring meaning to your life. Are you also thrilled with the possibilities … but maybe just a little apprehensive about making the big leap? Many people are.

Sometimes fear holds us back from our dreams. We want to try something new, but we retreat back into our own comfort zone. I’ve watched one person after the other join Toastmasters against their better judgement over the past six years. Each one was terrified to speak in public. Each one jumped off the proverbial cliff, brave souls every one of them. And every one of them is braver now than they were when they joined. Every one is more skilled than when they joined. And every one feels less trapped by their personal comfort zone than they were when they joined.

Research shows that people regret more their inactions than their actions. In the long run, we tend to regret more what we didn’t do (Why didn’t I at least give it a try?). Do you want to improve your skills? Discover God? Travel around the world? Make a difference on our little Starship Earth? Tell somebody how much you care? Whatever it is you would most want to do, make the commitment right now to do it. Otherwise, the research says you will regret it later.

Many people strike out into business for themselves. Some succeed. Many fail. None regret. We may fear failure, but it is not trying that we regret.

As for Little Lady, she will overcome her fear of grass. Unfortunately, she may also overcome her squeals of delight. Aaaahh. The pure joy of childhood. Hey, there’s another lesson we adults can learn from our children!

About The Author

David Leonhardt is The Happy Guy, and author of Climb your Stairway to Heaven: the 9 habits of maximum happiness.

Visit him at http://www.TheHappyGuy.com

David@TheHappyGuy.com

Source: http://www.365articles.com

 by: News Canada