The Positive Mind

This week Kevin and Niseema talk about research into "memory" and how our adult brains impose a memory on to our childhood brain. Statistics consistently show that the adult brain often creates a faulty "memory" of incidents that happened in the past. It's as if the brain takes a photograph of a past event and then distorts or enhances the photograph. The brain will often create a faulty memory of what love looked like in our childhood, and then project this onto future loe relationships. It can be the cause of immense, and unnecessary, suffering. It is this faulty memory that we project onto our future love relationships.

Everything and everyone changes. What is revealed when the green leaves of summer turn so many varied colors? Each tree, each leaf, has specific traits to it. What if love's essence is an ability to see through the personality of our partner, to what is a completely unique constellation of traits that make them who they are. Kevin and Niseema explore the concept that it is this essence that delights us and makes us fall in love. Join us this week as we help you identify the traits of your partner that hint at their essence, and to also reflect on what they might see in you.

Love is a feeling, not a Hallmark card or a box of chocolates. It is deeper and harder than that. Love is not unconditional, it needs the right conditions to be present, to be felt.

This week Kevin and Niseema talk about love and how it is the antidote to loneliness. In looking at the questions of the UCLA Loneliness Scale (linked below) it becomes clear that a lack of love, or the feeling of love, is at the core of why loneliness is so ubiquitous. In looking at love and the ways it shapes our experience of living, we hope to inspire a thoughtful process about the meaning and feeling of love for you.

In this final show on loneliness, Kevin and Niseema discuss the personality system called The Enneagram, and the nine different ways people hide their loneliness from themselves. What if all human beings could be understood as having one of nine personality styles? Knowing your own personality style might help you solve many problems in your life, including any loneliness you might have.

In this show, Kevin and Niseema talk about six of the nine styles and how they lead to a sense of isolation and loneliness. They also talk about ways to end your style of loneliness.

This week, Kevin and Niseema talk about ways to recognize and cultivate “Companionship” and “Belonging,” the two themes of the Loneliness Scale questions, (see button below.) Did your parents have companions or feel a sense of belonging in their community or social circle? If not, you may have a high tolerance for isolation and loneliness yourself. Birth order is also a factor: first-born children are often the parent/caregiver's companions while last-born children are often the loneliest, especially in a large family. Hoarding and addictions can be seen as "companions" too: though in reality, both are very isolating, cutting us off from the sense of belonging we crave. It is a paradox!

In the second half of the show Kevin and Niseema go through four steps that can help EASE your loneliness: Extend your boundaries, have Action plan, Select an activity, and Expect the best. By practicing these four simple steps anyone can move from a sense of isolation and loneliness to a place of companionship and a feeling of belonging.

In Part 2 of our series on loneliness, Kevin and Niseema talk about the idea of having a "high" or "low" tolerance for loneliness based on your family heritage or genetic makeup. When you look at your own background can you see whether or not you have a high or low tolerance for loneliness? Does this make it easier for you to talk about loneliness in a non-judgemental, less shameful way?

In the second part of the show, we talk about the physical effects of loneliness, and the wear and tear that it can take on both the heart and the immune system. John Caciopo in his book, "Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection," unveils his pioneering research on the startling effects of loneliness: a sense of isolation or social rejection disrupts not only your thinking abilities and willpower but also your immune system, and can be as damaging as obesity or smoking. His book demonstrates that, as individuals and as a society, we have everything to gain, and everything to lose, in how well or how poorly we manage our need for social bonds.

Tune in next week when we talk about ways of minimizing and "easing" a sense of loneliness.

This week Kevin and Niseema talk about that other pandemic, Loneliness. In the 1970's only 11% of Americans reported feeling lonely. That number has more than tripled to 36% of all Americans, including 61% of young adults and 51% of mothers with young children. More and more people are expressing their feelings about loneliness yet we still can't seem to find the language to talk about it.

How do you react when you hear someone say the words, "I am lonely?" Do you feel overwhelmed, burdened, that you must do something for the person? If you can learn to bear and sit with your own loneliness, you learn that you don't have to solve someone else's.

In the second half of the show, Kevin and Niseema do an exercise that makes talking about loneliness as routine as talking about the weather. Ending your loneliness can be as easy as telling somebody about it.

Children learn to navigate their surroundings with little guidance except for the voices and actions of the adults who are responsible for them. These words, feelings, and behaviors shape who they become for better or worse.

This Independence Day, join Kevin and Niseema as they explore steps outlined by Alice Miller, author of, "The Drama of the Gifted Child.” These steps help you discover your true nature, starting with your core "self" and working outwards. By identifying and learning to utilize these innermost traits, we give ourselves permission to be free!

This week Kevin and Niseema invite Charley Wininger LP, LMHC, author of Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA, back for his third appearance on the show to discuss why he calls MDMA, "The Chemical of Connection." Charley reads pivotal passages that describe the physical and emotional responses that MDMA creates, as well as its bonding effects in both his relationship with his spouse and some courageous couples who are exploring MDMA as an option.

Charley talks about a recent New York Times article that discusses FDA approval for the use of medical MDMA for treatments of PTSD, substance abuse, obsessive-compulsive disorder, phobias, eating disorders, depression, end-of-life anxiety and social anxiety in autistic adults. The FDA is currently in Phase 3 clinical trials that are expected to clear the way for legal use by 2023.

Do you find yourself being pulled in two directions at once? Do you have many feelings about one aspect or one situation in your life? Sometimes, when we have a number of feelings running through us at one time, it becomes hard to find our ground and difficult to make decisions. What you might be feeling is called ambivalence, feeling two things at once (Ambi meaning two, and valence meaning feeling), which is not necessarily a bad thing.

Culturally, we tend to admire the decisive, single-minded person who seems to know what they want and goes towards it. However, ambivalence awakens us to the complexity of being human, and the possibility for greater freedom and choice in our lives. Life is more than just pursuing goals; it is also about expanding ourselves by opening our senses to all the things we can feel.

When feeling too much becomes too much, a person can feel paralyzed and the single-minded goal pursuer can seem like a very attractive alternative. It does NOT have to be one or the other. Join Kevin O'Donoghue and Niseema Dyan Diemer as they explore how feelings of ambivalence play out in the context of relationships and current events.