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Learn what ADHD is and how it affects the lives of adults. Discover tips and strategies for managing symptoms and improving quality of life.

pHOTO CREDIT: PIXABAY

Discover the psychology behind our search for extremes and explore what drives our unconscious desire to live life on the edge. Why are we extremists sometimes? Find out here!

Breathing is a fundamental process that keeps us alive, but have you ever considered its impact on your mental well-being? It may come as a surprise, but there is a direct relationship between healthy breathing patterns and anxiety. In this article, we will explore how breathing patterns affect the anatomy of our bodies, delve into the interconnectedness of breathing and anxiety, and discuss why establishing healthy breathing patterns is crucial for our overall well-being.

The direct relationship between emotional intelligence and Leadership and how integrating microdosing into the game can be a game changer.

Microdosing is an alternative aproach to mental health, creativity, and productivity. This article is a guide to any person looking to learn more about microdosing.

Some habits are unconsciously developed from internal or external stress, and others are developed mindfully and for a specific goal; but what are habits? how do they form in the brain, and why does it feel so hard sometimes to release them and integrate new ones? Through the work of Descartes, Kant, and Sartre, habit was thought to be a kind of “mechanism that inhibits consciousness and freedom”. Philosophers like Felix Ravaisson who considered that “actions that are repeated over time become habits, with a curious life of their own” and Henry-Luis Bergson, who took cues from Ravaisson to write about active and passive habits, understood Habit as creative and addressed to the future, rather than negative and arresting freedom. Today, The American Journal of Psychology defines a “habit, from a psychological perspective, [as] a more or less fixed way of thinking, willing, or feeling acquired through previous repetition of a mental experience", and neuroscience has its standpoint on the topic. Neuroscientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that when practicing a habitual routine such as brushing one’s teeth, certain neurons in the basal ganglia will activate or “fire” at the beginning of the routine. Then, they lay quiet while the routine proceeds. Finally, they fire again when the routine is completed (Martiros, Burgess, & Graybiel, 2018). So now we know that neuronal networks lay the infrastructure for habits. A Habit becomes integrated into our life, so even if we think of something else, some specialized neurons in our brains will “make sure” to remind us to perform the habit.

What we call today psychedelic substances, were for a very long time considered sacred natural medicine among different cultures, mainly the Indigenous peoples of America including the Shipibo, Huichol, and Mazatec as well as the Aztec, Maya, Olmec societies, among others… Unfortunately, this kind of wisdom and knowledge have witnessed centuries of extremely aggressive suppression that started with the Inquisition of the Americas and got even worse upon the start of the “War on drugs” led by the USA in 1971, which was the main reason behind cutting the funding on a large number of clinical trials and studies that were going on at that time, aiming to learn and understand the medical benefits of these naturally occurring substances. Despite all the political pressure, a large number of professionals from the medical field - especially the mental health field - believed in our need for this kind of research after seeing that mental health problems are always on the rise, and the typical treatments used today, are not proving their effectiveness in many of the cases; as a result, the studies on the topic have reemerged over the past couple of decades, proving the potential of addressing specific mental health problems and even enhancing the well-being in general.

The Bandhas are much more than muscle activation; They are considered Energy “locks” and by activating them, we retain or seal our Pranic energy within the central energy channel in our body, the “Sushumna nadi” which in Yogic beliefs, is believed to run along the Spine. There are 3 main bandhas, the Mula bandha which is the pelvic lock – the Udiyana bandha which is the abdominal lock, Jalandhara bandha which is the chin lock. There is a fourth bandha which is the Maha bandha, which includes all three bandhas in it. On a physical level, while practicing Bandhas’ activation the flow of the blood is temporarily halted, and once released, the flow increases again which affects directly and positively the blood circulation and the activation of body organs. We have different sphincters in our Digestive system, which are specialized rings of muscles that remain in a continuous state of contraction and serve in closing and releasing an opening, and three out of them can be voluntarily contracted to activate these energy locks or Bandhas: The ( IAS ) or the Internal anal sphincter, the sphincter of Oddi, and the lower esophageal sphincter ( LES ).