Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Best Motivational Quotes From Oprah Winfrey to Start Your Day


Do you feel uninspired lately? Do you feel like going to work or to school is a total chore? Are you worried about doing something? Are you feeling unhappy again?

Negative thinking has a way of dragging us into inactivity and depression. When we start thinking and entertaining those sample questions, it will eventually become a habit. Positive thinking is the only way that we can get ourselves out of a sticky situation. If we want to become a healthy, happy, and productive individual we need to constantly remind ourselves that a positive disposition is the way to go.

The thing to remember is that it's a conscious effort on your part. You have to remember that happiness is a choice. So every day is an opportunity for you to exercise an optimistic personality. You'll be amazed at how it will naturally become a habit. One of the most crucial parts of our daily routine is waking up in the morning. This is the time when you set up your mood for the entire day. Some people take time to eat their breakfast or drink their coffee to prepare them for a fruitful day ahead. Some people take sometime alone and meditate as a form of cleansing and relaxation. This time try to incorporate motivational and success quotations to your daily routine. Not only are inspirational quotes accessible but they also make great daily mantras for you stay focused on your goals.

Here is a list of ten motivational and success quotes to get you started. These inspirational quotes are the words of one of America's most influential women, Oprah Winfrey. Oprah's quotes offer a clear cut, direct, and honest message that is sympathetic to everyone. Her motivational quotes are meant to be practical sources of wisdom and inspiration to empower those who feel uninspired and depressed. She is a credible source of such empowerment because her life is a grand testament of her success. Whenever you feel unsure of yourself, just read the following quotations to keep you going.

Oprah Winfrey says

1. Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure.

2. Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.

3. Be thankful for what you have; you'll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don't have, you will never, ever have enough.

4. I was raised to believe that excellence is the best deterrent to racism or sexism. And that's how I operate my life.

5. So go ahead. Fall down. The world looks different from the ground.

6. Turn your wounds into wisdom.

7. My philosophy is that not only are you responsible for your life, but doing the best at this moment puts you I the best place for the next moment.

8. Surround yourself with only people who are going to lift you higher.

9. I always knew I was destined for greatness.

10. Do the one thing you think you cannot do. Fail at it. Try again. Do better the second time. The only people who never tumble are those who never mount the high wire. This is your moment. Own it.

These are only some of Oprah's take on happiness, success, failure, and self-improvement. Write down the quotes that you find most applicable to your situation and try to use them as daily reminders. In no time, you will be surprised that you have already made a habit out of it.

Break Up Blues - 5 Strategies to Get Over Depression Over a Break Up


Most people experience a break up at some point in their lives. The feelings of sadness and loss can be very significant and effect many areas of life and functioning. Sometimes, symptoms persist and can become full blown depression. Lingering sadness, anxiety, lethargy, loss of joy in activities, changes in sleep and eating habits - these can be symptoms of depression that should be addressed. It is very important to take good care of yourself during this difficult time. Here are 5 strategies to help you get over the depression of a break up:

1. Eat well and healthy. Steer clear of junk foods and processed sugars, and eat mostly fruit, vegetables, lean proteins, and whole grains. If you have trouble with your appetite, try carrying around healthy snack foods to eat throughout the day. If the opposite is true and you overeat, try limiting your intake to meals, and be sure you aren't eating while distracted, like in front of the TV. Set a time to stop eating in the evening.

2. Try taking supplements. It is always advisable to consult your health care provider before trying new supplements. A food based multivitamin is a good start, as well as calcium if you need additional calcium, and fish oil. Fish oil has many physical benefits including the promotion of healthy brain function. L-theanine is a good anti-anxiety natural supplement, and 5 HTP (hydroxytryptophan) is a helpful natural antidepressant that increases serotonin, a mood regulating brain neurotransmitter.

3. Exercise regularly. Consult your physician to determine the appropriate level of physical activity for you, then adopt a regular cardiovascular-focused plan. This type of exercise releases endorphins into the body through the sustained elevation of heart rate. Try working up to 45 minutes 5 times a week. Not only will you feel better emotionally, but your physical health and body image will improve.

4. See a counselor to talk things out. Spend time with friends and family who can be supportive as well. A professional ear can be valuable and the feedback very beneficial. It may be helpful to have someone to help you sort out what went wrong in your relationship and how to avoid repeating future negative patterns in relationships.

5. Practice self care on a daily basis. Make a list of small things you enjoy dong and cross one off every day when you've completed it. Make new lists once old ones are exhausted.

Monday, January 6, 2014

Deal With Break Up Grief - Tips to Survive the Pain


Many have compared the grief of a break up similar to that of losing a loved one to death. Dealing with the pain isn't easy. But, there are ways to deal with break up grief that will help ease the pain.

If you were in a relationship that has been lost, it will feel similar to losing having a loved one be lost to death. It will seem impossible to even survive the grief that you will be feeling as a stabbing emotional pain that is with you every moment. It is important to learn how to survive the pain and cope in ways that will help you heal.

One of the first tips that will help you heal through your intense emotional grief of a bad break up is to find people you can talk about it with. Having a listening ear can keep emotions from becoming bottled up. It is important to vent and have someone willing to let you cry on their shoulder. Many times, those who are there to help you deal with break up grief have been in your shoes at least one or twice themselves.

Dealing with break up pain by yourself probably will seem impossible to you at first, but always keep in mind the number of people who get and lose love in their lives and somehow seem to survive. You are not alone in your feelings. Just like others, you also will be able to get over your heartbreak and live to tell about it. You may even mature some. However, getting over this pain will only be easy if you are willing to go about dealing with it the correct way, a way that is going to be healthier for you.

Along with having people to listen to your feelings of grief, it will help to have them around to spend time with. Find things to do with friends that will take your mind off the pain. Getting your mind off the break up is the first step in moving on.

Life will go on, and you will need to know how to move on to speed the healing process. Along with spending time with friends in an effort to move on, it is also important to focus on the positive. Don't dwell on your grief. Instead find the good things in your life that will pull you in a positive direction. Your friends will be there to help you. Focus on the positive relationships you have with friends. Go out and have fun even if you don't feel like having fun. This will keep the healing process moving in the right direction.

A bad break up is never easy. It is important to deal with break up grief successfully, however. Without taking the steps to heal and move on, you will become stuck in a dark place of emotional pain and depression that will make it harder to pull yourself out and get back to living life. Moving on will allow you to heal. I promise, the pain you are feeling right now will heal with time. I've been there. I know what you are feeling.

How to Find Unemployment Income Protection


In these uncertain times, we are all taking considerable measures to save more and spend less of our hard earned money. We are facing our fears and realizing that unemployment can become a reality for all of us. Financial experts tell us that, ideally, we should have enough money in savings to get through 6 months of unemployment. In actuality, there's probably not enough savings in our rainy day fund to get us through much more than a few weeks.

The Government Gives You Minimal Unemployment Income Protection

The Federal government instituted unemployment benefits during the great depression. However, the government will give you no greater than 50% of what your previous salary was, and there is a set maximum you are able to receive each week. It's unlikely that unemployment benefits will be enough to pay your bills-- let alone support the quality of life you're used to. You should also know that if you are self-employed and can't find work, you are not eligible for government unemployment benefits.

Insurance, Insurance, Insurance

There are several insurance policies you can sign up for that will give you unemployment income protection. The three policies you should seriously consider are income payment protection insurance, mortgage payment protection insurance, and loan payment protection insurance. All three types will support you through the stress of unemployment.

Unemployment Income Protection for Your Salary

You depend on your salary to pay your bills, buy food, keep your home, and put gas in your car. Income protection insurance will give you a monthly lump sum, tax free, to keep your quality of life intact. When taking out a policy, you determine the amount you will receive each month based on your salary. This is the broadest form of unemployment income protection as you decide where to put the money that comes in. It is also the most policy with the highest premiums. Should you become unemployed, you have a safety net of cash flow waiting to catch you. 

Unemployment Income Protection for Your Mortgage

Your biggest monthly payment is likely to be your mortgage. If your home goes into default, not only do you have the anxiety of being unemployed, you and your family can soon face foreclosure. Unemployment mortgage protection insurance will pay your mortgage loan for a certain amount of time. This policy will safeguard the future in your home and give you time to get back on your feet and enter into the work force again.

Unemployment Income Protection for Your Loans

Unless you're an above average American, then you have several lines of revolving credit requiring a monthly payment. Loan protection insurance is designed to pay your monthly debt obligations in full. This policy will take care of the basics such as your school loans and car payment.  

Getting Started 

With all the forms of unemployment income protection available, you don't have to go a single month without the cash you need. Find an insurance agent online or locally to help you decide if this type of protection fits your needs and concerns. Do your research and get started finding the unemployment income protection that will meet your needs today!

You need to work more than part time, and self employed individuals and seasonal and temporary employees are not eligible for mortgage payment insurance. Companies may even consider how long one has been self employed as well. 

You may want to consider this protection if the loss of your job would put your family in a hardship position. Consider the cost of the monthly premiums, the likelihood of losing your job, and the potential stress and financial difficulty that would come from difficulty in paying your home loan to decide if this protection is right for you. Take charge of your financial future and do your research to see if mortgage payment protection insurance is right for you!

What Is Mania And How Do I Know If I Have Mania?


Mania is the medical condition where patients suffer severely elevated moods at all times. Normally it is associated with mood swings when the patient goes through extremely elevated or happy mood at one time and at the other time may feel depressed. However this is not the only condition and Mania can occur without these cyclical episodes.

How do I know I have Mania?

Although some one who is not suffering from the disease may fail to understand what the big deal is all about since the patient is happy at all times, people afflicted by it lose their judgment as a result of being over powered by feelings of joy at all times and end up taking wrong decisions and keep getting into socially uncomfortable situations as a result of this. Manic patients often get irritable, belligerent and deny there is anything wrong with them when pointed out the obvious disconnect that their behavior shows with the situation prevailing at that particular time.

Some of the prominent symptoms of Mania are given below:

The patients feel decreased need of sleep and will be hyperactive, hypersexual and hyper religious.

The afflicted person has got grandiose ideas and plans and finds himself to be unusually talkative.

There are other behavior that the person suffering from Mania displays like wasteful expenditure, risky liaisons in personal and business life as well as very vocal and violent arguments.

Mania patients fail to recognize signs of sadness in the facial expression of others, while they can easily recognize expressions of happiness the expression of sadness fails to register in their minds.

There is a mnemonic which is used to describe Mania - DIGFAST

D = Distractibility (Difficulty to concentrate on one thing)

I = Indiscretion (indulging in excessive pleasure activities)

G = Grandiosity (having grand notions and making grand plans)

F = Flight of ideas (having a flurry of ideas and feeling the need to slow down)

A = Activity increased (getting hyperactive emotionally and physically)

S = Sleep deficit (not getting enough sleep and continually going through a dazed state)

T = Talkativeness (the pressure and tendency to speak incessantly and needlessly)

Can Mania be treated?

Mania can be treated by medication and talk therapy, however before that it is necessary to diagnose it correctly. This is because most of the symptoms mentioned can occur due to non psychiatric reasons and something known as differential diagnosis needs to be performed. What happens in this type of diagnosis is the various symptoms of the patients are observed and then a list of diseases is mapped according to the symptoms. Then the doctors start off their treatment and analyze which is the treatment that the patient is responding to the best.

In cases of acute mania patient may also have to be admitted for treatment involuntarily and is typically treated with mood stabilizers and antipsychotic medication. But invariably all of these medicines have side effects and the patient has to be carefully observed to avoid any side effects. Even while the symptoms of Mania have subsided long term treatment still continues in a bid to stabilize the patient's mood through a combination of medicine and talk therapy.

Collective Mania

Collective Mania is a state where a large number of people start behaving irrationally, the numbers can in some cases be as large as an entire country as in the case of Tulip Mania. Such cases can be often witnessed in some of the stock market rallies that happen where the stock prices reach very high levels but despite repeated warnings from analysts people keep on buying without any apparent reason to do so.

Overview of Symptoms Associated With Pancreatic Cancer


Pancreatic cancer symptoms are often difficult to detect, making it even harder to diagnose this potentially deadly disease. It's important to remember that many of the indicators will not present themselves until after the disease is in an advanced stage. Keep reading for a list of possible signs.

Stomach Pains

Among the basic pancreatic cancer symptoms is a soreness or pain in the high abdomen. Patients often complain that the pain spreads through the area and around to their back. Many people going through this type of discomfort will often experience alleviation once they lean forward.

This type of abdomen pain is usually present in the majority of patients (approximately 80%), but is typically only evident during the advance stages of the disease. Eating can often worsen the pain or cause increased discomfort.

Loss of Appetite

Weight loss and a decreased appetite are often typical symptoms affiliated with pancreatic cancer. Regrettably, these are also common signs often associated with other afflictions and diseases, particular those affecting the digestive system.

Painful or Painless Jaundice

Since pancreatic cancer can block the bile duct - which flows partly through the head of the pancreas - jaundice is a frequent symptom of the disease. Tumors that develop on the pancreas are typically the root of jaundice development, which is characterized by a yellowing of the skin.

Typically, jaundice for patients with pancreatic cancer is accompanied by dark urine and pruritus, or itching. Approximately half of pancreatic cancer patients with local forms of the disease experience painful jaundice while the other half with a curable or resectable lesion experience painless yellowing of the skin.

Trusseau Sign (Blood Clots)

Trusseau Sign is a secondary affliction that causes grumes or blood clots to develop in hepatic portal veins, abstruse veins and surface veins without warning. While not exclusive to patients with pancreatic cancer, it is often associated with the disease.

Depression

Though not as exhaustively accounted or referenced, depression is a subtle side effect of pancreatic cancer. The clinical depression often develops even before the disease is detected. Doctors and researchers are still unsure why or how the two connect.

How Pancreatic Cancer is Diagnosed

Pancreatic cancer is typically diagnosed after the above symptoms are either detected by the patient or the supervising doctor. After the indicators are evaluated, liver function tests and tests for CA19-9 - a marker for pancreatic cancer - are often performed.

CT scans and ultrasounds are other common methods of detecting pancreatic cancer and used to detect visible tumors or lesions. An endoscopic ultrasound or biopsy can also be used to obtain and test tissue samples.

Pancreatic Cancer Screening

If you have two or more immediate family members (or three or more extended relatives) who have been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer symptoms, you should ask your doctor about early screening for the disease. Pancreatic cancer symptoms often don't present themselves until it is too late, making early screening critical for those at risk.

What Is The Cause Of The Rapidly Increasing Number Of People Who Are Depressed?


The World Health Organization (WHO) has issued a report stating that the number of people who experience depression is doubling every ten years and that by 2020 it will be the most pervasive illness in the world and the second leading cause of death.

Why is this happening in an affluent society such as ours that currently spends more money on medical care than at any other time in history?

There are many factors contributing to this increase in the number of people who are suffering the debilitating effects of depression.

This article will shed some light on some of these factors.

1. The News Media

Our news media is a major contributing factor to the rise of depression. Out of all the good things that happen every single day, the news on TV, the radio and in newspapers focuses almost exclusively on the small percentage of things that are wrong in our world.

Believing what you hear or read in the news leaves you with the feeling that the world situation and the physical condition of our planet are in a downward spiral with little hope for improvement.

If you watch, listen to, or read the news everyday you are feeding your mind with the equivalent of garbage. Have you ever heard the computer term "garbage in, garbage out?" This is not only true with computers, but also the human mind.

2. Pharmaceutical Companies

Prescriptions for antidepressants issued to children and adolescents grew three to tenfold between 1987 and 1996. Between 1998 and 2002 there was a 50 percent overall increase in antidepressant prescriptions despite the lack of proof they cure depression.

The April 2004 issue of the journal "Psychiatric Services" reports findings of a study conducted by Express Scripts. This study shows that the use of antidepressant medications continues to grow by about 10 percent annually among children and adolescents.

U.K. and U.S. studies indicate there are increased suicidal tendencies in many young patients taking these drugs. Children and teens are at a stage in their lives where their brain is developing rapidly. This raises a question regarding unknown and long-term side effects of these drugs being prescribed during this critical stage of growth.

While natural remedies are an option, doctors rarely suggest their use. When discussing natural remedies in her book "Molecules of Emotion," Candace Pert, Ph.D., (recognized as the world's foremost brain researcher) has this to say in regard to natural remedies: "The answer reflects the economics of medicine. Since the natural substances are not patentable, there is no incentive for drug companies to study their benefits, and so the vast majority of M.D.s, who get their information about drugs from the drug companies, don't even know about them."

Pharamaceutical companies are publicly traded corporations that have a legal responsibility to their shareholders to increase profits. How do they do this? According to Kevin Trudeau in his book "Natural Cures 'They' Don't Want You To Know About" they do it by "producing their product at the lowest possible cost, selling it at the highest price, and selling as much as they can."

According to Mr. Trudeau, "the health care industry, defined as the treatment, prevention and diagnosis of disease, is the most profitable industry in the world." It is true that enormous amounts of money will continue to be made as long as people stay sick. It is not in the best interest of the pharmaceutical companies for you to get healthy and stay healthy.

3. The School System

Our school system is still pretty much focused on learning the three R's: reading, 'riting, and 'rithmetic. Yes, these are important fundamentals that one needs to function well in society. But, one needs to know more than these basics to succeed in life.

Have you ever studied for a test in school and passed with flying colors only to forget all the answers when they were no longer important for you to remember them?

Well known and respected financial author of the "Rich Dad" series of books, Robert T. Kiyosaki, touched on this subject in one of his earlier books, "If You Want to Be Rich & Happy: Don't Go to School?: Ensuring Lifetime Security for Yourself and Your Children" published in 1995. He believes there's a flaw in a system that rewards students for memorizing facts, but fails to help teach them to succeed in the real world.

Today a standard is set in all subjects and every child is expected to achieve that standard. If they don't, they're looked at as deficient in some way, or less than perfect, by their teacher and the school system in general. This system of comparison is detrimental to the self-esteem of the child which leads to depression.

4. Concern Over What Other People Think

People often worry about what others will think of them if they seek help for their depression, especially males. There is the erroneous belief that depression is something only women have, causing men to feel they are "weak" when they are depressed.

Also, people who are depressed have the tendency to look at themselves as failures and to adopt the belief that other people see them as failures. They end up expending a lot of energy worrying about this and doing little or nothing to get help with their depression.

5. Our Natural Tendency Toward Dependency

From the time we are born most of us are taught to depend on others to know what is best for us and to tell us what to do.

We have been taught to depend on our parents to know what is best for us when we are young and even into adulthood. We have been taught to look to our teachers and schools to know what is best for us if our parents don't know. We have been taught to depend on our preferred religious organization for our spiritual needs, on doctors and conventional medicine for our health needs, on the government to provide for and take care of us after retirement (or before), etc.

This attitude has led us to believe we aren't in control of our lives or our destiny. This fosters feelings of powerlessness that naturally leads to depression.

Now that you know more about what is causing the number of depressed people to increase so rapidly, what can be done to counteract these conditions? Are there solutions?

Gwynne Curry, who suffered with depression for 30+ years, reveals the proven method she personally used to overcome her depression in her eBook "You Can Heal Your Depression Now! No Expensive Therapy... No Dangerous Antidepressants..." Gwynne has now lived depression free for more than five years and shares with you everything she learned during her 20+ year search to find the answers to living depression free.

If you, or someone you know, suffer with depression, don't pass this by. Just imagine, you could be feeling better in less than 30 days.