We all need a little help now and then.  These are, in our opinion, the best books to have around when you need a little advice or uplift.

11. Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life By Martin Seligman

From the ‘father of positive psychology,’ Seligman harnesses over twenty years of clinical research to demonstrate how optimism enhances our quality of life, and how to learn to practice it.

He covers aspects of life such as money, love, sports, health, and parenting. The author also devotes a large segment on how to free children from pessimistic thinking.

This best-seller originally published in 1990 delivers positive-thought strategies that could turn even the most strident pessimist into an optimist.

10. To Have or To Be? By Erich Fromm

Two modes exist in the struggle for the spirit of humankind: the having mode, which concentrates on power, aggression, and possession, the foundation of the evils of violence, envy and greed; and the being mode, which is based on love, the pleasure of sharing, and in productive activity. 

Fromm, a social psychologist, critiques American culture from the perspective of the 70’s when it was written. The main idea is that America had become a culture obsessed with “having.” Not much has changed.  We still tend to think that we can buy happiness, and that our possessions will somehow fulfill us. Continue reading →

Article originally written and published by www.collective-evolution.com

Evolution is something scientists have observed at several different levels in nature, and when it comes to human ancestry, they’ve been able to collect bits and pieces of the giant puzzle that is human evolution.

It’s important to remember that there is still much we do not know, and the evolutionary tree is far from understood, let alone complete.We do know that some form of evolution (scientifically speaking) has occurred on various levels, but there are still many missing links to our evolutionary journey, and new discoveries made every year are continuing to re-write what we previously believed to be true.

A New Species Discovered?

One great example is a discovery that was made just over a year ago where researchers found what looks to be an entirely new species of hominin that is currently unknown to modern day science. The discovery was made in a Siberian cave. Continue reading →

During a recent meeting on ancient DNA at the Roya Society of London, research was revealed regarding analysis of the human genome. This study uncovered evidence that modern humans not only interbred with Neanderthals, but also with Denisovians and an unknown archaic human population.

Ewen Callaway of the journal Nature reports that the genome sequences of Neanderthal and Denisovian man were compared, and the results suggested that there was interbreeding among several groups of hominid in Europe and Asia around 30,000 years ago, which included an as-yet-unidentified ancestor from Asia.

A Complex Heritage.

“What it begins to suggest is that we’re looking at a Lord of the Rings-type world — that there were many hominid populations,” says Mark Thomas, an evolutionary geneticist at University College London who was at the meeting but was not involved in the work. Continue reading →

The controversy surrounding the medication of children diagnosed with ADD/ADHD has taken a new twist: doctors prescribing drugs for children who are having trouble in school, but not necessarily diagnosed with any disorder.

In his 2012 article for the New York Times titled “Attention Disorder or Not, Pills to Help in School,”

Alan Schwartz reports on the new phenomenon.  Included is not only anecdotal evidence of doctors prescribing drugs for what amounts to a diagnosis of ‘bad grades,’ but also parents self-medicating their children.

One can only wonder if this may aid the continuation of the known trend of recreational abuse of these stimulants among teenagers and young adults.

Square Peg, Round Hole

(from austinalcoholtreatment.org)

Dr. Michael Anderson, a pediatrician near Atlanta, gets a spotlight for this piece.  In the article he even goes as far as suggesting that ADD/ADHD are not real conditions, but rather functions of our one-size-fits-all society that leaves behind people who are not built to succeed within the parameters of common standards. Continue reading →