I proposed, and the next week we eloped, charging forward as man and wife. After 14 months of courtship, I thought I knew everything about her. But one evening my lovely bride disclosed that during a rebellious moment while I was away, she’d started “puffing vapor” to blow off some steam. I saw her pull out the cigar-sized device and,…
Music is now a government-endorsed painkiller. This is not to say the Food and Drug Administration has approved rock, jazz, or hip-hop MP3 downloads as over-the-counter analgesics. But stretching beyond the labels of “alternative” or “complementary” healing techniques, music and sound have been studied and applied to patients in recent years in well-funded federal labs with impressive and verifiable results.…
What do books about dog brains, a year spent in a tiny French village, mindfulness at work and in our daily lives, and new perspectives on mental and physical health have in common? They all involve some sort of transformation—to our thinking, to our behavior. Here’s a list of some of the Rewire Me editors’ favorite books of 2013. How…
Recently I took my mother to see tap star Savion Glover at our local performing arts center. The hall was packed, mostly with children whose parents had brought them to see the legendary dancer. Predominant in the crowd were students from inner-city performing arts schools. During intermission my mother and I went to the concession stand, where candy was on…
Ever go to bed with the name of someone or something on the tip of your tongue? You just can’t quite remember it. Then you wake up the next morning, and bang! Mystery solved. This often happens to me after I watch an old movie on TCM, the Turner Classic Movies cable station. I’ll recognize an actor from the 1930s,…
It was with me at the beginning, almost before I was here myself. It will be there at the end, gently easing me closer to the secrets of the universe. It provides escape from daily stress. It makes all my problems disappear, at least for a little while. It helped me grow into what I am today. It is sleep.…
We tend to think of our internal organs as specialists, highly refined machines that work 24/7 at specific tasks. The one exception is the brain: the ultimate supercomputer that can make a multitude of decisions and manage our behavior with incredible speed and efficiency. Now research shows that the brain doesn’t have a monopoly on intelligence. The heart and stomach,…
Many of us on the Rewire Me staff are what you might call neuroscience nerds. We love digging in to the latest research on the brain and thinking about how it could improve people’s lives. So we couldn’t resist listening in on the presentations at “Neuroscience 2013,” a conference that brought together 30,000 neuroscientists from around the world. Among many…
Anxiety easily becomes a lifestyle when your body and mind see threat and danger everywhere. What do you do then? Learn to live in The Worry Zone, or develop daily practices to rewire your body and brain. I spoke with licensed clinical social worker Guy Oberwise for some tips on how to reduce anxiety naturally. First, can anxiety and its…
