carnival of healing #143

a herb gardenit’s been a year since i last hosted a carnival of healing, so it’s great to come back to this. as usual, there were many submissions. so this is a rather long post. i’ve categorized them to make it a bit easier to read.

personal development and spirituality
spiritual healing: 50+ podcasts to find wellness within: what a large connection of podcasts! as you can imagine, i immediately went to the buddhist section but unfortunately couldn’t find anything there that either appealed to me or that worked with my tired old laptop. but then i looked at the other links and went to susan gregg’s podcast and listened to episode 27, and that really spoke to me. technically well done, no long-winded introductions, a pleasant voice – and intelligence! she talks about toltec wisdom there, about domination, right vs. wrong, judgment, resistance – interesting topics! she also mentions one of my favourite stories, the story of the two hungry wolves. which wolf do you want to feed? the one who feeds on desperation and envy or the one who feeds on love and generosity?

shirley from fun spirit offers 10 great ways to do absolutely nothing. yup, that’s the kind of stuff i like, for example:

get rid of your to-do list, your never-ending chores, and say no to today’s social events. dispose of the “have-to’s” and give yourself permission to enjoy the process. take a deep breath and smile.

next, my blogging friend astrid, who also lives in our beautiful city of vancouver asks
is there a latent talent you wish to use, .. some day ?

is there something else that you’d rather do, but you doubt whether you could make any money with it, or even: whether you would be ‘good enough’ for it? today, i want to encourage you to consider letting the world know what you actually do

chris edgar, on his post transcending your boundaries contributes this:

i believe many of our fears stem from a misperception of ourselves as small and weak. we see ourselves as too fragile to deal with possible setbacks in our jobs, confrontations in our relationships, and so on. in my experience, one way to overcome this sense of frailty is to feel, on a physical level, the fact that you are much greater and stronger than you may think you are. in fact, as the exercise i’ll describe helps you see, in your essence you have no boundaries, and no problem arising in your life can truly harm you.

avani-mehta has this take on motivation

can you really afford to leave it to motivation? do you have the luxury to leave what you want to chance? is what you want so trivial for you that you are in a way telling yourself – “let’s see … if i get motivated enough, i will work on this. and hopefully get what i want”.fact is, if you want something, then you simply have to go for it and work for it. like it or not. are motivated or not. nothing really matters. because truth is, you really don’t have a choice. you want something, you have to take actions which lead you to that. we make a mistake of seeing choices when there are none.

finally, praveen gifts us with one of his lovely little tidbits: peanuts zen: linus explains resetting to charlie brown.

holistic health
once more, the nursing people have gathered a huge amount of resources, this time on holistic health, for example an interesting article on therapeutic landscaping

interestingly, a novel, but strong selling points for healing gardens is that they help hospitals attract and keep nurses. there is a serious nursing shortage in north america. roger ulrich has reported on studies showing reduced staff turnover in hospitals with healing gardens.

william peeters informs us about a study that seems to discredit herbal remedies

it is very common that studies done on natural medicine seem to be designed with an end result in mind, which shows herbs and nutrients in a negative light. more often than not you will find a study designed using very low dosages of a nutrient, a synthetic form of a nutrient, using the incorrect part of a herb (e.g. the flowers when the root is the part that contains active ingredients), or as in this study, a completely inactive form of the herb was used.

similarly, on brainblogger, some thoughts on research on the mind-body connection

have you ever tried to find proof that mind-body treatments work? there are far too many articles that end like this: “more trials are needed,” or “future research… must be more rigorous in the design and execution of studies and in the analysis and reporting of results;” is there any real proof at all?

stress
beth at the virtual teahouse talks about … callie ann’s scalp:

callie, while she encounters stressful situations in her life, basically carries none of that stress with her. and is that why she’s so loving? or is the reason that she has no stress because she is so loving? i have no real insight into this…other than that, for the most part, callie takes each day as it comes, looks forward to it and finds reasons to laugh and be mischievous all the time. i like being around her!

more contributions on the topic of stress are

communication
anna from widow’s quest has a lovely little post on the blogging community around us: world’s apart, world’s together

blogging and indeed having all your wonderful comments, really shows me that no matter what culture, how the grief has occurred – the feeling of loss is the same worldwide. blogging has been a great comfort to me to know that i am not alone, that i am not daft because at times i haven’t coped very well.

chandra unplugged’s post about communication talks about a different topic

there is nothing worse than hearing the same old story over and over again, and yet most of us have no trouble repeating our story. for some reason, we think our tale of woe is different and proceed to share the intimate details with all who will listen. we are oblivious to the blank stares and veiled yawns, and talk long after all interest has waned.

and also …
i’d also like to thank the bloggers who submitted these posts:

if you haven’t had a chance yet to read last week’s carnival, it was at libido and health. next week’s carnival will be at chinese medicine notes. if you have an article you’d like to submit, please use this form!

(image of herb garden by by JL2003)

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *