End Suffering

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

End Suffering

This Is One of Those Days

Overstressed!

Need some calming Shabbat relief.  ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

This Is One of Those Days

Sounds Refreshing

Great sign for the Pablo Picasso drink.

If you have too much, do you feel like the guy pictured here?

Maybe people need to feel this way sometimes (especially when the world looks like it's going to hell).  ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Sounds Refreshing

Politically Incorrect Ointment

Couldn't believe that this was a real product in CVS.

Didn't think any legitimate product would actually be named "Butt Paste."

Can you imagine going up to the pharmacist and asking:

Do you have any butt paste?

Pharmacist: 

Oh yes, it's in Aisle 7. Do you want me to show you where it is?

Now, we're really going down a rabbit's hole! ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Politically Incorrect Ointment

Face It!

Wow, it only takes a little to show a lot. 

The brilliance of capturing the essence while leaving out the extraneous. 

A person is clearly there even though it's just his face. 

What is hidden is also revealed. 

Absence makes the heart grow fonder. 

Yet, I don't miss him, because he's right there.

It looks like he's about to say something!  ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Face It!

Can't Sit, Can't Stand

So I've been having this excruciating lower back pain for about a week. 

I literally cannot sit or stand without shooting pain. 

When I sit, it hurts the lower back so much to get up. 

And when I stand, all I want to do is relieve the pressure and sit down. 

I feel like the warning from G-d in the Torah where He says (Deuteronomy 28:67):

In the morning you will say '"If only it were evening!" and in the evening "If only it were morning!"

The only real relief so far is lying down or going in the pool. 

Planning to see the doctor to check it out and hopefully with G-d's mercy it will be better very soon.  ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal) 

Can't Sit, Can't Stand

Shopping Vs Psychiatrist

This sign had a pretty good point:

"Shopping is cheaper than a psychiatrist."

Plus it's more fun and you get to take the junk home that you buy.

For many, shopping truly is a form of mental/stress relief--almost like medicine. 

Unfortunately, if you think about it, things don't really make a person happy...rather people do and doing good does. 

But industry wants you to think a lot more superficially and materialistically than that. 

Hence the notion that if you take your daily dose of shopping, maybe you can skip the shrink! ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Shopping Vs Psychiatrist

Icing That Migraine

So a lot of people I know get excruciating migraines in the Washington, D.C. area. 

I don't know the statistical incident rate here for migraines, but anecdotally it seems significantly higher.

Is it the weather patterns, pollution, toxic chemicals or something else in this geographic area?

While medicine seems to be critical in actually getting rid of the migraine, I do notice that sustained use of ice packs or freezing water on the head also seems to help. 

Cold generally constricts the blood vessels, so I am not sure why this provides migraine relief.

Note: I am not giving medical advise or guidance to anyone, but just sharing my experiences. 

I would be interested to see a medical study done on treating migraines with freezing cold--from my experience, I think it definitely helps.  ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Icing That Migraine

How Some People Cope With Stress

Thought this was incredible. 

Someone opened up a "Rage Room" in Maryland. 

I know the atmosphere in D.C. is polarized and sort of toxic lately, and there is lot's of identity politics, obstruction, and even people hating on each other, but this really shows how things have degenerated.

And let's face it, it's not just the politics that people are stressed out about--how about stress from family, work, and bills.  We're on 24/7 these days and a lot of stress can build up in people that way. 

But now, people can actually pay money to go to into a room, wrap themselves in safety clothing, and spend their time smashing things. 

Almost like when they put crazy people in a padded room in a straight jacket and let them hit their heads against the wall for a while. 

In the Rage Room:

You can break 10 glass items for just $25!

Or throw in a medium printer in the starter pack and it's $35. 

You can even BYOB (Bring Your Own Breakables) and have at it for $15.

Group packages and even gift cards are available. 

Fun maybe, a little crazy for sure. ;-)

How Some People Cope With Stress

The Value of Pain

Three notables on the value of pain:

1) Pain is a warning of dangerous threats and helps safeguard us.

2) Pain that doesn't kill us makes us stronger!

3) Pain lets you know you ain't dead yet.

Then again, nothing wrong with a little pain relief. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

The Value of Pain

Like Removing A Nail

So you always hear about the techniques used when people are being tortured...one of them being have their nails ripped off.

Ouch!

So this week when I had a ingrown toenail removed, I said jokingly to the podiatrist:

"Do you do waterboarding also?"

Ok, funny, not-funny.  Still got a chuckle!

But in removing the nail, the technique is really so amazing.

They inject the toe with a local anesthetic, but hey even the injections into a sensitive toe could be pretty uncomfortable. 

So before the injection, they spray you toe with a freezing spray, so you don't even feel the injections.

When he actually removed the nail and chemically destroyed the nailbed so it wouldn't come back, I didn't feel a thing.

I mean, I literally didn't feel a thing!

It was a wonderful feeling--whatever he did, however much it would've hurt--it didn't.

I thought to myself in a wave of anesthetic and freeze-numbed delight, this is absolutely wonderful.

No pain, not even a pinch. 

I could sense everything going on around me, take it in, think about it, even mull it over again and again, and just smile. 

In a way, I thought how wonderful life would be to have the ability to think in the head and feel from the heart, but have no pain or suffering in the body. 

Yes, there are plenty of damning and painful thoughts, memories, and heartaches, but for the body to be numb (even momentarily) to all the bad stuff that actually felt pretty good.

How would it feel if the mind and heart also felt no pain and only bliss--I smiled even more. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Like Removing A Nail

Letting It Out

We hit the boxing gym last night for a little tour. 

Guys and gals working out on the punching bags, mitts, and pads. 

It was great to see the energy--push ups, sits ups, weaving and jabbing, kicks, and more. 

They even had an Israeli self-defense class, taught by what I believe was a non-Israeli--that was a little strange.  

I asked one guy who looked like he'd been around the block there, if he was one of the instructors, and he told me how he's been boxing for 30 years. 

Curious, I said "What did you do before boxing?" He said, "Fighting! I've been fighting my entire life."

Anyway, whoever is laying around the house in front of the boob tube day and night--you need to get out and try some moving and shaking. 

Great stuff, and right in the mold of my role model, Rocky!  ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Letting It Out

Never Worn, But Not For The Reason You Think

I remember learning for my MBA about people's shopping addiction (aka compulsive shopping) and how it consumes their time and money and fuels their self-esteem. 

Like a high gotten from alcohol, drugs, and sex, shopping can give people a relief from the everyday stresses that engulf them.

An interesting article in the Wall Street Journal (18 April 2013) called "A Closet Filled With Regrets" chronicles how people buy stuff they never wear and are sorry they bought it. 

In fact, the article states, "Only about 20% of clothes in the average person's closet are worn on a regular basis."

One example given is a Pulitzer Prize -winning author who spent $587,000 on Gucci items between 2010-2012, before seeking treatment for his addiction. 

A related disorder is shopper's remorse that occurs, because people second guess themselves and feel maybe an alternative would've been a better choice (i.e. they made a bad choice), they didn't really need the item to begin with (i.e. it was just impulsive), or that they spent too much (i.e. they got a bad deal). 

For me, as a child of Holocaust survivors, I find that when I purchase something nice (not extravagant), I put away and also never wear it. 

The difference for me is not that I have shoppers remorse, an addiction to shopping, or that I am unhappy with my purchase, but rather that I cannot wear it because I feel as a child of survivors that I have to save it--just in case. 

No, it's not rational--even though I am a very practical and rational person in just about every other way.

It's just that having seen what can happen when times are bad--and people have nothing--I cannot bear to grant myself the luxury of actually wearing or using something really good.

Perhaps also, I look at my parent's generation, who suffered so much, and think why am I deserving of this? 

They sacrificed and survived, so we (their children) could have it better--what every parent wants for their children, or should.

But still, in my heart, I know that I am the one who has had it easy compared to their lives, and so those purchases are going to stay right where they are--never worn until I donate them to Goodwill. 

I never really considered them mine anyway. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Never Worn, But Not For The Reason You Think