(This post is downloadable as a Word doc or a PDF file).

Ouch, a very interesting international health survey, that has just been released, reports:

"Middle-aged Britons are experiencing a mid-life health crisis, according to new research from Bupa, which shows that those aged 45-54 are more likely to be obese, more likely to smoke and more likely to suffer from depression than their peers around the world.

The international Bupa Health Pulse study, which asked more than 13,000 people in 12 different countries questions about their health and lifestyles has shown that late-middle age is the toughest time health-wise for Britons. No other country in the survey - which included Europe, the Americas, the Middle East, Asia and Australasia showed such a consistent range of unhealthy results for this age group.

The study, which questioned more than 2,000 people in the UK, found:

There has been a ripple of media interest - and rightly so - in the recent Lancet article  "Minimum amount of physical activity for reduced mortality and extended life expectancy: a prospective cohort study."  The article's abstract reads "The health benefits of leisure-time physical activity are well known, but whether less exercise than the recommended 150 min a week can have life expectancy benefits is unclear.  We assessed the health benefits of a range of volumes of physical activity in a Taiwanese population.  In this prospective cohort study, 416,175 individuals (199,265 men and 216,910 women) participated in a standard medical screening programme in Taiwan between 1996 and 2008, with an average follow-up of 8·05 years (SD 4·21).  On the basis of the amount of weekly exercise indicated in a self-administered questio

This blog post is downloadable both as a Word doc and as a PDF file.

“

I thank you God for most this amazing day: for the leaping greenly spirits of the trees, and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes.

” - e e cummings

“ The life I touch for good or ill will touch another life, and that in turn another, until who knows where the trembling stops or in what far place my touch will be felt. ” - Frederick Buechner

“

Love makes labour light.  Love alone gives value to all things. 

” - St Teresa of Avila

So it was the second session of the group yesterday.  I blogged about the first session last week.  Sadly a couple of people couldn't get to this second meeting - due to a pre-planned holiday and to an unexpected crisis.  It's quite common for participants to miss one or two evenings across a twelve session course like this, but I want to be careful when people miss such an early meeting.  It's important that they don't lose their way and get left behind.  They will get copies of the handouts and the Autogenic CD, but I also make a note to contact them myself.   

“

As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death.

” - Leonardo da Vinci

Yesterday we had the first evening of the Life Skills group.  I've written in the past about the background planning behind this group.  How did this first meeting go?  Well there were nine of us - eight participants and myself.  Rather demandingly I'm both running a new course and trying to get used to new technology at the same time.  For years, when running small group trainings here at our house, I've used an overhead projector to shine transparencies up onto the wall.  For a while I've wanted to upgrade to a laptop and data projector, and this evening I went ahead to put this into practice.

“ A leader is a dealer in hope. ” - Napoleon

In the 1970's I taught yoga and several different types of meditation.  In the 1980's I began teaching courses in Autogenic Training, a form of deep relaxation/meditation.  I continued running Autogenic classes for about 25 years.  In addition to the relaxation/meditation exercises, the teaching also covered several other life skill/stress management techniques.  For a much fuller description of these eight session courses, visit the Autogenic Training section of this website.