If we could turn back the clock psychologically, could we also turn it back physically?
Ellen Langer’s 35 years of experiments have shown that mental attitudes can reverse some of the physical declines of old age.
The innovative research by this Harvard psychology professor has shown that people can heal themselves “if there is a psychological “prime” — something that triggers the body to take curative measures all by itself,” as the New York Times put it in a recent article.
The small number of elderly men who participated “became suppler, showed greater manual dexterity and sat taller — just as Langer had guessed.” Even at 80 years old, their hearing and sight improved.
That study, along with important works by other researchers, has shown Langer that “the magic lies in being aware of the ways we mindlessly react to cultural cues.”
In Counterclockwise, Langer describes ways to reorient our attitudes and language in order to achieve better health and points out the ways in which our belief in physical limits constrains us.
In one study, hotel maids who believed they did “no exercise” with their daily routines were educated to understand that their job provided specific health benefits. Later, when the housekeepers were given a follow-up exam, their physical bodies had markedly improved.
She has recently completed tests on diabetes patients that showed their glucose levels were influenced by mental cues.
Next, she wants to test her ‘mind-body unity theory’ on women with cancerous stage four tumors.
A 40-seat airport shuttle bus in Britain is making headlines for running on human sewage and food waste.
The Bath Bus Company’s Bio-Bus hits the road next week moving passengers between Bristol to Bath while cutting its emissions by 30 percent with the use of biomethane gas instead of diesel fuel.
The odorless gas is produced at a sewage treatment plant in Avonmouth run by GENeco, a subsidiary of Wessex Water, reports the BBC.
In the US, the Sanitation District of Los Angeles is converting its trucks to use biogas being processed as its landfills. It also sells the alternative fuel to anyone with a compressed natural gas vehicle in Carson and Puente Hills. Learn more about related services in California, from the California NGV Coalition.
“Honestly, if he had both hands, he might just be a typical good athlete,” said Riley Quinn’s father. “Not having that hand just made him work that much harder and made his passion burn that much deeper.”
Sports fed that passion and Quinn played all of them: kickball, football, basketball, baseball (as a pitcher), soccer, tennis and golf. The two-handed world obviously had an advantage, but soaking in such a notion would only prove poisonous.
“The idea that I am handicapped has never entered my mind,” Quinn, the straight-A student wrote on his college essay. “Instead, I use what others may call a physical disability as my driving force and motivation to excel at everything I do.”
The Bobby Bones Show, a nationally-syndicated radio morning show, has sparked a movement that reminds people to be joyful in honor of a co-host’s mother, who recently died of cancer.
Since her diagnosis two years ago, Amy’s mother, Judy, wanted to choose only joy, and fill her life with purpose. Especially with the reach of her daughter’s radio audience, she found that purpose, spreading joy to people everywhere.
With Judy as the inspiration, the country music radio hosts, who are musicians themselves, started a campaign called “Pimpin’ Joy.” Hundreds of thousands of listeners have been “pimpin’ joy” through random acts of kindness, good deeds and donations – all inspired by Judy. (Watch the delightful video below.)
”I’ve seen her make a choice to compliment strangers at the hospital because she feels like it will make a difference,” Amy said. “I mean, she talks to people in elevators. Nobody talks in elevators.”
After her mom died in October, Amy and Bobby Bones raised more than $150,000 in her honor and gave the check last week to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital in Memphis, where no child is denied treatment based on their family’s ability to pay.
After raising money for country music artist Jason Aldean’s favorite breast cancer cause, The Bobby Bones Show teamed up with him to perform a benefit concert for St. Jude which raised another $60K for the organization.
The radio show’s hosts also tour the nation performing benefit concerts for animal charities, with proceeds from these shows totaling $500,000, so far.
For Amy’s charity, 30 Abes, the Bobby Bones Show helped break the world record for number of hunger-relief meals packaged in one hour by gathering 2000 volunteers in the Nashville Auditorium last year, to feed children in Haiti.
(WATCH the delightful “Pimpin’ Joy video with Judy, below)
At a packed arena in Canada, where NHL hockey teams were set to battle on the ice, the Toronto Maple Leafs were hosting an American team from Nashville.
During the opening ceremony, the singer’s microphone failed during the US national anthem and the music suddenly stopped.
The Canadians, in a heartwarming moment, began singing the words, and cheered as they finished up the song.
“I’m sharing this story because I want Americans to know that Canadians love them,” writes JKC, who submitted the video to the Good News Network.
“Americans are like our older brother: sometimes we poke fun, and we don’t always have the same interests, but we would stand up for them in a heartbeat, and want their lives to be great.”
(WATCH the video above uploaded by ‘bagabus’ to YouTube)
A boy from Coventry, England has become the youngest Microsoft Certified Professional in the world after passing the exam when he was just five years old.
Ayan Qureshi’s father is an IT consultant who introduced his son to computers when he was three years old, reports the BBC. They boy played with old computers, so he could understand hard drives and motherboards.
“I found whatever I was telling him, the next day he’d remember everything I said, so I started to feed him more information,” he explained.
This is an amazing update to the October story about the magician who made headlines when he ripped up a homeless veteran’s sign and turned it into money — big money.
After he met the veteran, who always holds a SMILE sign to inspire passersby, Rob Anderson set up a fund so his fans on YouTube could donate to the smiling homeless vet. He raised $40,000, but the ever-humble Alan McCracken only wanted a portion of it, so he could move from Las Vegas to California, where, according to Rob, his is now living happily.
What should he do with the leftover funds? He surprised a Navy vet who was suffering with some health issues, lost his job, and was having trouble paying rent and providing food for his family of four.
The beautiful family of Gulf War veteran Johnny Hicks was presented with rent for one year, money for food, furniture and new car, thanks to the humble Alan McCracken and generous strangers who donated to a veteran in need.
It all started with an idea to throw the greatest Halloween Party ever. But it would become an opportunity to give back in a big way.
Two months before the holiday, Katrina and I began working tirelessly to turn our home into the coolest, most frightening Halloween-themed house in the entire neighborhood.
While we succeeded in drawing a large crowd and creating memorable moments, we also were able to transform the fun event into a benefit that would feed the hungry.
So what we did we do? We decided to collect money from our guests, friends and family, and social networks, to contribute to a local food bank.
By the time the party had come and gone, Katrina and I were able to raise more than $600 that went toward the purchase of 400 lbs of frozen turkey, and 10 lbs of ground coffee.
The moral of this experience is simple; there doesn’t need to be a reason to give back. What started as a reason to get friends and family together, turned into an opportunity to raise money for a greater cause, an organization in need.
So how will you give back in the biggest or smallest of ways, especially as the Holiday Season rapidly approaches?
Restauranteur John Baumgarten will serve free homemade soup on Thanksgiving day and Christmas day in his Palmetto, Florida dining room, Caribbean Chicken.
“I’m doing it because I know what its like to be alone with nothing on the Holidays,” he said on Facebook. “I still have very little but I’m willing to share all I have with those who could use it.”
When he told customers John and Alice yesterday about his desire to help others on the holidays, they offered to volunteer with their kids, assisting the chef in dishing out soup.
His Ox Tail and Black Bean soup with ham, chorizo, and bacon is a slow-cooked Jamaican specialty. And, he’s already starting cooking it.
“I feel this would be better than handing out gifts,” he told us. “Free tea and coffee also for anyone who has no other place to go.”
“If you’re in the area and don’t have any place to go those days, stop in. We have TV and comfortable seats so you can relax, and let the soup carry you away.”
Visit the Caribbean Chicken Facebook page or stop by his restaurant located at 814 8th Ave. W in Palmetto.
Beginning next year, New Yorkers may be able to find a wi-fi hotspot on any corner. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced plans to replace the city’s pay phone booths with 10,000 new wi-fi kiosks that can connect 250 devices to the internet simultaneously.
The kiosks will also have keypads to make calls on, charging stations and tablets with connecting speeds 20 times faster than the average home.
The project aims to provide low-income residents in all five boroughs with more opportunities to go online.
Country singer-musician Garth Brooks and his wife Trisha Yearwood made a special dream come true in October for a girl with spina bifida. Before a concert they spent one-on-one time with Nicole Small, who calls Brooks her “life long idol”.
“I was so surprised about how long I was allowed to spend with him,” she wrote on SharedAbilities.com. “I just thought it would be something along the lines of saying hi, getting a picture and maybe an autograph.”
”Yes, all of those took place, but on a personal level! He really got to know me and I shared with him my two favorite songs that are sung by him.”
Halfway through the show, the singer announced, “This next song is for a powerful girl named Nicole,” and sang one of her favorite songs, Outside the Fire.
“I couldn’t stop crying for the entire length of the song,” she recalled
A UK conservationist who raised a pair of Western lowland gorillas in Kent, England went looking for them eleven years after they were reintroduced into the wild of Gabon, West Africa. He wondered if the pair would recognize him or his daughter, Tansy, who was just a child when she last played with the animals.
For the past 15 years the Aspinall foundation has been reintroducing captive gorillas back into the wild on their million acres of jungle in West Africa. But would these now-wild gorillas recognize Damian Aspinall or the girl who had grown up?
Damian and Tansy were thrilled when, after many hours of calling out to Djalta and Bimms from a boat on the river, they both appeared and clearly did recognize them.
A video shows the pair fondly greeting their human friends and being especially gentle with the woman in their midst.
“It was fantastic to see the greeting I got,” says Damian, who runs Howletts Wild Animal Park near Canterbury. “I felt such love from them.”
“When it was time to leave, they held onto Tansy and you could see they didn’t want her to go.”
(WATCH the video below – Learn More about the Aspinall Foundation)
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer launched a push Wendseday to reinstate an expired tax break that helps teachers deduct out-of-pocket classroom costs from their taxes. The Teacher Expense Deduction, would enable teachers across the United States to deduct up to $250 per year from their tax bill.
The New York senator said that this deduction is vital to help offset the $485 on average that teachers in his state spend each year to provide additional supplies for their students. The tax benefit went into effect in 2002, but expired in 2013.
Schumer said Congress is currently considering a package of provisions to reinstate and extend this and other tax benefits. Schumer said that passing the Teacher Expense Deduction must be a priority before December, because, if passed, it would apply to last year, helping teachers recoup costs retroactively, and it would extend the provision to 2015. All teachers could take advantage of it regardless of whether they itemize their deductions or take the standard deduction.
“Our teachers and school administrators have the incredibly important task of educating our children and providing them with the knowledge they need to be successful. But all too often, due to a lack of sufficient resources, our educators are forced to dig into their own pockets to purchase the supplies our kids need to learn and succeed,” said Schumer. “We can give an apple to those teachers this holiday season by making these out-of-pocket investments in their classrooms tax deductible.”
Schumer explained that the Teacher Expense Deduction allows eligible educators, including teachers, instructors, counselors, principals, and aides, to deduct up to $250 each year from their tax bill for any unreimbursed expense incurred for books, supplies, computer equipment (including related software and services), and other equipment, as well as supplementary materials used in the classroom. Schumer said that this applies to educators from grades K-12 who work at least 900 hours per school year. According to the National School Supply and Equipment Association, teachers spend on average $485 out of pocket on additional supplies for their students.
The package Congress is currently considering is called the EXPIRE Act and has received bipartisan approval in the Senate Finance Committee, but has not yet received a vote in the Senate.
Pen Farthing, who founded a nonprofit that reunites soldiers at home with stray dogs and cats they cared for during combat, has been named the 2014 CNN Hero of the Year.
“There is no stronger bond between man and dog than that formed during war,” Farthing said at the CNN Heroes All-Star Tribute gala, set to air on the network December 7.
Farthing was awarded $100,000 to support the cause he started after experiencing difficulties trying to bring his dog back to England from Afghanistan, where the two formed an unbreakable bond.
“Speaking from my own experience,” Farthing, 45, said, “I know that the dog I looked after was my saving grace from the stress of conflict.”
(WATCH the video below or READ the story at CNN Heroes – *NOTE auto-playing audio)
A deluge of love and compassion has reached a 54-year-old homeless man who had the courage to put into action the Christian tenet, “Ask, and it is given.”
Neal Shytles posted an ad on the Facebook pages of local television stations around his hometown of Virginia Beach asking for someone to invite him for Thanksgiving dinner.
I was very alone last Thanksgiving and really would not like to go throughout that this Thanksgiving… PLEASE, if you have room in your home and in your heart to share your Thanksgiving, I not only (would) be thankful, but would also consider myself blessed to spend this time with you.
Shytles has lived in the Norfolk, Virginia Union Mission shelter for a year. He pays a small amount of rent from his monthly social security check, according to WTKR-News Channel 3, who interviewed him on Tuesday about the ad.
Even before Channel 3 aired the full report Tuesday evening, he began receiving offers from viewers volunteering to adopt him for the day.
The very first call he got came from a young military family, The McLemores from Newport News, 30 miles away. They offered to pick him up, and said another military couple with children would also be coming, fulfilling his wish for a “family atmosphere” at the table.
“The girl is a sweetheart,” he said of Ashley McLemore, who called the mission and spoke with Neal Tuesday morning. “I’ve been so blessed. I love the people here at the Christian mission, but I just wanted a home to go to.”
Both the mission and the television station were flooded with calls following the story that aired later that day.
Invitations Flooded In
“I’d like to donate a turkey and corn and potatoes to whoever takes him in, wrote Tanner Doerr on WTKR’s Facebook page.
Shay Shannon Blankenship from Chesterfield, VA, wrote, “For the wonderful man that wants family for the holidays: I’m in Chesterfield, and I’m willing to pick him up on Wednesday and he can hang out for thanksgiving with my family for a day or two. And then I will return him to where he stays. How do I reach him?”
“I want to send him a Christmas package,” commented Joe Walls.
A television station in Ohio said they would send a care package, and had set up a fund for him that people were already donating to.
Neal is trying to take it all in stride, but told the Good News Network, “I cried all day yesterday. I’m a big guy, but then the reporters were reading all the letters to me that they’d gotten.”
“Sometimes you don’t see the hearts of people until something like this happens,” he said after a long pause. “People do have big hearts.”
The New Face of Homelessness?
Self-portrait by Neil Shytles
In a sense Neal has become the new face of homelessness for the many thousands of people around the country who have seen his story. He received a lot of offers from Wisconsin. A man in Sioux Falls, South Dakota offered to fly in Neal for the holiday and a family in Arkansas who owns a trucking company even offered to have their truckers pick him up and bring him back again. But, Neal, who has not traveled outside of his state except to DC, said he was already committed to the McLemores. “Maybe Christmas!” they responded.
The former taxi cab driver hopes he can get some of the other guys from the mission placed with a family. “I know they are responsible and they would like to have a family atmosphere, too.”
“Last night, Paul, who works here but is also homeless, said, ‘Oh my gosh, that is such a good idea. I wish I would have thought of it.'”
Perhaps Neal’s story has planted seeds for the future, like when Kimberly Kelly posted on Facebook, “I’m starting a program called Home for the Holiday in the Charlottesville area to help others get adopted! I would love this program to spread.”
As often happens when stories of homeless people go nation, two of Neal’s relatives contacted him.
“My cousin saw it in south carolina, and they got kinda mad because I never told them my situation. they saw it and said, ‘Why didn’t you tell us about what was going on?’ It was really important to me that someone who is actually family, showed me they cared. They were really upset. They asked me if I needed anything.”
“I texted my best friend who lives in Detroit, telling him about the media reports. He said, ‘See, people do want to help. All you have to do is ask.'”
(WATCH the follow-up video featuring the McLemores below)
Growing up in 13 different foster homes and the pain of physical and sexual abuse left Tina Thomas feeling empty and incomplete. But Tina is a survivor and no longer can be defined by her past.
Fate intervened in her teen years when, despite never having broken the law, she was assigned a probation officer, Mary Beth Ryan. That summer, Ryan asked Tina to be a peer mentor at a special camp for abused girls. It changed her life forever.
“That weekend was the first time I felt needed, and that I belonged,” she told Talking Good, a website that profiles people who make a difference in their communities. “It is also when I realized that I wanted to make an impact on people’s lives.”
In 1999, two weeks after graduating high school, Tina enlisted in the Marines. She served for four years, stationed in Camp Pendleton, just off the Pacific Coast in southern California. Military service not only allowed Tina to grow as an individual and a professional, but it provided her with a sense of belonging, something she yearned for as a child.
Now 34-years-old, she wants people to know that no person should be defined by their past: “If I’m a victim of sexual trauma and foster care, the statistics say I’m supposed to be a certain way. But I’m me … I’m not a number.”
Tina with daughter, Arianna
In 2013, Tina moved to Washington, DC, along with her 11-year-old daughter Arianna. She works at the Federal Aviation Administration, but continues to serve her community as a volunteer, often alongside her daughter. She also joined The Mission Continues’ DC, a service group for veterans that tackles malnutrition and obesity in the nation’s capital. “All of this service work provides me with structure and growth. It keeps me motivated and gets me out there so that I can continue to make a difference.”
Last week, The Meredith Vieira Show chose to honor Tina for her service, with a touching video, and a surprise check for $10,000. Watch the video below…
New data shows that beginning in early 2014, Greece’s economy began emerging from its deep recession, expanding for the first time in five years and confirming predictions the country has left the worst of its economic crisis behind.
Leo Moody was driving home from work on a rural Maine road Monday night when he spotted an SUV submerged upside-down in shallow water and a frantic woman inside.
She told him her baby was trapped in the backseat.
Luckily he carries a knife with him for peeling apples or whittling wood, he told the Associated Press.
The 44-year-old logger dove into the frigid water and later recalled that he couldn’t feel his frozen hands as he sawed at the car-seat straps with a knife.
“I kept telling myself, ‘Don’t drop the knife.’”
After that ordeal he used CPR skills that he’d recently reviewed to revive the baby.
In one study, hotel maids who believed they did “no exercise” with their daily routines were educated to understand that their job provided specific health benefits. Later, when the housekeepers were given a follow-up exam, their physical bodies had markedly improved.
