Tag: ruminations (Page 9 of 10)

who’d’a thunk it

January 5, 2010 / jeanne / 44 Comments

creation of the collage started on shaky ground – real shaky ground – and for a while it seemed that i would go through 2010 red-faced and collageless. i left my journal at home, see, the one i wanted to shelter the collage, and to make matters worse, my only magazines themed around fiber arts and pottery (not an oprah magazine in sight) (and how can a worthy collage be created without images and words from a staff who knows me. i mean, they really know me.) (which is odd, given that i am not a subscriber.) (or a regular reader, for that matter.)

but then i put on my martyr pants and got busy ripping, and before we got to the end of the 2nd season of lost dvd’s (the television show, i mean), i’d ripped past thoughtfully weighing the pros and cons of every. single. image. i’d ripped my way past looking for words and fonts. i’d ripped my way past justification and rationalization and a whole lotta’ other stuff that i can’t quite name.

now remember: i still didn’t have my journal

so i just ~~crammed~~ tucked the ripped images into my bag, figuring la-te-da i could throw it all away at home just as easily as i could fill the trashcan there, and i pretty much forgot about the whole thing until last night when i couldn’t sleep and couldn’t turn on the television without waking up the dog who would, in turn, wake up the husband who has to get up early so i try not to.

wake my husband up, i mean.

i tiptoed out of the bedroom, fished the ripped bits out of my bag, found my journal, got some glue, and sat down at the dining room table where i was immediately surprised by how many images i had. now you have to understand that spatial concepts is not my strongest intelligence by anybody’s measurement system, but any fool could see that all those images were not going to fit on a 2-page spread in my journal, and i didn’t feel like going downstairs in search of one of those big sheets of paper (and besides, where would i store it) (the collage, i mean), so i just started tearing off any superfluous paper, ripping it right on down to the quick.

to the essential image, i mean.

i eventually came to the last piece, and there i was: surprised again, this time by the hugeness of the discard pile (especially compared to the keypers). ~~coveting~~ wanting my little ole’ collage to be as pretty as emma james‘ vision board, i stuck my tongue out the side of my mouth and started laying the pieces out on the page. but then when i ~~bit my tongue~~ remembered that this is not about planning, i just started squirting glue and laying ’em down, and before i knew it, i was done. finished. collaged.

well, almost.

there was this one image in the discard pile that kept jumping out on the way to the trashcan, and when it leapt out for the third time, i said okay, fine and took it back and glued it onto a page all by itself.

i’m calling it the annex.

and here’s the really super trooper amazing part: by the time i crawled back into bed around 5 a.m., all the keypers – i mean, every last one of ’em – had found a home on the two-page spread in my journal.

and i even had a few spaces to boot.

just goes to show, doesn’t it . . .

burn

January 3, 2010 / jeanne / 38 Comments

i hate sunday nights. i love sunday nights.

sunday nights are a transition time for me. the end of the pause. the threshold of beginning.

i am ready for my husband to go back to work. i want him to call in sick tomorrow.

i want to watch another movie. i am ready to get up and move.

i do not want go to back to a life of to do lists. i long for the structure of plans and productivity.

i am a different person. i am the same person trying to be different.

i want to spill things onto the page. i don’t have a damn thing to say.

i love the way i’m beginning to drop down into some philosophical, reflective writing (except for yesterday – that piece was pretty blah). i am tired of being serious, longing to cut loose and romp.

i want to change my update on facebook. i want to drop facebook altogether.

i want to finish my collage. i want to rip up the ripped out bits and flush them.

i want to sing and dance. i want to go to bed and sleep in the fetal position.

i want to twitter. i want to tuck in.

i want to get something done tonight so i’ll be ahead of the game tomorrow. i don’t even want to think about doing anything tonight.

i want to find a book on the writing of lost. if i never see another book, it’ll be too soon.

etc.

~~~

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best gift of 2009: a new way of being

December 26, 2009 / jeanne / 29 Comments

i release my grip; i tighten my grip. like the beating of a heart: systolic, diastolic. both are necessary. both are sometimes erratic and irregular . . .

for proof that i’m releasing my grip, you’d have to look back no further than yesterday. some 12 hours after ravaging our way through enticingly-shaped packages and stories of selection criteria, the floor was still covered with spent wrapping paper and ribbons. gifts were still strewn about the house, in nomads in search of a home. back in the day, we would’ve opened packages and after a short exhale, i would’ve scooped up the paper and mainstreamed the gifts, leaving only the tree (with only a scant 12-15 hours remaining) and tablecloth as evidence that christmas was different from any other day.

in november i spent 4 days with the in-laws and prepared no script. in august we went to visit my son in colorado, and the only items on the itinerary were flight times and rental car confirmation number.

we moved into a new house, and while many of the big projects have been ticked off the list, there are switches without plate covers and marble floors in need of polishing and entire rooms that still look like attics.

i am more willing to accept without comment that some members of my family are just not likely to follow through with their commitments. that some projects may never be resoundingly finished. that some people are just more comfortable seeing the negative side.

and in the releasing, there is a tightening . . .

i tighten my grip around my writing self, living into my promise to regularly carve out time for stringing words together. i am not yet satisfied with what i am writing, finding myself still reluctant to peel back the top and release the contents of what’s in the can, but step one: thanks to gwen bell, there is a writing rhythm in the making.

i trust myself more, increasingly confident that i can and will handle whatever appears. i become more comfortable asking for help when needed without feeling faulty or indentured. i accept tears as highlighting pens instead of signs of weakness.

though i am not yet fully brave, i do speak my truth more, knowing full-well that my truth may not be your truth, but recognizing that my truth has value, too. and as i grow stronger, i learn to speak without the watering down and protective padding of tacked-on qualifiers. and even when the conversations get rough and bumpy, i stay. i stay.

i tighten my hold on patience – around these things and more – because i am not done here. these are not gifts that have been unwrapped and fully assimilated into daily life. this tightening and releasing – this shedding of layers and forming of balance – this is a gift that is still giving and still in the making.

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge. today’s prompt: the best gift of 2009.
~~~

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throw away the red pen, i get it now

December 24, 2009 / jeanne / 6 Comments

it’s said that we teach to learn, and that’s true. it’s said that when the student is ready, the teacher appears, yeah, maybe so. it’s said that children are angels that teach us a lot . . . and, well, okay. i can only agree to the angel bit only on a case-by-case basis, but i can tell you that the best lesson i (re)learned in 2009 came from my son: when he says go see a movie, i go. (yes, kipp, i promise.) (really.)

he lived as an actor in los angeles and went to many a screening on account of being on some committee having to do with oscar selection, and it looks like that would have given him enough credibility for me to take his word for it. i mean, i meant to go see movies he told me to see, it’s just that, well, things kinda’ get in the way sometimes. sure, we went to see the movies he was in, but those he recommended, not so much.

a few of the movies he called about on his way out of the theater include cars, finding nemo, the up side of anger, the incredible hulk, ratatouille, juno, and whale rider. one christmas he made us go see the family stone, and today he dragged us to see avatar. so i think we can agree that he has good taste in must-see movies, that he knows what he’s talking about.

he tells me to read a book, i drop everything and go find it. he tells me to see a movie, i decide to wait till it comes out on dvd so i don’t have to deal with the kid talking and the cell phones ringing and the sticky floors and seats. “but some movies you just have to see on the big screen,” he says repeatedly. and now, today, after seeing avatar, i get it. we can go enjoy one of our post-viewing deconstructionist talks after any show, kipp and i, (and oh how i do love those and look forward to more discussion about avatar because there’s just too much for one sitting) but some movies are just too big to be seen on anything smaller than a movie screen.

why didn’t you just say so, kipp?

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge. today’s prompt: the best lesson learned in 2009.
~~~

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2009, the year of grappling

December 22, 2009 / jeanne / 8 Comments

it’s been a year of grappling. yes, yes it has. there’s been grappling with things that could be decided with wishbones or the magic 8 ball or using my roll-on deodorant as a crystal ball – things like eat-in-or-out and do-i-or-don’t-i sign up for that bootcamp. then there was more advanced grappling that required more advanced divination techniques walking or writing or stitching.

the year began with grappling about whether to buy the house or not, whether to move or stay put. then once we decided to buy the new house, i grappled a lot with things like where to place furniture, what to leave and what to take, wall colors, floor coverings, and best use of space. as the grappling wanes and we get settled, i begin to see that anything’s possible in a house that loves you.

on and off throughout the year, i grapple with difficult people – one in particular. do i go eyeball-to-eyeball or do as i’ve been taught and take the so-called high road (the road i was taught to ALWAYS take, the road that feels so much like cowardice)? i write to distill, write for clarity of purpose, and set up a meeting. when we part hours later, there is no grappling at all as i silently thank her for giving me the opportunity to finally stand up to a bully. thank her for this feeling of powerful satisfaction and self-confidence i have seldom known.

when the calendar reaches the one-and-a-half year anniversary of the day my best friend from graduate school broke up with me, i grapple with whether it is time to write that letter or wait a while longer. i write the letter, and feel quietly satisfied, knowing whatever her reception, i’ve done the right thing.

when my cousin’s son “went off the deep end”, i grapple with whether to speak flat-out or take the usual vague, watered-down approach. flat-out won, and i have to tell you: it feels really good to speak unencumbered with syrupy words and hollow platitudes. i traveled light, and i like it. i like it a lot.

yes, i grapple . . . and whenever i think myself out of something – when i let my head overrule and overrun my heart – i look back and wonder what would have happened if. but, oh, oh, oh. every time i listen to my self, trust my self, heed my self . . . i stand a little taller, feel a bit surer, and say thank you. a lot.

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge. today’s prompt: what one word best describes your 2009?
~~~

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singing my heroes and sheroes

December 21, 2009 / jeanne / 13 Comments

i tell them i love them, but do i tell them why?

i tell them i’m proud of them, but do i elaborate?

sometimes i do, but not nearly enough.

today, i tell them that they are my unsung heroes and shero, and yes, i tell them at least some of the reasons why (to list all the reasons would get us into bandwidth issues) . . .

my husband, andy has been my hero for 36.5 years now, and here’s why:

he makes me laugh. sometimes he cracks himself up more than he cracks me up, but he still makes me laugh.

he listens when i talk (well, not like i’m some e.f. hutton. i mean, sometimes his eyes glaze over, but we’re working on that).

he will go to the grocery store with me just because. once, in the days before cell phones, he figured out where i was and just showed up in the spices aisle to help me get groceries then we went home and put them up together.

to this day, we hold hands wherever we are.

he shares the scepter (read: remote control) to the television. he may leave the room when i’m in control, but he shares.

willingly and without complaint, he helps members of my family.

he is wicked smart, talented, creative, and funny.

he gives me cards. now, honestly, it used to make me mad that he gave me store-bought greeting cards. but then i had this small-huge shift in thinking and realized that he spends a lot of time sifting through racks of cards in search of one that says what his engineer-trained brain can’t quite articulate. or maybe it says what he doesn’t even know he wants to say until he finds the card.

my son, kipp. my hero because . . .

he knows that you can learn more about humans and their relationships from poetry, music, and literature than from any psychology class or textbook.

he edited my thesis, and when it was done, he asked if he could share it with some of his friends (who then became my friends from ensuing conversations.)

once, on a trip to hawaii, he surprised me with a handblown stylus and inkwell set because he knew – he just knew – how much i would enjoy the scratching of nib to paper and how much i needed to allow my brain to exhale and make room for all the important things that get buried and shoved aside under burgeoning to do lists and overcrowded calendars.

when he landed in l.a., he took a job delivering food to learn his way around.

he is an adventurous eater, something he learned all on his own.

he writes poetry, songs, and essays; does open mic events; is an actor and skydiver – all this and balances his checkbook.

we go to movies and shows, and afterwards to dinner or for drinks and discuss what we just saw from as analytical deconstructive creativists.

he is willing to say “i don’t know” right out loud.

he is wicked smart, talented, creative, and funny.

my shero is my daughter, alison. want to know why?

she ran for local city council then the state legislature before she was 25 years old. (and in the state legislature race, he was in a run-off with the older male career politician. lost the runoff only by a slim, slim margin, too.)

she started a local theatre company in 2005, and it’s still going and growing.

she supervises my hair stylist and goes clothes shopping with me.

in 2006 she hit a rough spot with depression, and i just kept putting one foot in front of the other, doing what needed to be done. a year later, she directed steel magnolias, casting me as m’lynn to her shelby. coincidence? i think not.

as a beautiful, articulate, talented public figure in a small town, she receives more than anybody’s fair share of other people’s insecurities and bad behavior. yet through it all, she remains the bamboo – bending but refusing to break. she is tenaciously nonconformist.

she is wicked smart, talented, creative, and funny.

she can do genealogical research and retain what she uncovered.

if you need to know what to give a person, call her. she knows people better than they know themselves.

she speaks her truth. others may not understand or agree, but she speaks it anyway.

yes, i am one lucky woman. luckier than i deserve.

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge. today’s prompt: who is your unsung hero?
~~~

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catching up (again)

December 17, 2009 / jeanne / 24 Comments

they say that catching-up is hard to do . . . no, that’s breaking up that’s hard to do. whatever.

best rush of 09 was brought on by . . . well, honestly, i don’t have rushes any more. not since that one unfortunate night in undergraduate school when i was drunk on life – the closest to feeling joy i can remember. for the record: there were no drugs and no alcohol involved – just a day of good things. like being asked out by an upperclassman who was easy on the eyes. getting an A on my paper. finding $20 in my wallet when i was hoping to find enough change to make $1. it was just me and happiness to the 7th degree.

maybe to the 9th.

so there i was, humming to myself in the room when my roommate got back with her little entourage of ~~toadies~~ pledglings. humming, laughing, saying whatever funny stuff popped into my head (and it was all pretty damn funny, if i do say so myself). “what’s wrong with her?” sniffed the ~~condescending bitch~~ girl from across the hall who’d just pledged a sorority. “oh i don’t know,” sniffed back my ~~condescending bitch in the making~~ sorority wannabe roomie. “just ignore her.”

they ignored me all right, talking about me as though being drunk on life automatically rendered me stone deaf. it took weeks for them to change the subject, and life was so miserable, i vowed to never disturb the flatlines again. it’s just too dangerous. even now, there are far too many people around here who prefer homogenization. to get a rush and show it is to risk being labeled, and the labels used around here have some more kind of everlasting glue on the back, let me tell you.

i don’t know why this college memory bubbled up. maybe it’s time to:
a) find these gals on facebook, ask them to be my fb friends, then drop them like hot potatoes (that’ll really sting ’em.).
b) learn how to have a rush and keep it to my own self. (i guess that’s possible?)
c) don my big girl panties and get over it.

~~~

best packaging has to be anything apple sells. space for only the necessary. the essentials held firmly in place to prevent jarring and breakage . . .

wish they’d create packaging for my life.

~~~

best tea of the year . . . well, since no tea has crossed these lips in the past 16 years, i’m just gonna trek down memory lane and tell you that the best tea i ever had was aunt rene’s sweet tea.

down here, when we go to a restaurant and the waiter asks what we want, we say “sweet tea” to which, more often than not, we get a “huh?” eventually followed by “we only have unsweetened tea.” let’s be real clear about this: the term “sweet tea” is NOT retarded. it is a type of tea. a particularly pleasing, desirable kind of tea. sure it’s been a while, but i can tell you this with absolute certainty: you cannot thump all the crystals to the bottom of some colorful little packet, dump it in a glass of tea, whirl it around a few times, and expect to get anything near the quality of aunt rene’s sweet tea. it’s just not gonna’ happen.

aunt rene’s tea was so good, i once gave her a big ass set of drinking glasses when it wasn’t even a holiday. (something that’s unheard of in my ~~cheap~~ economically-correct family.) you could get about 3/4 of a gallon in those glasses, and we’d down at least 2 refills with every meal. the woman had to make her tea in a stockpot, i tell you, it was that good. before i swore off tea, i was known to make a meal off aunt rene’s sweet tea, though i have to admit that like my children, i preferred to have aunt rene’s sweet tea with a side of her blackeyed peas and some of her crisply fried bacon for dessert.

the secret to aunt rene’s sweet tea? sugar. lots and lots and lots of sugar. added while the tea was still hot so it would dissolve. she’d stir that disappearing sugar, and once she couldn’t see it anymore, she’d up and add some more, reckoning that if you can’t see it you can’t taste it.

i guess now folks would call that wrong or unhealthy or something. i mean, we all know that sugar is on the bad-for-you list.

sure. whatever.

i just quit drinking tea cause it was staining my teeth, and i read somewhere that discolored teeth add about a decade to your real age.

yeah, i’m kidding. there’s no way i can talk about age in the same hemisphere as aunt rene cause the best thing that special woman (she was my great aunt) (and i mean that in more ways than one) ever taught me is to not ever tell ’em your age. “it’s none of their business,” she’d declare, the “damn” implied. “besides, just ’cause you can count it doesn’t mean it counts.” (she lived to be 97.5 years young.) (but who’s counting her years or the number of glasses of sweet tea she imbibed?)

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge.
~~~

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favorite album: lessons from a bird brain

December 10, 2009 / jeanne / 12 Comments

today’s challenge is to write about our favorite album, and since gwen didn’t specifically mention music, i’m going with something we’ll call a video album. though you can’t really hum along and it’s hard to dance to, it is an album that rocked my world. (okay, maybe that’s a little too over the top, but i did learn how to take videos with my new camera and though i did already know how to use idvd, i learned how to use quick time pro, and last but not least, i learned how to upload and share via flickr.)

every morning like clockwork, ms. redbird shows up to defend her space. she’s a tenacious thing, continuing her task despite the would-be distractions of a nosey cat and a growling dog. outsiders are not the issue, you see. ms. redbird tenaciously defends her space from her own reflection, from her own self. when it comes to protecting her personal territory, she is her own worst enemy.

#best09
~~~
the story is mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge.
~~~

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#best09, #bestof2009

the wind tunnel as life’s little book of big lessons

December 7, 2009 / jeanne / 24 Comments

this is my boy, kipp. he could collect toy trains or comic books or baseball cards, but nooooo. his hobby is jumping out of airplanes, and the weekend before thanksgiving, i got to see him compete in the national skydiving championship.

i’ll get to the conference part in a minute, but first, let me introduce you to my son:

when he was 11 years old, kipp was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. he could’ve tucked himself into a nice safe cocoon where he remained comfortable, but instead he pursued acting and snowboarding and running themed marathons (like the time he ran through the mud carrying a huge boombox) and eventually skydiving. which is not to say that he runs around constantly pushing the limits and behaving recklessly. no, he’s quite the balanced guy – one helluva writer who’s also holding down a full-time job, raising a dog he rescued from the pound, participating in some open mic nights, snowboarding during the season . . . and skydiving every chance he gets.

i’ll get to the conference part in a minute, right after i show you a few snapshots of my boy at the recent championship:

here he is right after his chute opened. his dad argued that some other guy was kipp (his dad also mistakenly goo-goo’ed over somebody else’s baby in the nursery after our daughter was born, but we’ll talk about that another time).

and this is kipp righting himself in preparation for the landing:

and finally we see kipp – well, we see his chute anyway – safely on the ground:

i’ll tell you about the conference, but first you need to know that kipp’s team, relativity, came in 2nd at that national championship.

okay, now proud mama is ready to tell you about the best conference of 2009 . . . which isn’t exactly a conference but i’m going with it anyway. if you squint, i promise it comes close to qualifying because: (1) there were several people there, (2) i only knew one of them (2 if you count kipp’s former girlfriend, but let’s not), and (3) i learned something new. (not something you’d call a marketable skill, but still, i learned something. something important.)

kipp practices for skydiving competitions during weekly sessions in the indoor wind tunnel, and one day last year, (this is as good a time as any to mention that i just don’t track linear, chronological time that well) he took me along. i watched the 5-minute training video, suited up, double-knotted my shoes, and took my place in line (last).

before we started, the instructor went over the hand signals one more time. this, he said slightly curling 2 fingers, means bend your legs slowly. and this, he said straightening out those same 2 fingers, means straighten out your legs just a little. this, he said putting a finger to each corner of his mouth, means smile, and this, he said displaying the hawaiian sign for hang loose, means relax.

as it turns out, falling into the tunnel is my specialty. once inside the tunnel, however, things went ugly fast. some of the air churned by the unbelievably huge and loud (even with earplugs) jet engines went right up my nose and, well, you know how when you forget that you’re not a fish and inhale while under water and feel like you’re gonna’ drown any minute now? it’s not just a water thing. it can happen with air, too, i’m here to tell you. i felt like i was going to drown and just like in the movies, my life whizzed by before my eyes.

okay, well, not my ENTIRE life, but i did vividly remember that one time when i went swimming at lake spivey with my friend joyce and nearly drowned because i jumped off the concrete block wall (don’t ask why a lake had a wall – just don’t ask) a little further to the deep side than i should have been. ordinarily i would have just waded in like i normally did, but you see joyce knew everything about everything (just like her mother did) and she was best at everything (just like her mother was) and she knew everybody who was anybody (just like her mother did) so naturally i could NOT tell them that i didn’t know how to do anything more at a lake than walk in ankle-deep water.

i was drowning in jet-propelled air this time, though, and right about then is when i realized that while i could read their signals, we hadn’t begun to talk about mine. i began motioning furiously to the exit door, and the instructor just smiled and gave me the relax sign. eventually, when i pulled away and just started to swim (i’m embarrassed to tell you that i did – i swam through the air) towards the exit door, the instructor picked up on where i was headed and helped me get there.

my boy and his friends were kinda’ concerned about me, but honestly, my early exit meant more flying time for them, so their concern didn’t exactly eat up a lot of clock. i gave myself a good talking to and knew – i just knew – i couldn’t quit. i might never have this opportunity again, so i had to shake it off, take myself in hand, get back in there, and fly.

and when it was my turn again, i did – get back in there, i mean – and i swear, it was a near-exact repeat. fall in: check. air goes up nose: check. panic sets in: big time check. again i started with my own wild, obviously indecipherable hand signals, and again the instructor gave me his signal to relax. every time i’d manage to get myself oriented towards the exit door, he’d grab a grip on my suit and spin me back around. with my eyes, i pleaded with the guy in the control booth to GET ME OUT, but he just smiled and turned up the air. finally i realized that i was, in fact, going to be in that tunnel until my time was up, and so, i reasoned, i and i alone was responsible for how i spent my time there.

relax, i told myself, and i relaxed. breathe, i told myself, and i breathed. look around, i told myself, and i looked around. shoot, i think i even smiled a bit. i focused on what my body was doing and feeling and marveled at how the slightest movement – just a quarter turn of one hand, for example, changed my direction or altitude.

when my 2 minutes were up (yes, it sounded like it was a lot longer, didn’t it?), was when i was just getting comfortable.

i’ve thought a lot about that conference. about how short my time was there, about how i spoke my own language that not everybody understood, about how my slightest movement was powerful enough to affect big changes . . . about how if i’d’ve been given a face guard to provide full-face protection, things might’ve turned out much, much differently.

#best09
~~~
the story is mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge.
~~~

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compassion: the new black

October 4, 2009 / jeanne / 16 Comments

communing with nature has countless powerful benefits – more self-control, increased working memory, lower levels of stress, better moods, decreased blood pressure to name a few – but a new study conducted by psychologists at the university of rochester shows that being exposed to animals just might actually make us more compassionate.

to test prosocial behaviors such as compassion and generosity, 370 different subjects were exposed to either natural settings (calm lakes, wooded forests, vast deserts) or man-made environments (cityscapes, skyscrapers, highways). in two of the experiments, a person was given a $5 prize and told they could share it with a stranger who would then be given an additional $5, though there was no guarantee that the second person would return any of the winnings. researchers found that subjects exposed to nature were significantly more likely to open their wallets and that increased exposure to nature led to an increased willingness to share with strangers.

results of the study led to a cornucopia of hypotheses, of course, but perhaps the “why” is not important. perhaps there are many “why’s” with no single correct answer. perhaps the evident correlation is enough to start thoughtful, meaningful conversations with ourselves and others. perhaps the results touch us in some inexplicable way that leads to a change in our behavior that ultimately makes us better people – and perhaps that is enough in and of itself.

to the ancient greek philosophers, that was the goal of life: to be the very best person you could be. it’s a quest that continues to this very day. we spend money on self-help books, workshops, seminars, schools, often overlooking the vast lessons all around us . . .

Watch CBS News Videos Online

~~~
information on the study from The Frontal Cortex by josh lehrer. video from cbs.