How to get Dr. Irene's Advice: Look here!

Ask The Doc Board Archives

The CatBox Archives

Stories Archives

 

Below is an Interactive Board sampler. A fuller listing is found in the "Stories" menu above.

4/14 Interactive Board: Codependent Partners

3/23 Interactive Board: He's Changing... I'm Not...

3/1 Interactive Board: D/s Lifestyle

1/14 Interactive Board: My Purrrfect Husband

12/12 Interactive Board: What if He Could Have Changed?

10/23 Interactive Board: Quandary Revisited

8/24 Interactive Board: Quandary! What's Going On?

7/20: Dr. Irene on cognitive behavior therapy and mindfulness

6/12 Interactive Board: Unintentional Abuse

11/7 Interactive Board: Is This Abusive?

12/29 Interactive Board: There Goes the Wife...

11/4 Interactive Board: A New Me!

10/8 Interactive Board: Seeming Impossibility

9/8 Interactive Board: My Ex MisTreats Our Son

5/1 Interactive Board: I feel Dead - Towards Him

4/26 Interactive Board: Why is This So Hard?

4/19 Interactive Board: I Lost My Love...

4/7 Interactive Board: Too Guilty!

Inner Peace

Inner Peace: Watch Out, It Might Be Catching

From DR. DEAN AT HEALTHCENTRAL'S GREAT WEBSITE at www.healthcentral.com/drdean/

A reader sent this in: Here’s a creeping disease you’ve got to watch out for. It’s called Inner Peace, and if we’re not careful, it could reach epidemic proportions. This was edited by Unknown.

Signs and symptoms of Inner Peace include lacking interest in the following: conflict, judging other people, judging ourselves and interpreting the actions of others.

Here are a few more clues:
--Thinking or acting spontaneously rather than from fear
--Enjoying each moment
--Frequent, overwhelming episodes of appreciation
--Attacks of smiling through the eyes and from the heart
--A tendency to let things happen rather than make them happen
--Contented feeling of connectedness with others

Another very serious symptom is the loss of ability to worry. If you have most of these symptoms, it may be too late to turn back. If you know someone with these symptoms, remain exposed at your own risk since Inner Peace may be well into its infectious stage.

Hey, maybe there’s a vaccine?
Updated March 3, 2007  Ooops! Heard from the original author!

Dear Doc,
Your reader did a pretty nice job revising THE SYMPTOMS OF INNER PEACE which I wrote in 1983. I don't mind if you leave the version that you have posted on your website, but would you mind saying that it is THE SYMPTOMS OF INNER PEACE, that it has been freely edited and adding my name as author?
Here is my original version.


THE SYMPTOMS OF INNER PEACE
by Saskia Davis
Contact info: saskialucia@earthlink.net

Be on the lookout for symptoms of inner peace. The hearts of a great many have already been exposed to inner peace and it is possible that people everywhere could come down with it in epidemic proportions. This could pose a serious threat to what has, up to now, been a fairly stable condition of conflict in the world.

Some signs and symptoms of inner peace:

* A tendency to think and act spontaneously rather than on fears based on past experiences.

* An unmistakable ability to enjoy each moment.

* A loss of interest in judging other people.

* A loss of interest in judging self.

* A loss of interest in interpreting the actions of others.

* A loss of interest in conflict.

* A loss of the ability to worry. (This is a very serious symptom.)

* Frequent, overwhelming episodes of appreciation.

* Contented feelings of connectedness with others and nature.

* Frequent attacks of smiling.

* An increasing tendency to let things happen rather than make them happen.

* An increased susceptibility to the love extended by others as well as the uncontrollable urge to extend it.


WARNING:
If you have some or all of the above symptoms, please be advised that your condition of inner peace may be so far advanced as to not be curable. If you are exposed to anyone exhibiting any of these symptoms, remain exposed only at your own risk.


Thanks so much, and many blessings!

Saskia Davis, author
My pleasure. Thank you Saskia!

Dr. Irene (ps: I like your original version much better. You know, this is about what we behavioral shrink-types call "mindfulness." Good stuff! No... GREAT STUFF!!!)

Reprinted by permission of Saskia Davis