Holiday, friendship and “meditation retreat” (sixth post)
24th March 2009
This is the sixth - and a rather longer - Moroccan post. It looks a little at mindfulness and interpersonal conflict. And after the siesta yesterday, we walked (again without the camels) up to the top of the highest "singing dune" (so-called because of the noise it sometimes makes in …
Holiday, friendship and “meditation retreat” (fifth post)
23rd March 2009
This fifth Moroccan post is written two days into the desert walk with the mindfulness practice beginning to deepen. This is the second full day in the desert. We've been here about 48 hours. Now is post-lunch siesta time. Walking meditatively this morning was much easier than yesterday's walk. I'm …
Holiday, friendship and “meditation retreat” (fourth post)
22nd March 2009
This brief fourth Moroccan blog post describes some of the first day in the desert. Waking this morning in the encampment ... desert dawn ... a few clouds catching the sunlight ... people slowly emerge from their tents. Camels wandering. Packing up gradually. Breakfast. Then heading out through scattered tamarisk …
Holiday, friendship and “meditation retreat” (third post)
21st March 2009
This is the third Moroccan blog post. It introduces some ideas about mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), self-criticism and problem solving. So yesterday we drove East and South from Marrakech across the Atlas - the road, our driver said, winding up to over 6,500 feet (about 2,000 meters) before heading back …
Holiday, friendship and “meditation retreat” (second post)
20th March 2009
This is the second of 11 blog posts about going to Morocco to walk "mindfully" in the Sahara desert. This post covers the arrival in Marrakech. 5.00am - the calls of the muezzin increase in volume. This seems a good time to meditate. All around, here in the Marrakech medina, …
Holiday, friendship and “meditation retreat” (first post)
19th March 2009
This is the first of 11 blog posts about going to Morocco to walk "mindfully" in the Sahara desert. This post gives a bit of background to the trip. 6.00am - the old clock has just sounded in my cousin's house in London. We arrived yesterday evening, flew down from …
Implementation intentions & reaching our goals more successfully (second post)
15th March 2009
I wrote a post yesterday introducing some of the ideas and research on implementation intentions. Today I extend this in more practical how-to-do-it directions: when to use implementation intentions? Implementation intentions help us reach our goals more successfully. The companion handout "Implementation intentions background ... " gives introductory information about …
Implementation intentions & reaching our goals more successfully (first post)
14th March 2009
what are implementation intentions? "Goal intentions" involve aiming for some desired future outcome. They are of the form "I intend to attain goal X". Unfortunately we know only too well that making such intentions does not necessarily mean that we will reach our goals. As the old saying goes "There's …
Recent research: five papers on childhood trauma, parenting & health in adulthood
12th March 2009
Here are five papers on childhood, the effects childhood experience can have on adulthood, and the effects adults may then have on their own children. The first paper by Brody et al. is the encouraging one. It demonstrates how caring parenting can combat genetic vulnerability - "involved-supportive" mothering greatly reduced …
“Antidepressants are not all created equal”
8th March 2009
Cipriani and colleagues published a major multiple-treatments meta-analysis of new generation antidepressants last week - see abstract below. As Parikh wrote in his linked editorial (see below) "Andrea Cipriani and colleagues provide the field with a major answer. Free of any potential funding bias (and including an analysis of studies …