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You are here: Home / Archives for health and happiness

Wisdom from my Hearing Aid

August 19, 2020 by Scott "Q" Marcus Leave a Comment

“Did you know that approximately one-third of all folks your age suffers from hearing loss?”

“What?”

Okay, before you jump on me for being insensitive to those who are hearing impaired, I am one of that one in three.

I also suffer from Tinnitus, which is described as a non-stop ringing in the ears. For me, it’s not a ringing; rather I live in my own private wind storm; there’s a constant hiss that serves as the soundtrack of my life. At times it’s a whisper, sometimes it’s a gale, yet it’s unrelenting. Most likely it’s the result of being a rock ‘n’ roll disc jockey from my teens into my thirties. Regrettably, it matters not how I contracted it, it makes itself known from the moment I rise until I fall asleep.

I thought that the unending whisper that accompanied me 24/7 was normal until I heard a public service announcement about it, raising my consciousness to its existence. Turning to my wife, I asked, “What do you hear when it’s silent?”

She looked at me as if I had two noses, perplexed,

“What do you mean, what do I hear when it’s silent? It’s silent. I don’t hear anything.”

“You don’t hear a hiss?”

“No, I don’t hear anything.”

Henceforth, I realized this was not the norm and began pursuing options to rid myself of it.

Although one will see ads for cures on social media and some experts claim that everything from Paxil to microdoses of LSD will alleviate the problem, there is no cure except patience and habituation, just getting used to it.

Once I became aware of my hearing issues, I also realized that I had to turn up the television to a deafening level, needed closed captions to follow the dialog, and annoyed the hell out of my life-partner by repeatedly asking her to speak up. Although vanity delayed me from seeking help, I finally decided that hearing better beat out the need to deny my aging and I was fitted for hearing aids.

They’re not your grandfather’s hearing aids.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Baby Boomers, humor, Newspaper Column, Power of Attitude Tagged With: aging, apps, health and happiness, health attitude, hearing, hearing aid, humor, old, quality of life

Celebrate More Often

September 29, 2014 by Scott "Q" Marcus Leave a Comment

Find a way to celebrate more often.

CandlesYes, sometimes life can be dull. Yes, it can be dreary. Periodically, it is even painful.

However, that’s probably not the majority of time.

So, when things aren’t bad – even if life isn’t a “party” – find a way to celebrate what’s going well.
[Read more…]

Filed Under: Happiness, mental health, Motivational Monday, Power of Attitude, Self Talk Tagged With: celebration, celebrations, emotions, happiness, happy thought, health and happiness, inner dialogue, inner voices, laugh, quality of life

Seeking Long-Term-Relationship, Must Share Common Values

October 24, 2012 by Scott "Q" Marcus

We are imperfect beings; therefore so too are our relationships.

We engage mouth before activating brain. We dismiss our partner’s concerns as irrelevant. We can be inconsiderate, petty, or cranky. It’s part of the human condition; we mess up, and since we live with others, we hurt them. We don’t intend to — but we cannot deny that we do. It matters not how much energy you put into it, nor how long you’ve been together; even the finest relationships cause some pain.

At our end of days, should we be so fortunate to take inventory of our most important relationships and can proclaim them as  “good” more times than not; then indeed they were “good.”

A successful long-term-relationship is not without flaw; rather, it:

  • Incurs less damage during conflicts
  • Recovers from that hurt more quickly and fully
  • Tilts the scale in the direction of “happy” rather than “unhappy”

Short of choosing the wrong partner — those whose relationships fall asunder did not necessarily disagree more often than those with “good” relationships. Instead they had unrealistic expectations, conflating conflict with failure; and did not possess a method to handle disagreement when it raised its unpleasant, but unavoidable, head.

When any relationship is smack dab in the midst of a “rough patch,” our initial reaction is to flee the pain.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Baby Boomers, Diet, family, Inspiration, mental health, Relationships Tagged With: attitude, better relationships, conflict, disagreement, happiness, health and happiness, healthier lifestyle, long term relationship, relationships, unrealistic expectations

Building Supportive Relationships While Taking Care of Yourself

May 11, 2011 by Scott "Q" Marcus Leave a Comment

In the end, we are remembered via the relationships we leave behind.

I stand five-eight, no one’s depiction of “towering giant.” Someone of my stature is supposed to tip the scales at no more than 165 pounds. When I was 39 years old, I weighed 250. More frightening was that at such an early age, I experienced chest pains with regularity. As a father for two young sons, I was a ghost. My career was in free fall; my 12-year marriage was in tatters. (When your marriage counselor suggests divorce lawyers, the odds for regaining your long-lost marital bliss are slim.)

Change is born of fear, force, or pain. No one wakes up one fine day and says, “Wow! I really love my life; how am I going to change it?” Rather, unhappy, dissatisfied, and overwhelmed, we resolve to do virtually anything to alter our circumstances; anywhere is better than here.

For me, that conclusion came late one night, sitting alone yet again, pondering sorrowfully the source of my life’s despair. Out of that sadness came the painful realization that the common bond among all my troubles was ME. It was ME who relinquished the reins of my life, it was ME who helped build a dysfunctional marriage, and it was ME who chose to stuff myself, medicating the hurt by eating instead of fixing it. Therefore, if anyone was going to transform my life, it too must be ME. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Change, Group Support, Habits, Intentions, mental health, Relationships, Weight Loss Tagged With: chest pains, common bond, despair, divorce lawyers, dysfunctional marriage, health and happiness, painful realization, sadness, stressful days

Giving Thanks for Wherever You Are On the Journey

March 31, 2011 by Featured Author

Give thanks for what you are now, and keep fighting for what you want to be tomorrow.  ~Fernanda Miramontes-Landeros

Give thanks for what you are now. That’s not easy when you’re not happy with what you are now.  But, you’ve got to start somewhere, so why not start with exactly who you are today?  That was the first step on my journey towards better health and happiness in my life – getting honest about who I really was, and accepting that as my starting place.  That’s something you can do right now

Here’s how I got honest.  I was 287 pounds, in physical and emotional pain and I knew I needed to change things.  I didn’t know where to begin, so I asked my doctor.  My doctor had been telling me for years that I needed to drop some weight, and I got angry and resentful every, single time.  It took a lot of nerve for me to walk into his office and say, “Okay, let’s say you’re right, I do need to lose some weight.  Where do I start?”

He referred me to a nutritionist.  After my first meeting with her, she asked me to start a ‘Food Journal.’  In it, I was to write down everything I ate for a week.  She asked me not to edit my food choices yet.  “Just eat what you’d normally eat, and write it down after you’re finished,” she said.  I bought myself a new notebook on the way home from the appointment, and I was very excited about starting the next day.  Then came the morning, and suddenly I was angry.  I don’t know where it came from – this defiance, this rebellion.  Suddenly I was thinking, “I’ll show her what I eat everyday!”  And I went off to the doughnut shop and bought six of my favorites and ate them all, with a quart of milk, for breakfast.  And I wrote it all down.  Then for lunch, I was feeling guilty, so I made myself a salad.  It was a large salad, loaded with cheese, beans, and plenty of dressing, but I felt less guilty about that than I did about the doughnuts.  Again, I recorded it all in my journal – this time with measurements.  I had two snacks that afternoon – 18 vanilla wafers and two pudding cups, and “a bag of trail mix.” I’m quoting from the journal here.  For dinner, I fixed spaghetti.  I wrote that I ate a “full plate of spaghetti,” which was a lot.

The week continued on like this.  Looking back now, even though I seemed to be eating with a vengeance, I don’t recall feeling as though I ate more in this particular week than I did most of the time.  Eating a half-dozen doughnuts was nearly a weekly ritual.  I’d just never made note of it before. Two snacks in the afternoon – pretty common for me.  I didn’t feel fuller than usual, and I didn’t get a stomach ache from eating like this, so the guilt and shame I felt when showing my journal to the nutritionist at our next appointment wasn’t as much about what I was eating, as how I was living.
[Read more…]

Filed Under: Asking for help, Change, Diet, Gratitude, Happiness, Inspiration, Self Talk, Weight Loss Tagged With: better health, defiance, emotional pain, food choices, food journal, health and happiness, journey, lot of nerve, nutritionist, rebellion

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