Hugs

Who doesn't love hugs?

Who doesn't need them? Touch and closeness with others is in fact necessary for survival. It also lessens the intensity of pain and strengthens the immune system. According to a 2003 study, more hugs are related to better cardiovascular health and less reactivity to stress.

Apparently some high schools have banned hugging, while others embrace it. If appropriateness is a problem there is always the safe "side-hug" to fall back on.

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Here's probably my favorite music video. Music by DMB and a lot of hugs by a guy with some sweet sideburns.


What is your stance on hugging? Close friends and family only? New friends? Weird guys running around on the street? Trees? Personally, I like any opportunity for a good hug, as long as it feels safe. Granted, hugs with my wife are more frequent and last a little longer, but being able to hug someone is a sign that there is comfort there--some kind of positive connection.

Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love by Sue Johnson

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hold Me Tight presents an attachment-based view of adult romantic love and relationships, based on the author's own Emotionally Focused Therapy... a lot of great info on working with emotions in your relationship, and not getting caught up in the same patterns up conflict that plague pretty much all of us. However, I think that the attempt at putting the highly interactive and experiential (not to mention effective!) therapy into book form was not a complete success--if it is even possible.

Read the book, especially the parts you can relate to (there will be plenty). Then if you have the inclination, find an EFT therapist. My wife and I have been to 8 sessions now, and are loving it. It is quite liberating to have new emotional experiences in therapy that allow for new ways of dealing with old problems and cycles of conflict.

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Nature of The Person

New post of mine on mormon matters.

Gay Marriage & Some Real Threats to The Family

A colleague and I led a discussion on lesbian and gay families in class last week. Here are some of the talking points from the text:

1. “Lesbians and gays are simultaneously depicted as chic and pioneering, and as a major sign of social deterioration and the source of the destruction of the family as we know it.”
   
2. “There is no uniform or normative definition for the “gay family” any more than there is for the “American family.”
   
3. “Governments, through social and family policies, determine the rights, rules, and benefits for families… in the process encouraging some family forms and discouraging others.”
   
4. “This fiery and continuing national debate has nothing to do with the success, mental or social health, or social responsibility of lesbian or gay couples and their children. It has everything to do with cultural struggles over the meaning of “family,” and protecting and preserving heterosexual marriage..."
5. “It is clear that gay and lesbian expressions of family and kinship are having profound effects on the larger society’s construction of these categories.”

What think Ye of these points? What would it be like to be simultaneously considered "pioneering" and a "sign of deterioration" (#1)? Legalizing gay marriage will have an effect on society. The important point is, what kind of effect? Should we widen the "legal" definition of a "married couple" or is it a threat to the heterosexual definition of The Family? Why?

I think the real threats to the "The Family" are poor parenting, disorganized attachment, lack of adequate health care, the idea that love = romance, and extremely poor emotional regulation and relationship skills, to name just a few. These problems exist in families across the board, despite sexual orientation, race, gender, religion, or ice-cream flavor preference. 

Rather then spending so much time and money in California and elsewhere, imagine if we all put the same money and effort into providing effective mental health care, parent and couples education, and programs like Circle of Security? What if we went door to door and put up signs and made phone calls and read letters over the pulpit encouraging community action to work on these insidious problems that have been plaguing The Family for generations?