I was born on the saddest day of the year in Paris, France – the Day of the Dead! Catholics in France wore black on October 31 and went to cemeteries to honor the dead. There were no parties and everyone looked glum. When I was thirteen, I came to America as a refugee, having MORE >
Author: Natasha Josefowitz
Gaining Awareness of Our Individual Decision-Making Processes
How do you decide? Do you prefer ad hoc or go through a process? Do you prefer action or caution? Do you look for information narrowly or broadly? Do you tend to opt for corporate or personal interest? Do you prefer continuity or change? Do you seek opinions or only rely on facts? Although, dear MORE >
How Attuned Are You to the Three Components of Spirituality?
How often have you heard people say that someone is spiritual? I always wonder what they mean exactly; when asked, no one has ever given me a satisfactory explanation. Current studies include a variety of definitions. There is still no widely agreed on definition of spirituality currently. The spiritual dimension is deeply subjective, without any MORE >
Are You Experiencing Burnout: At Work? At Home? Is It Self-Imposed?
You wake up exhausted after a good night’s sleep. You take no pleasure in your activities. You have difficulty concentrating, tasks take longer than usual, at times you find yourself irritable for no obvious reason. Maybe you feel “keyed up” all the time, or as if your energy goes through ups and downs. You keep MORE >
The World is Constantly Changing, As Is Everything and Everyone Around Us
Some people seem to be wired to like variety, novelty, change from routine. Others seem to prefer the status quo, the predictable, the familiar. To some extent, this is genetic, but it is also influenced by the multitude of experiences we have been subjected to in our lives. Embracing change requires the ability to break MORE >
How to Cope with the Arrival of Today’s Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
The four horsemen of the apocalypse have arrived! Yes, here in San Diego and throughout the world. The four calamities are: famine, pestilence, war, and death. With the increasing drought many regions across the African continent, crops are failing, contributing to widespread famine. There is also famine in Afghanistan and in many other countries. Although MORE >
Learning how to Trust Your Gut and Heed Your Intuition
Have you ever felt something to be either right or wrong in the pit of your stomach, but meanwhile your head kept repeating, “No, I can’t trust it. I can’t act on it; I need more information?” Most of us have experienced this at one time or another. Somehow we respond to a new situation MORE >
Identifying the Various Social Determinants of Mental Health
I recently received an email from Dr. Dilip Jeste stating that after serving thirty-six years at the University of California San Diego (UCSD), including nearly two decades as director of the Stein Institute for Research on Aging (SIRA), he was retiring from the university. In this new phase of his life, he intends to focus MORE >
As Old Identities Are Lost, Surprising New Identities Are Emerging
Had my son been alive he would have been 70 years old. I miss him! I lost my identity as a mother of a son. I am thankful to still be the mother of a daughter, a relationship I treasure! Lately, I have been thinking about all the identities I have lost and all those MORE >
Issues Too Many Widows Face Contending with Lack of Financial Knowledge
I was raised in a traditional Russian family. My father always said, “We dont’ talk business in front of the ladies” as it was considered very rude. My first husband, raised with a similar background, was equally reserved; his perception was that it was “too complicated for a woman to understand.” My second husband, a MORE >