How Hope Can Help You Cope

A school system in a large city had a special program to help hospitalized children keep up with their schoolwork. One day a teacher who worked in the program received a routine call asking her to visit such a child. She was given the child’s name, hospital, and room number. Her instructions were to help the boy with lessons in grammar.

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Water Works

Water provides true refreshment for the thirsty, but most people don’t know that it also plays a vital role in all bodily processes. Unfortunately, most people don’t drink enough water, perhaps because they don’t realize just how important it is. The fact is, not drinking enough water affects every aspect of your body, right out to your skin.

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Forgiveness: A Key to Better Health

Forgiveness has long laid the foundation for spiritual well-being in the Judeo-Christian tradition. But scientific research now suggests its healing power may extend beyond the sacred realm. Research shows links between forgiveness and physical and mental health.

While this may come as some surprise to secular scientists, psychologist Dan Shoultz says God has created the need to give and receive as an important part of our makeup as human beings.

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Ten Ways Your Outlook Enriches Your Life

Writer Joseph Goldstein tells of an experiment he did that helped him better understand the power of our speech to impact the mind. He decided that for a period of three months he would not speak about any third person. “That is, I wouldn’t speak to someone about someone else.” Here is what came to light for him during that three-month experiment when he eradicated gossip from his life: “First, my mind became much less judgmental, because I wasn’t giving voice to the various judgments in my mind. . . . And as I judged others less, I found that I judged myself less as well. Second, I discovered in this experiment that about 90 percent of my speech was eliminated. This silence led to a lot more peace in my mind. It was astonishing to see so clearly how much of the time our talk is about other people.”

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Gifts for That V.I.P. (Very Important Parent)

If you are a parent, then you are probably already familiar with the impact of children on your personal life. Even in the most functional families, parents who juggle rearing energetic children with careers and other commitments often tell of feeling burned out. Maybe your personal experience with burnout began the week after you brought your newborn home from the hospital and she got her days and nights mixed up. Perhaps it started the day your employer informed you that because of company downsizing, your job was history, and the pediatrician informed you the same day that your child needed his tonsils out soon.

Whatever the monumental interruptions are that you face juggling kids, career, and other responsibilities, I want you to remember one necessity of life: be kind to yourself.

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The Sounds of Healing

Betsey Carle never autographs napkins, wears sequined gowns, or takes tips.

One day while Carle was on the job an elderly hospice patient with faltering memory gave her a snippet of a lyric from an old song he longed to hear but could not place.

Carle searched her songbooks for four months to finally identify and sing “When It’s Springtime in the Rockies” while strumming her guitar.

“The music made a difference,” Carle says. “Many people in that age group remember the song. They mouth the words. And because music is tied into emotion, cognition, and memory in the brain, it takes them back to a more normal time,” she says. “That’s healing.”
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Live With Purpose

Successful people—and companies—throughout time have been led by mission statements.

Get inspired tow rite your own mission statement by reading some of the best mission statements of famous people and corporations.

Mission Statements of Famous People

Nelson Mandela: “To end apartheid.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.: “Social equality for all.”
Walt Disney: “To make people happy.”
Mother Teresa: “To show mercy and compassion to the dying.”

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Help for Overcoming Habits, Hurts and Hang-ups

Do you sometimes feel your habits and choices control you, rather than the other way around? Is there something about yourself you’ve tried to change, but you just can’t seem to experience a breakthrough? Does fear hold you back from getting the help you need?

The truth is we all suffer from circumstances, feelings, thoughts, or behaviors that can cause disruption in our lives. Often we feel like we just have to live with it, but there is hope for change. Twelve-step programs can be of assistance to you or loved ones.

The 12-steps are spiritual—not religious—tools that can be applied to any issue in life. The steps have been proven to help countless people work through unhealthy life issues that separate them from God and other people, thus freeing them up to healthy relationships in the environment in which they work and live.

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Ha-Ha, He-He, Health

The healing power of humor and maintaining a merry heart have been around since ancient times. “A cheerful heart is good medicine,” proclaims Solomon in Proverbs 17:22. Even modern science agrees.

Stanford University psychiatrist Dr. William Fry, Jr., has done extensive research on the physiological benefits of laughter and has found that humor plays an active role in maintaining a healthy heart. “Humor acts to relieve fear,” Fry exclaims. “Excessive fearful thoughts, built-up anger, and tension put tremendous pressure on the heart. Yet, laughter readily relieves stress and promotes a positive perspective. This uplifted spirit breeds hope and leads to healing and well-being.”
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