10 Signs Your Child Might Be Anxious, Not Just Shy

10 Signs Your Child Might Be Anxious, Not Just Shy

Inspirational   17:05:00

A child who is described as “shy” may have trouble speaking up in school, talking with adults not familiar to them, and even making friends with peers. These behaviors all seem to be characteristic of garden-variety shyness. But how do you know if a child is more than shy, if their inability to communicate with others becomes so extreme that it interferes with their functioning in daily life?

Social anxiety — an officially recognized psychiatric disorder — can look a lot like shyness, and it can be hard to know when a child is beyond shy and needs the help of a professional mental health provider. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association (APA), used by mental health professionals, states that the symptoms of social anxiety disorder must be present for six months or more in order for a diagnosis to be made.

The 10 signs that a child might have anxiety rather than simple shyness involve not only the symptoms but also their intensity and their tendency to interrupt a child’s normal functioning.

1. Fear Of Embarrassment

A person with social anxiety experiences actual fear when confronted with a social situation. They may fear that others will view them critically and that they will somehow embarrass themselves in front of others. Being in a social setting can feel like being on display or performing.

2. Intensity Of The Fear

The fear of social situations can hit an anxious person hard: they may experience such physical symptoms as a racing heart, dry mouth, sweaty palms, trembling, and shaky voice. The mind and the body are intertwined when it comes to anxiety.

3. Anxiety Or Panic Attacks

The anxious person’s feelings of fear about a social situation can escalate to the point that they experience an anxiety attack or panic attack. These kinds of attacks can be frightening. They can involve such intense physical symptoms as heart palpitations, chest pain, shortness of breath, and nausea. Many people having a panic attack feel as if they are having a heart attack.

4. Awareness Of The Fear Being Out Of Proportion To The Trigger

The child with anxiety may be fully aware that their feelings of fear about going to a social gathering like a birthday party are irrational, but they are unable to control them nonetheless.

5. Avoidance Of Situations Causing Fear

Children with extreme social anxiety often avoid the situations that cause their fears. School is often a setting that generates fears in the anxious child, as it places demands on the child to perform and to engage with others at a level that may feel overwhelming.

6. Interference With Normal Life

For children, going to school is a part of everyday life. If severe anxiety prevents a child from attending school, the child isn’t able to access an education or socialize with peers, both of which are important facets of a so-called “normal” life.

7. Withdrawal From Social Activities

Aside from missing school, avoiding other typical childhood social activities such as parties, playdates, and extracurricular activities like clubs and sports can leave the anxious child feeling alone and frustrated by the inability to connect with others.

8. Six Or More Months Of Symptoms

In order for social anxiety to be diagnosed, the symptoms must have been present and have interfered with the child’s functioning for six or more months. This time frame shows that anxiety is more about how the child is “hardwired” than about avoiding certain uncomfortable situations. Anxiety is more pervasive and persistent than temporary bouts of insecurity or shyness.

9. No Other Medical Reasons For The Fears And Avoidance

A doctor could rule out the impact of medications the child might be taking, or any other co-occurring conditions, on the child’s behavior.

10. Your Gut Tells You It’s More Than Simple Shyness

Those who are closest to a child with anxiety know that child best, and their intuition may tell them long before symptoms become intense and debilitating that the child is affected by a condition more intense and pervasive than shyness. Trust your gut. If your child seems to be hindered from engaging successfully with the world, check with your pediatrician.

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How To Improve Your Memory And Concentration

How To Improve Your Memory And Concentration

Inspirational   16:54:00

Your brain is like a muscle. Without going to the gym and feeding your muscles with the right food, they simply won’t grow. The same applies to your brain. Without giving it any care and attention, it will be just like any other body part, continuing to serve you with a series of mundane tasks that it’s used to doing every other day.

What if there was an easy method to improve on your brain power which would improve memory and concentration tremendously? Would you try it? Of course you would. But would you take that method and convert it into a good habit? You probably would not. Why? Because we are creatures of habit — and, sadly, they’re mostly bad habits.

So, having said that, we urge you to read on, as there are things you might not know about your body which you can use to your advantage and turn into habits to improve memory and concentration.

1. Be The Master Of Your Own Sleep

We all know that getting the suggested 8 hours of sleep a night can be tough, especially in today’s fast-paced world. Instead of chasing the norms, why not take power naps during the day? According to the National Sleep Foundation, 85% of the mammal species are polyphasic sleepers, meaning they take naps — we humans are also in this category. A short nap of 20-30 minutes can have a great impact on your concentration and memory.

2. Understand Your Periods Of Wakefulness And Sleepiness

Understanding when you are most awake and alert helps increase productivity. Studies have shown that people feel most alert at 10 in the morning and items on the top of the to-do list should be done during this time.

However, alertness varies between different people and understanding when you are most awake is important. Why not keep track of your productivity levels by penning down the times when you have accomplished the most? By doing this, you will be able to know your best times of alertness.

3. Develop A Ritual To Kickstart Your Engine

There’s a lot of research that looks into how CEOs are so productive. One method used by CEOs is the 3 wins for the day technique. By setting out 3 big tasks you want to accomplish before your day starts, you position your mind to complete these 3 big tasks in order for the day to be a success.

4. Understand Focus And Losing Concentration

Breaking focus is an innate involuntary reaction to keep us safe. While selective focus is about top-down attention, breaking focus is a bottom-up reaction. For example, a loud voice or a very bright light breaks our focus most of the time. Once our focus is broken, it takes us approximately 25 minutes to refocus again. With this knowledge, you can focus for long periods of time provided that there are no distractions around.

5. Exercise To Improve Memory And Concentration

When we exercise, our nerve cells produce proteins called neurotrophic factors which trigger other chemicals that help in learning. A study in 2010 on monkeys published by Neuroscience has proven that regular exercise helps monkeys learn new tasks twice as fast compared to non-exercising monkeys, and it is one benefit scientists think would apply to humans as well.

6. Play Brain Games

“If you don’t use it, you lose it,” and this applies aptly to the brain. Research into brain plasticity tells us that by providing your brain with brain exercises, you can stop this degeneration.

A program called Brain HQ is designed to provide our brain with different stimuli to improve different areas, from reading and comprehension to memory improvement. Just by checking out smartphone app stores, you can find many various brain games. However, it’s advisable to only invest 20 minutes a day on brain games, as these will become just like any other mundane task if performed for longer on a daily basis.

7. Practice Visualisation And Association

Images are easier remember than facts, and scientists have uncovered that we actually never forget anything. The reason why we cannot remember things is the lack of “mental hooks” that help us retrieve the information from our brain.

To use the V&A method of remembering things, you associate things that are memorable. For example, to remember a grocery list can be quite daunting. With an item such as blueberries, you can associate it with something memorable, such as a blue bear. Blueberries are not memorable,

but riding a blue bear sure is!

8. Hang Out With Friends Often

A study done by the Harvard School of Public Health found that people with active social lives show lesser mental decline. Humans are, after all, social animals, and being around friends often not only is a benefit to our emotional health but also to our brain health.

You can take advantage of the memory-boosting benefits of socializing by reaching out over the phone, volunteering, or even joining a club. And if everyone’s just busy doing their thing, you can turn to a pet — especially a highly sociable dog.

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10 Difficult Life Situations And How To Make The Best Out Of Them

10 Difficult Life Situations And How To Make The Best Out Of Them

Inspirational   14:43:00

Ups and downs, rises and falls, rain and shine, joy and sorrow, day and night- this is how people define life: a series of events, sometimes jolly, sometimes painfully full of sorrow. Well, that is what life, as we know, is. There come many situations in life which we can classify as difficult. A wise thing to do is to be prepared to face the difficult times in our lives. These times usually affect us deeply on a psychological level and could potentially damage our lives. Being prepared for these times could help us to improve how we live our lives. Being prepared to face the challenges is what it means to learn and grow.
 The idea is to make the best out of everything life throws at us. Remember, most of these situations are not under our control. So the logical method to deal with these circumstances is to accept and move on. Here below we discuss about some of the tough situations we come across in our lives and how we can best deal with them.

1. Quarter-life, midlife crisis

As we age, we see ourselves changing physically and mentally. So, there come times during our aging process that we seek answers about the changes happening to and around us. After adolescence, between our early 20s and early 30s, we begin to make choices on how to best fit into society.

This transition period could be difficult for some of us to handle which turns into the ‘quarter-life crisis’. The sheer amount of confusion and pressure often leads to situations like depression or potentially even acts of self-harm.

During the process of aging, there comes another phase called ‘midlife crisis’, in between the early 40s and early 50s when we begin to truly feel our mortality. These are times when we have to deal with lots of changes which we naturally, as humans, find difficult to deal with. Knowing that the changes are inevitable and finding the strength to accept the changes is the only way to find courage and get through these times of crisis.

2. Breakups

Love happens and breakups too. And it goes without saying, breakups are heart breaking. When all those feelings of love suddenly turns into something vile, it becomes painful to handle.

What’s there to be done after breakups? Accept that it happened for the best of reasons, keep your mind busy doing something productive and know that love happens again. The pain subsides like it always does. Turn the pain into motivation to bring a positive change in your life. (Join a gym, perhaps, and sweat it all out.)

3. Changing friendship

Being social beings, we seek love and friendship. These are undoubtedly the most important aspects of having an overall healthy life. We simply cannot do without friends because we aren’t made to survive alone. We seek and keep friends to help us grow. So a changing friendship can be a difficult thing to deal with. Letting go of friends and adapting to new faces as you leave behind what you had come to love can be challenging.

But people come and go. This is yet another inevitable truth about life. We’ve all read those cheeky lines on the internet like “Those who want to stay in your life will find ways to do so” and they’re true. Don’t be afraid to accept and let go of people and welcome new people into your life.

4. Failures

Failures are difficult times, of course. They are difficult on many levels. Not meeting goals you’ve worked so hard for, the sense of worthlessness, all the negativity failures bring along- these are hard to put up with. But then again, we’ve heard and read many stories of success after failures, stories of what patience and perseverance can deliver. So we know the best thing to do during these times is to find inspiration and push through.

5. Divorce

Marriages takes a lot of effort to function well. We’ve witnessed many failed marriages leading up to divorce and heard the stories or even experienced how difficult the transition is for the whole family. Sadly, some of us might have to live through this terrible experience.

While splitting a family is as horrible as it sounds and probably no one really likes the idea of going to divorce lawyers, divorce is the best answer if a marriage is not working. It opens up doors for positive changes in life. Knowing this helps people keep the right attitude towards life after divorce.

6. Losing a job

Losing a job could be devastating, and you might even go hungry in the worst case scenario. And trust me, there’s no rougher time than when you have to spend days on a hungry stomach.

So, what’s there to do after losing your job? You might feel hopeless at this point but don’t sweat over it anymore. Be strong and make efforts to find another, a better job. Keep calm and carry on.

7. Getting older

You might have heard the story of Buddha and how he set out onto the path of enlightenment; he saw the miseries in man’s life for which he wanted to find cure.  The point being: getting older can certainly be a difficult situation and there’s no cure to it. Gray hair, wrinkles, frail health, not being able to do things you once did with great ease, these are some of the things we adjust to as we age.

Well, it’s no secret that there’s no fountain of youth. We are all going to be old if we live long enough. So, the best thing to do is plan ahead for  old age if you don’t want it to be miserable. You see, that is why  wise people came up with things like pensions and retirement plans.

8. Getting injured, falling sick

Accidents happen and sickness might find us, no matter how many precautions we take. Though, this should not dissuade us from being cautious and trying to live healthily. Recovering from injuries is one of the hardest times one could experience and potentially learning to live with changes to your body and abilities can be a major adjustment physically and emotionally.

Again, keeping the right attitude towards life is the key to dealing with it. The seemingly long journey of recovery could be made less stressful by engaging in other  activities that the ailments don’t prevent. There is usually always something that you can find to do if you’re willing. For example, there have been people with cancer have written great novels from their hospital beds.

9. Losing all that you have in a natural disaster

Natural disasters are one of the worst things that could ever happen to anyone. During these disasters, people can potentially lose the people they are closest to as well as all their possessions, including their home: a truly traumatic life experience.

But like always, we bounce back.

We are resilient enough to come back from the toughest of times and start over anew. The fact that we survived this calamity is reason enough to believe that we are given a second chance. All we can do in the wake of disasters like an earthquake, tsunami or hurricane is to help each other and find hope in this time of despair.

10. Death of a loved one

Death is the ultimate truth in life. It could come to anyone at any time. The sorrow it casts is always tough to handle. Losing  loved ones, having to live life without them is the most awful kind of change one could experience in life.

The grief and loss model has five stages of grief: denial, anger, depression, bargaining and acceptance but it doesn’t necessarily occur in the same way for everyone. Some of us might take a very long time to reach the stage of acceptance.

Death demands grief so grieving is the right thing to do but the best thing we can do to honor the dead is to accept the fact and move on when we are able to do so. To commemorate the importance of this person’s passing we could also plant a tree, perhaps.

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10 Keys That Will Unlock Your Success

10 Keys That Will Unlock Your Success

Inspirational   13:51:00

FOLLOW US ON OUR BBM CHANNEL C002A9544 FOR LATEST GIST. Every successful person has a great secret leading to his or her success. Some love to share their secrets with others and some don’t. It is good to know how some people lived their life before making a success. There are some facts of life that will guide our foot steps to become successful in future and below are some. I have written 10 Keys that will help you unlock your success. 10 Keys To Unlock Your Success

• ON EARNING

Do not depend on a single income. Make investment to create chances. Imagine if you earn a living only by working in a company and unfortunately you get fired one day.
How will you survive?

It is good to have so many sources that generate money into your pocket. If one gets terminated, you can survive from the other sources and investment is the best way to get unlimited income.

• SPENDING

Some times when you get money, you start buying things that are not really of much importance. If you buy things you do not need now, you will find yourself selling things you need at cheaper price in the future. Spend your money responsibly and make sure whatever you buy is of importance.

• SAVINGS

Savings is the only key for making yourself rich. It i s quiet easy to spend your earnings than saving them. Always remember; “Do not save what is left after spending but rather, spend what is left after saving.” You can’t live in a life without saving. If you don’t save, any little thing that goes wrong, will affect your whole life.

• TAKING RISK

Taking risk is something that every successful man has attempted so many times in his or her life. There is one trick for surviving risks in life. “Never test the depth of a river with both feet.”
Make sure you invest 50% or less in risky businesses. If you invest 100% in risky businesses and everything fails, your whole life gets shuttered. Remember risky businesses has 50% chance to be successful so you also give it only 50% attention.

INVESTMENT

When you want to invest, always remember this saying “Do not put all your eggs into one basket”. Investment is a life time business. Do not put all your trust in one area of investment. Anything can happen so invest in divers ways so that when something happens, you will still have much hope and enough confidence to say you have not lost.

• EXPECTATIONS

If you give people good treats, don’t expect them to treat you back the same. Always have in mind that not every body likes you.
Honesty is an expensive gift so don’t expect it from cheap people. Do not trust just anybody. Trust people who are worthy of your trust.

• BANISH YOUR PAST

Past is waste paper, present is a news paper and future is a question paper. Come out of your past, control your present and secure your future. The past has no effect on your future if you stop thinking about it today.

• BE STRONG

When bad things happen in your life, one of three things happen. You allow the problem to define you, you let it destroy you or you let it strengthen you. Always be strong enough to carry your problem no matter how it is. Don’t let your problem carry you.

• PLAN AHEAD

When you are crossing a gutter, you don’t leap before finding where the gutter is. Instead, you look out for dangers before you leap. Same way you must think very well about your future when taking decisions. Find out about dangers ahead before you take decisions. If you don’t plan your future well, you will end up putting your whole life in a mess.
MAKE NO MISTAKES
We use pencil when we were young, but now we use pens. Do you know why? Because mistakes in childhood can easily be erased, unlike now. So read and write carefully, otherwise, life will be a tissue paper. Mistakes at this age can never be erased so be extra careful in whatever you do.

All of us have started our journey to success. I don’t know what your believes are but it is my belief that without all the keys above, success is very impossible.
Good Luck!
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7 Ways I Made the Most of Being Single

7 Ways I Made the Most of Being Single

Inspirational   17:54:00

Being single isn’t always easy. Trust me — I know! I was single most of my adult life, into my early 30s. While at times I had moments of self-doubt and fear of never meeting the right person, I found ways to make the most of this “me time,” because I realized that being single — or coupled up — is really what we make of it. Check out my tips below to make being single a positive chapter in your life (which I did ALL of, and am really glad I did):
1. Get to you know your town.

Whether you live in a big city or a small town, there’s always a stone left unturned and a new café, restaurant, or venue to check out. Explore where you are and take it in. Where you live can constantly be your own little adventure — plus, you never know who you might meet while on it!

2. Live alone.
If you’re single, sometimes it makes the most financial sense to live with roommates. But if you ever get the chance to live alone before coupling up, I highly recommend it. There’s nothing like having your very own space, even if just for a short time, to live just like you want to without answering to anyone else! Plus you get to walk around naked without a care in the world... added bonus!


3. Go out with the person you don’t think you’d ever end up with.
Getting to know new people who might not be your “type” can actually surprise you. You could make a new friend out of it, it could be a great connection for your career, or who knows — you might realize you are indeed attracted to them or something about them. Exposing yourself to different people makes life and connection a little more interesting, and you never know what can come of that.

4. Travel solo or with your friends.
There’s something really special about discovering new places on your own, or with a friend or small group. It’s different than traveling with your significant other because the trip is more about you (if you’re solo) or an experience to share and bond with your closest pals. Travel experiences are memories you will never forget, and by seeing and experiencing new places and cultures, you will even learn so much more about yourself.

5. Take a class, try a new hobby, go back to school.
When you’re single, it’s such an excellent time to work on yourself, because your primary focus is you. Invest in creating a better version of yourself — whether you take the time to concentrate on a new hobby, get that certification you had been thinking of, or get more training related to your career. Plus — when you’re working on being the best version of yourself, it’s uber-attractive to others!

6. Give your time to others.
There’s nothing like giving back — and it’s fun to do it on your own or round up some friends to do it with you. Whether you walk dogs at the local shelter, mentor younger students, or spend an afternoon at the soup kitchen, giving back spreads the positive vibes and also will give you some internal sparkle — and who doesn’t need more of that?!


7. Do that thing that’s been on your bucket list.
Have you always wanted to move to another city or country? Start your own business? Get photos taken of yourself? Go mountain climbing on the other side of the world? Whatever it may be, now is such a great time to do it! Taking that leap to do something you’ve been thinking about or you’re even scared of, is so exhilarating when you actually do it because it’s your own special moment in your life that you’ll always be proud of.

Know someone who could use a little inspiration or ideas on this topic? Send this to them. And feel free to share your ideas below!

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The #1 Reason We Give Up

The #1 Reason We Give Up

Inspirational   05:39:00

Think about the person you wish you could be: what you’d look like, how you’d carry yourself, how you’d treat people around you, the career you’d have, the money you’d have and what you’d do with it. The difference between you now and the badass version of you is certainty. You can be the person you want to be, but you need to have the absolute certainty that you will become that person — not a belief, not a hope. It has to be an inevitability.

A lot of how your life plays out is determined by your mentality.

An example of this that a lot of people can relate to is weight loss and dieting. Adherence to most diets is pretty low. As soon as results start to slow, uncertainty begins to convince you the effort is no longer worth a questionable outcome. Wasted time and effort can be powerful fears once you let uncertainty creep in. At that point, it becomes easy to give up.

I’m no psychologist, but I believe most people who fail do so because they were not certain that their path would lead to success. When you know with 100% certainty that what you’re doing will lead to the desired outcome, it makes the effort much easier to accept. I will never worry about my weight or body fat again because I am certain I can control it. I don’t think I can, Iknow I can because I’ve proven it to myself many times. Once you find your way, you will have the satisfaction of knowing how to traverse that path, or, at the very least, that you can traverse it.

The hard part is creating certainty without prior success. A coach or mentor is one way to create certainty. If someone you trust and has proven they know the path to success, it is easier to convince yourself they will keep you on track. Another way is to visualize your success so many times that it becomes more than just a visualization. Produce the results in your head and convince yourself it is inevitable. Create an obsession, a ritual.

It may not be an easy path, so you need to know that it’s worth it. But if it’s worth it, then prove it. Make it to the end and don’t give up — not this time. Prove to yourself that you can do this and learn along the way. Whether your goal is weight loss, business, or some other goal, make success an inevitable certainty and become that badass version of you!

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