Sunday, July 4, 2010

The reason we"re here

A thought to share.....

She wrote................. I just finished taking an evening class at Stanford. The last lecture was on the mind-body connection--the relationship between stress and disease. The speaker (head of psychiatry at Stanford) said, among other things, that one of the best things that a man could do for his health is to be married to a woman whereas for a woman, one of the best things she could do for her health was to nurture her relationships with her girlfriends. At first everyone laughed, but he was serious.

Women connect with each other differently and provide support systems that help each other to deal with stress and difficult life experiences. Physically this "quality girlfriend time" helps us to create more serotonin--a neurotransmitter that helps combat depression and can create a general feeling of well being. Women share feelings whereas men often form relationships around activities. They rarely sit down with a buddy and talk about how they feel about certain things or how their personal lives are going. Jobs? Yes. Sports? Yes. Cars? Yes. Fishing, hunting, golf? Yes. But their feelings?--rarely. Women do it all the time. We share from our souls with our sisters, and evidently that is very good for our health. He said that spending time with a friend is just as important to our general health as jogging or working out at a gym.

There's a tendency to think that when we are "exercising" we are doing something good for our bodies, but when we are hanging out with friends, we are wasting our time and should be more productively engaged--not true. In fact, he said that failure to create and maintain quality personal relationships with other humans is as dangerous to our physical health as smoking! So every time you hang out to schmooze with a gal pal, just pat yourself on the back and congratulate yourself for doing something good for your health!


We are indeed very very lucky.

So let's toast to our friendship with the women in our lives. Evidently it's very good for our health!!

July 3, 2010 Arrival

It was an almost uneventful arrival except for a couple of Carolisms that will be remembered. Seeing her come out of the men's rooms at the Austin airport was very special. Of course, she had already done what she needed to do in the bathroom but never noticed that there were men there.
Carol calling another passenger on the plane "Kevorkian" , I'm sure made his day!

It is soo good to be home again after a year long absence. Who knows whats in store for us this week, but whatever it is you will be reading about it right here!!