Ignorance is not bliss

Let me first start with something I found rather interesting and somewhat quaint. When at the turn of the 1900 Century the highly radioactive element Radium was discovered by Marie Curie, the French public and the tabloid press were fascinated by it. Rather touchingly though no one had a clue what radioactivity really was assumed it must be wholesome and healthy. So all sorts of weird and wonderful uses for it began to hit the streets; Radium bath products, Radium eau de Cologne, Atomic perfume and Radium face cream that was supposed to enhance beauty through healthy skin. Here, perhaps Ignorance is truly bliss.

There are bumper stickers that claim, "Ignorance is NOT bliss" so it’s got to be asked; is ignorance really bliss? 

Thomas Gray’s “Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College” which was written in 1742, which introduces and concludes with the famed line “…where ignorance is bliss, ‘Tis folly to be wise.” This concept basically means that as long as one lacks knowledge, they are able to be carefree. Nostalgically reminisces about the bliss of youth with its carefree days of playfulness unmarred by the dark realities of adult life.  The poem reveals Gray's double perspective that not only is ignorance bliss but knowledge is misery.

So what of psychology and the apparent contrast?  It is a kind of splitting, in which we remember what we once had as better than it was and we relate to what we do have as worse than it is.  Is childhood really all that blissful?  And is adulthood really all that miserable?

Practicing Motivational Interviewing Requires Compassion

Motivational interviewing (MI) is a collaborative, goal-oriented method of communication with particular attention to the language of change.  It is intended to strengthen personal motivation for and commitment to a change goal by eliciting and exploring an individual’s own arguments for change.”  -- William Miller, Steve Rollnick, 2012

Miller & Rolling described MI as one style of helping others make changes in their behavior (I believe this has more recently been revised to include broader range of change than just behavior). It contrasts with the more typical directing helping style where the practitioner tries to install knowledge or motivation. It is similar to a guiding helping style where the practitioner collaborates with the client to explore and experiment with changes.

However, a practitioner who uses an MI style goes beyond just guiding when he or she tries to solicit from the client his or her desires and reasons for engaging in the health promoting behavior.

There are two aspects of MI that are significant and often overlooked. These are:

1. Responding to the client as a person who is competent rather than someone who needs to be rescued or is incapable of making welfare or health promoting decisions.

2. Compassion; motivational interviewing is not something one does to someone, does in order to get to some goal of the health care provider, or does as part of selling the client on something.  MI is intended to help the client and for the client.

It’s on compassion that I wanted to share the following. It may help to spend a few minutes reflecting upon your client as a person and less so about their problems.

1.         Close your eyes

2.         Think about someone you’re working with now

• Now think…              - she was once young too

• Think how…             - she once had dreams
• Think how…             - she had ups and downs in her life
• Think…                    - of her joys and happiness
• Think how…             - her successes must have felt
• Think how…             - she must have had pain & heartache
• Think of her…           - strengths
• Think…                     - she has faults

3.             Now ask yourself, is she really any different from you

Happiness is synthetic so why not harvest it

Jack Dikian

March 2012

We’ve always known that a being a positive person or a negative person is all about repetition – laying neural pathways in our otherwise plastic brains. There are also reward pathways which through diet and drug abuse can lead to addictions.

Not all major lottery winners are happy. In fact, according to the work of psychologists Brickman, Coates, and Janoff-Bulman(1) lottery winners didn't report themselves much happier than people in the general community who hadn’t won the lottery. And while paralysed victims showed to be less happy than people in the general community, the difference was not that big.

It turns out that what makes us happy, what motivates us, follows the philosophy of Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose. We do things for ourselves that help grow us and are important to us, we do things that we have to struggle with to improve ourselves, and we do things that make us part of a bigger world, and all of these three things have the capacity to make us happy or happier.

So winning the lottery in itself won’t make us happy, but if we use that money to do things that are important to us, that improve us day to day, and that make us part of a wider socially meaningful project it makes us happy.

1. Brickman, P., Coates, D., Janoff-Bulman, R,. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 36(8), Aug 1978, 917-927. Lottery winners and accident victims: Is happiness relative?

Brain-Body Integration

Jack Dikian

March 2012

Yesterday I attended a one-day course facilitated by Dr. Roy Sugarman in Sydney titled “The Brain For Allied Health Professionals”. And what a treasure trove of insights, learning, practical techniques, sprightly anecdotes and much wit.

Over the years I’ve attended numerous clinical psychology and neuropsychology courses, many of them, such as Louis Cozolino’s presentations excellent. However and unequivocally this is a standout. Sugarman explains the benefits of looking at brain-body integration - describing how the science of body and brain health has suffered from limitations such as (for example) body experts often neglecting brain function and vice versa even more so.

The one-day course is an intro to showing how the body and brain benefit in terms of increased resilience to stress and ageing when peak performance athlete training principles are applied to us mortals. Through his work with athletes performance in the USA and other populations groups requiring peak performance Sugarman has developed an integrated approach to treating brain conditions, such as traumatic brain injury, depression, anxiety and other mood disorders. Some of the elements he explores include:

• Objective assessment of brain speed, efficiency, and non-conscious bias

• Complex movement improving fitness, flexibility, sleep, relaxation, cognition etc;

• Nutritional hygiene, involving modification of food choice and preparation, without dieting or usurping role of the nutritionist;

• Improvement in interpersonal communication skills and effective social engagement;

• Clarity on motivational drivers based on non-conscious emotional bias assessment;

• Self-defense techniques guarding brain from everyday toxins, alcohol, and other threats to brain and body health;

• The Science of Positivity, heart rate variability and self-guided solutions that target the nervous system directly.

Below is a link to Dr Roy Sugarman’s website http://www.roysugarman.com