Can A Healthy Lifestyle Help Your Back?

Back pain is the leading cause of disability in the United Kingdom, affecting almost 1 in 10 people. Suffering from back pain can be debilitating and have a significant impact on your work and social life. But did you know that making some simple lifestyle changes can reduce the amount of back pain you experience?

A recent study from researchers in Sweden found that people who lived a healthy lifestyle were much less likely to develop chronic back problems. This article will explain why healthy living can have a positive effect on your back.

What is a healthy lifestyle?

A healthy lifestyle is living in a way that maximises your health, energy levels and physical capacity. The five main components of healthy living include:

  1. Eating a nutritious diet

    Enjoying a healthy and balanced diet ensures that your body has the energy and nutrients it requires to remain healthy.

  2. Exercising regularly

    Adults should aim for at least 150 minutes of moderate aerobic activity a week (half that if exercising at a high intensity). You should also perform some strength training for all major muscle groups each week. This ensures that your muscles, ligaments, bones, and cardiovascular system remain healthy.

  3. Managing your weight

    A healthy lifestyle includes staying at a healthy weight through diet and exercise.

  4. Managing your stress levels

    Being stressed can have a dramatic impact on your body, increasing your blood sugar levels, causing anxiety, and slowing your metabolism. Finding ways to manage stress is an important part of enjoying a healthy lifestyle.

  5. Getting enough sleep

    The body uses sleep to heal the body, regulate hormones, remove toxins, and much more. Sleep is an important part of remaining healthy and happy.

How will living a healthy lifestyle help your back?

Not only will living a healthy lifestyle give you more energy, improve the quality of your life, and help you live longer – it also can help you avoid back pain. Here is how:

Better core strength to support your back

Exercising regularly will ensure that the muscles in the abdomen and lower back are well-developed. Keeping these muscles strong will help to take some strain off your spine and provide it with support. You will be less likely to injure or strain your back and there will be less pressure on it each day.

Better posture

Being active and physically fit will also help you improve your posture. It will become easier to keep your spine straight when sitting, walking and running, which helps you avoid back pain.

Less weight means a healthier back

The United Kingdom is still going through an obesity epidemic with over 62% of adults being overweight or obese. Unfortunately, carrying all of this extra weight can contribute to back pain and change the alignment of your spine. Living a healthy lifestyle helps you avoid obesity and remain in a weight range that is appropriate for your age, gender, and height.

Spending less time sitting down

Sitting down for long periods is one of the major risk factors for back pain and lumbar disorders. Essentially, the more time you spend sitting down, the more likely it is that you will have back pain. Living a healthy lifestyle helps because it is a more active lifestyle. You will spend less time sitting down in front of the computer or television, and more time moving about.

Your spine will have the nutrients it needs

The human spine requires many nutrients to grow new tissue and repair itself including vitamin D, calcium, magnesium, Vitamin K, Vitamin C, Vitamin B12, Iron, and protein. Eating a healthy and nutritious diet ensures that your spine has all these important nutrients.

Less risk of degenerative spinal injuries

A healthy lifestyle is one that avoids cigarettes and excessive alcohol consumption. This can help you avoid certain illnesses and injuries. For example, researchers have discovered that smoking can increase the risk of degenerative disc disease and lower back pain. Other research has shown that people who drink excessively are more likely to injure their back.

More likely to get professional help

Having a healthy lifestyle makes a person more health conscious and more likely to see a medical professional if something is wrong. This means you won’t hesitate to see a chiropractor or general practitioner if your back hurts – which helps you identify and treat a spinal injury or other back problem before it becomes worse.

Contant Improvement – A Hero’s Vital Trait

And there she is, saving the day again! She always turns the toughest situations into a winning situation. How does she do it?

We all have someone we look up to. Our hero! I try hard everyday to be that for my kids, my friends, others that look up to me. To be a hero, you must have certain traits. Luckily for us, these are all traits that you can learn and implement over time. We are not born a hero; we develop into one. Constant improvement is one vital trait of a hero. I think we all know that, but do we live it?

There are several benefits to being a constant learner:

  • It is a fun and rewarding way to live.
  • You can fulfill your abilities and reach your potential.
  • By sharpening your mind, you will become a more original thinker.
  • Others will see you as wise and will follow you, making you a more productive leader, and helping to increase your income.
  • You will write your own story and accomplish what you want.
  • You will be able to make better decisions, which again means you will make more money.

So, what are the ways the most successful people constantly improve?

Read: I was recently asked on a panel what my daily routine is. One thing I do hands down, no question, even when I don’t feel well, is read something. I read both business books as well as fiction. I also listen to books in my car. Obviously reading is a great way to learn and might be one of the easiest to implement. Something as small as 15 minutes a day will change your life, with some consistency.

Talk To Someone: Another great way to learn is to talk to people. Some of the most well-known CEOs say they manage by walking. This just means that they go out on the floor and talk to their team. They ask questions and learn from the bottom up. I think about this in my life and business. I don’t need to walk around to talk to my team, because the ones that are local are all in the same room. I do implement the strategy of bottom up, and we do talk about real estate every day. I may have more experience, but they still have more knowledge in many areas of this business, and I love extracting that. I also think about this as a real estate investor. You don’t need to have an office and a team to implement this strategy. What about walking your job site and talking to contractors? I love meeting with and talking to building inspectors. They are a wealth of knowledge, and they love to share how much they know. (And they like me when I take the time to learn from them, which might make it easier to pass some inspections: ) ) You can take time to visit with tenants, or go to networking groups and learn from other investors, agents, lenders, appraisers, accountants, attorneys and so many more. The idea is to talk less and listen more. I know it is hard… Are you getting out and learning from others?

Emulate Someone: I recently had a meeting with a pretty prolific real estate investor in Denver. He owns several parking lots, a self-storage brand, two shared work office buildings and two hotels in the heart of the city. All of his down payments have been self-funded. I want to be where this guy is. He was generous enough to give me some of his time, so I took advantage. “I want to know what makes you tick?” “How do you manage your team? How do you find your projects? How do you over come your obstacles?” I just kept going, and he did too. I want to know his routines, and habits, where he learns, and how he hires. I want to emulate! He gave me some great advice and some material I should study. He made an introduction to a group of several other successful entrepreneurs. This was a fantastic meeting that I am excited about.

When you find someone, you want to emulate be sure you know that is where you want to be. Follow their lead by copying what they say and watching what they do. If they are open to it, take them out to coffee, lunch, or for a drink.

Mistakes: This is hands down the best way to improve. In fact, in my opinion, you will never be successful without mistakes. You need them to move forward. Because you need to fail to be successful, you should not be afraid of it. If you are concerned with mistakes, I would challenge you to find just one self-made success story that has not gone through a tough time or made mistakes. Often times, they were large mistakes that would take the average person out. It is the tenacity to push through and the willingness to make the mistakes that separate those that are successful to those that will never be. The only mistake you will likely regret is not making more mistakes.

Is Blogging A Dying Trend?

When blogging first started, it was a chance for anyone to have their say online because they did not have to worry about all the tricky aspects of setting up a webpage. While there are still some writers and those with strong opinions who use blogs to exercise their freedom of expression, many more have realized the huge potential of blogs as a chance to earn money online, and as a marketing tool.

The free content you post can lead to paid content you will sell. Information marketing is booming, as is online education. You could also turn your content into a membership blog, or a structured eCourse.

Themes, Widgets and Plugins

Gone are the days when you have to be an expert coder or website developer to create a professional-looking site and add great features to your site that your audience will love. On the navigation bar are widgets, which can help you show off all your content and get more readers as they click through your recent articles and categories.

Plugins are small programs that can add functionality to your site such as turning it into an eCommerce store and allowing you to get paid for your work.

Marketing Tools

The best plugins are ones that allow you to market your business with just a few clicks. Other plugins allow you to optimize your content for search engines, and even communicate with them directly and automatically through creating a site map of all your great content. More marketing means more traffic, and more traffic can mean more sales if you are offering the right items to your target audience.

Being Mobile Friendly

One of the best things about a blog is that the modern themes are all mobile-friendly. That trend is here to stay, so smart business owners need to know they can service it, and that their website will look good on any size of screen.

Offering Multimedia

Blogging is no longer just words on the page. It can be images, video and audio too. The written content can be articles, lists, Top 5s and more. The important thing is to offer variety so your readers will keep coming back for more.

So is blogging a dying trend?

The answer is definitely no. It is alive and well, but it will keep on changing as new users, devices and trends come and go. Keep an eye on those trends and your blog will remain healthy and profitable.

Get A Younger Smoother Skin Texture Using Microdermabrasion Treatment

Skin damage builds up and over time it can make your skin texture uneven and scarred, and can even make it look discoloured, but you can vastly improve your skin by exfoliating. Exfoliation involves removing the old, dead skin cells on the skin’s outer surface, getting rid of clogged pores, dull skin and signs of ageing. Exfoliating your skin can make it look softer, with a more even surface, helping skin treatments to work better and giving you a smoother base to apply your make-up on.

We exfoliate our face for three reasons:

  • To cleanse the skin by removing build-up from the pores, which helps to get rid of blackheads and white heads
  • To smooth the skin’s texture, giving your skin a soft and flawless look
  • To stimulate blood flow to the face, giving a youthful glow

We can exfoliate the skin in different ways:

Twice weekly exfoliation using a traditional scrub. A facial wash containing tiny, sand-like particles will physically smooth away any rough areas, removing dead skin cells and uncovering new ones, leaving your skin feeling soft and looking flawless. It’s possible to create your own face and body scrub by mixing baking soda with your facial cleanser to make it an exfoliating cleanser.

A liquid exfoliator uses acids to take away dead skin cells and it works on a deeper level by dissolving the glue-like substance that bonds the dead skin cells. Acid based products have an anti-bacterial effect which cleans deep within the pores and some of them can boost hydration, cell turnover and collagen production. The skin sheds cells daily, however, by applying products and make-up every day we can halt this process, but using acids every day can copy this natural process.

Microdermabrasion treatment. Exfoliation done at home is superficial, but microdermabrasion at a cosmetic clinic is more in-depth and goes deeper than your typical facial scrub. A precision blast of superfine crystals will smooth away fine lines, and reduce pigment irregularities on the surface of the skin. This stimulates an increase in cell turnover, and you’ll notice more brightness to your complexion. Microdermabrasion is one of the most popular cosmetic medical procedures performed today. It’s an ideal treatment for the skin because it uses non-allergenic crystals which is good for skin that’s sensitive to chemicals.

Microdermabrasion is a safe non-surgical treatment which doesn’t present any risks when it’s performed by a qualified practitioner. This treatment can easily be done in a lunchtime and is one which will allow you to return to your normal activities on the same day

A Turning Point in Global History – Changing the Future

Sometimes we can look back and see times that were turning points in our lives, in our world. What could have been done to make a positive difference? What could we as individuals and as a group have done to steer events to a better outcome? We have just such an opportunity before us, right here, right now, at the end of 2019 and into next January of 2020.

Consider an upcoming celestial event as our chance as a united force field to influence its effect on our lives and on our world in a powerfully positive way. I’m referring to the planetary alignment of two “big hitters” in our solar system, Saturn and Pluto. These slow-moving planets take quite a bit of time to get together in the sky and have been dancing around each other all year. But what does it mean for us?

All the planets from Saturn on out ask us to change, each in its own way. Saturn is known – among other things – for its influence to remove anything or anyone in our lives that does not serve our purpose on earth. A kind of pruning, if you will. Whatever is not working for us has to go. Hold on to it and suffer. Pluto forces change by intense pressure, almost feeling like we cannot breathe or escape. What it touches over time undergoes a renewal, a resurrection, but often by means of inescapable pressure.

So what happens when they ‘get together”, when they align in the sky as a conjunction? Any two planets aligning symbolize a kind of birth, a new start, a creation of energy that will influence how life on earth goes forward from that time on. Sometimes the effect is mild, sometimes powerful. Applying the Saturn-Pluto new birth energy, let’s look back and get an idea of the scope and power that this alignment can bring about.

August 1947, Saturn met Pluto meet at 13 degrees of the sign of Leo for a rebirth of things that are not working right on earth regarding Leo issues. These include – among other things – sports, entertainment, children. Pro sports up to that time paid players horribly. Many had to hold regular jobs just to support their families and survive. Many had to sleep in cars or buses If the team traveled to another area. The big money went to the owners and the imbalance was unfair. Zoom forward to the present day to see how Pluto and Saturn corrected that wrong and you see sports figures making phenomenal sums.

The same goes for the entertainment industry. Up to 1947 – and even after that for a while, since it does take a few years for planetary influence from the big hitters to kick in – movie stars were driven to turn out several productions a year and were often keep on drugs to keep them moving during the day and sleeping at night. Today, like with pro sports players, movie stars make top dollar whether it’s for a movie or tv.

The same can be said for musicians, who were worked to the bone up to that time touring and doing concerts but who now make the big sums.

Now we come to Leo’s rulership of children, who suffered as much injustice (unless they were from royalty or wealth) working on farms at early ages or in factories until child labor laws came into being. Still, children were not particularly regarded as human beings with any value until they matured and started “contributing to society”; and child psychology was barely in its infancy. Today we are not only concerned with the development of a child as an individual human being with his or her own gifts and talents, but we are learning to pay attention to the prenatal influences on the developing fetus and how they affect the child’s later growth and development.

Yes, these influences have taken decades to reform, and that should give us a good idea of how powerful such celestial births can be. Which brings us to what’s coming in January of 2020 and the reason my alarm bells keep going off.

On January 12, 2020, Saturn and Pluto conjoin in the sky at the 22nd degree in the sign of Capricorn. We’ve seen what happened with the conjunction in Leo. Now let’s look at what Capricorn holds for us. Most simply put, it is “the world”. This includes our planet itself, our governments and the structure of our lives, our banking system, corporations – all that big stuff. So what can we expect?

At the level of the physical earth, where tectonic plates are grinding together and weather patterns are more and more extreme, we’ve already been seeing how badly nature needs to be brought into balance because of how horribly mankind has fouled the environments of air and water and run ragged pillaging the spoils deep in the dirt. The warning signs from the earth have been there and the conjunction will force us – one way or another – to pay attention and take appropriate action. Or not.

On the governmental level, what needs to change? Is democracy or socialism or communism really “for the people” any more, as they were designed to be, or do they only serve the 1%? Are too many governments corrupt and need to be pruned down to operate more honestly and efficiently?

The same can be said of the banking industry that reaps phenomenal profits from legions of fees while they are protected from any wrong-doing against their customers who are the ones responsible for the banks’ existence and survival. Talk about cutting off the hand that feeds. And yet it has come to that by corrupted manipulation of the legal system.

Corporations worldwide will also be brought to task by Saturn and Pluto. Their focus has strayed far from manufacturing or offering quality and usefulness to making ridiculously cheap products that create dump sites of third world countries, products we are brainwashed to believe that we cannot live without, throwing economies into tailspins of debt and teetering on the brink of collapse.

Yes, Capricorn holds sway over the some of the biggest concerns of our lives. And with the planet Pluto’s deathly influence weighing in, we can also, thankfully, expect to see such repulsive factions of life as the international sex slave cartels, pornography, child abuse and violence removed from our world.

Let’s take a break and go back for a minute to the discussion about the Saturn-Pluto conjunction in Leo in 1947. This was what I would call a “simple conjunction” in that they only got together in the sky at that degree without any other energies adding to or subtracting from it. And you can appreciate how sweeping those influences turned out to be over the following decades.

Well, the 2020 conjunction is what I would call “supercharged” and I say that for three reasons:

First, the conjunction happens in Capricorn, which is a sign that is ruled by Saturn. This means that Saturn is stronger in influence, as is any planet that travels through its own sign. So the pruning and correcting effects are now turned up a notch.

Second, Saturn and Pluto are not only conjoining at the 22nd degree of the constellation Capricorn, but they are also parallel, that is, together in the sky by declination, or at the same point above the earth’s equator, giving it a double conjunction and again multiplying their effect.

Third, as if we needed any more power added to this celestial phenomenon, there is an eclipse on January 10, 2020 near that degree and along with that is the planet Mercury which is also conjunct and parallel to Saturn and Pluto. (Numerologists will also note that the 22nd degree is a power number, so do we need any more reasons to take this event very, very seriously and see what we can do to engage and steer this energy into constructive corrections?)

So now we have the Sun, Mercury, the earth, Saturn and Pluto – five of our 10 solar system planets — all together three-dimensionally in the sky, strongly influencing and in a way pulling on the very fabric of our lives on earth.

Yes, there’s much that needs to be reformed and it’s been talked about for a long time by those with the intelligence and foresight enough to read the writing on the wall.

And now it’s coming time to pay the piper and make the changes. Left on its own, the changes look to hold some horribly devastating outcomes for the planet and for the people. We have been seeing and feeling the chaos of things out of control for some years now. Violence, storms, floods, fires, tsunamis, quakes, terror attacks. But is there anything we can do to shift or lessen the catastrophies that keep happening and that are slated by this massive super-conjunction to continue and get even worse in the coming years before the phoenix is reborn from the ashes?

This question has reminded me of scenes I’ve seen of bombed out cities and towns and buildings, where the rubble is sky high and people with grim faces are moving the debris brick by brick to clear the way for rebuilding. All the painstaking time it takes to rebuild from the ashes. What can we do?

I believe that a united force field of positive energy – whether through prayer or meditation or creative imagery or heartfelt desire – can influence events in our lives. Without a doubt. I’ve seen this happen enough to know it’s true and real. So from now through January, let’s all of us determine to focus only positive, light-filled, loving thoughts and feelings of how this world, this life could look, could feel, and could be lived.

If your concerns are for the earth herself, see her with clean air and pure water, species surviving and thriving, zones temperate with just the right balance of sunshine and rain to support life.

If your concerns are for humanity, see all the people with more than enough not only to live with the basic necessities but enough to develop into their full potentials, healthy, educated in whatever social group they belong to, individually bringing their gifts more fully into the world, thriving at a high level of fulfillment and satisfaction. See us all as accepting of differences and respectful of each other, enjoying the wonders and diversity of humankind.

See our governments and institutions, banks and corporations run by people qualified to administer with equanimity, fairness, business acumen, mutual respect and responsibility. Imagining this all brings an element of sanity, safety, even pleasure to what many of us experience every day when we turn on the tv or get on the internet.

If we can do this daily, and especially on the 10th and 12th of January, 2020, then I wholeheartedly believe that we can lessen the catastrophes and hasten the rebuilding by adding grace and light and love to the growth process our solar system is requiring of us. Whether we think of the future as a new earth, as Eden reborn, as rising to a higher dimension, as elevating the consciousness of the world, what matters is only that we do this together.

If I can be so bold as to suggest that we put forth our heartfelt efforts at noon and/or midnight every day — times that are recognized as “changeovers” — that might be ideal. But it’s even more critical that we co-create our new world consistently, daily, at whatever time we can make it happen.

We can affect this celestial birth. We. Together. An untapped powerhouse to harness today, now. Let’s do this!

Pre-Wedding Photo Shoot: A Guide

For many people, the most special day of their lives is their wedding day. Every girl dreams to get married to a guy one day and also dreams to have a big fat wedding. On this special day, everyone wishes they could remember forever. That is why people hire photographers to capture those happy moments. There are wedding photographers in Delhi, whom you can easily hire. They are affordable and click great quality pictures on your special day. At every wedding, there is a photographer who is a must. These photographers are good at capturing small details which is a must quality in a good photographer.

As time changes, there is a new concept which is trending. This new trend is called pre-wedding photo shoots. Everyone wants to flaunt about how they met and how their love story started and what better way to tell this through a pre-wedding photo shoot. Photographs are the best way to showcase anything. Every photograph has a huge story behind it. They are the most expressive tools available. There are many pre-wedding photographers available in Delhi. They are very talented and come up with creative concepts for not only pre-wedding shoots, but also other photo shoots.

They are professional photographers who come with a very affordable fee. They have very good skills and very professional. These photographers are ideal for pre-wedding photo shoots and never disappoint any client. They have their own tools and own props so that the client does not need to worry about the props and location and can easily enjoy their photo shoot.

If you are someone who does not have the budget to afford a pre-wedding photoshoot, here are some tips to make it happen on your own. Although professional photo shoots are always preferable, you can do it too! All you need is a good quality camera and a pretty location.

Whenever you take a closer shot use a longer lens. This helps taking a very detailed shot and helps capture those small and subtle details which are important to capture. Midrange lenses are not recommended as they might make the people look broader and unflattering. Longer and higher resolution lenses are always recommended and advised for great quality pictures. Always shoot in burst mode available as most of the poses are candid and a continuous movement goes on. When pictures are clicked in burst mode, it helps in capturing fleeting movements for a photo shoot.

Also set your shutter speed beforehand for capturing continuous movements. This helps to click continuous shots and helps to have multiple pictures and options to choose from. You can choose the best pictures by setting your shutter speed. Also talking to the couple beforehand is important. The couples are not models, so they can be camera conscious. Therefore, talking to them beforehand is always advised.

With a professional camera, a beautiful location and the couple, you are good to go. With all of them together and a great photographer, your pre-wedding photo shoot will turn out to be the best.

The Importance of Keeping A Notebook

A notebook is writing material used every day by a lot of people, especially students, either at the elementary level or tertiary level to jot and write down information for future and present purposes. It is also used by other professionals for jotting and writing down important information.

Notebooks can be regarded as ancient writing materials because it has been writing materials used for centuries. Ancient writers and other professionals used notebooks to write down information for future and immediate use. Till this present day, the importance of notebooks cannot be over-emphasized as it is still been utilized every day by a lot of people for different writing purposes.

There are many benefits and importance of using a notebook. We will be talking about some of these benefits and importance of a notebook;

10 importance and benefits of a notebook

1. Improves and Enhances your writing skills and abilities – Using a notebook improves and enhances writing skills and abilities. Right from our elementary days, notebooks are a means to teach little kids on how to write and improve their writing skills and abilities. Through the use of notebooks, pupils from the elementary level up to high school and even tertiary students have improved their writing abilities and vocabulary usage.

2. Increases spelling abilities and memory retentions – In recent times where computers and digital means of writing are gradually taking over writing on notebooks, we are experiencing a decline in spelling abilities and memory retentions as compared to the times when there were no computers and digital means of writing. This is to show that notebooks are very important in increasing spelling abilities and also the ability to remember things we have written down. When you write down information on a notebook, you have better ability to remember it in the future compared to when it is written on a digital device.

3. Better thinking and decision making – A notebook is a place that you have total control of. You are not limited to what you can do with it, unlike the digital devices that you may not be able to do the things you will easily do with a notebook. This increases decision making and enables you to think better. You may want to give your notebook different designs and patterns for better understanding and the quick search for any information you have written in the notebook.

4. It increases creativity – In a notebook, there are no templates, you create what you desire all by yourself unlike computers and other digital devices where you are limited. You have all the enabling means to be creative in your writing to better suit your understanding and other people that may come in contact with your notebook or want to make use of it. Most of us have experienced times that our younger siblings will want to make use of our notebooks from previous classes. When you are very creative in your writing, they will have a better understanding of what you have written and be able to assimilate with ease.

5. It improves personal responsibility and organization – A notebook has the ability to increase our personal responsibility because it enables you to sit down in a position and think without distractions. Students who write on notebooks are more responsible and better organized compared to students who use computers to write. This can be observed in our world today as compared to the ancient world before now were we have seen dedicated and responsible inventors and researchers such as Charles Darwin, Isaac Newton e.t.c, who made researches and remarkable inventions with the use of notebooks.

6. It is more safe and easier to access – A notebook is safer and easier to access compared to digital means. Using a notebook, you are not scared of any virus attack or loss of information due to technical dis-functionalities. A notebook is easier to access, as you can easily open it at any time you like and easily access any information without stress. You can easily take it along with you anywhere you go, unlike a computer that is quite heavy to carry all the time.

7. It is reliable – A notebook is a reliable means of writing at all times. It has proved to be a reliable means of writing better than computers because you do not need electricity to power it, there is no server error, you do not need any password to access your computer and it is always readily available to you at all times. Are you in the classroom, attending a seminar, at an office meeting, or attending a religious event, a notebook is easy to take with you and it is always available for use without any worries.

8. It is quick – It is quicker to write on a notebook as compared to writing on a computer or digital devices. It increases writing spontaneity and allow you to pen-down your thoughts faster without distractions. When using computers to write, you may experience some difficulty and distractions but when using a notebook you write with ease and your writing speed is increased. You can quickly flip from page to page, unlike a computer where you need to use the mouse and scroll up and down all the time. It also saves more time as you do not need to turn it on and wait for it to boot, unlike a computer.

9. It enhances ideas and inspirations – Ideas and inspirations can come at any time and when you do not write them down immediately they can be forgotten. Using a notebook will enable you to write down your ideas and inspirations immediately they come to you. As soon as you capture them in your mind you write them down in a notebook so you do not forget.

10. Reflect on what you have learned – A notebook is a place you write down everything you have learned so you can read and reflect on them any time you want. Either as a student, worker or a professional, you need a notebook to pen-down information so you can reflect on them some other times.

Are You a "Feel-Good Investor"?

That’s not a bad thing. “Feel -Good” investors buy stocks because they feel good about either the stocks or the companies that have issued them.

“Feel-Good” investors are motivated by emotion, not by any financial acumen.

That’s not a bad way to select stocks. It may not be optimal, and it may not be the most profitable, but its not a bad way.

Let me tell you about an experiment done a number of years ago.

A group of researchers wanted to see just how random stock picking really is.

They “commissioned” a monkey to throw darts at a financial stock page.

They then followed the companies the monkey “selected.”

After following those randomly selected companies for a year, they concluded that the monkey-picked companies performed better than the S&P 500!

That’s a really scary thought: randomly pick a bundle of stocks and you can beat the market!

Which shows that the market, in general, can be seen as a random collection of random events.

Our challenge is “How to profit from those seemingly random events?”

The companion task is “When to Sell?”

You don’t make money unless you sell a stock. Merely holding on to a stock that’s rising may make your net worth look good on paper, but you can’t take that paper to the grocery store and buy dinner!

Only when you sell. Or if you collect dividends from those stocks.

Now we have two tasks ahead of us:

  1. What stocks to buy?
  2. When to sell those stocks?

Another general rule is: “Don’t plan to hold those stocks Forever.” Nothing lasts forever. All you can do is to maximize your returns.

Another thing: the stock market is currently being maintained and controlled by institution investors who control billions of dollars of stock.

You can not beat them.

But you can profit from them.

May I tell you a small story?

A number of years I was trying to “Beat the Table” at the craps tables in Las Vegas. But I had very little money and even less knowledge. I observed that there was one player who had a very large stack of very large-valued chips. And he kept adding to his horde. So I began to emulate his “trades”. When he put chips down, on a position, so did I. When he picked up his position, so did I. And I began to accumulate chips. Not having the foggiest idea of what I was doing, I was actually earning money!

Then, thinking I knew something about craps, I went to another table, and you guessed it, put it all back into the casino’s pocket, plus a few more!

Moral? Don’t try to second guess the experts. But you can profit by following them.

This leads to my first observation about the stock market: Because of the phenomenon of “Beginner’s Luck”, amateurs may do better than the average individual investor.

As your knowledge grows, so, too, does your unfounded confidence, and you can soon find yourself making [hindsight] horrible decisions. Until you become as savvy as the Institutional Investor, you may be bound to fail.

Even the professionals don’t get it right all the time. Look at how many “professional” hedge fund managers have gone out of business. Look at how many stock traders have lost their collective rear ends.

And, on the other side, look how many multibillion dollar houses have been bailed out because they were “too big to fail”.

So, my advice to you is, create a set of trading rules that work for you. Follow them religiously, until they begin to fail you. Make adjustments as necessary.

Selected correctly, trading rules don’t fail: the principles are universal, but they must be scrupulously followed.

My personal trading rules are very simple:

  1. Select dividend-paying stocks according to a set of fixed parameters.
  2. Set “sell” rules according to rigid parameters.
  3. Set trailing stop loss orders to protect your gains.
  4. Remove emotion from your trades as much as possible. Never fall in love with a stock.

Do my rules work for me? Yes. My goal is to achieve a monthly dividend income of $2,500 before taxes in less than ten years. After only five years of trading my way, I have achieved a monthly dividend income of $1,800. I’m on target to achieve my goal.

My starting dividend position five years ago was only $208 a month.

Because you have the benefit of my mistakes, you can easily achieve better returns!

A Valuable Review of "Alternative Investing: Making Money Outside the Stock Market"

During the economic recession in September and October 2008, most investors lost a lot of money due to a huge banking crisis which caused the stock market to crash. For those with most of their money in the stock market, the crash became a catastrophic nightmare. In many cases, people lost everything, not just in the stock market, but in most other investments as well.

In 2012, financial investigator, Robert Cancellaro published a book that challenges what most investors would say, “Nope”. “Bad idea”, “Won’t work.” Alternative Investing: Making Money outside the Stock Market introduces a revolutionary idea that “collectibles” are better investments than traditional investments, like the stock market. Collectibles have no financial ties to the stock market, but they have the financial strength to make money.

Cancellaro investigates seven categories of collectibles that have historically gone up in value. The following categories are known as tangible assets – items you can hold and definitely hold onto autographs, postage stamps, precious metals and coins, comic books, sports cards, and investment-grade wine. Why did the author choose these “misfit” collectibles as investments? Answer: They have consistently outperformed the S & P 500 by a large margin.

All seven categories include their own lists of specific items that have consistently increased in value over their lifetime and have held steady appeal to those who have bought them. However, before you buy anything, it’s important to learn as much about collectibles as you can. The Internet has an endless number of resources; the most important ones are included in Cancellaro’s book. In addition to the Internet, you can visit and search libraries or bookstores to look for books that contain general information and price guides.

The keys that drive collectibles’ values are based on the fact they are tangible. In other words, it can be touched, making them a part of the law of low supply and high demand. So, the items in Cancellaro’s list are hard to find yet they are popular and many people want them, which increases their value. For some collectibles, their conditions are extremely important; the better the condition, the more valuable it might be. The items in Cancellaro’s lists are expensive. If you want the item, you may have to pay a lot, but its value will most likely go up over a period of time. Above all, time is your most important ally because the longer you keep it the more value it adds to your collectible. So it is important to protect your collection safely from the elements and stay in the same condition you bought it.

Autographs, postage stamps, precious metals and coins, comic books, sports cards and investment-grade wine can become part of your investment strategy. You should not always trust the stock market; it can go up just as much as it can go down, whereas collectibles’ values have remained more stable. Obtaining information is a must for buying trustworthy collectibles that keep their value. Not only is it a sensible and clever move now, but it will also financially protect you against the next stock market catastrophe or world financial crisis. Also, Cancellaro lists specific recommendations on what to buy in all seven categories. When the economy sinks the next time, don’t squander your money in the stock market. So, choose carefully, buy and keep an alternative investment.

Anima Woman in Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House

The play A Doll’s House labeled Norwegian Henrik Ibsen as the perpetrator of scandal in 1879, when the play was staged. In the debate over women’s rights that was stirring worldwide, Ibsen confronted a storm of protests, especially from the patriarchal church, against a woman leaving her husband at the conclusion of the play. With no prior knowledge of Jung’s theories of the anima and animus, Ibsen created a protagonist who begins as an anima woman attempting to enact her husband Torvald’s ideal woman but who, in the end, rejects this persona and leaves him in search of self-realization.

Father-Child

In Act I, Nora Helmer surreptitiously eats macaroons and must lie about it for fear of her husband Torvald’s reprisal for eating sweets. Hearing her return from shopping, he calls out, “Is that my little lark twittering out there?… Is it my little squirrel bustling about?… Has my little spendthrift been wasting money again?” Three short pages into the script, the reader quickly deduces the nature of the relationship between Nora and Torvald. There is a sweet outer layer to the darker censure of Nora that lies only slightly under the surface of his words. It is a father-child arrangement based on Torvald’s need for control over his wife and his own image, both of which are illusory, creating the tension of uncertainty about Nora’s choices.

Nora as Loyal Ariadne

An old friend from school days, Mrs. Christine Linde, comes to visit Nora. Their conversation allows them to fill in the ten-year gap of news, including Nora’s need to take in needlework to make ends meet and Torvald’s exhaustion and illness that required a period of recuperation in Italy, a tremendous expense that Nora explains came from her papa. Torvald recovered and returned to Norway where he has just received a promotion in the bank and the promise of a secure future for his family. This situation, too, is an illusion, for although Torvald has recovered, his debt is not to her papa, who has since died, but to his wife who secretly borrowed the large sum from a moneylender of questionable repute to pay for the expenses of his recuperation.

The Tangled Web

By Act II the characters’ lives have intertwined. Nora offers to help the widowed Mrs. Linde by telling her husband of her friend’s accounting skills, which convinces Torvald to give her a bank position recently become available with the termination of Nils Krogstad, the secret moneylender of Nora Helmer. The deception indeed has led to a tangled web, but it will be the necessary test of the anima for Nora and Torvald. When Krogstad is fired, he will make public the news of the scandalous loan, an announcement that Torvald’s ego will not survive. Krogstad indeed sends Torvald the note calling in the balance of the loan and the letter sits untouched in the box. While Nora and Torvald are upstairs at a holiday celebration, Christine and Krogstad meet, revealing their former love affair. Christine’s good fortune leads her to offer Krogstad the security of marriage, and he accepts her offer, at the same time rescinding the loan to Nora.

Torvald’s Control

In Act III Torvald and Nora are alone. He calls her his “fascinating, charming little darling… all the beauty that is mine, all my very own… more captivating than ever… I want to be with you, my darling wife. I have often wished that you might be threatened by some great danger, so that I might risk my life’s blood, and everything, for your sake.” Once he has read the letter revealing Nora’s loan dilemma, his words quickly change to “miserable creature, hypocrite, liar, criminal, the unutterable ugliness of it, no religion, no morality, no sense of duty… Now you have destroyed my happiness… ruined my future..I must sink to such miserable depths because of a thoughtless woman!” Torvald’s anima calls upon all the images he knows as woman: Aphrodite the beautiful, Ariadne the loyal, Persephone the obliging, Pygmalion’s Galatea, the woman he created. She is every woman in his unconscious that will allow him to mold and control her.

A Clear Anima Projection

After his tirade of accusation, he calmly says to Nora, “It must appear as if everything between us were as before… You will still remain in my house… but I shall not allow you to bring up the children; I dare not trust them to you… From this moment happiness is not the question; all that concerns us is to save the remains, the fragments, the appearance-” Suddenly the door bell rings; a letter for Nora has arrived, which Torvald insists on reading first. It is news from Krogstad who has returned her bond, saving Nora and Torvald from embarrassment. In no time Torvald forgives his wife for her inability to “understand how to act on your own responsibly” and insists that she lean on him who will advise and direct her in her womanly helplessness. He has broad wings to shelter his “frightened little singing-bird” and will protect her “like a hunted dove.” While Nora is getting dressed to leave him, although unknown to him, he tells her he has given her a new life-Galatea-and she has become both archetypal wife and child to him. “So you shall be for me after this, my little scared, helpless darling.”

Casting Off the Anima

Nora, in each moment that passes, quietly looks inward, examining the undiscovered new woman inside her and casting off the anima projection she had abided for eight years in her marriage. With her cold, set face, she makes Torvald sit down while she tells him for the first time that they have never had a serious conversation as husband and wife. She is weary of being her papa’s and now her husband’s doll-child who must have the same opinions as and perform tricks for the men in her life. Their marriage and home have been nothing but a doll’s house, and having been trained to be manipulated according to Torvald’s wishes, she is not fit to be a mother either. She must stand alone and try to educate herself, for the understanding of the self is as sacred a duty as wife and mother. Torvald challenges Nora’s expectation that he could possibly sacrifice his honor for her–even while he fantasizes the shedding of his lifeblood for her–by telling her no man would do that. Her insightful response is, “It is a thing hundreds of thousands of women have done.” The door closes behind her and she is gone. The play has ended with Torvald confused and befuddled. Nora has killed Torvald’s symbolic mistress, the anima projection that enslaved her, and now she is free to discover the person she is and can become.

The Cycle of the Anima

Perpetual in its motion, the projection of the anima, the images a man unconsciously collects of the ideal woman, is reinforced by the woman who agrees to mirror those behaviors and mold herself accordingly to fit the projection. In each story the female protagonist strives to conform to her husband’s ideal at the time, and she slowly begins to think the way he does. His way becomes her way; his preferences become hers. In two other works of anima women, Katherine Anne Porter’s short story “Maria Concepcion” and Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, the marriages remain intact only because the wives assent to relinquishing themselves. In Ibsen’s play The Doll’s House, Nora must sacrifice her old life to be reborn as an authentic woman.

Please see the following works:

Jung, C.G. The Basic Writings of C.G. Jung. Trans. FR.F.C. Hull. Ed. Violet S. de Laszlo. Bollingen Series. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1990.

Ibsen, Henrik. A Doll’s House. Girard, Kansas: Haldeman-Julius Company,

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