Martha Beck Quotes
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I had a client who was a professional baseball player once, and he would go to clubs and dance for seven, eight, nine hours at a time. He wouldn't drink, he wouldn't take drugs - he just danced because he had so much physical energy; he was this amazing athlete.
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Something in the human psyche confuses beauty with the right to be loved. The briefest glance at human folly reveals that good looks and worthiness operate independently. Yet countless socializing forces, from Aunt Clara to the latest perfume ad, reinforce beliefs like 'If I were pretty enough, I would be loved.'
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Loneliness is proof that your innate search for connection is intact.
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Focusing on one mildly disturbing, semi-controllable issue allows the mind to stuff much greater terrors in relatively tidy packages.
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It takes about four days of virtuous living to create a little weight loss. That also happens to be the time required to get used to eating less. In other words, if you can get past day three of a fitness regimen, things improve.
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If I tell a man he needs to quit his soul-sucking job, he has to go home and fight with his wife or fight with his parents and fight with his in-laws and fight with everybody, because men aren't supposed to be happy; they're supposed to do well.
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All mental hygiene is based on the core practice of doing nothing. Most of us are good at wasting time, staring at the wall while telling ourselves we should be working. We call this doing nothing, but our brains are furiously active. We think constantly, and our thinking is often rife with distress.
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I'd like to help repair the earth's ecosystems, and to fully live until I'm fully dead.
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Not having time or energy for weight loss makes no sense. Does it take more time or energy to eat fish than prime rib? No.
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Ten years ago, I still feared loss enough to abandon myself in order to keep things stable. I'd smile when I was sad, pretend to like people who appalled me. What I now know is that losses aren't cataclysmic if they teach the heart and soul their natural cycle of breaking and healing.
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Once we're willing to confront our emotional suffering, we begin making choices based on attraction instead of aversion, love instead of fear. Where we used to think about what was 'safe,' we now become interested in doing what seems right or fun or meaningful or ripe with possibilities.
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Everything I've ever taught in terms of self-help boils down to this - I cannot believe people keep paying me to say this - if something feels really good for you, you might want to do it. And if it feels really horrible, you might want to consider not doing it. Thank you, give me my $150.
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Sometimes a psychic tells you something and it feels wrong and others may be right on the money. It's your choice about whom to trust, and giving that trust is something we do ourselves.
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As a life coach, I love makeovers, from new clothes to surgery, pedicures to highlights. But redoing makes you feel better only if approached with the right attitude.
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I suggest Substituting Inedible Nurturance, or SIN. Don't replace overeating with virtuous work or exercise; instead, make a list of things you love, from watching TV to hanging out with favorite people.
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The pretty girls get all the good stuff. Oh, God. So not true. I unlearned this after years of coaching beautiful clients. Yes, these lovelies get preferential treatment in most life scenarios, but there's a catch: While everyone's looking at them, virtually no one sees them.
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I don't believe that there are no spiritual beings around us. I don't know what to call them, I don't know how they work. But I know they're there.
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Only since the Industrial Revolution have most people worked in places away from their homes or been left to raise small children without the help of multiple adults, making for an unsupported life.
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Self-pity, a dominant characteristic of sociopaths, is also the characteristic that differentiates heroic storytelling from psychological rumination. When you talk about your experiences to shed light, you may feel wrenching pain, grief, anger, or shame. Your audience may pity you, but not because you want them to.
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Whoever said love is blind is dead wrong. Love is the only thing that lets us see each other with the remotest accuracy.
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Whatever terrible things may have happened to you, only one thing allows them to damage your core self, and that is continued belief in them.
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As much horror as we have always created, we are a species that keeps moving forward, seeing new sights in new ways, and enjoying the journey.
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If you'd rather live surrounded by pristine objects than by the traces of happy memories, stay focused on tangible things. Otherwise, stop fixating on stuff you can touch and start caring about stuff that touches you.
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Good-looking individuals are treated better than homely ones in virtually every social situation, from dating to trial by jury. If everyday experience hasn't convinced you of this, there's research that will.