Tantric Sex and the City

Okay, this is clearly not what's going on in tantric beginners' workshops. Not from my experience, anyway. (Granted, I've only ever been to one, and never say never.)

But I thought it incredibly funny.

NSFW, of course. You have been warned.

Why Rituals Matter

Practically every life coach and self-help guru will go on about rituals, and how important they are. As one popular example, watch the following Tony Robbins video:

(Note for clarity, added after my discussion with Brent Mosher in the comments section below: I do not endorse Tony Robbins; he's a self-help guru, and he keeps raising unrealistic and false hopes in his followers. However, I think he's right in this regard, and I believe in separating the wheat from the chaff, even with gurus.)

He's right, of course, and they all are: Rituals are good for you!

This posting is about what they don't tell you, perhaps because it's not trendy and not "positive" enough. Or, more probably, they simply don't know it. (*)

There is a well-documented psychological effect called decision fatigue. It describes how decisions are physically exhausting. The following quote from a NYT article (quoted in an excellent article aptly titled "Decision Fatigue: Why Willpower Isn’t Always Enough") explains it nicely:

Decision fatigue helps explain why ordinarily sensible people get angry at colleagues and families, splurge on clothes, buy junk food at the supermarket and can’t resist the dealer’s offer to rustproof their new car. No matter how rational and high-minded you try to be, you can’t make decision after decision without paying a biological price.

It’s different from ordinary physical fatigue — you’re not consciously aware of being tired — but you’re low on mental energy. The more choices you make throughout the day, the harder each one becomes for your brain...

(Highlights by me.)

And that is precisely why it makes sense to ritualize our tasks - especially those we don't like. Daily workout, I guess, is one of those for most of us. You get up in the morning and your brain and your whole body goes noooo, not again... I'm tired, I want ten more minutes in bed, it'll feel terrible... And that odd behaviour will continue day after day after day, even though you repeatedly have the experience of being more happy after the workout than before. But when you're used to doing your morning exercises every day at the same time for so long you don't even remember a time when you did not do them, it's much easier. It's one thing you don't have to think about.

Perhaps more importantly, if you know the dynamics of decision fatigue, it gets easier to handle those situations. It's not a question of guilt anymore, but a question of acquiring the skills. Instead of calling yourself a failure for not having enough willpower, now it's time to learn how to ritualize all the things you want to do on a regular basis.

And it gets even better!

'Cos you can apply the same principle on a much lower level, too.

I find that workout gets easier if I do the same set of exercises every time. Sure, every now and then I add an "extra", just to make it more interesting, but in general, I have my 10 or so moves that I do every day.

Okay, almost every day. Probably 5 days a week. Except last week, when there was all this christmas business, and then sometimes I just don't get to it, so let's say it's probably a solid... 7 days out of 10...

I hear similar stories from people who decided to go vegetarian. There is no question about ordering that rare steak. One more decision they don't have to take with every single meal.

Venturing into philosophical terrain, I find it plausible that our identity, the labels we attach to ourselves and then attach ourselves to, are yet another way to get rid of decisions. If that is so, my decision never to go 100% with any dietary philosophy has a severe drawback here, and I will rethink it in the next few days.

So, in case you were wondering why your grandma always insisted the dishes be done right after the meal, now you know - she was perfectly right. Sometimes, a lifetime of experience can make one a great psychologist.

What tasks can you think of right now that you would like to ritualize in this way?

---------

(*) To be fair, some of them probably do tell you, I haven't ever heard it though.

"How To Change Your Beliefs And Your Identity" follow-up

Dear Stefan Pylarinos,


yes, blocking people who are skeptical about your claims and ask you to provide the proof you claim on your website, as well as removing their comments from your youtube videos, sure speaks to your professional attitude, success as a self-help guru and personal decency.

I guess we have settled that issue, haven't we?

To be fair, there has been one person claiming that she did get rid of her bipolar disorder by practicing emotion management. Her name is Tieu Nguye, and here is her comment at the youtube video. However, she doesn't claim that she used your method, and her claim is very vague and generalized.

I never doubted that emotion management has good effects; I'm doubting that your outrageous claims are true, that you actually have the proof you claim, that you ever cared to actually test your own claims, and that you can provide "hundreds of examples" of people who experienced fast, radical and lasting change by applying your method.


Sincerely

bet lamed

"How To Change Your Beliefs And Identity"

Dear Stefan Pylarinos,

in our recent conversation on your youtube video about "How To Change Your Beliefs And Identity", you claimed that you can give me "hundreds of examples of people that have made amazing changes." From context, I infer that you are talking about people who have made changes following your own method which you detail in your videos and on your website.

Talking about your website, you claim there that you have a "7-Step Proven Method To Creating The Life Of Your Dreams" and that you know and can teach people "How To Change Any Negative Behaviour Or Emotion Instantly".

Regarding those claims, I have a challenge that I am sure you will enjoy to meet. After all, what's in it for you is nothing short of the best publicity you can ever hope to get: independently verified, irrefutable proof of your claims. You can find this challenge at the end of this blog posting, under the heading "The Challenge".

Before we start, I would like to make one thing abundantly clear: I do not doubt your sincerity. I am perfectly sure that you believe what you say, and that you are convinced that you're doing a tremendous amount of good for other people. The same goes for many other life coaches out there. To what degree that assessment is correct, of course, is an entirely different question.

A Few Remarks About Skepticism And Beliefs

Let's talk a bit about your latest contribution to our youtube conversation, and let me clarify a few things. Here is your text:

I have some feedback, if you're open to it. You have a very disempowering way of looking at things. You very much have a pessimistic or skeptical view of life coaches in my opinion, which is all fear based - it's a fear of being disappointed, or that change can't happen that fast. As long as you believe this, how is it going to help your life? How does believing what you just said going to empower you in any way? I can give you hundreds of examples of people that have made amazing changes.

First off, please stop calling this feedback. It violates pretty much every rule of feedback I ever learned in all the communication courses I took: It generalizes my remarks about self-help and life coaches to my overall worldview, it personalizes matters, it attempts to turn the factual problem I raised into my own personal issue, and most amusingly, it is an attempt at reading my mind. You don't know anything about my personal fears or disappointments, because I never talked to you about that. If you've taken any NLP course at all, you know that mind-reading is one of the main ways of distorting your internal representation of the world. It is also a good way of unnecessarily escalating a conflict, and in the case of a life coach, it is entirely unprofessional and unacceptable.

In short, I guess I might have struck a nerve there, ain't I?

Fast Change

Let's talk about "fast change" first, since it is a repeated topic here on my blog. (Probably even ad nauseam, sometimes, I'm afraid...) Do I believe that change can't happen "that fast"? (How fast is "that fast", anyway? Well, you claim instantaneous radical change on your webpage, so let's go with that.)

Well, I wouldn't completely rule out the possibility of very fast changes.

What I can say is that I have never witnessed any such change. What I can also say is that I probably should have witnessed at least a few, given that I have a sheet of paper in my drawer that says "NLP practitioner" in nice golden letters, that I have another certificate identifying me as a mediator, and I've looked into various "transformative" practices ranging from christianity to kabbalah to buddhism over the years. In my NLP class, there were about 30 peple, and we spent a lot of time with each other over the course of about 18 months. And yet, none of those 30 people ever reported any significant, mind-blowing, instant changes, even though NLP claims to be the most effective method ever, and the institute is probably the largest and most renowned NLP institute in my country. Are we to surmise that they all had those drastic mind-boggling revelations, but somehow all of them just kept their mouth shut about it? Perhaps they talked with each other and somehow kept me out of the loop? Possible. But not very convincing, if you ask me.

As I said, I don't even claim that instant, radical change can never ever happen. I'm sure it does. In fact, it happened to me, and I blogged about it here and here. I do think, however, that probably no-one has ever devised a fool-proof, 100% method of achieving it. If that were not so, how do you explain thousands upon thousands of self-help books and methods, all claiming total effectiveness, often contradicting each other? Don't start with "not everything is for everyone". The moment you admit that, you have essentially admitted that your specific method is not proven, not 100%.

In short, if anyone has a "100% proven method for achieving instant, radical and lasting change", where the heck do they hide their Nobel Prize, and why do they hide it in the first place? Looking around, this is the most sought-after knowledge since the goddarn frakkin' dawn of humanity. If you claim that you have a method like that, be prepared to back that up with evidence. This is a very, very, VERY extraordinary claim, almost as extraordinary as the claim of being able to walk on water or raise the dead. Evidence for this should be MASSIVE if you want it to be believable.

Change is chaotic and unpredictable, in my experience. We can learn how to ride the avalanche, how to steer it to a degree, and that's about all we can do.

Skepticism

You write that I have a "pessimistic or skeptical view of life coaches". You are spot on: In fact, I do, and it is backed by my own experience. Looking at the name of my blog, what else do you expect?

I don't claim that they're all completely bogus, and I do think that a lot of them actually have something useful to say. But I also think that most of them overgeneralize their own experience, have read a few books here and there, and create some brilliant positive, good-sounding, overly optimistic ideology from that, and then sell this as absolute truth. I also think that this is a devastatingly destructive way of going about things that ultimately hurts the customers way more than it benefits them.

But all that is just my own very personal rambling, and skepticism is not about that. Skepticism is about requiring evidence. You made a claim, you show us the evidence, we examine it. Simple, really, isn't it?

The Usefulness Of Beliefs

You asked me (rhetorically, I guess), "How does believing what you just said going to empower you in any way?"

I take from that that you have a very utilitarian view of beliefs. In fact, it is the view taught in NLP and next to all self-help and life coaching. I bought into that view myself, for a while.

Here's the catch: It is not TRULY utilitarian. It consistently overlooks the fact that beliefs, ultimately, are tools for survival. And they can't well function as that if they are not in some way realistic. Yes, beliefs can be disempowering, and we can rephrase and reframe a good many of our beliefs in better ways so as to better empower ourselves and others. But I have also found that I can not make myself believe something that I know to be objectively false. Have you ever tried to make yourself believe that you ate ice cream for breakfast, when you really ate toast? Go on and do it, I challenge you. I predict that you will fail. Your brain will simply reject it as not consistent with your experience.

How will my belief about life coaches empower me? By avoiding to fall for bullshit claims that don't actually work in reality. By avoiding to invest time and money in methods that fail to deliver.

And yes, I did try that stunt with the ice-cream, thanks for asking.

The Challenge

Okay, here's your challenge. As an honest entrepeneur, a decent human being and a great life coach, I'm sure you'll be happy to meet the following criteria:

1. Hundreds of Examples

Regarding the hundreds of examples of people that have made amazing changes, I am looking forward to having all of those reply to this posting. Specifically, I require that the following criteria be met:

1. Every entry has to come from a different person.
2. Every single one of them has to be properly authenticated, so we can make sure that none of them are faked. I am flexible about the method of authentication; however, I'm sure our audience and your prospective customers will have a keen and skeptical eye on any method you come up with.
3. In order to reflect permanent change, the radical instantaneous experience has to have taken place more than 6 months ago.
4. The report has to be detailed and sufficiently void of vague language.
5. The person has to attest that the change they achieved was actually the change that they planned to achieve before the experience.
6. Your influence on and involvement with the change have to be obvious in the report.
7. The challenge is met if there are at least 200 ("hundreds") such entries within the next month. For starters, I'll be happy to provisionally declare the challenge met if we have 50 entries within one week.

2. 7-Step Proven Method

Regarding your "7-Step Proven Method To Creating The Life Of Your Dreams", kindly answer the following questions:

1. Without revealing any trade secrets, what is the main psychological method that you base your method on?
2. What renowned institution performed the scientific tests necessary to devise the proof you claim?
3. What methods of psychological and sociological measurement were employed?
4. Were the tests double-blind?
5. Were the tests quantitative or qualitative?
6. How many subjects were tested?
7. What measures were taken to avoid, or at least account for, confirmation and selection bias?

I am looking forward to literally hundreds of replies...

With kind regards,

Betlamed

How can we turn struggle into pleasure?

In the past view days and weeks, I've seen quite a few weight loss videos. Some of which are more inspiring than others.

I really dig how people share their weight loss experiences on youtube. This is how social networks are supposed to work, in my view: building up support networks and helping each other on journeys of self-improvement.

One of the best youtube channels in this respect is Jumoke (http://www.youtube.com/feed/UCf2gJTH7ItjH0BUWmevtkIg). Huuuuge dude, with a good heart and a great sense of humor, who lost 50 lbs in 6 months and is still going strong.

Now, with my recent revelation about healthy and delicious food, I can't help but notice with some sadness one fact about many, many of those videos: They're often telling the story of a struggle. A fight. For example, there's these two fine ladies.

I sincerely wish the best for them. That they reach their goals and move on to live happier lives.

But, judging from my own experiences, it's not going to happen. I don't know how to put this in a way that is not disavowing or dismissive, which is one reason why I didn't put it in a youtube comment. They will last for a month or maybe two, and then they'll bounce back. It is my conviction that you will not succeed on a journey like this as long as you think of it as a fight. I mean, maybe other people are just wired differently, but I cannot imagine how to go on, day to day, with a practice you secretly loathe.

Once you discover the pleasures of whatever it is you're doing, it gets easy. Almost a bit too easy in a way. It's hard to believe, some days, that, yes, I found the way to sustain a healthy diet. After I spent at least 5 or 6 years trying ever so hard to find that way, without making any progress whatsoever.

Tantra, to me, is (among other things) a way to turn meditation into pleasure. Of course I will practice my breathing, if it is one way to get pleasure, whenever I want it, wherever I want it, completely for free!

So, the big question is: How can you turn the challenges you're facing into pleasure? How can you find pleasurable aspects in your chores - taking out the trash, doing the dishes, working at your job, etc.

I have not, as of yet, found a way to generalize my experience with tantra and food to other areas. I'm fairly certain that there is one, and I'm almost sure it has to do with self-empathy, self-love and mindfulness.

One lesson I took from these past few weeks is that it is not always a linear process. Years and years of struggle, and then one youtube video changed it all. So I guess that the struggle is one necessary part of the trip. Maybe it's life's way of "softening us up" so we're prepared for the one sudden revelation. Okay, that's metaphysical b.s., admittedly. But maybe something is actually happening on the psychological level while we're going through all that struggle. The big question is: what is it? What can we learn about it? Can we speed up the process? Or maybe it is all about not doing that, about just giving in to whatever happens?

One big guessing game.

I will keep you posted as I find out more.

"Faith And Reason" (a letter to Fr Robert Barron)

Dear Mr Barron,

this is probably the first in a series of open letters to you.

Why you?

Simply because you turned up in one of my youtube binges one fine day, you openly perform evangelist and apologetic work as a priest of the roman catholic church, and so I tend to disagree with most of what you say. I dig debates, so I started asking questions on your channel.

Now, you have long ago banned me from that channel, so I can't ask any more questions there. So I'm doing it in my own blog instead.

In your video about "Faith and Reason", you quote Thomas Didymus and Thomas Aquinas as examples for the roman catholic church welcoming questions. "After all", I hear you say, and I paraphrase, "Thomas Aquinas asked whether god exists. If that question can be asked within the church, so can any other question."

I find that a bit ironic. After all, what do those two Thomases have in common beside their name?

Assuming that Thomas Aquinas' answer to the question whether god exists was an emphatic negative, a deeply convinced "NO" -- would you still be quoting him? Chances are, no.  He wouldn't be a "saint" of the roman catholic church. He wouldn't even have lived long enough for that. He would be a sidenote of history, yet another victim of the church's welcoming way to deal with people whose questions, and more precisely whose answers to those questions it dislikes.

No, I do not bring up ancient issues to damn the church. It wasn't me who started quoting Aquinas here.

In other words, my suspicion is that the church, and -- as far as you represent that church -- you, Mr Barron, welcome questions and rational discourse just as long as the answer is exactly the one you like. Yes, one may ask whether god exists, or whether Jesus is the messiah - as long as the answer to both is a loud and clear "yes".  And that seems patently absurd to me. Correct me if I'm wrong...  You strike me as an exceptionally intelligent and learned man, so I wonder what your answer to that might be.

You then move on to talk about Faith being "suprarational, surrender from the far side of reason". And then at the core part of your video, you make a very odd switch... suddenly, the juxtaposition is not about Faith and Reason, but about Faith and Rationalism. You say:

"Is it wrong to question - no. But is it wrong to be so aggressive in one's rationalism that one wants utterly to control the situation - yeah. That's a problem. Cause you'll never get god that way with our grasping, self-asserting minds."

Let me repeat that one more time: CAUSE YOU'LL NEVER GET GOD THAT WAY. Something is wrong because it doesn't lead to the answer that you have already set up to be true. I think that this is a very interesting slip there.

What exactly do you mean by "rationalism"? The textbook definition is "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification." That can hardly be what you mean.

See, what I don't get is this odd pairing of rationality and "controlling the situation". It's not like you're the first one to come up with that.  It's an old stock item from the staple of religious apologetics.

Of course, I can only guess what's actually meant by that term. Usually, it tells us something about a person's behaviour in their social relationships. A guy can control the situation by not listening to his girlfriend, by putting words into her mouth, by applying manipulative language or plain old violence. But that's not the context of your video. The context of your video is you trying to set up Faith as a valid source of knowledge or justification. It is trying to show that there are things beyond reason. There is no relationship there. It's a question of facts -- either things do exist that are not to be explained by reason, or not. And the burden of proof is still on your side, of course.

Actually, let me submit an alternative view: Contrary to being a form of self-assertion and control, adhering to reason is a form of submission.  In adhering to reason, e.g. by calling myself a skeptic, I submit myself to a set of well-known, well-defined rules. If I then move on to violate those rules, you can call me out on that. If my syllogisms don't work, or my premises are doubtful, or I show no evidence for my claims - you can criticize me. I may grumble and grouch, but ultimately, I cannot but accept that you're simply right. That's the beauty of reason -- it is universal and takes no sides.

I fail to see how that is "controlling".

Where is the same form of submission in Faith? In Faith, you cannot criticize the sacred doctrines. In Faith, there is no way to have a debate, to amend one's views, to get a better understanding of reality.

Is it not the case that, contrary to your position, Faith is the ultimate form of control? In Faith, you get to choose what you want to believe, and ain't nobody gonna take it away from you, ever. There is simply no way, based on Faith, that I could convince you of anything.  You control the situation much, much more than I do. It's you who ban unwanted commenters, not me. (I'm not butthurt about it, I just made the experience that it is rather symptomatic for apologists.)

But let's not end it here. I know that your reply (in a purely metaphorical sense -- of course you won't ever honor me with an actual reply) will be along the lines of, "that is not what I mean by Faith.  That is not True Faith." And beside the obvious No True Scotsman there, I actually agree.

Let me submit yet another little proposition here: Faith is the position that there is something beyond reason. We cannot hope to falsify that.  But we can safely say that there is no reasonable way to talk about whatever is "there", beyond reason.

I think that you, and your church, completely and utterly fail in going all the way. And that's what we need to do: GO ALL THE WAY. There is probably something beyond reason, and we cannot talk about it, so LET'S STOP TALKING ABOUT IT.

Yes, I do understand submitting to the transcendent. And I think that that is, to a part, what you're aiming at -- most probably it's something that every somewhat mature human being is striving for: transcendence. And of course, we're all failing at it, all the time. And that's okay.

The mistake I see is not having Faith per se; the mistake is having Faith IN SOMETHING. In a doctrine, a dogma. "God is a person", "God is love", "God thinks that premarital sex is wrong". All of those are speculations. Nothing wrong with speculations, but one shouldn't treat a speculation as a fact. (The same goes, of course, for "universal energy", "karma", "the law of attraction", etc.)

You cannot set something up to be beyond reason, and then move on to talk about that something as if you knew it.  It's having the cake, and eating it.  As I'm sure you're well aware after years of academic study in theology and philosophy, in order to talk about something you always need reason.

The mistake is, as I like to call it somewhat cheekily, falling for one's own bullshit.

The moment the roman catholic church stops falling for its own bullshit, and starts recognizing that it has no clue about god, or about Jesus, or about the trinity, is exactly the moment that it may become useful for humanity.

 With kind regards,
Skeptic Tantrika

Thunderf00t vs Kent Hovind at Reason Rally

At the recent "Reason Rally" event, well-known youtube atheist activist Thunderf00t was - umm, well - "interviewed" by creationist Eric Hovind, son of Kent Hovind.

I won't go into the details of how the conversation went down, as all of it has been covered extensively by others. (The following video is one example out of many.)

Suffice it to say that it was a textbook example of presuppositional apologetics, pre-planned and well-designed to make a scientist look bad, simply because the scientist tried to honestly answer questions that were by no means honest.

I think that episodes like this raise a more general question: Do I, as an atheist, want to engage in debates like that? Do I want to train strategies for "winning" those debates?

1. The issue of "winning"

To me, the issue of "winning" a debate is a rather weird concept.

Part of that weirdness seems to stem from cultural heritage. I have the impression that, in the anglo-american countries, debates are more or less seen as sportive events. There is a rich tradition of formalized debates there, that we continentals simply lack.

If you watch a "discussion" in an Austrian or German tv show, you will see 4-8 people talking past and above each other, while a rather desperate moderator tries to maintain some modicum of order.

An American "debate", on the other hand - say between Kent Hovind and Sam Harris - is a strictly formalized exchange of blows between two opponents in several rounds. The two participants are not, actually, engaging in communication with each other - they are performing a stage-play for the audience, much like the ongoing drama of professional Wrestling. And, of course, everybody goes home with the firm confidence that "their side" has won.

Call me naive, but I tend to think that discussions should be entered with an open mind and an open heart. I tend to think that discussions are an exchange of ideas that may or may not change my thinking. Ritualized exchanges of rhetorics and clever semantics designed to make the other party look like a fool simply have no part in a discussion like that.

Of course, I do not stand above the crowd. I do enjoy those shows just as much as any other dude.

On the other hand, it would be nice to see an actual honest discussion between a theist and an atheist, for once.

2. The resulting questions

The question resulting from all this is whether you, as an atheist, want to engage in public debates, recognize them as sportive events, and learn the strategies necessary for "winning". Thunderf00t clearly failed to do so. I cannot tell whether this was his conscious personal choice, or whether he conforms to the stereotype of "naive scientist" mentioned above.

And, of course, I cannot speak for all atheists.

I want to urge everyone to see that many apologists out there do engage in debate tactics. (I think there are  courses out there on "how to win any debate with any atheist, every time" or so.)

On the one hand, you can see debates as a sport, and train yourself to firmly keep the ball in your opponent's field, using deception, always attacking, repeating yourself until the other party gives up, and so on. It does make you seem like a winner. And it sure is a lot of fun.

On the other hand, you might choose to always try and be as honest as you can, in any debate.

In the latter case, I also urge you to ask yourself what to do when a debate like that comes up. It is perfectly valid to simply refuse to engage in it and walk away. You can choose to have the debate, but not in front of a camera (Thunderf00t clearly didn't have those possibilities - he had something to lose!). You may choose to have the debate, at a later point, in private.

If, however, you choose to engage in (public) debates with a schooled apologist, without having been schooled in counter-apologetics yourself, you will most likely be blown to pieces in mid-air. It's not a question of intelligence or quick wit. It's simply a question of having learned the techniques and being prepared to apply them without any regard for the other person's feelings, or for logic, rationality or really anything that could step in the way of "winning". It's a battle of egos, nothing more and nothing less.

Another possibility might be that we atheists have our own schools of counter-apologetics. These would then have to be actual practical courses, instead of mere lectures on logic. You do not learn rhetorics just from a lecture - you have to train that stuff, much like boxing, until it becomes automatic.

Personally, I would like to engage in a course like that. If not anything else, it should be a whole lot of fun!  I'm fairly certain that I would still like to avoid the actual debates, though, for reasons mentioned above. But it definitely can't hurt to be able to counter stupid rhetorics.

TEDxSF - Nicole Daedone - Orgasm: The Cure for Hunger in the Western Woman

Nicole Daedone is a sought-after speaker, author, and educator focusing on the intersection between orgasm, intimacy, and life. She is the founder of OneTaste, a cutting-edge company bringing a new definition of orgasm to women. The practice at the heart of her work is called OM or Orgasmic Meditation. OM uniquely combines the tradition of extended orgasm with Nicole's own interest in Zen Buddhism, mystical Judaism and semantics. Helping to foster a new conversation about orgasm —one that's real, relevant, and intelligent—she has inspired thousands of students to make OM a part of their everyday lives.

I agree with almost everything said in the video - but let me add the following:

Change will NOT come from turned-on women ALONE, whether in the west or wherever.

Change will come from turned-on PEOPLE of all genders and sexual orientations.

Let's be sexual. And please, please, PLEASE, let's be TOGETHER in this! Whether male, female, shemale, whatever. Let's be openly sexual.

Just say Yes

Say Yes to that annoying neighbour. Say Yes to smelly subway cars. Say Yes to babies piercing your ears at frequencies hitherto unencountered by humankind. Say Yes to stupid tv ads. Say Yes to your bad moods. Say Yes to anxiety attacks and depression.

Say Yes to what you're proud of. Say Yes to what you're thankful for. Say Yes to your beauty, inner and outer. Say Yes to your partner, to your loneliness, to your desire for touch, to your independence. Say Yes to friends and family.

This is an EXERCISE. I don't say that you HAVE to say Yes, from now on, every time. I'm only suggesting that you give it a try, once.

I find it tremendously rewarding, empowering, and satisfying.