According to a Psychology Today "Diagnosis Dictionary" entry, more children suffer from neglect in the U.S. than from physical and sexual abuse combined.

During 2005, 62.8 percent of victims experienced neglect, 16.6 percent were physically abused, 9.3 percent were sexually abused, 7.1 percent were emotionally or psychologically maltreated, and 2.0 percent were medically neglected.

Unlike child sexual abuse, where girls are more likely to be victims (based on reporting - there might be more "equality" here than statistics indicate), neglect is equal opportunity, with only a slight difference (2003) between girls (50.7%) and boys (47.3%) - it's unclear where the other 2% fall. Another study (2001) found boys accounting for 48.6 percent and girls accounting for 51.1 percent.

We have known for quite some time that neglect has serious impacts on brain development. Rene Spitz showed the effects of neglect on infant attachment in his foundling home studies. Spitz (1945) compared 61 infants living in a foundling home to 69 infants living in a nursery. The foundling home contained children given up by un-wed mothers whereas the nursery contained children of delinquent girls.

In the foundling homes there was very little to no interaction with adults, few things with which to play, and most of the infants' time is spent in cribs with extremely limited visual stimulation. In the nursery, however, infants were cared for by mothers or foster mothers, they were given toys, and the cribs allowed for visual stimulation. Spitz found that the Developmental Quotient for foundling home babies was averaged at 72, while for the nursery babies the Developmental Quotient was averaged at 105.

More recent research, with the aid of brain imaging, reveals that - among other issues - the mass of the corpus callosum was reduced by 15%–18% (Teicher, et al, 2004) in neglected children. I am particularly interested, however, in how neglect (or the corresponding inflammation from the stress response) impacts myelination.


This article is from Wired Science in 2012, but it remains relevant and informative. The original article is here:

Full Citation:  
Makinodan, M, Rosen, KM, Ito, S, and Corfas, G. (2012, Sep 14). A Critical Period for Social Experience–Dependent Oligodendrocyte Maturation and Myelination. Science, Vol. 337 No. 6090.

How Childhood Neglect Stunts the Brain

By Brandon Keim
09.13.12 | Wired Science


Photo: D. Sharon Pruitt/Flickr

Science is painting a dramatic picture of how childhood neglect damages developing brains, so stunting them that neglect might be likened to physically violent abuse.

The latest addition to this research narrative comes from a study of mice placed in isolation early in their lives, an experiment that, on its surface, might seem redundant: After all, we already know that neglect is bad for humans, much less mice.

But they key to the study is in the details. The researchers found striking abnormalities in tissues that transmit electrical messages across the brain, suggesting a specific mechanism for some of the dysfunctions seen in neglected human children.

“This is very strong evidence that changes in myelin cause some of the behavioral problems caused by isolation,” said neurologist Gabriel Corfas of Harvard Medical School, a co-author of the new study, released Sept. 13 in Science.

Corfas and his team, led by fellow Harvard Med neuroscientist Manabu Makinodan, put 21-day-old mice in isolation for two weeks, then returned them to their colonies. When the mice reached adolescence, the researchers compared their brains and behavior to mice who hadn’t been isolated.

The isolated mice were antisocial, with striking deficits in memory. Their myelin, a cell layer that forms around neuronal networks like insulation around wires, was unusually thin, especially in the prefrontal cortex, a brain region central to cognition and personality.

'The first years of life are crucially important for brain architecture.'Similar patterns of behavior have been seen, again and again, in children raised in orphanages or neglected by parents, as have changes to a variety of brain regions, including the prefrontal cortex. The myelin deficiencies identified by Corfas and Makinodan may underlie these defects.

“This is incredibly important data, because it gives us the neural mechanisms associated with the deleterious changes in the brain” that arise from neglect, said Nathan Fox, a cognitive neuroscientist at the University of Maryland.

Fox was not involved in the new study, but is part of a research group working on a long-term study of childhood neglect that is scientifically striking and poignantly tragic. Led by Harvard Medical School pediatricians Charles Nelson and Margaret Sheridan, the project has tracked for the last 12 years children who started their lives in an orphanage in Bucharest, Romania, a country infamous for the spartan, impersonal conditions of its orphanages.

Among children who spent their first two years in the orphanage, the researchers observed high levels developmental problems, cognitive deficits, mental illness, and significant reductions in brain size. When the researchers measured the sheer amount of electrical activity generated by the brains of children who’d been isolated as toddlers, “it was like you’d had a rheostat, a dimmer, and dimmed down the amount of energy in these institutionalized children,” said Fox.

These problems persisted even when toddlers were later adopted, suggesting a crucial importance for those early years in setting a life’s neurological trajectory. “There’s a sensitive period for which, if a child is taken out of an institution, the effects appear to be remediated, and after which remediation is very, very difficult,” Fox said. The same pattern was observed in Corfas and Makinodan’s mice.

One phenomenon not studied in the mice, but regularly found in people neglected as children, are problems with stress: mood disorders, anxiety, and general dysfunction in a body’s stress responses.

Controlled for gender and age, average white matter volumes in the brains of children who grew up in a Romanian orphanage (left), started in an orphange but were placed in foster care (center), or never lived in an orphanage at all (right). Image: Sheridan et al./PNAS

Those mechanisms have been studied in another animal, the rhesus monkey. While deprivation studies on non-human primates — and in particular chimpanzees — are controversial, the results from the monkey studies have been instructive.

Early-life isolation sets off a flood of hormones that permanently warp their responses to stress, leaving them anxious and prone to violent swings in mood.

Isolation is so damaging because humans, especially as infants, literally depend on social stimulation to shape their minds, said psychologist John Cacioppo of the University of Chicago.

“Human social processes were once thought to have been incidental to learning and cognition,” Cacioppo wrote in an e-mail. “However, we now think that the complexities and demands of social species have contributed to the evolution of the brain and nervous system and to various aspects of cognition.”

Corfas and Makinodan’s team linked specific genetic changes to the abnormalities in their mice, and hope they might someday inform the development of drugs that can help reverse isolation’s effects.

A more immediate implication of the research is social. As evidence of neglect’s severe, long-term consequences accumulates, it could shape the way people think not just of orphanages, but policy matters like maternity and paternity leave, or the work requirements of single parents on welfare.

“What this work certainly says is that the first years of life are crucially important for brain architecture,” Fox said. “Infants and young children have to grow up in an environment of social relationships, and experiencing those is critical for healthy cognitive, social and psychological development. As a society, we should be figuring out how to encourage all that to happen.”

Did Anyone Really Expect the Star of "Duck Dynasty" to Be a Liberal Regarding Same-Sex Couples?

Honestly, I had never even heard of Duck Dynasty until last week when someone gave a DVD of the show as a White Elephant gift where I work. Then, the very next day, all hell breaks loose because the redneck star of the show, Phil Robertson, who is vocally pro-God and pro-guns, said in an interview with GQ that he thinks same-sex couples are sinful and might lead to beastiality (he made the implication there without stating directly what he meant: "Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there").

Was anyone, other the execs at A&E, surprised he felt this way? 

The man is living in a very traditional, nearly pre-modern world, so of course he holds traditionally conservative positions in line with his fundamentalist faith. Robertson is pro-God and pro-guns, as well as harboring a dislike for modern technology (he proudly admits that he does not own a cellphone or a computer).

The people at Duck Dynasty and A&E surely knew his beliefs when they created the show four seasons ago, before it became the most watched non-fiction television show in cable history. Still, on December 18, 2013, A&E announced that it was suspending Phil Robertson from the show indefinitely due to comments he made in the GQ interview.

Seriously?

What happened to freedom of speech? 

There is actually an opportunity here to have a real national conversation on values and beliefs, but A&E has crushed it by censoring their star and distancing themselves from him and his beliefs.

Why couldn't A&E just make the usual disclaimers, "the views and opinions of Phil Robertson do not reflect the views and opinions of A&E or its staff." Done. THEN we could have a discussion on why people who live in the south tend to be so much more socially conservative than the coastal states. Or we could be discussing the Political Correctness Police who seem intolerant of those who are not liberal progressives.

As Larry Alex Taunton stated in The Atlantic:

Tolerance is not the same thing as acceptance, and acceptance is not the same thing as an endorsement. The message A&E’s decision sends is that there is zero tolerance on television for Christians who are conscientious objectors to homosexuality. More than that, it implicitly suggests that the campaign for tolerance has advanced to a campaign to pressure 45 percent of Americans to recant their beliefs and endorse a lifestyle to which they are opposed, conscience be damned.

We stand at a crossroads. The country must decide. Is the endgame here to be that orthodox Christians will henceforth have no voice within their own culture? If so, does this mean we have become a nation of bullies, forcing conformity while calling it tolerance?

I agree with these sentiments. While I think Robertson's beliefs are archaic and promote inequality, I fully defend his right to believe and say what he feels in his heart.

When we begin trying to force everyone to believe the same things, we are entering into a kind tyranny.

9 Tricks for Consistent Workouts by Charles Staley

This is a nice new article from Charles Staley writing at T-Nation on how to become more consistent in our workouts. Hint: do not focus on outcomes - focus on behaviors.

9 Tricks for Consistent Workouts

by Charles Staley
12/19/13 

Here's what you need to know...

• Consistency is the most critical parameter to training success.
• You can dramatically improve your training consistency by imposing accountability, better internal decision-making, and flexible programming strategies.
• More often than not, it's not about discipline, it's about creating an optimal environment for success.

Consistency is the "true north" indicator of any successful athletes. All forms of learning and personal development depend on regular repetition, and resistance training is no exception. Even the world's most perfect program – if there were such a thing – would utterly fail without sufficient consistency. Likewise, consistent application to a sub-par program will deliver the results in spades.

This makes great training consistency a secret weapon that helps you level the playing field between you and your more gifted peers. In fact, it's the best kind of secret there is – it's so obvious that no one pays attention to it.

One reason consistency can take such a beating is that when shit happens, workouts are typically one of the first activities to be sacrificed. The big lie you'll tell yourself is, "Well, my training won't suffer if I just miss this one workout." And as lies go, this is a great one, because it's completely true. The problem, of course, is it probably won't only happen once, and after a while, the lie becomes a crutch.

Fortunately it doesn't ever need to come to that. Here are nine very powerful strategies that will make you as consistent as clockwork. All these "hacks" are just ways of managing both your external and internal climate so that instead of feeling like you're always having to push yourself, you'll find yourself "pulled" toward making the best decisions on a regular basis.

I've placed these nine strategies into three different categories, based upon their mechanism of action. The first category features three hacks that are all fueled by accountability. The three tips in the second category involve upgrading your internal climate. Finally, the third category highlights three ways that you can tweak your programming for maximum adherence.

1: Be Accountable to an External Influence

Be Accountable to a Program

There's no shortage of solid programs at T Nation. Before worrying about which program is best, just start doing one. Chances are, no matter which one you pick, doing it consistently will work dramatically better than doing what you're doing now with no consistency.

The beauty in doing a training program (as opposed to training "instinctively") is that you're accountable to its pre-formatted schedule. If the program calls for you to squat on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, then on Thursday night you know what you'll be doing tomorrow.

Programs – even the worst ones – make demands on you. "Instinctive training" doesn't.

Be Accountable to a Training Partner or Coach

If you're already accountable to a training program, adding this next component will improve your consistency even more.

One of the main reasons people hire coaches is to keep them accountable. And one of the main reasons people don't hire coaches is that they think they don't need one. Which is the better group to be associated with? Looking back at my training journal, I see that I've completed 186 workouts so far this year, and I'm 54 years old. How about you?

Incidentally, coaches and training partners can be on site or remote. Sure, face-to-face interaction is ideal, but if we're mostly focused on accountability, remote support works just fine.
 
Be Accountable to a Competition Date

I've written about the value of competing many times and will no doubt write about it many more times. Chances are, most of the lifters you admire are competitive athletes; otherwise you'd never know who they were in the first place. So why not you?

Perhaps you don't think you're good enough? You may be right of course, and assuming that's true, I have a secret for you – competing is how you get good enough.

Personally, with many competitions under my belt, I'm still not quite good enough, but I'm still getting better, which is really all I ever wanted anyway.

2: Optimize Your Internal Software

Act As If

Even if you're accountable to a program, a coach, or both, you might still find yourself struggling to get your ass to the gym on occasion. Here's how to fix that.

You'll get up out of bed and make breakfast. Then you'll take a shower and put your gym clothes on. Next, you'll walk out to the car, start it up, and head toward the gym. You still may have no intention of training, and that's fine. You'll park the car, walk into the gym, and....

Chances are, at this point, you'll probably do something resembling a workout, right? If not, my guess is that you skipped the workout for a good reason, not a shitty one.
 
Cut Yourself Some Slack

Look, even half-ass workouts are far better than skipping them altogether, so don't be so absolutist in your thinking. It's inevitable that about a third of your workouts will pretty much suck. Another third will be okay, and the remaining third will be Facebook worthy.

Again, our goal is consistency, not necessarily gym heroism. Your goal is to show up and do what you can. That way, you give success a fighting chance.

Base Goals Around Behaviors, Not Outcomes

This is simple but game changing. It's based on control. More specifically, control what you can, and don't sweat the rest. Outcomes are multi-factorial, and therefore, often beyond your attempts to control them.

Behaviors, on the other hand, are largely within your control. So what you must do is identify behaviors that will likely lead to desired outcomes, and then frame your goals around these behaviors.

Some examples might be to complete at least 16 workouts next month, while eating at least 200 grams of protein every day. Anyone can do both of those things, and if you do, chances are you'll be closer to your goals in 30 days.

Other examples might be hiring a coach, drinking enough fluids, improving your sleep, and signing up for a competition. The key is to find your poorest habit patterns and then replace them with more productive ones.

3: Encourage Consistency 

 

Use Complementary Training

Are you busting your ass trying to be good at something, when the truth is, you might be far more capable in a different but related discipline?

The iron world is full of bodybuilders who would be much better powerlifters and strongmen who would be much better Olympic lifters. And there are lots of people who are just "recreational lifters" who could be great at one of the competitive lifting sports.

There are lots of lesser-known strength and power sports that you may not be aware of – kettlebell sport and Highland games competitions are just two examples. I'm going to do something called the Tactical Strength Challenge in April. There are also odd lift competitions, breaking competitions in the martial arts, and arm wrestling events.

The point is, if you're struggling at something that's not panning out for you despite your best efforts, it might be that your ladder is up against the wrong wall. Keep your options open and keep exploring until you discover your greatness.

Employ a Semi-Flexible Training Schedule

It's important to have a schedule but it should ideally be a flexible one. My scheduled training sessions are Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays. Mondays and Fridays are upper body sessions while Wednesdays and Sundays are lower body sessions.

Using this type of arrangement, I have some options. Monday's session can be done on Tuesday without negatively affecting the program whatsoever. The same goes for the Wednesday session, which can be done on Thursday without any negative repercussions.

Also, if you find yourself in a crunch where you know you'll miss a workout, find a creative solution. Perhaps you can tack the most important exercise of the session you'll miss to a neighboring workout instead of skipping the session altogether?

Use Compulsory/Optional Exercise Categories

This final strategy is something I've used successfully for years. If you have a long exercise menu for a given workout, you'll dread the prospect of doing it, which will make you more prone to skip it altogether. What we really need is a challenging but friendly workout.

The way to do this is to have both compulsory and optional exercises in each workout. An upper body session might look like this:

Compulsory

Bench Press 5 x 2
Pull-up 3 x 8
Barbell Shrug 4 x 6
 
Optional

EZ Bar Curl 3 x 10
Lying Dumbbell Triceps Extension 3 x 10

Here, all you've got on your mind is completing the compulsory exercises. Once you've finished with those, you can make a decision about the optional drills. In my experience, more often than not, you'll do those too. It's just a simple little mind trick, but little things add up fast in this game.

It's Not About Discipline!

The nine strategies really aren't about discipline – they're ways to stay on track when discipline inevitably wanes. Most importantly, they're all methods of optimizing our environment and our habits so that we have the best chance of success.

If you've got a few tricks I haven't thought of, please share them.

Jim Palmer - Living with Your Heart Flung Wide Open

This is a nice quote from Jim Palmer's new book, Notes from (Over) the Edge: Unmasking the Truth to End Your Suffering.

Living with your heart flung wide open

December 19, 2013

“Jesus came to awaken our heart. Religion too often makes God about rules and rituals, duties and doctrines. It defines our holiness by our allegiance and compliance to the organization, tradition, and system. Over and against religion, Jesus showed up and calls for an awakening of the heart. Jesus invited all people to allow themselves to be loved by God – to open our hearts and know that we are lovable… ever last single one of us. Jesus said look at me and see what God is like, and then he knelt in the dirt to rescue a woman who had been written off by religion. Jesus taught us that love is not an idea. It’s something you feel in your heart, and then you bring expression to it through your humanity. The truth is not a sterile and indifferent philosophy, or a theological creed. Jesus said, “I am the truth,” and then he lived a life of love. He flung his heart wide open to God and the world.”

- Jim Palmer, Notes from (Over) the Edge: Unmasking the Truth to End Your Suffering

The Meaning of Masculinity - How Three 2013 Films Depict Masculinity in a Time of Societal Flux

Via The Washington Free Beacon (a seriously right wing paper - sorry about that), this article reviews three films from 2013 in terms of what they reveal about masculinity in a time when it's in flux, both for individual men and for the society as a whole. I haven't seen any of these, but they all sound interesting.

The Meaning of Masculinity

The Place Beyond the Pines, The Spectacular Now, and Dallas Buyers Club on what it means to be a man

December 6, 2013



As awards season kicks into high gear, critics are inundated with screeners for films they may have missed the first time around. Here are three prestige pictures—The Place Beyond the Pines, The Spectacular Now, and The Dallas Buyers Club—that are interesting for the competing ways in which they present masculinity in a time of societal flux.

###

Luke: He can get his own kid. That’s every man’s right.

The Place Beyond the Pines

Derek Cianfrance’s The Place Beyond the Pines is a story of fathers and sons, and the way sons become their fathers. But it is more than that, a look at masculinity in America and what it means to be a man in a changing world where opportunities are scarce.

Luke (Ryan Gosling) is a carnival daredevil who discovers that during his last turn through upstate New York he fathered a child. He is forced to choose: quit his act and get involved with his kid’s life or push on, same as always. Sticking around, of course, isn’t enough. He needs to earn the respect of Romina (Eva Mendes), his son’s mother. To do that, he needs to earn money. And to do that … well, how does a carny with no work experience, no skills, and a tendency to get violent do that?

In post-industrial America—an America in which there’s minimum-wage work and not much else for the unskilled—Luke doesn’t have many options. He is desperate to live up to his ideal of manhood—a father to his son, a provider to his lover—and that desperation eventually boils over. So he takes to robbing banks, upping the stakes until, eventually, he gets crushed.

###

Dan: If I were your father, I guess this would be the part where I give you a lecture.

Sutter: If you were my father, you wouldn’t have to give me a lecture.

The Spectacular Now

For much of The Spectacular Now, there is a noticeable lack of male role models in the life of the hard-drinking Sutter (Miles Teller). Sutter lives with his mother, a nurse doing her best to get by while raising a kind but troubled kid.

But then we see what has become of Sutter’s father and we understand that no influence can be better than a bad influence. His dad Tommy (Kyle Chandler) is a drunken lout, more interested in hooking up with the local slattern than having a beer or three with his long-neglected son. Indeed, he sticks Sutter with the tab as he scoots off to catch a case of the clap.

The closest things to positive male role models in Sutter’s life are Dan (Bob Odenkirk), his boss at a men’s clothing boutique, and Mr. Aster (Andre Royo), Sutter’s long-suffering math teacher. Each takes a different approach to straightening Sutter out: Mr. Aster offers the stick (do better in math or I’ll fail you and you won’t graduate) while Dan offers the carrot (you can avoid being downsized by promising not to come into work hammered). But neither has enough influence over the boy to set him on the right path.

Sutter needs a father, not a father figure. But the dissolution of the nuclear family and the lack of stability that results have destroyed whatever chances Sutter might have had at success. And it’s not long before his pathologies threaten the stability of Aimee (Shailene Woodley), another fatherless child floating through modern America, trying to find something on which to grab hold.

###

Ron: I got a newsflash for y’all: ain’t nothin’ out there that can kill Ron Woodruff in 30 days.

Dallas Buyers Club

Dallas Buyers Club isn’t terribly interested in fathers. But it is fascinated by the way traditional conceptions of masculinity initially may have facilitated the spread of AIDS—and then helped get the disease under control.

Ron Woodruff (Matthew McConaughey) is a man’s man in mid-1980s Dallas, running scams at the rodeo when he isn’t fixing the electrical systems on oil rigs or bedding trailer trash skanks two at a time, coke-rings around his nose and Jack Daniels in his gut. That excess comes back to haunt him, however, as he catches HIV from one of his conquests.

When the doctor who diagnoses him asks if he has engaged in homosexual relations recently, Ron snarls that he’s no “faggot.” HIV? That’s for queers and junkies. He loves the ladies and takes his drugs nasally, thank you very much.

But Ron definitely has HIV. And as he comes to grips with that fact, he must also come to grips with the fact that his friends have abandoned him. He’s no longer welcome in his local watering hole or at his place of business. He even gets evicted from the trailer park in which he lives. After overdosing on the retroviral AZT—at the time going through FDA testing—he heads to Mexico to concoct a cocktail of unapproved drugs.

Discovering a better way to keep his disease under control, Ron also stumbles into a business opportunity: He can sell his blend of drugs to similarly desperate men. This brings him into contact with the “faggots” he once so despised—and with them comes a modicum of compassion. His fight to live (and to save the lives of others) gives him new purpose, and helps him redefine what it means to be a man.

###

All three of these examinations of masculinity are interesting in spurts and all three have their problems. The Place Beyond the Pines is the most ambitious, in part due to its disregard for narrative conventions surrounding time lapsed on screen. Cianfrance discards the flow of the story in order to rather pedantically drive home the point he wants to make: The sins of the father are revisited upon the son.

The Spectacular Now, meanwhile, is the most heartfelt of these pictures. There’s a real pain in Sutter’s eyes; you can feel him struggling to make sense of his life in a world that doesn’t quite know what to do with him. Unfortunately, it feels a bit slight.

Dallas Buyer’s Club is probably the best of the three, and McConaughey deserves the buzz he’s receiving for his starring turn. But the film feels something like a Hallmark-special-by-way-of-HBO. We are in the theater to learn a lesson about tolerance and compassion and acceptance, and we’re rarely allowed to forget that fact.

Ethan Hawke Grows Up . . . and Becomes a Good Man

Nice interview with an actor, a human being, who has grown as a man while under the spotlight of being a star. But it feels as though he does not take any of that seriously. This could be an interview with any man his age, we are only reading this because there is a new move to promote and the studio is pimping him for ticket sales - and he gets that:

I love to talk all the time, except when I have something to sell. And then I feel like a whore. You're interviewing me because a studio has a giant movie they want to release, and they want the world to go see it. And you're not necessarily interested in me, but you want people to buy your magazine. So the actor is just serving as the tip of the spear. I might as well be standing on the street corner, juggling one of those cardboard arrow signs.

It's a good article.

Ethan Hawke: What I've Learned

Actor, 43, New York City
By Mike Sager on December 17, 2013 

PUBLISHED IN THE JANUARY 2014 ISSUE: The Meaning of Life

Interviewed by Mike Sager, October 29, 2013

The morning of this interview, his refrigerator fell through the kitchen floor. Still, he showed up early, wearing a nice sweater, and ready to talk.

When I was sixteen, I remember telling my high school sweetheart I was pretty sure I knew everything. There were some dates of wars and Latin terms I didn't know, but I felt I knew everything that was important. Now I'm forty-two and I'm pretty sure I don't know anything.

Everything about my life is different than I thought it would be. I don't remember what I thought it would be, but everything about being an adult is so much subtler, and grayer, and so mysterious, and so profound…and a lot more irritating than I ever imagined.

Being a parent dilutes your narcissism.

The father has a very particular role, which involves cutting the umbilical cord, not just as a literal thing but as a metaphor. The father is the guardian of that first step away from the real safety of the nest. Our job is to usher our children into the world.

Every perceived failure turns out to have a secret success, and every perceived success has some secret failing in it.

In Macbeth, it's fascinating to see the moment when the witches actually come to Macbeth—it's after the biggest triumph of his life. The play opens and he's won two battles and he's the hero of both. Everybody loves him more than ever. And that's the moment the witches come. That's what Shakespeare shows: You're not your most vulnerable when you're broke and destitute and hungry. I mean, it's a tough moment, sure. But it's even tougher when the world gives you everything you want. That's when you're really in danger of becoming a prick.

I love to talk all the time, except when I have something to sell. And then I feel like a whore. You're interviewing me because a studio has a giant movie they want to release, and they want the world to go see it. And you're not necessarily interested in me, but you want people to buy your magazine. So the actor is just serving as the tip of the spear. I might as well be standing on the street corner, juggling one of those cardboard arrow signs.

I remember saying to my son, "Who's the best father you ever saw?" And he said, "Dad, you just want me to say you. I don't know any other fathers."

One of the great advantages of not going to college is you're not taught a right and a wrong way to do things. So many young people have stopped freethinking for themselves. I never went to acting school; I learned from Peter Weir, Sidney Lumet, Denzel Washington. I kind of see myself as a perpetual student.

What we communicate—our magazines, movies, books, plays, and all that—are our collective consciousness.

My grandfather was a general manager of the Abilene Blue Sox of Abilene, Texas. He was also the head sportswriter for The Abilene Reporter-News. He would cover his own games, which I thought was kind of fascinating.

I can't imagine that there's a person in this world who doesn't have something better to do than tell people that they can't love each other forever, no matter what their sex.

What I've learned about divorce? Not to speak about it publicly. Hopefully that will make somebody laugh.

Flip through the channels sometime and count how many times you see a woman taking her top off under duress, like being attacked physically, or how many times you see a woman dead, a body or a cadaver. Now flip through and notice how many times we see a man taking his clothes off, a man dead, a man being physically attacked. It's like nine to one.

I'm always dubious about talking politics; I don't have anything to say about that. To some degree, I think performers should stick to performing, you know what I mean?

A long time ago, I had to give up on the dream of being a professional athlete. Now I have to give up the dream of even playing a professional athlete. But here's the perfect metaphor for aging: I'm starting to look for coach roles.

Daughters are easier because I don't project myself onto them. Like, if my daughter doesn't like the Yankees, I'm not offended. But if my son says he likes the Orioles, I'm like, "What is wrong with you?"

Following this year's Before Midnight, the third film of a trilogy by director Richard Linklater, Hawke is now appearing in Macbeth at Lincoln Center in New York.

I love Richard Rohr - if I had been exposed to this kind of spirituality in the Catholic Church, I may not have found the idea of God so absurd. When I read Rohr, it's easy for me to substitute more universal language for the traditional terms and not lose the meaning.

For example, he says, "When your mental judgmental grid and all its commentaries are placed aside, God finally has a chance to get through to you, because your pettiness is at last out of the way." As I read this, in my head I read "love" in place of "God," and nothing is lost in doing so.

His message is about the essential union of spirituality, as we often find in Eastern traditions, not the individual separation from "Source" we find in Western religion. This is a much more welcoming and inclusive perspective.

Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation - The Narrow Road

Meditation 39 of 52

Seven Themes of an Alternative Orthodoxy - Seventh Theme: Reality is paradoxical and complementary. Non-dual thinking is the highest level of consciousness. Divine union, not private perfection, is the goal of all religion (Goal).

Contemplation is meeting as much reality as we can handle in its most simple and immediate form, without filters, judgments, and commentaries. Now you see why it is so rare and, in fact, “the narrow road that few walk on” (Matthew 7:14). The only way you can contemplate is by recognizing and relativizing your own compulsive mental grids—your practiced ways of judging, critiquing, blocking, and computing everything.

This is what we are trying to do by practicing contemplative prayer, and people addicted to their own mind will find contemplation most difficult, if not impossible. Much that is called thinking is simply the ego’s stating of what it prefers and likes—and resistances to what it does not like. Narcissistic reactions to the moment are not worthy of being called thinking. Yet that is much of our public and private discourse.

When your mental judgmental grid and all its commentaries are placed aside, God finally has a chance to get through to you, because your pettiness is at last out of the way. Then Truth stands revealed! You will begin to recognize that we all carry the Divine Indwelling within us and we all carry it equally. That will change your theology, your politics, and your entire worldview. In fact, it is the very birth of the soul.

Adapted from CAC Foundation Set: Gospel Call to Compassionate Action

(Bias from the Bottom) and Contemplative Prayer (CD, DVD, MP3)

The Daily Meditations for 2013 are now available 

in Fr. Richard’s new book Yes, And . . . .

Give a CAC Bookstore certificate, an invitation to transformation and peace.

Nice documentary - I have a lot of respect for the man Russell Brand is becoming.

Russell Brand: From Addiction to Recovery

Cannabis, booze, acid, speed, coke, crack, heroin... Russell took drugs every single day. At one point he started being afraid of the fact that he might die. He was told that if he continues like that, in six month time, he's going to be dead, in prison, or in an asylum. He got clean at the age of 27, the age Amy Winehouse was when she died. Amy's death was a paradoxical, unsurprising shock, and Russell felt like he could have done something to help.

That's why he made this film, to have a sympathetic look at alcoholism and addiction, a condition that the World Health Organization regards as a disorder. He reckons that drugs and alcoholism are much misunderstood by users, non-users, and the government. He thinks that we need to start regarding addiction in all its forms as a health issue as opposed to the judicial and criminal issue. In this film he wants to learn more and see if we can do things differently.

Brand meets a whole range of people from whom he draws insights - scientists at the cutting edge of research into the psychology of addiction, those involved in innovative recovery treatments and drug addicts themselves. 

Is addiction a disease? Should it be criminalized? And is abstinence-based recovery, which worked for Brand, a possible way forward? In this documentary Brand challenges conventional theory and practice as well as government policy in his own inimitable style, confronting the reality of addiction head on. 

Along the way he draws on his own experience to try to help one of the addicts he meets to take the first steps towards recovery. Armed with his own heartfelt beliefs and new insights gained during his journey, Brand has the opportunity to change the hearts and minds of policy makers when he is invited to give evidence before the Home Affairs Select Committee investigating the efficacy of current drug addiction treatment in the UK. - BBC Three.

Watch the full documentary now - 60 min

Danny Baker - 13 Myths Surrounding Mental Illness (Good Men Project)

Danny Baker offers an important post on the myths of mental illness over at the Good Men Project. For a lot of us, especially readers of this blog, these are common sense and we know better - but there are a lot of people who hold these beliefs or variations of them, especially men (it's weak to ask for health, we should just get over it, and so on).

13 Myths Surrounding Mental Illness

December 13, 2013 by Danny Baker

From the belief that mental illness doesn’t exist to being able to just “get over it,” Danny Baker lists 13 myths surrounding mental illness that can hinder recovery.

—   In no particular order, here are 13 of the most widespread myths surrounding mental illness in the 21st century.

1. Mental illness doesn’t exist. Just because mental illnesses are invisible on the surface, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t real. We can’t see gravity, either – does that mean that that’s made up? Furthermore, through various brain image technology, it’s actually now possible to observe differences in the brain between people with certain mental illnesses and people without them.
2. Mental illness is rare. On the contrary, approximately 1 in 4 people suffer from a mental illness.
3. You don’t know anyone with a mental illness. Again, since mental illness affects 1 in 4, then unless you live by yourself on a raft in the middle of the ocean, then it’s almost certain that you do.
4. If you have a mental illness, then it means you’re crazy. No! If you have a mental illness, then all it means is that you have a mental illness – a condition that can be treated just like physical illnesses can.
5. Mental illnesses are lifelong and impossible to treat. I kind of gave the truth away in myth 4, but it’s worth emphasizing: treatments today are more refined than ever before, and as a result, most mental illnesses are able to be recovered from, or at the very least managed.
6. If someone has a mental illness, than they’re to blame for it. While I do believe that sufferers need to take responsibility for their illness and be proactive in trying to recover, it’s critical to note that absolutely anyone can fall victim to a mental illness. Mental illnesses tend to be caused by a combination of genetics, brain chemical imbalances, psychological trauma and environmental stresses; since so much of this is out of a person’s control, then blaming them for developing a mental illness is extremely unfair.
7. Only people who are weak ask for help. It’s really the complete opposite – it takes self-awareness to admit that you have a problem, and given the stigma surrounding mental illness, it takes a lot of courage to ask for support. And on a more fundamental level, seeking help is just the smart, logical thing to do. Just like physical illnesses, mental illnesses require treatment in order for the sufferer to recover – so if you want to get better and return to living a healthy life, then you have to get help. Otherwise your illness will always impair you.
8. People with a mental illness can “just get over it”. Again, mental illnesses are illnesses. You can’t “just get over them”, in the same way you just can’t get over a physical illness like cancer.
9. People with a mental illness are violent. This is nonsense perpetrated by the media and television shows. Numerous studies have shown this to be blatantly untrue. For example in the US, a nationwide study by NIMH showed that only 4% of violent crimes are committed by people with a diagnosed mental illness. Additionally, the study showed that people with a mental illness are 11 times more likely to be the victim of a violent crime than the general population.
10. People with a mental illness are incompetent. Because mental illnesses are treatable, then most sufferers who are getting help are able to work and live productive lives. In fact, it’s well known that depression rates are particularly high in the legal profession, which is proof that people with a mental illness can still be extremely high functioning. Furthermore, since mental illness affects 1 in 4 people, chances are that you work with one or multiple sufferers, even if you don’t know it.
11. Mental illnesses don’t affect teenagers – any problems they’re experiencing is just part of going through puberty. Granted that one’s adolescent years tend to be more of a roller coaster than most, but it’s ludicrous to assume that this is the root of all their problems and that it’s impossible for them to suffer from a mental illness. In fact, studies show that across Australia, the UK and the US, as many as 1 in 5 teens will experience depression before they reach adulthood – and that’s just one of a myriad of mental illnesses.
12. People with a mental illness – particular those suffering from depression – are attention seekers or drama queens. In fact, it’s usually the opposite, which is why the majority of sufferers hide their pain with a smile, and why their most common response to “how are you” is “I’m fine”.
13. I can’t do anything for someone with a mental illness. While it’s true that you can’t snap your fingers and make them recover, you can help immensely by being a good friend – by doing your best to understand them instead of judging them, by showing them respect, by listening to them when they need someone to talk to, and by putting your arm around them when they need your support.

What are some of the other mental illness myths you’ve heard? If you suffer from a mental illness, what are some you’ve heard that are specific to that particular illness?

Ben Bruno - Next Level Push-Ups and Dips (T-Nation)

Double Bodyweight Ring Pushups - Ring pushups with 185 lbs. of chains and weighted vests. Bodyweight 182 lbs.

Rings and a weighted vest are excellent additions to any training program, especially if you work out at home. Ben Bruno discusses how to use these tools to reach new levels with your push ups and dips (for some guys with wide shoulders, these are the best chest exercises available, but providing enough resistance has been challenging).

Next Level Push-Ups and Dips

by Ben Bruno | T-Nation (Facebook Page)

I first bought a pair of gymnastic rings six years ago as a way to progress pushups to make them harder. I’d figured anything endorsed by the likes of Dave Tate and Jim Wendler was at least worth a try. I’ve yet to venture into the harder gymnastics-type movements, but ring pushups have been a staple exercise in my program ever since. It was really a love-at-first-try type of thing. I always love a good challenge, and the rings definitely provide that.

The first few times I tried them I was shaking as if I had Parkinson’s and could only muster a few reps, but after a little bit of practice, my stability improved rapidly to where I could start to crank them out more easily. Once I got better at them, it quickly became one of my favorite upper-body exercises.

After I felt comfortable with ring pushups, I delved into ring dips and found I loved those too. Interestingly, I’ve found that bar dips can bug my shoulders sometimes -- especially weighted --but doing them on the rings feels fine.

The Problem

The one problem I’ve continually had though with both pushups and dips on the rings is that when the rings are set up at just outside shoulder width (the way most people do them), they tend to chafe your outer arms, right over the triceps. Wearing long sleeves helps a bit, but who wants to wear long sleeves when it’s hot in the gym?

As I got stronger and started to load the exercises more, the chafing got worse, to the point that after every time I did the exercise I’d have people asking me “what happened to your arms?” because there were massive red marks, similar to a rug burn.

A little chafing certainly isn’t enough to stop doing a good exercise though, just like you wouldn’t stop deadlifting because it can bruise your shins. It started to bug me more and more though, so as I way to eliminate it, I started hanging the rings wider.

I do all my ring work in a power rack, so rather than hang them straight down from the pull-up bar on the front just outside the shoulders, I hung them from the sides of the rack. It made a huge a difference!

The Surprise Effect

Not only did that eliminate the chafing, but it also enhanced the exercises significantly, which is even better.

The key is to perform the exercises just as you normally would and not let the wider rings dictate your arm position. For both the pushups and dips, your hands should be just outside your torso and your elbows should be tucked in, not directly to your sides, but pretty close. You certainly don’t want them flaring way out.

With the rings set wider, you have to actively squeeze your pecs like crazy in order to keep your arms and hands in tight, so doing pushups and dips in this fashion will absolutely smoke your chest. Keep in mind though that the wider the rings are, the harder the exercise becomes, so start at shoulder width and move out gradually over time.

With pushups, you may want to elevate your feet slightly as well to account for the ring being raised off the floor. Other than that, perform them just as you would a normal pushup.


With the dips, keep the hands in tight to your sides. Also, to keep the stress on your chest, lean forward slightly and don’t lock out your triceps fully at the top.


If you’ve got some experience with the rings and looking to take things to the next level and blast your chest in a whole new way, give this a shot. -- BB