oaluz:

“What if we treated our lovers more like friends? We saw in Chapter 3 that the privileging of love puts pressure on love relationships. Think about starting a new relationship: this person hasn’t spent as much time with you as some of your oldest friends and you haven’t yet told them about all the major events of your life but, somehow, because you’ve had sex, you expect them to telepathically know how you’re feeling and to respond perfectly to every situation in which you find yourselves. Also, we can handle our friend having opposing attitudes to us on some of the things we hold dear, but a lover can disagree with us on something as simple as whether its okay to miss the movie trailers and it is a major issue. It is easy to take lovers for granted. We may not be as grateful when a lover puts themselves out for us as we would if a friend did the same. We might not be as appreciative when they give up their evening to comfort us when we’re low. We might take out our irritations and frustrations out on them by being snappy, unfriendly, or quiet without explanation in a way we’d never do with a friend. Perhaps we should take a few moments, each time we’re being irritable with a lover, to ask ourselves, ‘How would I treat a friend in this situation?’

What if we were to treat our friends more like our lovers? Might it be good to put a bit more romance into our friendships? With lovers, we often celebrate by making a big thing of anniversaries or Valentine’s Day, or by spoiling them on their birthdays. We show our appreciation for them with little gifts and cards. We leave them a note when we depart in the morning after an enjoyable night together. We make time for them. Many of these things could be incorporated into friendships. We could send a friend a homemade CD when we hear they’ve been low. We could schedule in a regular lunch date. We could send a bunch of flowers to an old friend to let them know we’re thinking about them even though we haven’t seen each other in a while. We could arrange, each year, a day with a friend to specifically focus on our friendship, perhaps going away for a weekend together doing something we both enjoy, maybe acknowledging the day we met or cemented our friendship in some way. Perhaps friendships could also benefit from some of the ‘state of the relationship’ discussions we may have with overs. It may be easier to let friendships drift or to avoid talking about a problem because we’re not generally expected to reflect on, or work at, our friend relationships.”

Meg John Barker, Rewriting the Rules

oaluz:

“It is always appropriate to ask for love, but to ask any other adult (including our parents in the present) to meet our primal needs is unfair and unrealistic. Most of us emerge from childhood with conscious and unconscious primal wounds and emotional unfinished business. What we leave incomplete we are doomed to repeat. The untreated traumas of childhood become the frustrating dramas of adulthood. Our fantasy of the “perfect partner,” or our disappointments in a relationship we do not change or leave, or the dramas that keep arising in our relationships reveal our unique unmet primal wounds and needs. We try so hard to get from others what once we missed. What was missed can never be made up for, only mourned and let go of. Only then are we able to relate to adults as adults.”

David Richo, How to Be an Adult

Tea Facts

sherlockedrose:

Black tea

Think black tea makes you feel good? You’re right. It’s been proven to help you de-stress fast. It also helps eliminate bad breath. Plus medical research indicates that it lowers the risk of heart attacks and strokes, and reduces bad cholesterol.

Green tea

Want to stay slim, trim and beautiful? The antioxidants in green tea just might slow signs of aging, prevent the flu and raise your metabolism. More dramatically, it’s being shown to prevent and slow cancer, and help with arthritis and bad cholesterol too.

Oolong tea

This one’s known as a fat-buster in China, and science is indicating that it does indeed speed up your metabolism, burn fat and block fat absorption! Use it to fight expanding waistlines, high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease.

White tea

Science is saying that white tea might be more effective than even green tea at preventing cell damage, shrinking cancerous tumours and stopping the growth of cancer cells. Plus it’s becoming the new cosmetic fix for aging skin. Beautiful!

Pu’erh tea

Traditional Chinese medicine prizes Pu’erh as a wonder tea. It’s said to aid digestion, cleanse the blood and help with weight loss. Studies in Europe are also saying it busts cholesterol as effectively as some medications.

Rooibos tea

It’s said that rooibos helps you recover from hangovers, and that it could slow dementia. Plus there’s evidence that it fights skin cancer and boosts the immune system. And it’s supposed to help with insomnia!

Yerba tea

Yerba mate is a fabulous stimulant, without the jitters. It’s also full of antioxidants, so there’s scientific speculation that it could have anti-cancer properties, help stimulate the immune system and protect against disease.

Herbal tea

Herbs, spices, fruits and flowers have long been used in traditional medicine to cure everything from headaches, stomach bugs and colds to stress and insomnia. The power of the tea depends on its ingredients.

mingdliu:

“It’s nice,” I began to say, “to find someone whose soul dances on the same floor as yours. To find someone who lets you be the person you truly are, without the hidden temper and without holding in your deepest thoughts.

To find someone who is so easy to love, who makes you realize it all is truly simple even when you feel as if you are hard to love. To have someone who makes you laugh on the rough days and listen to all of your stories, even the darker ones, and still be there for more. It’s truly a blessing,

And to love, to truly love and be loved back. That’s not easy to find, but when you stumble upon it, you have to hold on to it. You’ve got to see the magic even when all you can feel is darkness.”