Ramani Durvasula's Blog, page 2

A Thank You Note to Donald Trump

Dear Mr. Trump: Thank you. Sincerely yours – Ramani

Never dreamed I would be thanking Mr. Trump, but here we are. For the last 3 years I have been working on a revolutionary new book on love and narcissism (it comes out on November 1 of this year – best and most useful holiday gift ever!), and he gave me just the hook I was looking for. Who knew that his icky invectives could end up as a marketing juggernaut for me? I for one, am hoping his campaign lasts until at least the new year.

I have been studying narcissism for a long time, and watching it devastate lives a day at a time. Narcissistic co-workers, bosses, parents, friends, and most importantly – partners (husbands, wives, girlfriends, boyfriends). Narcissists destroy those near them, like a parasitic worm that eats someone from the inside out. The absence of empathy means that they can barrel through the world effortlessly, unworried about the damage they sow. My book will save many many people from the tyranny of being stuck with a narcissistic partner – and perhaps a narcissistic presidential candidate (which is of course most of them).

At this time in history, narcissism is the new black. Without this charming trait, it is really difficult to get ahead. Our competitive economy incentivizes cruelty, carelessness, and mindlessness – shoot first, apologize later (if you ever apologize). Apologies are now written by publicists to ensure that stock prices don’t fall or platform is not lost, not as a means of acknowledging genuine responsibility. And when the measure of success is power, consumption and excess – forget about depth, it’s all about superficiality – and superficiality is the narcissist’s playground.

So back to the Donald. Because narcissism is a modern epidemic – it is ubiquitous, and we barely notice it anymore. Insensitivity and tweetable meanspirited taglines are an acceptable way to issue an opinion in a very noisy world. As long as you get the prize, it no longer matters how you get there. Hemingway said “It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.” Not so much anymore – journeys and conduct are becoming irrelevant– the ends justify the means, the racist banter and the degradation of McCain’s war record (and who knows what is next in his political sideshow) – all’s fair in love, politics and war.

But Trump hit a nerve – didn’t he? Perhaps he figured out that a subset of folks who are too busy with their own lives to care about the implications of his blowhard braggadocio, who feel threatened by an ever diversifying culture, who want to be entertained, and who no longer feel part of a community, but rather want to take their goodies and run – that these people will listen and even rally. In a world where the bombastic bad behavior of reality TV and social media trolls are our new benchmarks, then he as the mouthpiece of pathological narcissism is able to successfully prey on and even mobilize a narcissistic society. It’s hard to be empathic when most people are working harder for less money, and the 1% fiddles while our communities are imploding. Life has turned into the granddaddy of reality shows – Survivor. We are spending our days figuring out how to “outwit, outplay and outlast” each other. Is it any wonder that Donald Trump’s vitriol and divisive rhetoric are “trumping” many of the other candidates?

We tend to burn out on narcissists and bullies. They are sort of fun to watch for a while, and what sounds like “Fox-y” straight talk, is recognized as grandiose blather. Whether Trump’s narcissism can stand the test of time remains to be seen. For the first time in history, given the new narcissism, I think it can.

Trump may get elected, he may not. I won’t vote for him, others will. However, to me, Donald Trump is the canary in the coal mine. While he was a mere gadfly in past presidential bids, this time he is getting a foothold. A reminder that narcissism is becoming so normative that his acid diatribes may no longer give us pause. We are faced with the prospect of wondering whether it is a disorder any more? (perhaps the new disorder will be Empathic Personality Disorder – given to those us out there who give a damn about others, work hard, can’t pay our bills, and waste our time on ethics and kindness).

For those of you who don’t find empty rhetoric, empty partners, and overall meanness an acceptable new world order – have I got a book for you! Stay tuned – pre-orders can be placed in a few weeks. And even if you are a fan of Donald Trump – trust me, you will find lots of useful stuff within my pages.

Again – thanks Mr. Trump, much obliged.

I’ll be sure to get a copy out to you post-haste.

Is Anybody Listening?

A colleague just sent me a great op-ed written by Richard Friedman which appeared in the NY Times this past weekend. (http://nyti.ms/1SABga0). His arguments are spot-on, we woefully underfund psychotherapy research, and have put all of our eggs in understanding the brain and using medication – and as Friedman so beautifully puts it “the brain….won’t give up its secrets easily.” In our lifetimes, there will be no insta-cure that will help us manage mental illness or distress.

We have come a long way in the world of psychotherapy. What was once viewed with tremendous suspicion, is now a bit more acceptable (but just a bit, people are still a hell of a lot more likely to share with you that they have a personal trainer than that they have a psychologist). However, research presented in the American Journal of Psychiatry reveals that only about 3-4% of the population is in psychotherapy. Nearly 60% of mental health visits involve medication only.

Where mental wellness is concerned, just as with most things – we want a quick fix.

The utility of psychotherapy is far reaching – it’s not just a place to “vent” – but also a place to develop problem solving skills, coping strategies, interpersonal skills, and receive informed feedback. The research is clear- it works, and has far better long-term impact than medication alone. Optimally, therapy is non-judgmental, and a place to experience unconditional regard and support as you traverse crises old and new. The waning interest in wanting to understand psychotherapy, as evidenced by the unwillingness of insurers to reimburse for it and research dollars to fund is particularly troubling at a time in history when nobody is listening.

As we become a more technologically dependent society – maintaining the illusion of connection via smartphones, social media and 24 hour access – we actually believe we are being heard. And as the demands of modern life sink in – financial struggles, work stress, interpersonal stress, the stuff of life, and 24 hour workdays – we often turn to these empty platforms wanting to be heard. All the time I observe people on the phone with people, while at the same time checking Instagram on their tablet. They are not listening. I see people out to dinner, checking their phones instead of talking to each other. And when one is talking, the other is scrolling through his phone. They are not listening.

Listening is curative in its own right. To be heard, to be understood, to experience empathy – there is no pill that can do that. I have found in my practice that many times just a few weeks is enough for someone to feel “heard”, to have a sounding board, to shut out the world and focus for an hour, and then manage the crisis at hand with new vigor. In an increasingly narcissistic world, nobody is listening – instead everybody is posting.  It’s a one way road – all talk, no hear.

When I trained as a therapist, we still had phones that had dials on them, and used payphones to call a friend from campus. A tablet or a smartphone was not even fathomable. People had to talk to each other in person, and being heard was built into the fabric of life. Interestingly, despite our device soaked world I don’t feel that I am any more productive now than I was as a graduate student, I am just more convenienced. That convenience comes at a cost, and most of us are now more careless and less attentive.

I have similar conversations in therapy with my patients now as I did then, (though if you had told me back when I was in graduate school that I would be dealing with “virtual” cheating with my therapy patients I would have looked at you and your tin foil hat rather quizzically). The difference is that 45 minutes of powering down, of being heard without any distraction, of doing just one thing – is now so unusual, that I wonder if those elements of therapy may be more powerful now than they were once upon a time. Perhaps I am making my living charging for what was once given more often for free from those around us, and that has increased its value immeasurably. Research be damned, when therapy works, it is equal parts magic, mysticism, and science. It’s hard to quantify magic. Perhaps the magic is simply the mirror and the comfort of being heard.

Nobody is listening any more – I spent years learning how to listen.

Little did I know, that much like baking bread I was being trained in a dying art.

But one which we need. Now more than ever.

Freud and The Fall From Grace

The virtuous man contents himself with dreaming that which the wicked man does in actual life. (Freud)

My daughter asked me the other day if I could have dinner with Freud and ask him just one question – what would it be?

It was easy:

“Sigmund – what do you think of modern media?”

Anyone who has ever read Civilization and It’s Discontents, or On Narcissism, knows that our dear Dr. Freud would have a FIELD day with all of this. I was not trained psychoanalytically– but Freud is as classic as a Chanel suit – he got a lot of it right. He would likely puff on his cigar and opine on flattened egos, and urges for validation, and our conflicted primitive impulses.

He would also have a field day with our modern day pitchmen. Bill Cosby is the latest roadkill in a line of recent falls from grace (sandwich pitch men, the soiled spawn of the large litter of Duggars). And it keeps happening – right wing politicians found in compromising positions, family men found on vacation with their newest nubile girlfriends – you get the idea.

I teach my students one thing in my Abnormal Psychology class – the louder an idiot preaches, and the more they tout their lifestyle – the larger the skeletons in their closets. If you are comfortable with your position, with your opinion, with your lifestyle, and are not conflicted – you don’t have to scream about it. You simply know it, and don’t feel the need to defend it. And you are wise enough to see both sides.

This defensive posture, of taking an extreme position while secretly behaving in a VERY different way is called “reaction formation” – a term that reflects someone maintaining a zealot’s passion or a moralistic stance – while simultaneously committing the very sins against which they preach. (e.g. a politician who vehemently prattles about family values and has 3 mistresses on the side).

We want our media pitchmen and actors and leaders to be paragons of morality. They are not. They are entertainers – and by dint of that, may even be more morally slippery than the rest of us (anyone who can endure the slings and arrows of Hollywood has learned some bankrupt strategies to stay alive in those shark-infested waters).

So when Mr. Cosby and others like him take the high ground, we should start looking for the low ground on which they most likely stand. In our social media driven marketplace which evolves by the second – the person with the most extreme position gets heard. That can be extreme vulgarity, extreme nudity, or extreme moralism. Behind all extremity tends to be extreme discomfort.

We hate when our Bill Cosbys and other heavy-handed moralists and “family values folks” fail us. Since childhood, we have liked knowing who the good guy is and who the bad guy is. But we need to become more informed consumers of what we see. The self-righteous tend to be wrong. And a hasty apology written by an insincere publicist is considered adequate contrition.

For every Bill Cosby that gets found out, there are many more plying their trade. We have the power to pull the curtain back on these Wizards. If it’s too good to be true, it is likely false. Bottom line – stop looking to the media for heroes. The real heroes likely live among us – regular hard-working people who play by the rules, struggle to pay the bills, and find divinity in the prosaic. Rarely are our heroes standing on red carpets.

Whether Donald Trump trumpeting hateful vitriol about Mexican immigrants in America, powerful men denying allegations of indecency, or pious families hiding dirty secrets – media is a game of Three Card Monte. If you are going to play (or watch), recognize that you are being had.

And sit back with some popcorn and wait for their fall from grace.

The Illusion of Equality

Equality is by my estimation a basic human right. The lack thereof has inspired wars, protests, revolutions and social change. This country was founded on such principles, but saying we believe in equality often does not translate into practice.

This has been an equality inducing week in the United States – marriage equality, age-old symbols (Confederate flags) of human rights violations and anachronism being taken down from state houses – steps that just decades ago felt impossible. Using the law to dictate equality is an important and critical first step, but it is not enough.

We will continue to observe inequality across all parameters in our world- on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, economic status, disability status, and sexual orientation. Although the laws are shifting to a more equitable place, we CANNOT stand back and allow complacency to result in self-congratulation.

We are not out of the woods yet.

The robust literature on implicit bias speaks to the attitudes which unconsciously impact our behaviors and decision making. Simply put – our attitudes about factors such as race or religion or sexual orientation impact micro-choices and actions many times a day. The only thing more dangerous than a racist (sexist, ageist, or any other –ist) is a person who doesn’t think he is racist (or any other –ist).

Ask any non-majority group member and they will acknowledge this. Whether a black man who will observe that people walk a wider circle around him down the street, a disabled woman who notices that people may not make eye contact, a person of a different nationality who notices that people speak more loudly and slowly in her presence.

I recently had a bit of luck in my travels and received first class seats (not the norm for a college professor). Both times during my day, as I stood in line with the first class group of passengers to board, I was asked to step aside, and was loudly told by another passenger in this group “you need to wait, this is first class.” (I am guessing the speaking loudly was secondary to the presumption that I either did not understand English or I was dimwitted). I smiled politely and evinced my boarding pass printed with 4A and the word “FIRST” across the pass. The accuser stepped aside, nary a word of apology (there would not be an apology – as these are unconscious biases and typically lack insight). When I finally got up to the clerk scanning the passes, I carefully watched her scan the passes of my fellow travelers – on this flight they all happened to be Caucasian or men. She did not question a single one of them, but when I appeared she looked at me and said “First – right?”.

Oy. I was dressed simply enough in nice jeans and a black sweater. Hair combed. But I couldn’t really eliminate the skin color or my foreign name with too many letters.

Friends have since asked me why I didn’t make a stink, a fuss, pop them in the face. To which I responded “to what end?” Honestly, it’s a first world problem, and I regard it as dumb luck that I was even up there in the land of blankets and free booze. However, whether it is being called out in an airport line, being followed in a store because it is assumed you will shoplift, service employees avoiding eye contact, or the assumption that a student of color is at an elite university because of affirmative action – these microinsults and slights accumulate over a lifetime and erode identities and truncate our narratives. These assumptions are implicit, ergo they will keep happening because the transgressors aren’t even aware of their conduct. At a societal level this mountain of “unawareness” can foment institutionalized inequality in all sectors.

My parents told me as a child– “you better get an education, because they are going to see your face and assume you are not competent, the education will shield you.” I get it, but that is an inequitable assumption as well, as though education should result in “better” treatment by the world at large. They were partially right, the education has helped me move through the world more easily, and when faced with such biases I can at least try to play the “doctor” card. That shuts most people up, but you can’t unring a bel, and the slights still sting. My education placed me in universities and other worlds slightly more free of such biases, but whether professor or pauper, Black or White, man or woman – we are all vulnerable to holding these biases AND being recipients of them.

As long as we use mental shortcuts to organize our world, and these mental shortcuts reflect our implicit biases – all of the laws and SCOTUS rulings in the world will still not cut to the core of our careless split second decisions and behavior. These quick release decisions can be nuisances (e.g. being asked to leave a line) or deadly (the use of unnecessary force by law enforcement). These hair trigger reactions cannot be mandated by the law. These reactions may not even be that amenable to change. The only “interventions” may require us to simply be more mindful, AND more willing to take responsibility for our words and actions on the back end. A tall order in a world where mindfulness is relatively rare, and taking responsibility even rarer.

The rulings and changes of the past week are critical – they allow people to achieve greater equality on a visible playing field.

However, it is the invisible playing fields that may still do us in.

Ode to an Eclipse

I set an alarm and stepped out of my research lab. It felt that important.

On this blistering hot day, in the middle of my university campus in East Los Angeles, armed with a pinhole poked through an index card I stood at 245 PM and took it in.

A partial solar eclipse. The sun looked as though a tiny bite had been taken out of it. Solar goggles showed it to be a dark shadow taken out of a corner of the sun. The world wasn’t darkened, and if you didn’t know it was happening, you wouldn’t notice the difference.

As I drank in that eclipse I mused on alignment and timing and how the planets and stars and moons sometimes find themselves on the same page. Mused on wonder. Mused on how the ancients would take note, and take awe in the fact that their touchstones were transmogrified – if only for a moment.

No one took notice of me – the nutty professor with her index cards and childlike glee. As I carefully looked up, enjoying this cosmic alignment, I noticed that they remained transfixed by smartphones. Missing an eclipse (despite me telling them about it) in the name of text messages and the latest cat video sent to them via Facebook.

I wonder if we as a species haven’t lost our sense of wonder. Eclipses are wonderful. Shooting stars are wonderful. Harvest moons are wonderful. But to see them requires looking up, not down.

Far too often people attempt to partake of wonder solely to document it rather than to experience it. Sunsets on Instagram, selfies at the Grand Canyon. Wonder is meant to be cherished and experienced, not captured. Even if no one else sees it, it still happened.

How did our early ancestors get this so much better than us? Obviously they didn’t have iPhones. But perhaps they realize that they were in a relationship with this thing called the Earth and the cosmos. They needed it and so they worshipped it, they noticed it, they feared it, they didn’t take advantage of it, they took what they needed and didn’t try to take more.

As a psychologist who works with couples and folks with mega-relationship problems, I know one thing for sure. If you want to lose a relationship – neglect it. When you stop noticing your partner, when you stop building in a moment to share a kiss or a poem, when you start taking advantage of them, when you stop seeing the wonder – the relationship slowly dies. We tend to neglect the things that are the most steady in our lives, and shift our attention to frivolity and ego. So perhaps the eclipse is also a life lesson – to take a moment to notice that which is beautiful and unique and solid in your universe.

This takes us to another relationship – our relationship with our natural world. The eclipse is a reminder of the elegant rhythms of this natural world which sustains us. When I see how blithely and dismissively we treat this planet of ours –I muse over whether the planet is behaving like a wronged partner. Wronged partners tend to pull away – perhaps this is being evidenced via climate change, species extinction, dying oceans, melting icecaps. Every so often she throws a tantrum to get our attention (think mega hurricane, earthquake), but we just clean up the mess, get scared, apologize for a minute, and go back to neglecting her.

An eclipse could be a wakeup call to look up, and remember that this planet is a temporary home and part of something far larger which deserves to be noticed. It gives us perspective, reminds us not to sweat the small stuff, to take a minute and unplug, to pay attention, and that there is still wonder out there.

Mother Nature – thanks for the front row seat.

I look forward to an encore.

Facebook Users – Grow The Hell Up

Lots of bodice ripping and whining today as FB users felt betrayed that Facebook (the company) and some researchers manipulated Facebook feeds by putting in “fake” messages to examine a phenomenon called ‘emotional contagion’. The news shows, blogs, and internet flotsam and jetsam suggest that people feel somehow violated that their beloved ‘private’ space was sullied by the very people who own that space.

Newsflash FB users – you are mired in an Orwellian universe the likes of which even George couldn’t even imagine. Your every keystroke, thought, photo, and rant are used in the name of “big data” – that seems a hell of a lot more manipulative than a pedantic study on emotional manipulation by a few charming geeks at Princeton working in cahoots with Facbook. This is done to you 1000 times a day, so why is this so galling? Something about being a research guinea pig without consent I guess. Advertisers may just be sociopaths in good suits – manipulating you to do something you don’t want or to purchase something you don’t need. (we college professors on the other hand aren’t nearly as sociopathic (neurotic perhaps), and definitely don’t own good suits).

And honestly – don’t your so called “Facebook friends” manipulate your moods on an hourly basis with their tales of woe (“sitting home with Ben and Jerry on a Friday night”), their Schaedenfraude (“look at me and my supermodel girlfriend in my new Tesla in Ibiza”), their emptiness (look at my breakfast, hairstyle, underwear, new breasts)? Your moods and behavior change based on their posts – these researchers were just trying to examine this in a standardized way.

Fact is, we have less privacy than people residing in military states. Perhaps the first step to fixing it is – gasp – getting off of social media. But the validation, the oversharing, the illusion of connection – those are tough addictions to break. Every addiction carries opportunity costs – the opportunity cost for cigarettes is lung cancer, for injection drugs – Hep C, for social media – a daily download of your brain and subsequent loss of privacy (among other things).

For we behavioral scientists, social media is an empirical wet dream – a public/private record, a running timeline of behavior, a phase shift in mental health, ego development, personality, and human relationships. Privacy is a luxury – and means some sacrifices – even a child knows that. Before you cry about having your “public privacy” violated and moods manipulated, think about whether you are willing to give up on your selfies, tales of woe, political diatribes and photos of yet another sunset. Tradeoffs…..

Hillary and the Rumpelstiltskin Effect

I would like to think that most people know the tale of Rumpelstiltskin – the little elf who was able to spin straw into gold – and used that skill to gain further riches.

On her book tour/exploratory campaign Mrs. Clinton appears to be channeling her “inner Rumplestiltskin.”

I had the displeasure today of reading and listening to her accounts of how she and the former president left the White House “broke”.

Sweetie – many Americans have been broke and you have no idea what broke looks like.

Broke is having to choose between a mammogram and rent.

Broke is realizing that your family cannot afford the medications than an elderly parent requires.

Broke is having to choose between tuition and groceries.

Broke is paying the electric bill one month, and the gas bill the other, in hopes that both don’t get shut off.

Broke is working nights as a nanny, and days cleaning houses, and still raising your own kids.

Broke is waking up at 2 AM night after night wondering how you will keep the house of cards balanced, buy your children clothes, and whether you can sweet talk the landlord into another week.

Hillary, like Rumplestiltskin, was armed with the knowledge that she could spin straw into gold. That she could make $10 million dollars through a lecture circuit, and millions from a book. While I am sure it was quite unpleasant to have $4 million in legal bills, that is quite different than not knowing if you could EVER get out of the debt hole – NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU WORK. American salaries are flat, and the cost of living is outpacing salary growth for all but the rich. I am not convinced she or any American politician has a handle on the psychology of helplessness, of hopelessness, of uncertainty, and of the myth of meritocracy that has thrown American families under the bus with the falsehood that hard work can allow a family to sustain (forget about flourish). 24/7 of not knowing where the money is going to come from can take years off of your life.

Mrs. Clinton insulted working families, middle class families who can’t afford to purchase one home, let alone multiple homes. Who are one divorce, one layoff, one illness from ruin. Who, even in the midst of ACA, can’t afford healthcare. Couldn’t fathom affording college for a child. Most of us don’t get to go to bed at night knowing that we can do a day’s work and make a hundred grand. Most of us are not confident that we can fix our financial crises. Really being broke means NOT knowing, and the not knowing is what breaks us. Most of us cannot spin straw into gold. Most of us, frankly, are simply running out of straw.

I believe that most Americans now realize that their elected leaders are wealthy 1%ers, who MAYBE once upon a time MAY have come from hardscrabble origins, but who by and large lost touch with the rest of us long ago. It costs too much to get elected, ergo the Faustian bargains with Hollywood rich folk, special interests, and big donors of all stripes. No candidate can afford to fight for the middle class and the working poor. They would piss off too many big donors who find poverty to be a troubling artifact of our sociopathic economy. So perhaps the best we can hope for is a candidate who will get into bed with FEWER special interests and big donors, leaving a little hope for the rest of us.

Ironically, at the end, Rumpelstiltskin overspun, went to the well too many times, and when he asked for the ultimate prize for all his gold spinning, he ended being destroyed. She should heed the cautionary tale.

I respect Mrs. Clinton and believe she would make a terrific president, but girlfriend needs a reality check. I would personally be more likely to ask her for advice on how to deal with a cheating boyfriend than on how to make ends meet. As a woman, I am glad to see how far she went, as a struggling college professor, I don’t want her to pretend to understand my struggle or the struggles of those with far less than me. It trivializes the struggles of real people.

Keep it real – it’s crowded here at the bottom, don’t join us, just fix it.

One and a half tickets……

 

 

The envelope antagonized me.

 

Stared back at me from a bulletin board as a reminder of what was lost, and what still had to be found.

 

Such is the geography of a broken heart.

 

As a psychologist, a consistent theme that comes into my office or from friends and family who come seeking advice is the most universal plea – “Doc, help me get over this broken heart….it feels like it will never end.”   And like most health practitioners, we are great at fixing it for others and when faced with the ailment ourselves -we fold.

 

And so lots of well-intentioned people write books about broken hearts – but write them as a long delayed post-mortem. After they are firmly ensconced in new comfortable love, after they have recovered. Not in the confused, conflicted raw grips of it. Not interesting, I want to read the words from the trenches, not the afterparty.

 

The envelope.   It contained tickets.   Two. For a concert. Purchased a time when the relationship was real, and life was still being shared. When the tickets were bought I still believed – that he would be here, move forward, that we would share this together. The tickets marked those hopes. Apparently, Ticketmaster doesn’t seem to have a heartbreak clause – you have to purchase the damned things WAY in advance, and the lead up to the show lasts longer than the remainder of the relationship. No refunds due to a broken heart.

 

I was in denial for a long time, had myself convinced that the tickets fell on a night that I would be out of town so I could nobly give them to a friend as a gift or that he would come back. But they didn’t and he didn’t, and it was just another Saturday night. As the night approached, I pulled the tickets off the bulletin board, stared at them, reflected on my hopes, reflected on my hurt. Knew that the heart would not heal quickly, but life had to begin again. Knew that I could still give them away, but felt that if I succumbed and stayed home again, I may never get back up. And cheap as I am, I hated the idea of wasting the money.

 

I felt that attending would be an “intervention”. So I took my tickets, dreading the evening. These days LA feels like Noah’s Ark – and I am asking for a cabin for one. I handed over the tickets, the usher looked at me quizzically and tore the stub off of one – directing me to my seat. Two perfect seats. My backpack took one, I took the other. The concert was pitch perfect, and he would have loved it. I listened, at times I cried, the lyrics would often hit me in the chest, but I also felt a little emboldened. I sat next to a lovely older woman who kept asking me if I enjoyed the show – and it was sweet and comforting. All night I told myself – you can leave at intermission, you are brave, you did it, but cut your losses. But I pushed through and the music soothed me, and the people around me didn’t care. And I made it til the end.

 

That’s the geography of a broken heart – I am still in it, so I don’t know if the next curve on the trail is a mountain, valley, flat track or boulders. It’s easy to give in and stop living. But there is still music, and art, and nature, and travel – you just end up taking it in differently. And I avoided rebounds, booze, doughnuts, social media, and familiar restaurants, and instead focused on trying to find answers in Rilke, Rumi, May, and Neruda, exercise, sleep (lots), books, movies, and travel. Everyone has their own therapy, and antidepressants don’t fix a broken heart, they just mask the symptoms.

 

As a psychologist, I do nurse and mentor people through broken hearts, and I have found that time may be a better psychologist than I am. Hurt can’t be rushed. Mourning takes its own time – but Didion nails it when she says “Mourning has its place but also its limits.” The magic is when the broken hearted person, having walked through his or her own geography says that “today I woke up, and it was finally ok, and I started walking/running/writing/cooking/traveling/living again and it didn’t hurt.” As though a muscle healed. When that happens for my patients or for my friends, no one can take credit for that but them and time. I take solace in knowing that the day will come.

 

I gave up writing for a while because being in my head hurt and a broken heart isn’t pretty while it is happening – perhaps that is why people wait til they are over to share them, but that helps no one. Broken hearts happen, disappointment happens, dreams get dashed, hopes get re-rendered. TS Eliot notes that “to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from..”

 

The two tickets sit on top of my desk – one stub and one full ticket. The stub a reminder of persistence and courage, the unused ticket a reminder of hope and disappointment.   A new envelope also sits atop my desk for a show in June.

 

Only one ticket resides in that envelope – perhaps a symbol of wisdom.

 

 

The Myth of the Fad Diet

10 Fad Diets that don’t Really Work

In today’s impatient world, people try to find ways to achieve instant gratification—whether it’s work, play, communication, health, or beauty. As a result, so many diets promising much weight loss in a short amount of time are making the rounds. Some diets are genuinely good for you and result in lifestyle changes for the better, but others are ineffective and can even endanger your health. Unfortunately, many people still try them hoping to get thin quickly.

Here are 10 fad diets that don’t really work:

1. The Dukan Diet. This diet was first presented by French doctor Pierre Dukan, and encourages protein intake in place of carbs. The diet has four phases: the first allows the dieter to eat as much pure protein as he/she wants, the second allows protein and vegetable intake, the third allows the addition of fruit, cheese, bread, and other starchy products, and the fourth lifts all food restrictions six days out of the week, encourages dieters to take the stairs, and requires a protein-only day. This diet is ineffective in the long run because while you do lose weight, what you’re losing is water weight as a result of the lack of carbs rather than actual fat.

2. The 17-Day Diet. Developed by Dr. Michael Moreno, this diet also encourages the avoidance of carbs. Dieters are told to avoid carbs and certain fruits after 2 p.m., and are told to walk for 17 minutes a day. While this diet provides good advice in that it encourages dieters to replace unhealthy foods with healthier alternatives, the 2 p.m. restriction actually does not do anything to help you lose more weight. Neither does walking for exactly 17 minutes for 17 days.

3. The Atkins Diet. Proposed back in the 1970s by Dr. Robert Atkins, this diet also replaces carbs with protein. Many people like the fact that fat, such as butter and oil, is acceptable on this diet because the fat content is theoretically burned in lieu of carbs. However, as with the Dukan Diet, the promised 15-pound weight loss from this diet is just mostly water weight and not fat. The excess protein consumption can also lead to kidney and liver damage because the body needs to work harder to process all that meat.

4. The HCG Diet. This diet involves “calorie-counting”, cautioning dieters to consume only 500-800 calories per day. Human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG), a pregnancy hormone, is either ingested as a pill or injected into the body to help facilitate weight loss. This diet doesn’t work in the long term because the limited caloric intake is very difficult to maintain, and does not allow you to get the nutrients you need each day. HCG also actually doesn’t do anything to aid the weight loss process.

5. The Chewing Diet. This diet is one of the most dangerous on this list because it is practically equivalent to bulimia. The idea is that you chew your food very thoroughly and then spit it back out so that you can absorb some nutrients and enjoy the flavor while avoiding the calories. But this diet results in acid reflux because your body is anticipating the food you never swallow, and the constant chewing causes tooth decay.

6. Soup diet. Mostly done with cabbage soup, this diet encourages the consumption of just soup and other low-calorie foods for one week to shed 10 pounds. However, this diet does not have a long-term eating plan, and causes you to suffer from diarrhea in that week.

7. Juice fasting. This diet involves imbibing juices that supposedly contain all the nutrition you need in a day, and promises much weight loss along with physical detoxification to cleanse your body. However, the weight shed during such diets is water weight and colon debris as your body undergoes detoxification. Plus, it’s extremely expensive (if you’re getting your juices ordered) and time-consuming (if you’re preparing the juices yourself).

8. The Master Cleanse. This popular weight-loss method was endorsed by celebrities like Beyonce, Demi Moore, and Ashton Kutcher, and involves drinking a mix of lemon juice, cayenne pepper, and maple syrup. However, the Master Cleanse is intended to be a detoxification regimen, not a diet plan, and can’t be sustained in the long term.

9. The Cookie Diet. This diet was developed by Dr. Sanford Siegal, who came up with a recipe for a healthy cookie that could take the place of two meals. Four to six of these cookies reportedly packed only 500 calories, and for the remaining meal, dieters are encouraged to ingest a meal that clocks in at 1,000 calories. This diet gets boring after a while because replacing two meals with cookies every day gets old, which causes you to crave other foods and feel even hungrier.

10. The Acai Diet. Named for the Amazonian berry, this diet rose in popularity after the acai berry was reported to have weight-loss benefits. Dieters are required to incorporate acai into their meals as juices or capsules. However, the weight-loss properties of the acai berry haven’t been proven, and considering the high prices at which the supplements are sold, it just doesn’t seem worth it.

Fad crash diets are never a good way to go if you’re looking to lose weight. The best way to lose weight is through a healthy, varied diet that cuts down on saturated fats and empty calories like burgers, sodas, and sweets, in combination with a healthy exercise regimen. Join a course at a gym, a studio, or a fitness college like ACPE Academy that gets you moving daily to properly burn the calories you take in. And if you’re considering going on a strict diet, it’s always best to see your doctor first to determine if it’s going to have adverse effects on you. Many doctors can recommend you to a good nutritionist who can craft an effective eating plan tailored to your body’s needs.

Author bio:

Adeline Erwin is a budding lifestyle writer based in Sydney, Australia. As a part-time fitness instructor, she motivates people to get back into shape, using only the most natural means possible. She is also a strong advocate of eliminating junk food from the typical school child’s diet. On her spare time, she loves doing arts and crafts projects with her 2 adorable daughters, ages 6 and 8.

GUEST BLOG! The Myth of the “Good Diet”

‘The only good diet is a dead diet!’ – Experts Weigh in on Dieting

GUEST BLOG – Rens van der Windt

In the last ten years more than half of the world’s female population has been on a diet and around one third of men have tried to shed the pounds by dieting. People will try just about anything to lose some weight. The Cookie, Subway and Cabbage Soup diet are rightly considered to be nonsense but others have found quite a large following. At the moment the HCG, Paleo and Dukan diet are very popular. But do fad diets really work? Online doctor and pharmacy Chemist Direct consulted five renowned weight loss specialists. Here are their anwers:

First off is professor of psychology at California State University and author of You Are WHY You Eat: Change Your Food Attitude, Change Your Life, Ramani Durvasula. She couldn’t be clearer with her opinions on diets, fad or not: “the only good diet is a dead diet. Bottom line: they do not work.”

“There is no good scientific evidence that any ‘plan’ can lead to sustainable weight loss. Any fool can lose weight through starvation – which ultimately is the core of every diet plan: undernourishment and calorie control. They are also the single most consistent predictor of developing an eating disorder. Therefore, my tip is: don’t diet. If you want to lose weight you should tackle it using a three part strategy: Firstly, you need to change the context: don’t keep unhealthy options at easy reach. Clean out your cupboards, car and desk!”

Secondly, Dr. Ramani recommends that you should listen and react to the signals that your body is giving you and start to mute out the nonsense found in a lot of modern diet literature.

“The problem is that most people don’t know how to listen to their bodies. They are too busy measuring out a cup of quinoa to eat at three at night while standing on their heads because a book told them so! Eat mindfully, slow down and learn to stop cleaning your plate once you are full. It’s the mindless calories that make us and keep us overweight.”

She also believes that changing the way you think of your body has much more of an impact than most would expect.

“Exercise is a lousy weight loss tool, but a wonderful wellness tool. Once you start respecting your body more, by moving it and listening to it, you are less likely to put bad stuff in it. Use your body and let it reward you.”

As a structured cognitive behavioral trainer and CEO of SelfHelpWorks, Lou Ryan looks at the root causes of pound-packing eating habits and advises people on how to address the hidden behaviors that begin their binges.

 

“Diets are not an effective long-term solution because they target the symptoms. For people who feel they need to go on a diet the symptom is the unwanted eating behavior. These people need to start using willpower to defy their subconscious thought process that creates food cravings. Diets may work well for the short term, but they will not be an effective long-term solution unless coupled with an intervention that changes the subconscious thought process”

So, instead of fighting against your brain and struggling with restrictive diets, you should at first confront the psychological triggers that make you want to eat in the first place.

“Someone who loses weight by starving themselves and temporarily resetting their metabolism on the HCG diet will end up gaining it all back (plus more in many cases), because their subconscious thoughts will produce food cravings that drive them back to their old eating habits once their diet ends. The only real way to lose weight for the long term is to break down and replace the subconscious thought patterns that create emotionally-charged food cravings. This process is called structured cognitive behavioral training.”

Now that we have broken down our dependence on fad diets with Ramani Durvasula and Lou Ryan we can argue that dieting isn’t about what we eat but why we eat. But what’s the best way to implement these changes?

Lori Rosenthal is a registered dietitian, certified dialysis nurse, holds a degree in master of science and (surprise, surprise) she doesn’t believe in dieting:

”Diets don’t work because they are often extreme, forcing followers to give up whole food groups and change their habits all at once. Although diets don’t work, healthy dietary and lifestyle changes do. The best way to go about losing weight and keeping it off is to make one or two healthy changes at a time, only adding another once a change has become part of your routine and you enjoy it. If you feel restricted or deprived the change won’t last. Finding foods you like and that are in line with healthy eating is so important. If you are enjoying what you are eating you choose it because you like it, not because you’re on a diet.”

Lori’s advice seems to make sense, much like a smoker will strugle more with going cold turkey than they would with cutting down one cigarette at a time, dieters must make a series of small but significant changes to achieve their ideal behavior.

Our last weight loss expert is dietician Megan Ware. She has her own healthy living and weight loss practice, Nutrition Awareness, in Dallas, Texas. Unsurprisingly, she is not advocating dieting either…

”Do diets really work? In one word: no. Fad diets only work in the short term. They are not for long term weight loss. Anyone can stick to a packaged diet for a few weeks but most people go back to their old eating habits once they get tired of dieting. For instance, if you want to start on the ‘cookie diet,’ you send away for a box of cookies and you’re supposed to eat one for breakfast, one for lunch, then a sensible dinner. Of course you are going to lose weight following that plan when you’re probably taking in less than 1000 calories per day. But who can say that they are going to eat a cookie for two meals a day for the rest of their lives? As soon as you go back to normal eating habits, the weight lost will come back, and it’s very likely that you would gain more because your metabolism has slowed from eating too few calories.

“What I have found to work the best is to meet my clients where they currently are and set either weekly or biweekly goals to move them towards the right direction. We touch base weekly to evaluate whether we can move forward and set new goals, or take a step back and figure out what’s not working. The only true changes that can be made are ones that can be maintained for life.”

So there we have it, four great weight loss tips from four industry experts. Just to recap:

- Listen to your body and eat mindfully. If you are full, you are full. Don’t eat the mindless calories that make us overweight.

- Use your willpower to stop food cravings.

- Make small changes and don’t add additional changes until the ones you made have stuck. Think small gradual changes rather than total lifestyle overhaul.

- And finally, set yourself goals. Use the small targets you want to achieve as your path to weight loss success.

Listen to your body, exercise and stay mentally focused on losing those extra pounds. You’ve heard it from the experts and now it is up to you!