Just so we are clear, you can do this. Actually I’m pretty sure that the majority of people in the westernized world could. And what that is, is complete a one year challenge. The prize? Well, I can only speak for myself, but it was worth it. The Challenge? That’s where things get interesting.
 
I’m not to sure where I came up with the idea. It was probably in one of the last 4 moves I did in two years. I vowed on the last one that the countless boxes I was hauling around containing all my worldly possessions could use a little diet. Actually, that wasn’t my first thought. It was more along the lines of, “I wonder how much small storage would cost?” Then the absurdity of that statement struck home when I actually looked in those very boxes I considered paying to store these items.

Like many, I define myself by my possessions. Not entirely, but I will admit they play a part in who I am. I don’t consider myself especially materialistic, but it seems that over my 27 years on this planet that I had been accumulating more than shedding. It’s those types of things that begin to fill up closets, drawers and collect dust on shelves. It’s gifts that you feel guilty about throwing out but have absolutely no intention of using (I’m looking at you George Foreman Grill). It’s the shirt that is clearly out of fashion, but you did spend $60 on. It’s the electronics that you upgraded, but still feel compelled to keep, just in case the other one quits. The list is endless as are the reasons. But in the end, it’s clutter, and not just physically, but in the mind as well.

Okay, you’ve been patient enough. Let me explain what the challenge was. I vowed that everyday I was going to get rid of exactly one thing. That’s it. Beauty in simplicity. What I didn’t appreciate was the effect it would have on my life.

Although nobody can guarantee you that by adopting a specific lifestyle you will be able to live a longer life, there are certain things you can do to increase your chances of living longer. By following some healthy guidelines for sure you have nothing to lose but you have a lot to gain. Anything you do in order to live longer has to turn into a habit. In other words you have to do it without realizing it. Healthy living and lifestyle is a way of living and this is how you should approach it. The 7 most important habits for a better life and outlined below:

1. Don't worry be happy

It is proven by many studies that people who are happy live a better life. Happiness helps you approach life with a positive eye and this positivism keeps you away from stress, anxiety and other troubles. To find happiness in your life you have to ask for it and chase it. Finding happiness means: Desire to be happy, being grateful of what you have and achieved in your life, be ready to forgive other people, rejecting negative thoughts and feelings and generally be positive about life and people.

2. Eliminate negative thoughts

The way we think about our self or other people and situations can affect the quality of our life. If we approach anything we pessimism and negativity then this will create disappointment and stress. These two factors can be the beginning of more serious health problems. For a longer live you should eliminate negative thoughts and always approach situations from a positive angle. People who have negative thoughts end up with low self esteem and the low self esteem does not let them to anything else in their life than feeling useless and continuously in doubt about their abilities.

3. Healthy diet habits

Following a healthy diet is among the best ways to enjoy a life with out stress. A diet based on healthy principles cannot only improve your mood but also it can assist you maintain your normal weight and thus stay away from the stress caused by obesity. Weight loss and health are strongly tied together so you have to follow healthy guidelines for both. Some quick diet tips include: do not consume too much caffeine and alcohol, eat more fish and other protein food, avoid full fat foods, drink a lot of water, learn to enjoy fruits and vegetables, stay away from junk food and learn to cook at home.

Do you remember your excitement as you and your soon to be husband or wife planned to get married? I am sure your visions were of a wonderful, happy marriage. While you may have had wonderful, happy times, reality took over. The difficult task of making a marriage work, sometimes makes you want to give up. All relationships will have ups and downs. The following tips will help you learn how to make marriage better and get back the wonderful, happy marriage you dreamed of.

1.Communicate with your spouse.  Without effective communication a successful marriage is impossible. Tell your  pouse what is on your mind. Don't hold things in and silently fume. Your spouse is not a mind reader and if you don't tell them what is wrong, they won't know. While that seems obvious, so many people are guilty of expecting their spouse to know what they are thinking and feeling without ever sharing those thoughts and feelings.

headache causes by tcp909

What causes headaches in people is not easily determined. Headache causes are a lot and vary from physical and psychological factors. Headaches are one of the most common medical symptoms. Everyone at some point in his or her life suffered from headache. Some people also suffer from chronic headaches. The headache is also a major economic impact because no one can work properly when suffering from a headache. It is a sensation of pain coming from the nerves and muscles of the neck and around her head. Sometimes the pain comes from the meninges, the membranes covering the brain. The brain itself, even if it has a problem, it will not hurt and does not feel pain. The sense is, however pain in the head or any some part of it.

What causes headaches can be analyzed in two categories, the primary and secondary headaches. In the primary they have no association with a disease while in the secondary headaches are caused by a medical problem. When for example we get a cold we usually also have a headache, this is a secondary headache. The primary there is no specific cause can be due to various circumstances e.g. acute stress conditions that ultimately may cause a headache. The headaches depending on the pain are also separated into categories such as migraines, local headaches, etc. All headaches can be treated with various medications that help relax the region of the neck and head or suspend the feeling of the pain.

Secondary headaches are overcome when the illness that causes them is cured. The primary headaches do not have a specific way of dealing with them and we should give them special attention when they are intense or frequent to find what causes them.

Major causes of headaches

Headache cause #1: Stress

Stress is one of the main causes of headache. Stress is the major cause for a large percentage of headaches affecting people. The tension headaches are the most common form of headaches and stress is responsible for a large percentage of the cases.

The tension headaches are caused by increased tension of the muscles of the upper back, neck and head. People who have a tendency to depression or anxiety are likely to experience more tension headaches. Also women due to the increased obligations they have as workers, wives and mothers, they tend to experience more stress. For these reasons, they have more frequently than men, tension headaches.

Why does stress causes headaches?

The ability to remember things for a short or long time is crucial in order to be able to carry out the various activities of daily life. Our memory permeates throughout our lives. Without memory learning would be impossible, the past would be non-existent, the future would be uncertain. The good news is that there are ways on how to improve your memory through certain exercises and techniques, which you can use on a daily basis with out taking much of your time.

The loss of memory and cognitive functions, affects mainly those who do not exercise their memory and do not use their minds. The example of the great musician Xermpert von Karagian perhaps is no coincidence. He lost his father and grandfather due to Altschaimer disease. Because he feared that he would also suffer from Altschaimer disease he started to train his mind on various learning exercises. At 65 he learned to fly an airplane. Finally, he died 80 years with absolute clarity!

Why we forget things?

Often we forget things because we do not give adequate attention to them or because we are concerned with another event, or even because we were unable to digest new information during a period we have stress or when we are emotionally charged because of an unexpectedly sad event. There are many things that affect and damage our memory, which we need to watch out for:

Stress

The stress is bad adviser for memory. The most striking example is that of students, who can study perfectly but when it comes to exams they cannot remember anything. Their mind is somehow blocked and unable to recall what they memorized. Exam stress is bad for the memory and needs a special way to manage stress.

manage your weight by taketime111

One of the most common problems people face in the modern way of living is how to manage their weight. The demanding and fast rhythms of life make people forget about their weight, diet and health and as a result they either become overweight or are bound to unhealthy eating habits. To manage your weight you need to have a basic understanding of how our body works (in terms of fat and nutrients) and you also need to have persistence and patience because managing your weight is a process that takes time and needs a lot of effort. This article explains what you need to know about fats and gives some easy to follow tips to manage your weight faster and better.

Some basic but yet very important weight management calculations

Based on what experts say our body «burns» without extra exercise or vigorous activity, generally 30 calories per kilogram of active weight. Thus you can find out how many calories a day are needed to maintain your existing weight. But if you want to lose 1 kilo per week you should reduce them by 500 calories a day. But attention! The active weight is what is left from the body weight, if we remove the kilos of fat we have. The active weight is that which is actively involved in the "burning process" of the body and not our total weight.

To find the active weight we divide our total weight (e.g.80 kg) with our height multiplied by 2 (e.g. 1.62 cm), i.e.: 80 / (1.62 X1, 62) = 30.48. This number represents the percentage of fat in our body. In this example, the fat body is 80 X 30, 48% = 24 kg, so the active weight is 80-24 = 56 kg and the daily calories must be 56 X 30 = 1680. To lose 1 kilo per week we need 1680-500 = 1180 calories daily.

Its time to start manage your weight and health

how to tell if someone is lying? by confusionists

Being able to understand when someone is lying can really help your manage your life better. Think about it for a while...wouldn't be nice if you could easily understand when someone tells you a lie? Are you living an intense live where you talk to many people and you have a sense that some of them tell lies but you do not know whom? The answer is simpler than you think...Look at the movements of the person talking to you, look at their eyes and their smile. Why? But because ... body language never tells lies!

Why people lie is an old philosophical question that goes beyond our current scope! However, we have all experienced situations where we listen to someone talking and although the words seem entirely reasonable and real, there is «something» that tells us that the person is not telling the truth. And this «something» is a message from our brains that wants to protect us, as it is able to «scan» everything we see, decode the signals and act accordingly!

People interact with two main ways: with words and body language. Sometimes one of the two ways dominates the other, but usually they are combined at the same time. So we take brain signals that create meanings of words, thoughts, conclusions and signals from the body language (visual, hearing, smell and touch), which create confirmations, suspicious, energy flow (negative or positive), confidence or doubt. When the two languages, verbal and body, are not contradictory, meaning that what we say is also reflected in our body, we have effective communication and completeness and we accept the other message as true. But what happens when there is a contradiction between what we say and the way we say it? if we take into account that there are around 1 million marks of body language, you can understand that we are talking about a huge alphabet and a huge source of information. The more you exercise in observing body language the deeper you will be able to understand these codes, and the safer will be the conclusions. Sometimes you may have to combine 2 or 3 small body signals to make a safer conclusion.

relax and manage anger better by chitrasudar

Anger affects people in different ways. There are people who have no patience and get angry easily and there are other more patience that can manage their anger better. Unfortunately anger is inevitable in life and it is important to know safe ways to manage your anger better.

Discussions with conflicts can make you feel very uncomfortable. The best way to resolve a dispute or a disagreement with another person is to discuss with him.

If you feel angry prefer to do something else, for example go jogging or strike a pillow. Prefer to scream against a tree or a car than against another person. You can also talk to someone you trust.

It is important to retain and learn to express and manage your anger safely. Otherwise may harm someone else or yourself.

7 Ways to manage your anger

1. Try to understand why you are angry.

It is important to understand that you have reached the point where you will get angry. If a particular situation or a person is causing you anger, talk the matter with someone you trust. A faithful friend, a specialist, your doctor or psychologist can talk with you and help you.

manage stress by relaxing by eltercero

With the exception perhaps of Buddhist monks, stress is in our lives, to a lesser or greater extent. Managing stress means to be in position to understand the factors that can cause you stress and be able to minimize them or even better eliminate them completely. This is a difficult process and not all people can successfully manage to control their stress levels. The very first step in the process to manage stress is to understand what actually is stress. With the term stress we mean all the physiological changes that occur in humans when threatened or endangered by a stimulus or a situation. Therefore, any stimulus that can cause stress is known as a stress factor. Anxiety on the other hand, is nothing other than the feeling of fear and tension born in us when we face a new, provocative or dangerous situation (i.e. when we are in a state of stress). Stress is not necessarily something negative. In small levels it can be the driving force behind us. The desirable is that in the morning stress should be low, then rising during the day and at the evening to close at the low levels found in the morning.

The current pace of life is more intense and the ever-increasing demands force most of us to wake, sleep and live with stress, leaving no time to rest either the spirit or our body. Thus, even in conditions that there is no stress, we are still in a situation of constant muscle tension, which gradually became our way of living. The symptoms of intense stress occur at four levels:

• Feelings (distressed, irritability, restlessness)
• Mind (negative, destructive and irrational thoughts)
• Behaviour (indecision, excessive demands on others, loss of humour)
• Body (headaches, abdominal pain, grit, sweating)

manage your time by glasbergen

To successfully manage your time you have to get organized both in your professional and personal life. Getting organized in an efficient way is a skill that not all people posses. To manage your life and work you first have to be able to manage your time. In our days people spend most of their time working. There are times that they feel that they will never manage to escape from the four walls of the office and are lost in the various projects and tasks they have to finish.

Their personal life has become an old memory, which has been «locked in the drawer». The solution to this vicious circle is one: get organized and start managing your time. This article outlines 14 ways that can help you manage your time successfully and efficiently.

1. Make a list of what should be done

Make a list of what to do and try to constantly renew the list and keep it up to date. Include in this list both urgent and non-urgent things so as never forget or ignore something again. Keep the list all the time with you in your briefcase or in your daily agenda.

2. Allocate your time correctly

Include an estimated time frame for each action and the date by which each task must be completed. If the order that each task must be completed does not matter it may be possible to complete something during an unexpected free time. For example, you can look for information on the Internet while you wait in your office to start a meeting.

3. Set your own deadlines and meet them

manage stress after holidays by yukonblizzard

Millions of people worldwide are suffering from "stress syndrome after the holidays". This is a special form of stress, which appears after a particularly pleasant and relaxing (if not physically, but mentally) period of our lives. The effects of this type of stress are not only visible after the summer holidays but it affects people that take a break from work during Christmas and New Year's holidays. It takes a lot of effort and needs a special way to manage stress after the holidays.

manage your time better

The ability to manage our time efficiently is of great importance for happiness in our lives. Success in this critical area will allow us to enjoy the pleasures that life offers, will help us to manage stress and is a big step for our mental relaxation and calm.

Conversely, if we do not learn the basic principles of time management, the setting of objectives and priorities, we risk being caught up by the waves and storms of life that affect us too often.

Good time management is not easy. Not all people have the gift of proper organization. Many people have a wealth of activities and obligations. They feel they are oppressed by the many jobs that have to do with respect to the family, home or their profession. Easily, without the skills and education, one can be caught in a vicious cycle of time disruption and priorities with extremely negative consequences.

Despite the importance to manage time efficiently, educational systems at all levels give very little education to young people. This is a paradox if someone considers that the management of time is an essential component of success in all business sectors.

manage your time better by lutvision

Manage your time means to be in position to dominate the time and your work rather than being dominated by them. Your time is your life. Every thought and every action you make takes time. Therefore the way you use your time automatically determines where and how to use your life. The great paradox is that nobody has enough time, and yet everyone has as long as there is. Many of the time consuming factors affecting people cause stress and anxiety, so these factors must be identified and limited.

It is very important to manage your time successfully because:

• If you have more time for work you have more chances for success.
• If you have more time to think you can utilize your mind better.
• If you have more time to play, you can enjoy your life better.
• If you have more time to read, you can gain more knowledge.
• If you have more time for being friendly, the happier you will be.
• If you have more time to love, you will feel more joy.
• If you have more time to enjoy, the better is for your health and soul.

Do not forget Murphy’s law:" Nothing is as easy as it seems. Anything to be done needs more time than you think and if something can go wrong, it will go wrong. "

positive thinking is the key to your success by muha

Thinking positive is the key to your success. All successful people have one thing in common: Positive thinking and passion for what they are doing! Watch the great champions with what will and deprivation are fighting for reaching the desired objective. Watch the successful professionals and try to understand their dedication and sacrifices they do in their effort to reach that point that will bring them professional recognition. All the major successes start from a simple idea and if there is a real desire and positive thinking then they become a reality...!

Many of the ideas may temporarily give us incentives to try them but few of these ideas can keep our desire for success at such high levels in order to be able to overcome the obstacles that are found in the way. Take for example our personal goals and objectives set by each of us for our career, personal life, education, our looks etc. How committed are we to achieve these goals? Do we set objectives but we give up when things are difficult? Are we getting enthusiastic with an idea, which bursts on the road and cannot ever be converted into real objective? How can we keep this enthusiasm and desire for success until we meet our goals?

manage exam stress by forhealth

Students have a lot of stress especially during the exam period. It is more than vital for students to be able to manage stress if they want to succeed in the exams.

Exams themselves are a compelling experience that causes stress, because the stakes are high: the dreams that students make for their lives, the beginning of a career, the expectations that they have for themselves, the expectations parents have for their children. The exam stress is usually associated with the fear that students will disappoint their parents by their performance, and with the expectations they have from themselves. 

This article outlines some very useful tips that can help students and parents understand what are the causes and symptoms of stress and how students can manage stress before, during and after the exam period.

manage stress at work by career

Stress is a term that causes anxiety and it is usually connected with nervous tension and fatigue. The workplace is one of the major contributors of stress for all people. Despite the reasons that can cause stress at work there are quick and easy ways to manage stress at work and become more relaxed and more productive. This article outlines 12 methods you can follow to manage and relief your self from stress those difficult days at work.

12 Ways to manage stress at work

1. Give up your coffee

Coffee flows in your blood this is the problem. The caffeine is like wet stress that flows in your veins. It increases the production of adrenaline and simultaneously it prevents the production of adenosine, a natural sedative for your brain. «Blocking the caffeine from your daily habits is the most effective strategy to reduce stress as far as I know,” says David B. Posen, stress expert and author of Always Change a Losing Game. Posen supports the fact that 75% of decaffeinated coffee patients feel more relaxed and more active at work, mainly due to better sleep. For more information about coffee, you can read The real truth about the myth of coffee.

manage stress and your life

Regardless of what is the cause of stress the degree in which stress affects us depends on how we think about it. To manage stress effectively we need first to be able to manage our thoughts and the way of thinking. Each situation and each event gets the value that we give them, and thus causing us such stress, as we allow them to. Each person things and reacts differently from all other people. Also, the same person things and reacts for the same events differently at different times, depending on the circumstances.

What upset us is not the events themselves, but the perception we have for them. If this perception changed, then it is possible to manage, change or reduce the degree of stress we feel.

A very good way to manage stress, is to examine whether the situation or the causes of stress are really so bad as we think, or they are only bad in our thoughts. The steps below will help you manage your stress by first managing your thoughts.

manage stress and relax by ameliaps

Stress has become an integral component of our life. There are various ways to manage stress in a fast and efficient way. There are techniques that have to do with how we deal with problems - which are the major cause of stress and techniques we can use to relax in order to help our self to manage stress more efficiently. The bottom line is that stress is not a tangible component but it is a perception we have in our mind about different situations. Each situation and each event gets the value that we give them, and thus causing us such stress, as we allow them to.

Stress is not always a bad thing. Instead, it can keep us alert, it can warn us from possible dangers and in essence it helps us to understand what is important or not.

The inability to manage stress can sometimes prove to be dangerous for our health. We must be careful and take the necessary steps to protect ourselves. It is us that can make the difference in whether stress will remain useful or become dangerous for our health. Stress is harmful when we allow it to be.

happy faces by 001fj

The good thing with the stress of the holidays is that it is predictable. Unlike other types of stress that we encounter in life, we know exactly when it will start and when it will finish! Therefore, we can organize ourselves in order to avoid it or at least control it.

In our previous post "6 causes of Christmas stress and depression" we outlined the major causes why for many people Christmas holidays is a period of depression and stress. These are:

• Absence of a beloved person
• Family misunderstandings
• The economic difficulties
• Physical tiredness
• Loneliness
• Seasonal Emotional Disturbance

In this post, we give 15 tips to follow in order to make this Christmas holidays a period of joy and happiness.

puzzle games can help you improve memory by brainpower

There are ways to improve memory. Our memory like the rest of our body needs regular exercise to be in good condition, as the athlete must train to allow the body to respond to difficult times, so does the memory needs its own special training in order to stay in "shape" and improve. There are simple ways, which you can follow to keep your memory in shape, and also techniques that can actually help you to improve your memory's condition and performance.

Memory loss causes

The quality of the memory of a person depends not only on the education, the learning environment and the physical environment in which we live in, but also on other factors that can influence our life (e.g. loss of a beloved person). There is also the hereditary genetic factor that plays a very important role. Besides that, other memory loss causes are:

myth of coffee by refractedmoments

The myth of coffee has its roots from the ancient times. The popularity of coffee made people believe different things about how coffee affects our health. Some of the things about coffee are true, others are just myths that have been sustained over the years.

Coffee is mainly accused because of its main ingredient, caffeine. Caffeine is a natural substance found in leaves, seeds or fruits, in more than 60 plants. These include coffee, cocoa beans, the cola nuts and tealeaves, used to make many of our favourite soft drinks or beverages such as coffee, tea, cola drinks and various foods, such as chocolate.

Some facts about coffee and caffeine

Teamwork in the workplace by lumaxart

Teamwork is a very important aspect of every life. The person's ability to work harmoniously in a team as well as the communication and interpersonal skills are key factors for succeeding in the workplace. Persons who posses these characteristics are more likely to be successful in today's competitive business environment. There are some simple tips and techniques that one can easily follow to improve these skills and become a teamwork guru.

Why good teamwork relationships are important?

The relationship we have with our colleagues in the workplace, is affecting our psychological condition, productivity and quality of life in general. No doubt the quality of relations that exists between the members of a group working for a common purpose in a workplace is a key factor for the success of the group.

A harmonious relationship and good communication between the members of a team is necessary for the effective cooperation in achieving the goals of the team, and is an irreplaceable weapon in the struggle for your own personal success.

Inevitably in a human environment, you should expect to have different approaches to solving problems.

Vitamin C can help prevent cold by ruthalice43

One of the allies we have that can help us prevent cold is food. Probably you heard many times so far that vitamin C could help prevent cold. This is absolutely true. Besides vitamin C there are also other food and nutrients that can be included in our daily diet to help us prevent, minimize the effects, the duration and symptoms of common cold.

The common cold is seasonal. The first cases of common cold occur usually in autumn. Regardless of the temperature change or of the weather conditions in most parts of the world, cold begin in early autumn, lasting throughout the winter and there is a new upsurge in the middle of spring.

The first symptoms of cold are sneezing, coughing and a runny nose. There may also be low fever or no fever at all.

building self confidence and self esteem by bocavermelha

Even though many people understand the importance of self confidence and self esteem, unfortunately many of us do not realize that our confidence is low and that we need to find ways for building our confidence and self esteem. Even those who understand it, they do not know how to improve it! In today's world, with such increased obligations to our personal and professional live, the security that confidence and self esteem gives us is more than essential. If you have confidence you will win the respect of other people around you, and confidence and self esteem is not something that can be hidden when it exists.

A pre-requisite in building confidence and self esteem is to first understand what causes the reduction of self esteem and what signs in our behaviour indicate that we have a low self-esteem problem.

building confidence and self-esteem by qwurky

Building confidence and self-esteem is a process that needs a lot of effort, courage and patience. Confidence and Self-esteem is defined as the absolute faith in our self and our abilities. Confidence includes self-esteem and dignity and the belief that we are able to carry out and meet any challenge or dilemma in our life. Self-confidence is the way we talk to ourselves for ourselves!

The existence of self confidence and self esteem predisposes two interrelated concepts: the concept of internal competence and the sense of personal value i.e. Self-confidence and self-esteem, which together have resulted in the conviction that we live the life we deserve and if we do not live it, is in our hands to pursue it.

Stress in the workplace is devastating. Regardless of the factors causing stress at work is very important to develop ways to manage stress to be creative and productive for us. It is unrealistic to believe that we can live without stress. The aim of stress management is not to stop worrying and care about everything (so that we can avoid stress) but to learn to keep our self relaxed and under control.

In recent decades the word stress has entered our vocabulary for good, describing the fatigue, discomfort and pressure we are experiencing in our daily lives. The difficult working conditions, the financial difficulties, and the small or big personal problems of each of us became our personal load that we are forced to carry every day.

stress in workplace by nonsuonamale

Stress in workplace arises when we realize that the tasks we have to undertake in our work are greater than what we can handle. When the stress is intense and lasts for a long time, we begin to develop various symptoms that warn us that something is amiss. The most typical symptoms (signs) are the following: intense irritability, anxiety, uncertainty, difficulty in sleeping (insomnia), memory disturbances, tremor in the hands, headaches, abnormally tense muscles (particularly in the neck), nausea, tachycardia, intense sweating, dizziness, trends faint, and others.

There are a number of reasons that may cause migraine headaches. There are also a number of ways to prevent and cure migraine headaches crisis. This article explains what is the the migraine headaches cause and gives a list of proven tips and techniques for the prevention and cure of migraine headaches.

migraine headaches by Gallone

What are migraine headaches?

There are a few people who never experienced a headache. For most people, the headache occurs occasionally and it can be cured relatively quickly with a painkiller or a little rest. The migraine headaches, however, are much more than a headache. This is the most common neurological disease that are suffering 10-15% of the population and affects the quality of life, while in serious cases may even lead to abstention from the everyday activities and obligations for up to 3 days.

Stress and sleep are strongly bound together. Lack of sleep can cause stress and stress can be the cause for lack of sleep. It is important to find ways to manage stress and sleep because this combination can cause serious problems to our mental and physical health.

stress and sleep, image by fuffer2005

Stress is how the body and brain reacts in any new or threatening emotional (exciting) situation. Stress is not always harmful but it is sometimes helpful because it gives you more energy, which may help you experience physical challenges, solve problems and reach / achieve objectives / purposes. When stress continues without interruption for long periods can cause insomnia (lack of sleep), headaches, back pain, anorexia, fatigue, depression and other physical symptoms.

Positive thinking is an art that can help you manage your life better. There are ways to follow in order to learn how to start thinking positive. Positive thinking is not something that will fall one day from the sky but it needs effort and skills to be able to achieve it. By start thinking positive you will place you self in a position that will allow you not only to manage your life better but it will also help you to raise your self-esteem and self-confidence.

The power of positive thinking

Have you ever thought that the thoughts that pass through our minds are responsible for everything that happens in our lives? What we think is essentially what we live. The way we think affects our behaviour, our emotions, and our mood; how we see things, the way we act and react in our environment. So what is happening in our minds is our life itself! With the power of positive thinking and as soon as you start thinking positive your self-confidence and self-esteem will be firm and everything will seem easier.

the power of positive thinking by vizzzual

The power of the mind is the second strongest tool we have, after the power of the soul, which can in many situations give us even superhuman willingness or superhuman powers (e.g. in case of danger).

The eye is one of the reasons that we sometimes get the headache. The fatigue of the eye is one of the most common causes of headaches. There are various other eye diseases that can cause migraine, chronic and recurring headache. It is important to be able to identify and understand why eye is a cause of headache and try to minimize these factors so as to save our head from headache pain. This article explains why the eye is a major cause of headache and it also suggests a number of ways to cure the headache.

terrible headache by cayusa

Eye and Headache - Symptom #1: Pain above the eye

If the headache pain starts from the area above the eye and then extends in the back of the head, then most probably it is a migraine headache. Contrary to what most people believe, the migraine headache can sometimes be extended across the skull (in 1 / 3 of cases). In that case the migraine pain is more intense than the simple headache and is accompanied by nausea and vomiting. This type of headache displays some warning signs - for example, shortly before you will experience flashes and illusions of stars (the so-called aura). The cause of the headache is the dilation of blood vessels in the brain.

Food is not only necessary for our survival but it can also provide a way to manage stress. Stress can create a lot of problems to our mental and physical health. Managing stress with food is about consuming those foods that can give your body those ingredients and energy to cope with the daily life obligations that are the major causes of stress.

Foods that can help you manage stress

Foods rich in protein – Gain More energy

You can manage stress by consuming foods rich in protein. The proteins are broken into amino acid during the process of digestion. A particular amino acid, the tyrosine, contributes to the increase of chemicals dopamine and epinephrine, which have the capacity to give the body energy and to keep you vigilant. Foods that have high concentration of protein are meat, poultry, fish, eggs and dairy products.

Marriage is a ‘life relationship’ between two people. Marriage principles are ways, techniques and methods that can be followed by a couple to strengthen and protect their marriage relationship. It is a fact that more and more marriages end up in divorce. The good news is that there are principles that when applied consistently can save a marriage from the disaster. 

Marriage is in essence the substantial union of two people and the maintenance of an oath that they will be next to each other in good and bad times.

If we accept that we have married for all the right reasons, i.e. love, the companionship, communication, love and the absolute agreement of the heart with the logic, then what are these reasons, mistakes or marriage principles that we do not follow that eventually will lead the marriage into a disaster?

marriage ring in flower by aprilmuse

If you eat properly, then you will have a good mood. Yet many people are unaware that some foods may give us a little advantage in this area. Food can change our mood for the better or worse. In this article we give the reasons why food can change our mood and what are these foods that can affect our mood either positively or negatively.

The first step to look good is to feel good. But there are days when our mood is not as good and this is partly due to our diet. The basic principles of nutrition are more or less known and based on the famous food pyramid! Eating the right foods and especially eating the correct proportions (carbohydrates, vegetables, fruits, meat, milk, fats) and the right way of preparation (baked, boiled, fried) we ensure that our body gets the proper amount of nutrients and vitamins.

fruits and vegetables can change you mood, by khan_tandoori

The relationship between food and mood is a concern of health professionals, consumers, those responsible for public health and all those interested in improving dietary habits.

Many people wonder how they can change their mood. Physical exercise can help you change mood. This is not just an advice or a rumour but it is a proven scientific fact. During physical exercise our body creates substances that can change our mood. These substances are natural and healthier than any medication taken in an effort to change mood.

Surely you heart and know that regular physical exercise is beneficial for our physical health. It is especially beneficial for the heart, for the circulation of blood and of course for the lungs.

Perhaps you've also learned that physical training and exercising helps in maintaining our mental health, which helps improve our abilities during the unequal battle with the time, as we grow older.

The many benefits of exercise are not limited to physical health but they also expand to our mental health. Exercise is one of the factors that can change our mood and at the same time improve our mental condition. People that exercise regularly feels happy and their mood is improved after their physical training session. This is not only a good psychological feeling but it is also a proven scientific fact. Thirty minutes exercise per day can have a positive effect on our psychological condition.

in a good mood after exercise by nejron

Stress is not something that we cannot manage. There are ways to manage stress and reverse the negative consequences to our mental and physical health caused by stress. When we feel that stress is dominating our life we should take action immediately to find ways to manage our life and stress better.

Stress is created when we feel that the requirements in our lives go beyond those we can do and control. Stress is the physical defence of our organism. It is a good defence system in cases of emergency. At the same time it can cause problems to our physical and mental health if it continues for a long time. We should try and find ways to manage stress because our daily challenges and activities are full of stressful events and conditions.

image by programwitch

All changes in our lives are causing stress, even the good ones (e.g. a marriage, the birth of a child). The reaction of people to a change in their life is crucial. The reaction to a life change is one of the major factors whether the stress created from this situation will be good or bad for our health. Stress can cause health problems or make existing problems worse.

Many people wonder how to help depression and whether depression is a disease that can be treated. Depression is one of the most common mental diseases of our time and according to the World Health Organization, affects millions of people in the world. When talking about how to help depression we should always have in mind that depression is a disease that can be treated, and it can be treated successfully when treated early.

image by sujatha_fan

Do I have depression?

Everyone will feel at some point in their life the symptoms of depression. It is normal. If you have noticed, however, that some of the following symptoms appear for two or three weeks or more, you should visit a psychologist or psychiatrist, to assess if you are suffering from depression and give you help on how to overcome depression.

There are a number of ways to avoid a hangover and safe yourself from the terrible effects it creates to your head and stomach the next morning. Avoiding hangover has to do with a number of techniques you can follow before and during the period of alcohol consumption.

image by jmrocher2001

What is actually a hangover?

Although there is no clear definition, the hangover is the unpleasant feeling that follows a night of excessive alcohol consumption and includes at least two of the following symptoms: headache, nausea, diarrhoea, gastrointestinal disorders, feeling exhausted.

The mechanism that is causing a hangover is not entirely known, but is considered multifactor and is not only related to the quantity of alcohol consumed.

Key causes of a hangover are the reduction of glucose in the blood and dehydration, which is a result of the diuretic action of alcohol. For this reason, the hangover is combined with dry mouth and an unpleasant taste in the mouth.

Another important role in the whole process is the consumption of alcohol with an empty stomach, insomnia, and performing physical activity during the drunkenness, as well as the entire state of physical and mental health of the individual.

Some studies argue that children with alcoholic parents are faced with worse hangover symptoms than children of non-alcoholic parents.

How to avoid a hangover

Many people when they wake up in the morning after a night that they had a couple of drinks (or more) they experience the well-known hangover (Dizziness, headache, fatigue, severe thirst, even shivering, sweating or nausea). The best way to get rid of a hangover is to stay in bed and try to sleep until you pass the suffering. There are cases though that people have to go to work and must find ways on how to get rid of hangover quickly and effectively. This article provides for 11 ways on how to get rid of a hangover quickly.

Some facts about hangover

According to numerous surveys, the hangover is due to the metabolism of alcohol in our organism and depends on the age and ability of enzymes of the body to cope with it. About 65% of the people that consume alcohol do experience the hangover symptoms the next day.

One of the major differences between drinks is the content of methanol and complex organic molecules. The concentration of these substances is generally high in the dark liqueur, and thus deemed to cause more unpleasant drunkenness. Important role to play in this phenomenon are substances used to fraud drinks, for example the cheap vodka.

According to a survey published in the British Medical Journal, the drinks leading to the «worst drunkenness» are brandy, red wine, rum, whiskey, white wine, gin and vodka.

image by alexandrechang

Some Basic rules to avoid the hangover

Self-esteem is a major factor for the success of a marriage. It is the reason of success or the cause of the disaster of a relationship.

Self esteem exercises are ways that can help you improve yours and your partner’s self esteem that will eventually lead to a successful relationship and marriage.

First, lets do a quick analysis of the word Self Esteem. The word self-esteem is complex and consists of the words: self + esteem, esteem being appreciation, in other words I appreciate and respect myself.

Self esteem is the basis of a healthy personality. Many times, because of poor upbringing in a family environment, a person can have a bad notion about his character and skills, to feel inadequate, incompetent and a loser.

In the context of marriage the self esteem of both people is very important. Each partner should care about how to improve the self esteem of the other person. Weapons against the low self-esteem of our partner are our love and our acceptance. Stressing how remarkable person he/she is and showing our respect and our confidence in them, we essentially build on a daily basis the family environment that is demolished inside him/her.

image by spclarke

Causes of Low self esteem in marriage

There are many indications, in the context of marriage that can help you understand if someone lacks self-esteem. The most common are:

Low self esteem is not only dangerous for your health but it is also bad for your relationship. Self esteem plays a very important role on how you behave in a relationship and if you are suffering from low self esteem then it is more likely that the major cause of problems in your relationship is caused by your low self esteem. Improving your low self esteem will not only benefit your self but it will also do good for your relationships.

 The way we feel that other people accept us, plays a crucial role in our interpersonal and social relations. When you are married or in a relationship, these feelings have even greater influence on the quality and evolution of the marital relationship and therefore family life.

When you marry, you promise love and devotion for your entire life both in good and bad moments. But how do we experience these commitments in everyday life? Dow we feel that the other person loves us and accepts us no matter how good is the performance that we have in our professional life?

Understanding what happens to each of us might help us understand how we see others and what we expect from them. So we will be better able to recognize the influence of various negative or positive events in our relationships and to prevent undue complications that occur because of our own experiences and perceptions.

image by purrr

The low self-esteem is dangerous for your mental and physical health. When feelings of low self-esteem are accompanied by negative emotions such as anxiety, depression and stress then this fatal combination increases the risk of heart diseases. On the contrary high levels of self-esteem strengthens the mental and physical health.

I decided to by happy for the rest of my life because it is good for my health, Voltaire

The negative emotions that come with low self-esteem, weaken the body immune system and increase the levels of inflammation. These factors have been associated with heart disease.

image by zschnep

The low self-esteem increases stress and leads to unhealthy behaviours such as smoking and alcohol abuse. Not surprisingly this unhealthy combination of low self-esteem and stress also affects social behaviour. In addition people with low self-esteem have no incentive to care for themselves. Instead of exercising and trying to improve their health and improve their self esteem levels they tend to remain inactive and passive. 

In the last decade several investigations were made to study the link between good health and self-esteem. A recent research was conducted by the University College London.

People with low self esteem are unhappy, miserable and they are always full of negative feelings. To improve your self-esteem you have to focus on your own unique abilities and characteristics and also on things that you like. It is not an easy thing to do but low self esteem can be improved and raised to a high level.

We all have our insecurities. At times ourselves disappoint us, we find it difficult to believe in our capabilities, we question our worth and feel small and hopeless, especially when compared to some people who we admire, or that we consider models or simply believe that they represent what we think is of value and importance.

Even people with a high degree of self-confidence and self esteem have moments of self judgment and self denial. These crises are normal and expected. They are part of the human nature, at least as it has shaped in our days. In fact they are necessary for our reorientation process in life: where I am, where I go and what is my relationship with others? But are problematic and painful when they dominate your everyday life: When our every thought is about how incapable we are and how others are better from us.

Causes of low self esteem

The major cause of low self-esteem is the way we think. Our thoughts constantly rotate around the shortcomings, the medical disabilities, our weaknesses, and we lost the scope of our good and strong sides.

image by nicolepete

Negative feelings

Usually prevailing negative feelings of sorrow, anxiety, fear, shame, guilt, which intensify the feeling of failure and make more difficult any attempt to get out of this disadvantageous situation we believe we are.

There are a number of ways to manage and cure a headache. Headache cure is not necessarily done through medicines but there are a number of natural ways to treat your headache. It is important to take action and cure your headaches because those who suffer from frequent headaches are well aware of this: The pain from headaches reduces our ability to concentrate, has a negative impact on our productivity, restricts our social activities, and sometimes affects our personal relationships! However, in essence the pain from headache is a warning from our body that there is a "failure" that must be confronted.

And when we say "failure" we do not necessarily mean a serious health problem, but small and annoying "imbalances" of our daily life. It is a fact that headache alone, without other symptoms, does not cause any serious organic diseases.

 Headache can have a number of variations: primary - secondary, migraine, tension headaches or chronic.

Headaches are considered chronic if they last for long periods. To make a diagnosis that a patient is suffering from chronic daily headache, the number of days during which shows headaches is equal to or greater than 15 days per month for more than 3 months. Approximately 3% to 5% of adults suffer from chronic daily headache. Women are affected more often than men.

However, the only one who can make proper and thorough diagnosis, to distinguish whether this is a dangerous symptom, a chronic headache or a nuisance and to provide, if necessary, the appropriate medication is your doctor.

Headaches can be put partly under control with appropriate self-help measures, changes in lifestyle and proper medical care. This will help us reduce the frequency, intensity, duration, and the impact on daily life and also reduce the need for medication. Managing our headaches using self-help measures will also gives us more courage and a sense of self-control to assist us defeat the pain.

image by angryman

Major Causes of headache

Negative feelings of unhappiness, worry and frustration are common to all people. We feel disappointment after a failure or sorrow after a separation or a loss. These negative feelings are normal and do not affect significantly our ability to meet our daily obligations. You might even say that it is also useful to the extent that they help us to better understand some of our weaknesses. Sorrow can train us so that we can face adversity that may occur later in life in a dynamic way. The self-knowledge arising from the negative experiences helps us to make the effort to change ourselves in order to avoid future negative consequences of immature behaviour.

When the grief instead of decreasing by time it becomes more intense and lasts more than two weeks, and hinders the normal activities of our life such as work, diet, sleep and our close relations, then it is likely that we suffer from depression and we need the help of a specialist to deal with it. The major characteristic of depression is not the presence of negative feelings, but the great intensity and long duration.

What are the symptoms of Depression?

• Continuing grief
• Loss of energy and exhaustion
• More or less appetite for food
• More or less sleep
• Trends isolation, social withdrawal
• Stress, anxiety, indecision
• Frustration, indifference
• Loss of interest in the search for erotic partner or for sex.
• Feelings of guilty,
• Moodiness, for the most part of a day almost every day
• Reduction of interest or pleasure in all or almost all activities
• Concerns and pessimism for the future.
• Sometimes thoughts about death and suicide

Major causes of depression are:

Do you often think «I am a victim of life» and you are experiencing bitterness, confusion and uncertainty?

If you think something is not going good in your life, that something is wrong but you do not know what, then you are likely to lose control and, perhaps, it is a good time to change your life and start making changes. The successful people manage their lives by change, while unsuccessful people are passive and they do not dare to make changes at all.

Efficient time management is one of the ways to manage stress in our life. In the world of technology and computers all designed to make our lives easier and add to our free time, day by day we are ultimately more busy than ever! Single or with family responsibilities, we must all find ways to organize and manage our time so that we get little time for our own personal pleasure and relaxation. Our time is our life. The more we are able to plan and manage our time in an effective manner, the more we will be able to enjoy our lives.

But not everyone is having the gift of efficient organization and proper time management. Often many people feel that they are oppressed by the many things they have to do for their family, home or work.

The pressures felt by the unrestrained flow of things we have to do during working hours are increasing and eventually they become intolerable by the additional requirements that currently exist in our personal and family life.

All this creates too much stress and removes the psychological calm that we all need so much today.

Does this mean that we are condemned to the mass of committed work to be done, suffering psychologically and having repercussions on our physical health?

The answer is NO. If we do not have the inherent gift of good organisation and management of time and innumerable obligations of each kind are invading us continuously, it is possible with a methodical effort to learn to apply a few basic principles that will be able to protect us. To manage stress effectively you must first be able to manage your time efficiently.

The benefits of such a successful effort will not only reduce our levels of stress, but will also improve our psychology, mood and satisfaction, and it is a major step towards better physical health. Let us see then how best to approach the issue of proper management and efficient use of our time.

image by aussiegall

1. Create a to-do list

Initially we can make a list of our daily obligations, or even with the obligations we have to perform in the near future, specifying when and how our obligations will be met. Repetitive obligations can be planned for specific days and times where we have the appropriate time and availability to finish them.

We must never forget that the planning and design of our activities for each day gives us a large degree of control of our time. We must recognize what is important for us and be placed first on our list.

2. Create a ‘smart’ plan

What is insomnia?

Insomnia is a situation where a person feels that the length or quality of sleep is not satisfactory. Insomnia causes can be identified and insomnia can be cured with natural ways.

The stressful events, mild depression or anxiety disorders, are able to keep enough people awake at night .The people who suffer from insomnia are struggling and find it difficult to sleep or they get up unnecessarily during the night. Moreover, sleep is restless and turbulent and they often feel sleepy in the morning.

It is therefore important to stress that insomnia is not determined in accordance with the hours a person needs to sleep or how much time is needed to fall asleep. The need for sleep varies greatly from person to person as well as the satisfaction felt after sleep.

Some facts about insomnia

People suffer from insomnia in a variety of ways: They may have difficulties in falling asleep; they wake up frequently during the night with difficulty to sleep again. They can also wake up very early in the morning and feel that sleep did not give their bodies enough rest.

Self-confidence is an important asset for our mental and physical health and a necessity for a good life. Building self confidence is not something that one day falls from the sky, or a lottery that a lucky person wins… Self-confidence is build and maintained day by day with simple everyday things.

Did you ever ask your self these questions: Who am I; What I know; what can I do; do I deserve it; how can I do that? Those who can answer these questions in a positive way, they stand in fairly strong legs. Those who don’t then they lack one of the most important, priceless assets of our lives: self-confidence. Self-confidence is not a gift of nature to some people but it is something that we all deserve to search for; and nonetheless we own it our selves.

image by annbananne

What is the real meaning of self-confidence?

Home workout can be as affective as exercising at the gym. What you get back from your home workout sessions is what you give in the exercise. This, of course, does not mean that in order to achieve the desired result you should spend countless hours each day exercising. The most important thing is to exercise cleverly.

When exercising at home you should know that not all types of exercise bring the same result. Some exercises are more effective than others; some seek to exercise multiple muscles, some to burning more calories. Regardless what is your goal there are several types of exercises you can do at home and a number of tips to follow to make your home workout more effective. 

7 Tips for the effective home workout

1. Exercise with varying intensity

This practice can be implemented in walking as well as in other aerobic exercises and will help you strengthen your physical condition but also it will help you to lose weight faster. It's also very simple to achieve, while walking, for a few minutes increase your speed and start running and after that go back to walking pace again. In aerobics accelerate a little your intensity of exercise and then relax again. These variations in intensity helps the heart to strengthen the pulses, your body to accelerate blood circulation and to oxygenise better, while burning more calories.

Body language is when you talk to others not with your voice but with your body and gestures. It serves to better understand words since it gives them colour, emotion and meaning. The body language is many times more ... "betraying" as we would like. It also serves to understand if the other person lies, is honest with us and he really believes about us. It is a way to diagnose character, personality, mood and emotions.

Body language starts with the posture, gestures and expressions of your face and movements of your body. Body language is frequently one of the factors that determine the honesty and credibility or not of people. When someone can interpret body language moves and gestures it will be in a better position to understand and handle other people in many aspects of life including relationships, friendships and work. 

But how can you improve your body language? To improve your body language you have to first understand and interpet body language expressions nad movements.Most often, the mere avoidance of the most classic mistakes and replacing them by other movements showing more confidence can make the difference.

Body Language Expressions and their meaning

1. Eye contact

The person who avoids direct eye contact when making a presentation or talking to a group of people is a sign that he/she does not have confidence, he is nervous and unprepared. The overwhelming majority of people during a presentation look at their notes, the table in front of them or outside the window.

To improve your body language in this area you should spend more than 90% of the time in your presentation looking at the audience in the eyes. It is useful to video record yourself so as to take notice of how you look when you are targeting an audience in conjunction with the degree of attention the audience gives back to you during the presentation.

Take the example of powerful business leaders who tend to look their audience directly into the eyes when they want to pass a message. Check out some of the presentations by Bill Gates to see how he spoke to people with his body language.

Bill Gates Body language at CES 2007.
image by everystockphoto

How many times have you given your self the promise that you will quit smoking by tomorrow? To be reading this most probably you are still counting. Usually we make the promise to quit smoking when we are out of breath, when we walk up the stairs, whenever it hurts the neck, whenever we compare the strengths and our physical condition with non-smokers and we find out that we are insufficient, and when we do our New Year resolutions.

To clarify, and to avoid misunderstandings, quitting smoking is a personal choice. No one can convince someone to stop smoking better than him self. This article is not for making an anti-smoking campaign; there is not need for that, everybody around the world knows the harmful effects of smoking. This article is for providing some easy to follow and useful tips that can help someone who decided to quit smoking how to achieve it.

image by ilco

Experts agree that the decision to quit smoking is taken from the smoker when he really feels the desire for change. When the smoker feels threatened by the habit of smoking for both him and the others around him and when he believes that the dematerialisation from nicotine will bring significant benefits to him; and also when he feels capable of coping with change. Simply put, this means that the decision is in our minds and there must be hatched. Any effort influenced by ephemeral modes and prohibitions, if it does not come from our desire is doomed to fail.

So if you have taken your decisions, the following article will guide you on how to quit smoking. If you do not feel confident that you want to quit smoking, you can always keep it for future use.

20 Tips on How to quit smoking

1. Publicise your decision to quit smoking

Let your friends and family know your decision to quit smoking. Get practical support, delegating to a person close to you the difficult task of reminding you of your target and benefits in your health whenever you feel a strong desire for a cigarette. Also, very important, ask from friends and family not to smoke in front of you and not to leave cigarettes around you.

2. Set a target date

A good idea is the starting point, the impetus for everything we do. It is the most important success factor for a new project and at the same time the most difficult one.
 
Creativity is not a special skill, ability or privilege of a few people, but instead is the result of careful and structural thinking.

Digging your mind for new ideas is not an easy thing to do. This article gives you 15 tips and techniques on how to prepare your self and mind for your next big idea.

1. Exercise your mind by reading

Like the body, the mind needs exercise. One way to exercise your mind is to study the ideas and projects of smart people. For example, biographies of successful people are an excellent source of inspiration. Also reading magazines that are considered serious, such as Forbes, Business Week and The Economist, web sites like "Pick the Brain", “Digg” and "Self Growth" is "food for the brain." Reading other ideas, makes it easier to digg your ideas and bring them on the surface.

2. Write your ideas down

It would be a shame to suddenly come up with an excellent idea and after a while to forget it. Do not rely solely on your memory. Keep a notebook, a PDA or a recorder with you in order to capture the idea any time of the day - even besides your bed, in case your inspiration throws you a visit at 2 in the morning.

After you capture your idea, try to use it as soon as possible. Expand your thinking of how this idea can be implemented. What are the good things about this idea, how it can help you improve in an area. These ideas are like fruit: the fresher they are consumed, the better.

3. Discuss your new ideas with others

People have different views, different influences and different cultures, which make their minds work so uniquely. Discussing your ideas with others can help you discover new opportunities to integrate into the idea and ways to expand and enrich it. The discussion may bring something that had not previously gone through your mind, which will broaden your original idea.

Never discard any ideas. Some things that sound silly in the beginning may be simply rough diamonds at the end. Moreover, while discussing try to keep the conversation "open" and non-critical, encourage your friends to use their imagination to the fullest.

	image by Peia

There are simple and effective ways to cure cold, the most popular virus infection disease. Most people get the cold virus 2 to 4 times a year. Children are even more prone candidates to cold, since statistics show that children fall «victims» of virus infection at least 6 to 10 times a year. Cold is also the most common reason for visiting the doctor.

The common cold usually lasts for one week, although it may be extended for up to 2 weeks, it can be cured without treatment. If you notice that your cold lasts more than two weeks, then it is something serious and you should visit your doctor.
The cold virus comes in about 200 different forms. We can get the cold through breathing, handshaking, kissing or touching. Contrary to what most people think, we do not get the cold because of climate changes, or from poor nutrition or exercise. [See also "30 Medical Myth Busters you must know"]. Statistics also show that people who are suffering from asthma or allergies are more likely to be infected by the cold virus. Stress is also one of the reasons we get the cold.

There are things we can do and measures to take in order to cure cold. This article gives an overview of 10 simple actions for a fast treatment from cold.

The most common symptoms of cold are:

• Runny or Blocked nose
• Cough
• Sneezing
• Sore throat
• Fatigue
• Diminished sense of taste and smell
• Congestion
• Watery eyes
• Low Fever 

Stress is one of the most popular moods of our century. It is not a disease but if you do not manage stress properly and in time it can be the secret cause for many health problems.

This article talks about the major causes of stress in our work environment and gives 22 ways on how to manage stress at work but also in our everyday life.

Some facts about the consequences of stress at work:

• More than 40 million people in the European Union (EU), or nearly one in three European workers say they feel stress in the workplace.
• The stress at work is the second in frequency problem (after back pain), affecting 28% of workers in the EU
• According to an official European survey conducted some years ago, stress is the cause of the loss of millions of working days each year (more than 1 / 4 absences of at least 2 weeks for health reasons from work), thus costing Member States at least 20 billion annually.

What is stress and what are the major causes of stress at work?

As already stated above: stress is not a disease.

Stress occurs when the pressure and demands of work are in a constant and intense degree and beyond the ability we can handle and deal with the situation.

What are the major causes of stress at work?

Following our previous post "16 Tips for Better Time Management" we also post this article, which concentrates on how we can manage our time in our daily work activities.

Nowadays many people are always under "time pressure", they are constantly overwhelmed by work without the results to justify the effort.

The result?

• Anger, stress and Frustration;
• Inability to complete even the seemingly small or insignificant obligations;
• Limited or no time for social / personal life;
• Endless list of obligations and outstanding issues.

Thus intense anxiety and stress is generated, while threatening our self-esteem, after starting to doubt our value and capabilities.

Every day has just 24 hours - and this applies to all people. Some people are constantly pursuit and pushed by time. This article is about how we can learn to manage our valuable time more effectively.

In reality we cannot manage time, we can only manage ourselves and our relationship with time. After all, how we use (or utilize) our time is largely a matter of habit. And habits are not that easy to change.

To organize and manage our time - and generally our life- we need to clarify what are our objectives, this means we need to identify what to organize and make sure we know where we want to be and be ready to accept the possible 'cost'. In order for us to be able to change how we operate, we first need to 'consider' and understand how we use our time now.

How do you usually spend your time:

• Interruptions from others (telephone calls - visits)
• Doing work that should be assigned to others
• Indecision
• Lack of adequate information about what you have undertaken to do
• Unclear priorities
• Lack of planning
• Stress and tiredness
• Inability to say «no»
• Lack of organization in your surroundings, and that also disrupt you
• Lack of flexibility - very tight, rigid and unrealistic planning, etc. are some factors that have the ability to swallow your time!

In this article we outilne the most important reasons for memory loss and suggest ways of how to improve your memory. There are a number of reasons that may cause a memory loss. Most of them though can be addressed provided that are identified at an ealry stage.

Age

It is normal to sometimes forget things. With increasing age, we observe that we forget more often.

Besides age, there are other factors or diseases that contribute to declines in our memory. Fortunately there are many such situations but if detected early and treated effectively, then the memory loss can be reversed.

The sooner we realise that our memory is suffering from a specific cause the better. If we allow a situation without corrective measures, the problems with our memory will get worse and most probably create a permanent damage.

Chronic Stress

The prolonged chronic stress is so common today in our lives and this affects our memory in a negative way

It is important to find ways to correctly control stress so that we can keep our memory for many years to the maximum extent of its capabilities.

We must also know that a very large and intense stress situation can occur when we face a catastrophic event or the loss of a very loved person. This situation can cause a major blow to the possibilities of our memory.

By Clark Faint

Alrighty, it's time for another episode of Clark's blog. I've taken a couple of days off to refresh and now I feel ready to write. Sometimes it can be a challenge to come up with a good topic to write about even though this is world is full of things to talk about!

My topic today is motivation. What motivates you to push yourself to accomplish your goals and dreams? If you can't answer that question, you've got some soul-searching to do. Do you ever start off doing something with a full head of steam and charge right out of the gates? You probably even make good progress to start with. Then maybe things slow down to a more stagnant pace and you start to lose some of that enthusiasm and energy you had when you started. It happens to all of us. It even happened to me this week when I thought of writing a couple of days and then decided against it. Instead of going only a week with one blog entry though, I decided it would be better to push myself to write one night even if I didn't want to. Thankfully, tonight I did.

There are ways to improve your mood provided that you have the desire and faith to change to a better mood. Our mood may change suddenly like a storm with lightning and thunderbolts that comes without notice.

The good news is that bad mood can leave with the same sudden way it has come. Exceptions to this rule of course are cases where there are other problems such as depression or any other mental destruction.

In most people the changes in their feelings and mood can happen for various reasons. Surveys made for the identification of factors that create certain psychological dispositions and their impact on humans is a very interesting field study.
 
The fact that humans can transfer their feelings and mood to others is a situation that affects human relations. Scientists admit that this effect happens more often in human interactions than originally believed.

Have you noticed that you may begin to laugh just because you saw someone else laughing?
Laughter is contagious and many people are using techniques to include laughter in order to gain a better response from the target audience.