NEWS OF MIND

Confidence is attractive . It breeds opportunity and is powerful in the pursuit of expressing your self-worth. It inspires others to trust and believe in you, and exerting it right can be extremely self-fulfilling. Having strong levels of confidence and self-esteem is crucial when having to decide the best action to take in any situation. Or to effectively deal with unexpected and undesirable turn of events, or to persuade and influence others. Or when communicating with others without personal ego distorting the interaction. In the purest sense, your current self-confidence and self-esteem levels are determined by what you think (or know) you’re good at, the value you can provide, and then how effectively you convey that to others. Confidence thus evolves and increases in areas where you think you’re best at, and you naturally avoid avenues in which you expect to fail. But what do you think could happen if you knew how to improve self-confidence in all areas of your l...

Three friends walk into a bar. One instantly turns to a group of strangers and launches into boisterous conversation. Another sits back, momentarily, before joining in (while longing for something more intimate). The third, in an attempt to mask a spiralling mind, has their head down and appears disengaged. It's a vicious cycle. "Someone with social anxiety disorder will go into that social situation already being primed by thinking 'no one's going to talk to me,' or 'they're going to think I'm boring.' So when they get into that situation, they are already in an anxious state," told by Professor in Clinical Psychology Kim Felmingham told "They are more aware of their anxiety and therefore they are less engaged with the actual conversation. Inadvertently, they can appear disengaged to others who then may actually remove themselves from that interaction. "It's a vicious cycle." The distinction between introversion, shy...

Depression is a very serious mental illness that often goes unnoticed for years. People with concealed depression are battling demons within themselves all on their own. They are not sharing their struggles and do not want to burden those around them. You see, for most people wounds are not something we are open about. We tend to bottle things up and attempt to remedy them on our own. If you are reading this then you must know someone who you feel you need to better understand or you relate to this yourself. The following 15 habits are some of the most common I have noticed in people dealing with concealed depression. 1. The are often quite talented and very expressive. Alot of famous people have suffered from mental illnesses, and this suffering gives them deeper emotions. If you really think about it, this is in some form a source to their greatness. While we cannot always see it, their struggles are often reflected in their works. These people are able to bring something beautif...

Anxiety can be very harmful and it’s not something to be overlooked. The worst problem is that a lot of people can’t understand the effects it can have on a person and find anxious people as being lazy, irresponsible and passive. If you are not an anxious person, knowing this can help you understand anxiety a bit better. If you are, we are sure you are going to agree with these things. 1.Decline invites although you may want to go There are certain days that you may have planned all along and when they come, anxiety takes up the whole space. It can become so debilitating that you feel as if you lack the energy to go out. You are aware of what is happening to you and you don’t want to become a burden where you are supposed to go – so you just cancel everything. 2. Obsess over trivial things other people may not even notice A simple word or an unintended glance from someone is enough for your head to start processing and rewinding the situation even for days...

People with ADHD feel emotions more intensely than others do. When they feel happiness and excitement, it makes them more interesting and engaging. But strong emotion has its downside as well. People with ADHD are impulsive. They get carried away by what they are feeling, and act on it without considering how it will affect other people or themselves. If you see something interesting at the store, you may get excited and buy that item and forget the rest of your shopping list. This is the challenge of emotional self-control — having the appropriate emotion and feeling it at the right intensity. When it comes to getting things done, people with ADHD struggle with both sides of the equation. They get excited about distractions and get bored with the tasks they should be doing. They can’t hunker down. They can’t get things done. They may wonder, “Why am I so emotional all the time?” Lack of emotional control creates common and predictable struggles in daily...

This is an excerpt from DeSmog founder Jim Hoggan’s latest book, "I’m Right and You’re an Idiot: The Toxic State of Public Discourse", published by New Society Publishers . I first began reading the works of linguist and cognitive scientist George Lakoff about 15 years ago and I was struck by the Berkeley professor’s now famous ideas about what he calls frames. In public relations our stock in trade is messaging, because our role is to create understanding by combining maximum clarity with supreme brevity. We work in the world of sound bites and elevator pitches that are designed to be short and pithy, and we rarely have the time or budget to delve into frames or deeply moving narratives. When I started writing I’m Right and You’re an Idiot I wanted to better understand the difference between messages and frames, so I would know how frames work and be able to explain how to manage them. I wanted to better understand how they relate to the mechanic...

Do you have trouble building up your self-confidence? If so, you are not alone. Everybody has trouble with building one’s self-esteem in today’s world. The key is to be persistent and to find the ways to improve your confidence so you can be successful in life. Here are eight easy suggestions to increasing your self-esteem in your life. 1. Know Your Weaknesses and Strengths: It is important to know what you are good at. Taking a skills assessment test is a great way to determine your strengths and weaknesses. Once you realize your skill sets, the next step is to focus on those things that you are good at doing. A person can’ be good at everything so don’t take yourself too seriously. 2. Accept yourself: You are unique in this world. It is important that you do not beat yourself up over the things that you have trouble doing. Instead of complaining about what your weaknesses, try to find ways to improve your life. Take a class at a local community college to le...

Although musical preference is generally open to debate, the world seems to have come to a consensus about who deserves to be crowned the greatest band in history: The Beatles. Of course, you can disagree with this all you want, but The Beatles lead the pack in sales (nearly one billion albums sold, based on some estimates), number one hits (20!), and public opinion (if you Google “greatest band of all time,” The Beatles are the first search result). The Beatles are so beloved that Abbey Road, the road in London that served as the setting for their Abbey Road album cover, may employ a full-time crossing guard due to the dozens of adoring fans that stop in the road to take pictures. With all of this success, it’s natural for us to wonder who the band members were, where they came from, and how they reached this level of musical genius. In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell uses The Beatles as an example of how ten thousand hours of deliberate practice elevated the ba...

THE history of science could have been so different. When Charles Darwin applied to be the “energetic young man” that Robert Fitzroy, the Beagle’s captain, sought as his gentleman companion, he was almost let down by a woeful shortcoming that was as plain as the nose on his face. Fitzroy believed in physiognomy – the idea that you can tell a person’s character from their appearance. As Darwin’s daughter Henrietta later recalled, Fitzroy had “made up his mind that no man with such a nose could have energy”. Fortunately, the rest of Darwin’s visage compensated for his sluggardly proboscis: “His brow saved him.” The idea that a person’s character can be glimpsed in their face dates back to the ancient Greeks. It was most famously popularised in the late 18th century by the Swiss poet Johann Lavater, whose ideas became a talking point in intellectual circles. In Darwin’s day, they were more or less taken as give...

When anxiety strikes, you need fast relief. Here are six ways to tame your anxiety, without medication or a doctor's office visit. By Kathleen Doheny Medically Reviewed by Michael Cutler, DO, PhD The smell of lavender can quickly relieve anxiety.Shutterstock Anxiety disorders are the most common mental health problem in the U.S., affecting about one out of five people at any given time, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Anxiety can take many forms — generalized anxiety disorder (constant worrying about everyday things), obsessive-compulsive disorder or OCD, panic disorder, post traumatic stress disorder and social anxiety disorder. While medications to treat these anxiety conditions are often an important component in the management of anxiety, there is also many natural, do-it-yourself techniques that can help calm you down, either in place of medications or as a supplement to them. Next time you're too tense to cope, consider trying one of these na...

Worrying can be helpful when it spurs you to take action and solve a problem. But if you’re preoccupied with “what ifs” and worst-case scenarios, worry becomes a problem. Unrelenting doubts and fears can be paralyzing. They can sap your emotional energy, send your anxiety levels soaring, and interfere with your daily life. But chronic worrying is a mental habit that can be broken. You can train your brain to stay calm and look at life from a more positive perspective. Why is it so hard to stop worrying? No one likes the way constant worrying makes you feel, so why is it so difficult to stop? The answer lies in the beliefs—both negative and positive—you have about worrying. On the negative side, you may believe that your constant worrying is going to spiral completely out of control, drive you crazy, or damage your health. On the positive side, you may believe that your worrying helps you avoid bad things, prepare for the worst, or come up with solutions....