"Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men for they may act their dream with open eyes to make it possible. "


Posts tagged with 'relationships'

Recent research: four papers from the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

5th February 2009

I routinely scan quite a few journals every month. Sometimes it's disappointing and there's nothing in the issue of a particular journal that interests me much. Sometimes a particular journal contains a bunch of stimulating articles. January's edition of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology was a good find. …

Handouts & questionnaires for emotions, schema & personality

26th January 2009

Here are a set of diverse handouts and questionnaires on emotions, schema and personality. The "triangle of emotions" is a model I put together to help guide work on the longer term dysfunctional personality patterns that we probably all experience to some extent. The "big five" is a very widely …

Ways of coping: theory & personal experience

25th January 2009

In blog postings earlier this month, I've talked about supporting my Mum after her recent couple of strokes. She's been shipped through three different hospitals and now is more peaceful in a nursing home. It's sad - very sad at times - and it's great that she seems more comfortable, …

Friendship, life planning, & expressing emotions

11th January 2009

Yesterday and today are a check-in time with my friend Larry. I've written in a previous blog post how Larry and I have met every three or four months for many years specifically to review how our lives are going and to plan and prioritize our goals for the next …

New Year’s resolution – would you like to be happier?

28th December 2008

So here's a blast from the past ... that could be fun and useful for a New Year's resolution. I first came across Michael Fordyce's research year's ago (Fordyce 1977; Fordyce 1983). It was probably the first serious scientific exploration of how to help people become happier that I'd ever …

Recent research: mind-body & body-mind effects for cancer, allergy, dementia, & mental health

18th December 2008

Here are five studies on the loose theme of how the mind affects the body, and the body affects the mind ... and that the distinction between mind and body is pretty arbitrary anyway. Using meta-analysis, Chida & colleagues highlight considerable evidence suggesting that stress-related psychosocial factors have an adverse …

Barbara Fredrickson’s recent research study on loving-kindness meditation (second post)

14th December 2008

I have already written an initial blog post about Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues' interesting recent research paper (Fredrickson, Cohn et al. 2008) on the effects of teaching people loving-kindness meditation. So what are some possible implications of this research for people in general, for using forms of mind training (meditation, …

Personality, extroversion & compassion 2

16th November 2008

Having written the first blog posting on Personality, extroversion & compassion yesterday, I realized I wanted to add one or two further comments. These comments are mainly about scores on the Big five aspects scales (BFAS) and about "personality" in general. I've also made these comments downloadable as a BFAS …

Personality, extroversion & compassion 1

15th November 2008

If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion. Dalai Lama I have a lot of experience of interpersonal group work - both with participating in and running groups that provide a chance to learn more about ourselves and how we relate …

Recent research: egosystem & ecosystem

13th November 2008

In the end the love you take is equal to the love you make. Beatles This is essentially the Beatles closing statement. It is the last lyric on the last album they recorded. (Let It Be was the last album they released, but it was recorded earlier). Every now and …